This is not intended as advice, medical, legal or otherwise, and is to be used solely for educational purposes. See Program Agreement for further disclaimers and release of liability.
Dear People,
Countless numbers of people have found enormous pain relief, safely, using cannabis. We hear about others who have successfully healed their cancers. To my and the entire industry’s knowledge, no one has ever died from using just cannabis. They might have had a terrible, not-soon-forgotten emergency room experience. But they haven’t died. Before the 1920’s-30’s, it was regularly prescribed in small amounts for pain and nervous disorders by family physicians. In the 30’s it became demonized by the Rockefellers and the nascent pharmaceutical industry, eventually making cannabis so illegal and propagandized as evil, people were jailed for the rest of their lifetimes just for having the tiniest amount in their possession. However, it must be used responsibly and with mindful purpose. Some cancers it might aggravate instead of heal. Some people have allergic reactions of various types using cannabis.
So, you see all the disclaimers scattered around my cannabis topics. I hear you. Many are in so much pain, are desperate for relief, and have been around the medical establishments’ merry-go-round so many times that the disclaimers no longer matter. But here on this site, please know that in any of my cannabis topics as you review them and might start doubting again, hold your despair at bay a bit. I want to let you know that even if cannabis also ends up being not for you, this site is loaded with tons of alternatives that so many others have successfully used to reduce their pains WITHOUT any cannabis at all, or with just the slightest amount one time a day. I so encourage you to continue to explore the rest. Perhaps you too will be one of those truly free from all the drugs! Please give yourself a chance.
3 Ways to Consume
There actually are countless ways to consume cannabis, both marijuana and CBD varieties.
Smoking joints, blunts, dabbing, bonging, alcohol sprays, oil tinctures, cannabis butters, edibles, suppositories, lubes, gummies, lozenges, vaporizers, vape pens, the list goes on.
Most of these ways to consume are for entertainment and recreation and many of these ways can be dangerous given the insane modern day concentrations and variety of cannabinoids available to consumers today.
As well, any formulas like dropper tinctures or salves often contain all kinds of hazardous extra ingredients.
Oil and other tinctures or infusions often contain sweeteners for example. No sugar or chemical sweetener typically dissolves in oils or tincture recipes. So very special chemicals are included in these formulations to add a sweet taste and be more palatable to consumers.
There are preservatives. There are stabilizers and other undisclosed ingredients. Who knows if the oil bases are toxic (like hemp oil bases) or rancid.
Ingesting ANY THC-rich or CBD-rich, or combo product long-term, using some of the more common carrier oils, like MCT oil, like Hemp oil as carriers can cause more damage than the cannabis in the products will offer as benefit. Most will merely be adding to the person’s PUFA (polyunsaturated fatty acids) in-body damage. I recommend looking for olive oil based tinctures.
In addition, consuming cannabis in an oil based tincture or coconut oil base “butter” (INCLUDING THE RECIPE), in whatever CBD:THC concentration, might not work with some people’s digestive tract/gut. Hardly any of the Cannabis Medicine AT ALL might end up as medicine in the body if the body can’t digest it out of the oils in the first place.
The professionals recommend that any oil based medicines doses therefore, of whatever quantity need to be held in the mouth about 5 minutes and then swallowed, allowing some of the medicine to by-pass the gut.
Or the medicine needs to be worn as a patch, or INHALED instead.
And because many of the dropper tinctures and salves are made with their oil, alcohol or various butter bases and extracted concentrates are added back to try to standardize the dose serving, they often also have someone’s idea of what kind and how much of the various OTHER cannabinoids—and TERPENES (which add flavor and scent) to add in to the mix.
I for one, am very allergic to essential oils for example. Any kind, any amount, in any formulation. I sensitized myself to them years ago by applying tea tree oil straight up, no cutting it with other body oils, but directly to my legs. I ended up with burns up and down both legs before a dermatologist told me what happened.
Ever since, I’ve been completely unable to use any essential oil. I recently heard an essential oil expert and scientist explain this phenomena while he was warning people to NEVER apply any essential oil directly to the skin anywhere without diluting it in other oils.
I bring this up, because while I can ingest and inhale many different types of cannabis compounds, I have to be really careful to ingest only a slight amount first to see if I’m allergic—and clean, organic, homemade or otherwise cannabis salves of any kind, with or without added terpenes for effects make me break out in rashes if applied to my skin.
So it’s a good practice to ALWAYS test a small patch of skin with your product first if possible, even if it’s an oil tincture or butter meant to be ingested—FIRST apply a tiny amount to the inside of your elbow or wrist for 3 days in a row before you ingest more or slather the product all over yourself, to see if you have any redness or rash signaling an allergic reaction.
In addition, BEFORE YOU BEGIN: Realize that cannabis in all forms interacts uniquely with each of us and interacts with other medications we might be taking.
Cannabis can enhance the effects of some meds and reduce the effects of others and it’s not black or white.
In addition, because cannabis has been illegal federally for so long as well as that it’s a threat to the Big Pharma meds, interactions between cannabis and every other medication is sketchy at best.
With that said, BEFORE YOU BEGIN, check here for any medications you might be taking against cannabis. Just enter “cannabis” into the site’s cross reaction box and then any other medicine you are taking.
You can then decide if you want to go forward. You can check with your doctor but if they are not a cannabis specialist doctor they won’t know what to tell you.
AND SOME Pharma MEDS must be SLOWLY reduced if you want to take something instead. Please be aware to not just stop some med you are taking in order to try cannabis.
Conversely, if you start taking cannabis and it works for you and you consume it regularly, do check any future meds against it and KNOW– cannabis medicine can stay in the body for several weeks after your last dose.
No one knows the half life or where it is for each individual.
So if you decide to just stop cannabis and then take a Pharma med, cannabis might STILL be INTERACTING with the new med even though you have stopped taking cannabis to use the new med.
And when using your cannabis medicine, do not drive, operate vehicles or equipment or take the medicine when needing to give full attention to what you are doing until you are at the dose you need without feeling any effects except pain reduction and you know your sensations after taking it.
But I list here 3 ways that most people have found effective and safe ways to consume cannabis as a medicine. They each have their pros and cons.
Before using ANY of these, be sure to test a small amount with yourself first for any topical or ingestion allergies.
The one way to consume cannabis that is used most often to success is The RECIPE, the coconut oil infusion of both THC and CBD rich plant materials.
You will NOT find this in any store or dispensary, it’s homemade only.
This formula includes extra CBD, not in equal ratio like many manufactured products, but enough to keep many of the side effects in check for most people when used in regular small quantities after acclimating to cannabis for 2 or 3 weeks.
Using a fat-based formula seems to help the cannabis medicine be utilized more effectively in the body for most people than say consumed as a pre-packaged “drink” for example.
It’s easy enough for the mind to associate the formula with medicine and not “treats” because of the way it looks and the small amounts dosed.
I think many people find a lot of relief using it.
Many people find success also using this as a topical (keep bare fingers out of the jar), used as a nighttime relaxer and pain reducer to aid quality sleeping, and when small, spaced out doses are needed during the day they can be better managed with a more alerting formula.
It’s easy to replicate and easy to make at home. Most people find the dose and consistency of the medicine is one of the most reliable for homemade cannabis formulas.
It’s one of the easier formulas people have found to control the quality of the final product when the consumer can participate and choose the base materials, like very high quality coconut oil, to growing the plant materials, when legal, in the cleanest way possible, and controlling the decarb (the heating to a certain temperature and time to active the cannabinoids so the body can utilize them) and infusion heating temperatures and timing elements.
And there is no inhalation needed, nothing to do with the lungs, and after minimal experimenting, a consumer usually can gauge the “just right amount” to use each time and how long it takes to begin to offer relief—for them.
The downside with the Recipe is it is an edible. It takes awhile to begin to relieve pain.
Some people might not be able to digest the medicine this way and they will need to use a transdermal patch or inhale instead. Their bodies’ guts just don’t process it. So it will be an experiment.
Some people might object to the smell or taste, but then again, it’s a reminder to use the LEAST amount needed and not gulp down a jar at a time (don’t ever gulp a whole jar of the Recipe, no matter what, and keep all your cannabis and cannabis medicines away from where children can get into them).
And if it’s prepared correctly with the correct temperatures, amounts and not allowed to be reheated, often the smell and taste are very delicate and give no problems.
But again, it is an edible. This means the medicine needs to go through the digestive process and the cannabinoids change in nature and predictability as the liver changes them.
And it means the relief could start in 20 minutes or in two hours or more.
However, with the initial experiment with it, GOING LOW and GOING SLOW, most people quickly discover their optimal lowest amount, and the timing it takes for the body to react and have relief.
The next way to consume is with very discreet transdermal patches. These attach to an area of the skin, often near an ankle or wrist and time release into the body.
Depending on the brand, type and manufacture of the patch, many brands can be microdosed by cutting the patch into quarters.
Some manufacturers are trying to use as organic, least contaminant, allergenic materials as possible in their patches. Keep in mind that since cannabis in not federally legal, the label “organic” cannot be used or certified with the cannabis products.
The downsides are several. Some people might have allergic reactions to the adhesive in the patch or find it otherwise irritating to their skin to have it attached.
Another problem is dosing. The patches can be expensive and the experiment require some time to figure out how much dose and when relief is felt and not just a “high”.
Because of the time release function, and the unique nature of our bodies, sometimes the cannabinoid release can be faster or slower and inconsistent from session to session because the chemicals in our own body are reacting with the time release chemicals designed into the patch.
There is an unknown factor as well with the transdermal releases. That is that one person’s body might utilize the entire THC mg in the patch that is supposed to be released over 12 hours or so but instead is released all at once. This can cause unexpected side effects, like a high.
What can help this effect is to use only transdermals that can be microdosed from their content, such as being able to cut the patch into quarters.
The question then needs to be if the manufacturer designed the patch to cut up with a homogenous amount of medicine in each fourth. The manufacturers that offer these type patches are aware of this feature and most of them advise that the medicine is equally spread over the patch.
And of course with the transdermal patch, if it’s the THC-rich type patch, it is only available from a local, legal dispensary near the consumer. (CBD-rich hemp transdermal patches are often shipped nationwide). Cannabis marijuana THC-rich products are not yet shipped across state lines, even between legal-to-legal. Usually California has the most and highest quality choice with transdermals.
These patches cannot be homemade by the consumer. See the transdermal article for more information.
And the 3rd way to consume cannabis really effectively for a lot of people, as long as they have no lung or respiratory conditions but have pains that can be immediate, chronic or acute is to inhale the medicine.
HOWEVER, regardless the immediate pain needs, anyone with any lung conditions of any kind, like asthma, emphysema or chronic Covid infections or injuries MUST NOT inhale cannabis vapor or smoke or USE THIS OR ANY SIMILAR DEVICE.
But if your lungs have no issues, the ONLY way people say to inhale the plant is with a medical-grade device called a “dry” vaporizer unit. And there is only one recommended brand and type (a small handheld unit sold by many of the online vaporizer sellers) that fits this description and ONLY vaporizes the plant material when heated in their unit rather than combusting it.
Combusting plant material is what happens when someone smokes a joint or smokes through a bong (glass water bongs might somewhat cool the smoke but do NOT stop the bad smoke chemicals from getting to our lungs) or through any of the dozens and dozens of inexpensive, usually handheld “vaporizing” devices…the plant gets burned and enters our lungs harshly and with as much potential lung damage as lighting a joint on fire and inhaling that into our lungs.
A medical grade type vaporizer device takes a microdose amount of dry, but properly cured and properly “fresh” cannabis material and heats it to a point just before combustion but to where it causes vapors of the medicine to twirl out in very faint smoke like wisps. These wisps are inhaled as medicine vapors, not as harsh smoke. There is a learning curve to figure out the temps and inhale strength so not to combust the plant and inhale regular “smoke”.
And for most people the pain relief is IMMEDIATE.
This method too is the only method a lot of people use if all they have access to is CBD hemp plant ordered off the internet. With dry vaporizing in the correct unit, you can inhale the vapors of enough CBD to actually help with the pain. You will have to still consume far more of it in grams than a THC-rich variety, but at least it can be done.
But there is a learning curve for most people to figure out how deep of an inhale to use this inhaler, what the temp settings do and coughing could ensue until someone has learned the technique of use. There is a lot more experimentation to find the sweet spot using this device.
And the medicine does wear off fast for most, usually in only 1 or 2 hours and another puff or two is then needed again.
If someone ALWAYS prepares the plant material the same way, having the same THC percentage, weighing out micro grams amount in the device, has the device always set at the same temperature and always uses the same type and strength inhale draw—it’s possible one might discover a more consistent dose over time.
However, the biggest hurdle with this is NOW the plant strain, type, harvest, quality of trichome medicine, genetics, what terpenes are still present, how the plant was stored and cured and how old it is…ALL this NOW MATTERS (where none of this matters with the coconut oil Recipe by the way).
When smoked in a pipe, joint, bong or inhaled as vapor, now all the above factors of the full plant cannabis is in the bowl. And for most people they all go directly into the body through the lungs with immediate interactions and reactions. And these reactions and interactions are unique to each individual AND each session.
For example, you might find a 10% THC only marijuana strain with a certain mix of terpenes (the flavor and smell molecules of ANY plant from lemon to a mango to cannabis hemp or marijuana), the terpenes are like essential oils and all of them cause effects—effects of healing and pain relief or effects of getting really really high with hardly any THC!
And this problem with such a huge amount of variables can be incredibly difficult for all but the most experienced users to wade through.
Even if someone were to grow their own plants, same date and batch of seeds, same strain, same bag of dirt and growing conditions, same water used etc.—the plant has a mind of its own and ALWAYS, every harvest and every plant in the harvest will be a unique individual.
Oh, they all “might” smell similar, look similar and maybe with fancy lab tests one might determine the terpene types and amounts “might” be similar, but they are not. Even when the plants are grown with clones instead of seeds.
The other problem if people don’t control growing their own, is the HUGE problem with buying cannabis by a strain name.
There is no regulation of strains. Unless you are buying a highly respected, expensive and well known specialty cannabis terroir farm strain, there is rarely any way to tell if one strain or another is as it should be.
And if all the hybrids everywhere weren’t enough to get folks confused about strain names, now hemp CBD-rich hybrid plants are taking the same names in marketing as marijuana strains. Yikes.
And to confuse people more, a lot of the dispensaries might buy from very small local growers who come into the shop to sell their harvest and because they know people want to buy, say “Blue Dream” strain, they say what they are selling the shop is “Blue Dream” even if it’s a hybrid mutt of some kind.
In Denver if you buy “Blue Dream” from 7 different dispensaries, you’ll have 7 different strains in front of you by the end of the day!
So it needs a bit of training to figure out what cannabis is good quality, what a fresh but cured flower should smell like and generally look like and
what kind of blemishes to see or not (like mold), and try to assess just by sight and sense how any particular flower might make you feel once its lit on fire and inhaled.
The CBD flower market is doing some things correct. Since they can sell across state lines, they have been far more consistent in what they say they are selling and any effects any particular harvest might bring the consumer.
So using a dry plant vaporizer inhaler can be a god-send for those times of immediate crushing pain, but there is a learning curve and one will really need to trust and have a good relationship with the dispensary to lead to a flower that will work well in a vaporizer for pain. Regardless of what the “name” of the strain is.
The higher quality dispensary employees will be better trained and can help you choose.
And remember, please do not try this device or ANY similar, or pre-roll to smoke or anything inhaled if you have even the slightest lung or respiratory condition. It would be really dangerous to your condition.
Visit this website to find local dispensaries near you. See the article about dispensaries once you’ve looked around the internet a bit. But at this site, go to the very top of the right corner of the home page and click on “change” to put your approximate address or zip code in for the list of shops near you.
