Both my sister and my father have severe kidney disease.
They get kidney stones monthly and often have to get surgery for impacted stones when they’re not able to pass them like a normal person.
That’s because the stones that form in their kidneys are sometimes as large as 7mm or bigger. That’s nearly the entire diameter of the urethra itself, which is a nastily big rock to have going through your urinary tract. Naturally, these stones produce absolutely insane levels of pain for both my sister and my father. While my father absolutely refuses to take opiate pain medication these days after problems with dependency in the past, my sister still readily takes them when they’re offered to her. It’s a dangerous affair, but I can’t judge her for using them. My personal doctor told me that he’s watching a lot of people give up their prescription pain medications after they start using strong cannabis products. It’s not a matter of microdosing THC to replace opiates—typically you need a strong dose of marijuana to replicate the effects of an opiate narcotic. Surely this doesn’t work for everyone, but I can imagine there are large numbers of people who are able to make the transition and quit taking narcotics in favor of cannabis instead. It also depends on what exact kind of pain you’re trying to treat as well. Although cannabis can be phenomenal at treating emotional pain and digestive pain, it’s not always suited for subsing the tenderness that comes from having a kidney stone. It’s a whole different issue altogether.