My journey with cannabis started back in the early 80s.

By grade three, I had already been expelled from primary school for aggression and not fitting in. I was sent to a psychologist whose solution to my struggles was to suggest my parents separate. Thankfully, that never happened. Instead, I was labelled a “problem child” and put on opioids to calm me down. My mother saw how much this dulled me, and within a week she took me off them.

After much persistence from my parents, I was placed in a special needs classroom for unruly children. When I had outbursts, they would lock me in a box. That was the beginning of my PTSD.

I eventually returned to mainstream schooling for high school, but life didn’t get much easier. When I left school at 15 and entered the workforce, I discovered cannabis. It calmed me and gave me peace in my hectic world.

Using cannabis for my mental health was never easy. Because it wasn’t legal, it wasn’t always available, which led me to experiment with other drugs. With my parents’ support and with cannabis, I was able to pull myself back and overcome that dependency.

Cannabis helped me through many milestones. I even got both my car and truck licences with the help of cannabis, because it calmed my nerves enough to pass the tests. I drove for years under the influence of cannabis, never having an accident.

But when medical cannabis became legal, random workplace drug testing started. By then I had slowed my use and never drove while stoned again. Still, I sometimes quit cannabis altogether to pass drug tests for work. During those times, I was prescribed other medications that came with harsh side effects. Each time, I eventually returned to cannabis.

When cannabis wasn’t available, I turned to alcohol. In my mid-forties, I became an alcoholic. That destroyed my life — my twenty-year marriage ended, I lost my house, and my relationship with my children broke down.

On the long road to sobriety, cannabis once again became my lifeline. I’ve now been sober for two and a half years. Thanks to cannabis, I finally understood what the real problem was.

That’s why I’ve dedicated the past five years to the legalisation of cannabis. I know from lived experience that cannabis is medicine, and it’s also a safer recreational choice than alcohol.

I’m now 56 years old, and sadly I still see the same discrimination that existed before medical cannabis was legal. After all these years, it’s exhausting, but I keep pushing because the fight is too important.

Wayne Taylor
Founding Member, Legalise Cannabis Party Victoria
Former Candidate for State and Federal Parliament
Long-time Cannabis Advocate