Hayley’s Story

Hayley has Lennox-Gastaut Syndrome — one of the most severe forms of epilepsy there is.

She loves animals, music, and art. She has a sweet boyfriend she met through a disability program, and she is excitedly planning to join a musical theatre group. Last summer, for the first time in nearly twenty years, she went to a fireworks show. Then she went to an amusement park.

If you knew what it took to get her there, you would understand why I am writing this.

My name is Cheryl. I am Hayley's mum and her full-time caregiver.

Hayley is 33 years old. When she was 15, she became the first child in Canada to receive a federal authorization for medical cannabis, because conventional medicine had run out of answers.

That was the beginning of a very long road.

2019 — Hayley beginning to show severe malabsorption issues and the start of recurrent hypoglycemic events.

2021 Hospitalized for recurrent hypoglycemic events and malabsorption.

In 2021 and 2022, we almost lost her. Hayley's health collapsed — severe malabsorption, repeated hospitalizations, and at one point more than 75 serious hypoglycemic episodes in a single month. A medical listserv of 400 specialists from around the world could not find answers. I cannot describe what those years were like. I am just grateful we made it through them.

2022 Hospitalized for recurrent hypoglycemic events and malabsorption.

In March 2023, under careful medical supervision, we introduced fresh raw cannabis as part of her therapeutic nutrition plan.

What happened next changed everything.

Hayley came off two medications entirely. She is halfway off a third, with her doctors expecting further reductions. The malabsorption was resolved. The dangerous hypoglycemic episodes dramatically decreased. Three physicians and a ketogenic diet specialist from her care team have all documented this in writing.

She went to see fireworks. She went to an amusement park. She is planning for musical theatre.

After seventeen years, we found something that works.

The next step in her treatment involves cannabis microgreens — a non-psychoactive preparation consumed as a fresh therapeutic food, offering a more consistent form of what has already helped her so much.

The challenge is that this preparation does not yet fit within Canada's existing cannabis regulations, which were designed for flowering plants. So I did what I have always done for Hayley — I got to work.

I went back to university. I conducted laboratory testing. I built a research framework, and I submitted a formal exemption application to Health Canada with supporting letters from Hayley's medical team. That application is actively under review right now, and our legal team is confident.

Hayley is still waiting. But we are close.

Hayley - Spring 2026

Here is where we need your help.

The moment Health Canada grants this exemption, Hayley can legally grow and consume her microgreens. But before she can, they must be laboratory tested — cannabinoid profile, nutritional composition, microbial safety. This is not a formality. It is what makes this medically safe, legally sound, and scientifically documented — for Hayley, and for every family that might come after us.

That testing costs $30,000.

Every dollar raised goes directly and exclusively to those laboratory costs. Nothing else.

I am not yet eligible for most research grants — I am still early in my academic training. Every other avenue has hit a wall. Crowdfunding is the bridge between where we are and where Hayley needs us to be.

We want to be ready the moment approval comes. Not after another six months of waiting. Immediately.

Hayley has waited since she was fifteen for the system to catch up with what her body needs.

She deserves the musical theatre. She deserves her boyfriend and her dogs and her art and her life. She deserves to go to the fireworks again.

If you can give — even a small amount — thank you from the bottom of my heart. If you cannot, please share this.

With so much gratitude,

Cheryl Rose

Hayley's mum