Tom Brokaw - the celebrated senior correspondent for NBC News - says he uses medical marijuana to treat pain connected with his cancer treatment.

Brokaw, 79, has been one of the most recognizable figures in TV news over the past 50 years as the former host of NBC Nightly News. He's also one of the most famous patients with multiple myeloma—a form of cancer that grows in bone marrow. Doctors have treated his condition through chemotherapy and spinal surgery, which have left him with lasting pain in his back. To help control that pain, he says he has recently started using cannabis.

"I'm now on medical marijuana for my back, for the first time," Brokaw told SurvivorNet in a recent interview. "I've not done that before."

And while his new medication appears to be helping, Brokaw called understanding the medical marijuana laws in Florida where he lives a "full-time" job.

But what did Brokaw do to help soothe the pain before he got started on medical marijuana? Brokaw credits his daily walks to a local New York City café and one very famous NFL star for keeping him going.

"On the way to the coffee shop there was this enormous bus stop, with a big, big portrait of Tom Brady, looking moodily down the street in his Ugg boots," Brokaw recalled. "And I would walk by him, look at him and drop the 'F word' on him, just because it would give me a kind of a lift to keep on going."

Brokaw is now one of the many American cancer patients who are using medical marijuana to treat their cancer-related pain.

h/t New York Post