Erin Miller shares her family’s experience with a rare medical condition at the Abram Mayhem blog. You can find her past contributions to Bleeding Heartland here. -promoted by desmoinesdem

This blog is specifically regarding medical cannabis and what happened during the recent debate in Iowa House district 19 between State Representative Ralph Watts and his opponent, Bryce Smith. Please watch the enclosed video first, then read the following story.

Thanks to AbramsMom for her first-person account of how Iowa House Republicans avoided a floor vote on legislation that would have genuinely expanded access to medical cannabis. The author blogs about her son at Abram’s Mayhem. -promoted by desmoinesdem

As a parent who has been advocating for medical cannabis both before and after we obtained a Cannabidiol Registration Card (the fluke identification card that decriminalizes me for possession of my son’s medicine), I want to share what happened this year with Medical Cannabis, why it failed miserably and why I feel that the amendment (to an amendment) to a Controlled Substance Bill that expanded conditions – yet still did NOT ALLOW ACCESS IN IOWA is absolutely disgustingly wrong.

I sat in the House Gallery not once, but twice as Medical Cannabis came to the House Floor. The first time, I thought I was going to hear a debate on a Democratic amendment (because our original Bill for this year was stalled and killed in the Ways and Means committee by House Leadership) that would allow for expansion of qualifying conditions and would have allowed ACCESS IN IOWA – which is what every parent and patient have been asking for and advocating on behalf of for YEARS.

I sat in the Gallery in the last week of the session to learn that the Democratic Amendment was pulled by House Leadership and instead we heard a debate on Medical Cannabis that stunned those sitting in the Gallery hoping to have access to medicine for their children, their loved ones or for themselves.

What transpired was nothing short of being absolutely blindsided by a garbage truck.

Note from desmoinesdem: Cross-posted from the Abram Mayhem blog. The Iowa legislature adopted and Governor Terry Branstad signed into law a measure to legalize cannabis oil for some seizure disorders in 2014.

Dear US Senator Joni Ernst,
I was in the Drake Diner in Des Moines, Iowa the day you came to celebrate your win for the US Senate. I was sitting in the booth right by the front door. I had my small son who was two at the time and you had a large group in the back who cheered loudly and clapped for you as you came in.

You didn’t notice that when your group of supporters began screaming for you, that my son slammed his head twice on the edge of table. The noise your group suddenly made (without regard to any of the other patrons) both terrified and overwhelmed him. The metal edging on those old vintage-style tables there really did a number on my son’s forehead and he had a lump and a bruise for over a week. Two of your supporters noticed my son in hysterics as they walked by. Instead of smiling or offering some form of apology for the uproar, they sneered at us as I was trying to calm him down. I’m sure they saw the huge welt on his forehead and thought of me as a terrible mother. They were both still smoking outside when we left.

You didn’t acknowledge my son that day in the Diner and you aren’t acknowledging him now. So, it didn’t surprise me when you accidentally sent me the response to “crude oil” instead of “cannabis oil” to my e-mail. It’s those little attention-to-details things one has to do when someone truly cares about their people. I was pleased to see that I received an additional e-mail today with your response to “cannabis oil” instead of “crude oil” today.

The bare-boned truth here is you didn’t take the time to actually hear what my real concerns were at all. My name was just pasted into a bulk e-mail (just like the “crude oil” response) and sent on out, without any real regard to what is happening to people in the Unites States of America, let alone your home state, Iowa. You yourself claimed in your campaign that you are a “normal, everyday” Iowan. If that were true, you would listen to the concerns of the mothers and families in this state who are reaching out to you for help in Iowa and in Congress.