My mother was the first person I knew with a prescription for medical marijuana — in 1983, for relief from the effects of chemotherapy.
Though clearly exhausted from nausea, a few minutes after taking a THC-infused pill her attitude remarkably transformed. Instead of being depressed and withdrawn, she seemed happy and talked of plans for next year, though she well knew she was unlikely to live that long.
More recently, I have known people with prescriptions for medical marijuana in Montana, New Mexico, and Washington. All of these were for the old-fashioned kind of cannabis medicine that, besides relieving pain, has the side effect of getting the user high.