A Doctor’s Journey From Addiction to Activism
Photo Credit: Tony Luong
I didn’t grow up in an ordinary household. My dad was a well known cannabis advocate, and during my childhood there were a lot of influential people smoking and discussing (and arguing!), about cannabis legalization.
Carl Sagan reading Peter Grinspoon the book 'The Man Who Cried I Am' by John A. Williams.
I remember walking into a room when I was eight and Allen Ginsberg saying to me “Boy, get me some water!” Carl Sagan was also a frequent visitor to my house. I was just a kid, so it was hard to make sense of everything that was going on around me, but I absorbed every bit of it. In the 1970s my brother Danny got leukemia, and eventually passed away. To make his transition smoother, my parents decided to try using cannabis to treat his symptoms, and it helped Danny maintain weight and eat during those last years of his life.
“I remember walking into a room when I was eight and Allen Ginsberg saying to me ‘Boy, get me some water!’”
In the 1990s, I started my career as a doctor. Between my dad being an activist and seeing my brother find relief in cannabis’ healing abilities, I was on a completely different playing field than most hope-to-be doctors as I started my medical career. It was always clear to me that drugs in general were a public health issue, and that it should be doctors, not SWAT teams, handling issues of public health. It was as intuitive to me as the sky was blue because I was never exposed to anything else.
In the early 2000s, I thought I was invincible, untouchable, and that I had it all figured out - I was a successful doctor after all! Yet, before I knew it I was addicted to opioids, and in 2005, the DEA showed up at my office. At that point, I was out of control addicted to opioids. Thankfully, things got better, and because of my status, access to resources, and will, I was able to overcome my addiction and start walking down a road of healing and activism. My main passion is cannabis activism, which I do predominantly as a board member of Doctors for Cannabis Regulation, but I do a lot of work with opioid addiction in general.
“In the early 2000s, I thought I was invincible, untouchable, and that I had it all figured out — I was a successful doctor after all! Yet... I was addicted to opioids, and in 2005, the DEA showed up at my office.”
<div class="sqs-video-wrapper" data-provider-name="" data-html="[youtube=://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xIAxvvEoGOM&w=854&h=480]">
I am an expert at ignoring advice and learning it the wrong way. In fact, if there were a Nobel Prize for ignoring good advice, I would win it. When I met with a mentor of mine who played an incredibly important role in my recovery, he said to me, “If you could just find a way to get off opioids, everything will work out,” and I ignored him. Then, in a matter of 3-4 months, I was in trouble with the state police, divorce court, medical board, DEA - basically every institution you could think of I was in hot water with. I was addicted and in denial. If I had found a way to listen to that advice, I could have avoided an infinite world of suffering I brought upon myself. When you are addicted, you can't hear those voices trying to carry you out. Ultimately, I was lucky. Some say everything happens for a reason, but that is easy to say when you are alive, and not all are able to escape the grip of addiction.
“Criminal justice reform is tied to legalization, which is tied to ending the war on drugs, which is tied to de-stigmatizing people who use drugs, which is tied to treating people who battle addiction like human beings.”
All of this ties together into my cannabis activism. Criminal justice reform is tied to legalization, which is tied to ending the war on drugs, which is tied to de-stigmatizing people who use drugs, which is tied to treating people who battle addiction like human beings. Part of why I wrote my memoir, Free Refills: A Doctor Confronts His Addiction, is because doctors have a very high rate of addiction - it wasn't unique that I was addicted as a doctor, but it was unique I told my story about it. People are more than capable of overcoming their addiction and getting back into society, but we can’t keep letting them rot in prison because of bad laws.
A critical priority this election year is getting Trump out of office. Trump is by far the worst candidate for cannabis, appointing incredibly reactionary judges that are “tough on crime”, even if superficially other candidates seem worse. I generally try not to be political when I talk about cannabis, but we are at an existential moment, and if we destroy the climate any worse, there isn't going to be any planet to grow cannabis.
“Currently, being a primary care doctor is taking up a majority of my time because of the COVID-19 pandemic, and I’m having to make decisions for my patients I never thought I’d have to make.”
Currently, being a primary care doctor is taking up a majority of my time because of the COVID-19 pandemic, and I’m having to make decisions for my patients I never thought I’d have to make. Actually, after I finish writing this, I will be discussing with senior patients if they would want to be on a ventilator if they were to become extremely ill with Coronavirus. My whole journey through life, from being exposed to cannabis activism at a young age to overcoming addiction, has made me a much nicer person. Addiction burst my narcissist bubble, and I had to rebuild my life in a way that was meaningful. For me, there is nothing more meaningful than our connection to each other.
About Peter Grinspoon, M.D.
Peter is a primary care physician at Massachusetts General Hospital and an Instructor at Harvard Medical School. He is a board member of the advocacy group Doctors For Cannabis Regulation. He spent two years as an Associate Director of the Massachusetts Physician Health Service helping physicians with addiction and mental health issues.
He is the author of the memoir ‘Free Refills: A Doctor Confronts His Addiction’. He graduated with an M.A. in Philosophy with honors from Swarthmore College. He then spent five years as a Campaign Director for the environmental group Greenpeace before entering medical school at Boston University School of Medicine, where he graduated with honors. He completed his residency at Harvard’s Brigham and Woman’s Hospital, in the primary care program.
He has been on national television including NBC, C-SPAN and Fox and Friends discussing cannabis and the opioid crisis, he has been quoted in the national press such as People magazine and his writing has been published in The Nation and The Los Angeles Times. He is a Contributing Editor to Harvard Health Publications.
Today he is proudly eleven years in recovery from opiate addiction. He lives in Newton, Massachusetts with his wife Liz Grinspoon, his blended family, and his dog, Benji.
Peter’s father, Dr. Lester Grinspoon, is widely considered to be the “grandfather of medical marijuana” due to his legendary advocacy on behalf of cannabis legalization, starting with his groundbreaking 1971 book "Marihuana Reconsidered". There is a world famous strain of cannabis named after him, a sativa called Dr. Grinspoon, which is known for its tendency to induce creativity, a calm cerebral mind frame, and conviviality among its users.