Written by Stephanie Carmon
In this fourth video interview edition of Meet Merida’s Vanguards, I interview the Acevedo Cardos family whose healthy infant daughter started having constant convulsions at the age of one month old. In the months preceding and in desperate need for help and medical attention, they visited nearly all the neurologists in Merida, but to no avail.
The specialists could not find the origin of their baby girl`s, Maria Paula “Pauli”, epileptic seizures. She was having between 250 and 300 epileptic seizures a day which was quickly causing irreparable cognitive and physical damage. She was able to sleep very few hours of the day and was in a constant state of stress. Over the next six years the Acevedos relentlessly searched for a treatment that would provide their daughter and their family relief and allow them to have a better quality of life. Pauli was prescribed a wide range of medication for epilepsy, but the impact of such harsh medications left this young child hospitalized several times over the years.
Finally after 6 years of being in constant crisis mode, they stumbled upon an unlikely natural remedy, a controversial plant whose reputation has been tarnished because of its association with getting “high” and a party life. It was the plant Cannabis sativa otherwise known as hemp, cannabis or marijuana that transformed Pauli’s life for the better and has enabled the Acevedos to finally breathe and enjoy their day to day life together as a family.
