MOTHER
PATI ENT
FISHERWOMAN
CANNABIS ADVOCATE MERMAI D
EDUCATOR
NURSE
WI FE
BY BRIAN HOUCK
Tara DeMond was too excited to sleep. She had just started her first job in the medical marijuana industry, and it would be the first step on her journey. DeMond took a pay decrease by taking the job, but she wanted to get her foot in the door in the industry. “I couldn’t stop,” she said. “It didn’t matter what they were paying me.” She was working six days a week. If they had been open Sundays, she would have worked then, too. The startup reminded her of the adrenaline rush she experienced helping people when she first became a nurse. She was so excited to be at the forefront of medical marijuana in Florida that she would tell her husband, “It was like Christmas Eve, I couldn’t sleep because of the excitement.” Tara DeMond was semi-retired when she moved to Florida, working part-time as a legal nurse consultant focused on occupational diseases. When the opportunity to work at a medical marijuana treatment center became available, she thought, “I bet my husband would think that would be really cool if I went to work for a marijuana doctor.” His response? “You’ve gotta do it.” She started off as a sales associate, though she never previously worked in retail. For her, it was all
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about patient education, taking it as a challenge to educate herself on all aspects on the medicine. She read of marijuana helping children have fewer seizures and of Parkinson’s patients having their symptoms decrease. She became a physician outreach liaison, where—as a nurse—she would go out and educate physicians who were not yet familiar with marijuana. She also worked in patient advocacy; she would do events and talk about the benefits of medical cannabis. Instead of starting with a marijuana strain that is too strong, DeMond advises patients to start off with a low CBD product then proceed to one with a higher CBD content that has a touch of THC. “All of my patients seem to get a better response with that,” said DeMond. She understands every patient is different and what works for one may not work for another. It is important that they test different products to find the one which works best for them. She then got a call from another MMTC. Surterra promised to be a place where she could work directly with patients. She started off as a
