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.
Nearly all the cannabis articles I posted have information about cannabis hemp CBD as part of the discussion.
Since both the 2014 and 2018 Hemp Farm Bills passed, the floodgates opened hemp and its CBD to commerce nationwide.
CBD (cannabis industrial hemp) plant flower in all respects except for testing levels of cannabinoids, looks, smells, tastes, inhales, smokes, touches identical to THC-rich marijuana plant.
Except for testing the flower’s cannabinoids, and experiencing it by consuming it, no one can tell the difference between hemp and marijuana.
And with all the hybrids of today’s cannabis world, hemp cannabis too has already often been bred with marijuana plants weaving characteristics of both plants to make a new whole.
At this point, marijuana and hemp even share many of the same strain names!
It’s such an insanely lucrative business today that there are thousands and thousands of hemp CBD products of any shape, size, function, to put in the body, on the body, eat, smoke, inhale, suppository, you name it and there is a CBD something for sale, complete with smiling celebrities helping to sell it!
And to think just 3 years ago there were “only” about 3600 CBD products for sale anywhere.
Here are some problems with these type products, besides just wide-spread fraud about what exactly, and what amounts are even in CBD labeled, or even THC-rich cannabis products.
Except for the very weak supplement industry regulations with too few personnel to catch all its fraud, there is not much regulation of CBD products, and lately no time and attention given to test these hundreds of thousands of products to be sure they actually have in them what the label says.
For example, a study in 2021 showed well over 55% of products tested contained little to none of the compounds touted by the product label.
So a few more notes:
I suggest that most people ingesting ANY CBD product using oils, like MCT oil, like Hemp oil as carriers could cause the person more damage from ingesting the unhealthy oils than the little bit of CBD in the products will offer as benefit. Low dose CBD is nearly completely without benefit on its own. People will merely be adding to their PUFA (polyunsaturated fatty acids) in-body damage.
Oils of various kinds are most often used in cannabis products of any kind, CBD-rich hemp products as well as THC-rich marijuana products because the oil helps the body more easily use the medicines and other cannabis compounds.
And part of the oil problem is the ease of consumer use (measured droppers as opposed to spooning out more solid coconut oil) and lower cost of making the formulations with cheap PUFA shelf-stable, liquid-stable oils. These are most often either the toxic hybrid MCT oil or the poor quality, or even “organic” quality other seed oils, even hemp seed oils that are used as carriers and that can cause PUFA and linoleic acid damage in the body.
In addition, many have also found when consuming cannabis of either kind, hemp or marijuana, in an oil based tincture or coconut oil base “butter”, in whatever CBD or THC concentration, it might not work with some people’s digestive tract/gut. Hardly any of the cannabinoids– like CBD, 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.
Professionals believe any oil based CBD hemp cannabis medicine dose therefore, of whatever quantity (and it’s a waste of money in any case if the dose per serving isn’t AT LEAST 100 mg per SERVING) needs to be held in the mouth about 5 minutes and then swallowed, allowing some of the medicine to by-pass the gut.
Or the CBD hemp cannabis medicine needs to be INHALED from the cannabis plant flower/bud instead (smoking or dry vaporizing).
Those seeking relief have found in order for a CBD-rich product (alone) to relieve anxiety, pain, different maladies, the CBD mg per dose needs to be at least 100-700 mg (NOT 30 mg!) PER DOSE and as much as 1200-1500 PER DAY. See the Dr. Bonni Goldstein, MD books.
The epilepsy CBD prescription medicine, Epidilex, administers about 1200 mg CBD per day to aid in epilepsy seizure control.
EPIDIOLEX_cannabidiol_USPI
But now, also keep in mind that consuming these very high pharmacological doses carry additional side effects such as liver toxicity, infections, sleep disorders, fatigue, possibly life-threatening adverse events.
Most of the CBD-only scientific and medical studies use 1200 – 1500 mg doses for the studies. Look up anything CBD out on PubMed.
This is very different than the THC-rich marijuana cannabis flower/buds where a medicine dose might be only 5 mg to help reduce pain for example.
Even though the studies of using CBD only for the maladies are usually using 1200 mg doses, nearly the entire CBD products industry, of the tincture or oil (or candy drops or what not) considers a dose to be 25-50 mg per dose.
Because the majority of CBD products only have a few mg of CBD per serving, almost every single CBD product is created only to move your money to the product owners.
Also, a lot of people have found CBD cannabis hemp plant is exceptionally difficult to activate and infuse enough into any homemade medicine of any worth.
Consider that one gram of hemp CBD flower might have 10-15% CBDA, the potential to have, after decarb heat activation, of turning CBDA into usable CBD, that one gram might have about 90 mg activated-into-oil CBD from a gram of flower.
Doing the math, with a 300 mg dose, you would now need more than 3 grams of flower just for one dose! Those 3 grams of organic, premium hemp flower will be costly. All for one dose.
Or you would need to be smoking hemp flower constantly to consume so many many many smokable grams of CBD. (This smoking, or even dry vapor inhaling constantly for sure is NOT recommended!).
So again with the math, if a one ounce/30 ML dropper bottle even has 1500 mg per BOTTLE, because the manufacturer extracted and concentrated that amount out of many, many hemp plants and added it to the (dangerous) oil base, and the manufacturer says there are 30-50 doses in the bottle—well, if you take 300 mg per dose instead, there really are ONLY 5 DOSES IN THE BOTTLE. Or ONE DAY’S WORTH. And it probably costs $120!
There are also two other phenomena to discuss when considering using only CBD hemp cannabis for medicine instead of THC-rich marijuana cannabis.
In both kinds of cannabis, hemp and marijuana, there is something called an entourage effect that happens when a cannabis formula contains many or most of all the various compound types (CBD, THC, terpenes, flavonoids etc.) found in the cannabis plant’s whole flower bud trichomes (the sticky tiny resin heads that grow all over the flowers and upper leaves). These products are called “full spectrum” products.
This entourage effect is when all the cannabis compounds are taken together, in whatever ratios and however one consumes it, the cannabis product is more successful in solving malady, reducing pain and anxiety.
THC-rich formulas, both commercial as well as homemade often contain both THC and CBD and other cannabinoids, and in the commercial formulations, maybe some of the terpenes and/or flavonoids (which tend to be lost in homemade formulas as they are fragile) and other.
And some of the marijuana cannabis products, candies, whatever ONLY contain a THC-only extract because the products are meant for recreation, or for someone to fall asleep without healing anything. And those work that way.
But because the CBD industry purposely strips out THC for sure because of the legalities, in most of the products, the CBD that’s left is completely ineffective. Or effective only for a very limited time.
Yes, there are CBD products labeled “full spectrum” (made as stated above, with CBD, a tiny amount of THC, terpenes, other cannabinoids) and “broad spectrum” (made only of CBD and a tiny amount of THC) CBD-rich formulas to create that entourage effect. And THOSE are the CBD products to try. Except these are often the tiny dose for high cost products.
But if a person wants high dose, then they will look for a concentrated CBD ISOLATE, which is only the CBD molecule cannabinoid. And then the second problem happens. CBD-only, isolate (no THC, no terpenes, no other cannabinoids) products have an additional downside. These CBD isolate only products of any kind, whether oil tinctures, candies, concentrates, if they are made with only CBD isolate, the CBD cannabinoid alone without any other cannabinoid, without terpenes, without even a hint of THC, without the entourage effect, will stop working for the person using them sooner or later. This is called the Bell Curve effect.
Isolates-and-Overcoming_the_Bell_Shaped_response_of_CBD
The THC cannabinoid does not have the Bell Curve effect, only CBD. And only when using CBD isolate trying to get those high doses.
Because a lot of people eventually discover that “CBD really doesn’t work”, or they desperately want it to work and the placebo effect takes place, many believe the CBD product industry is corrupt and fraudulent. And it is! Follow the celebrities! Follow the money!
And those that can, farm hemp. And some of those are conscientious and grow the hemp responsibly, cleanly, as toxin free as they can. They are the heroes and stewards of the land. And they extract, concentrate and manufacture a lot of their grow each season into the “products that do nothing, or maybe help a little”…and sell some flower on the side.
So it’s best to just understand that CBD is generally useful and important for only a few things, and to leave the rest as brainwashing and opportunism and danger.
Where it’s useful:
Many have found relief in consuming very large (100-700 mg per day), full spectrum doses of CBD concentrate (gotten from extraction and concentration of the CBD, CBG, legal tiny amount of THC and other cannabinoids out of a lot of plant material, and IF it’s then put back together correctly into the consumer concentrate product), and that it’s highly useful for nearly all the things THC is. And sometimes better.
These full spectrum concentrates still need heat activation to work. They would be vaporized and inhaled by using an accessory tool of a dry vaporizer unit. Or heated to a correct temperature for a certain amount of time in a coconut oil infusion.
Others have found CBD consumed as the whole cannabis hemp flower bud smoked or inhaled with a dry vaporizer, in the right strain (which is always changing and different), and with experimenting and a willingness to change strains a lot, is marvelous for PTSD and anxiety issues in general. NOT THC—but CBD is the anxiety suppressant.
Be aware almost all of the CBD oil tincture industry, expensive high end organic or not, full spectrum or not, as a paste or drops is made using harmful MCT oil. MCT oil, though made FROM coconut oil, is NOT coconut oil!
Or now the new cannabis oil tincture oil base darling is the equally dangerous hemp oil.
If you take 2-4 ML of doses a day, which might be a couple teaspoons of MCT or hemp oil a day, this is a dangerous amount of PUFA oils to be ingesting over and over, and studies are now showing liver damage from MCT oil use.
As mentioned above, in the dose extractions of the prescription product Epidilex®, there are many reports that it’s amazingly effective for relieving many of the symptoms of epilepsy.
Remember that for those taking such high doses, they will need to carefully monitor themselves for CBD high-dose side effects mentioned above.
In small doses (no concentrate needed, use the hemp flower bud) added to THC-rich products, like in the Recipe, or in 1:1, or 1:30 oil tinctures with THC, it’s reported that it counters many sedation qualities of the THC by adding a bit of alertness qualities to the mix.
People have found that the full spectrum or broad spectrum larger doses of CBD can help relieve withdrawal symptoms (headache, nausea, diarrhea, sleeplessness) of THC withdrawal during tolerance breaks, needing to stop medications before travel out of area or when allergy strikes a long time user. Many use a dry vaporizer to inhale it for this purpose.
In addition to the CBD to relieve withdrawal symptoms of THC use (and withdrawal symptoms can even occur when stopping the use of regular CBD only products), taking daily aspirin, daily eating Peat’s carrot salad and clean real food and water helps immensely.
This company, out of Colorado, controlling the grow all the way to the product, but like all the rest, uses dangerous MCT oil, does sell an organic, full spectrum, quality tested, 3000 mg per 30 ML high mg version of CBD. One dose has 100 mg CBD. A couple or 3 of those doses for sleep might help. The 30 ML/one ounce is $145 (you’ll get 10-15 days worth out of a bottle).
Depending on the amount of CBD cannabinoids, if full plant extracts are used, what terpenes or essential oils, some high content CBD salves have proven effective for some people relieving arthritis and fibromyalgia pains with topical application.
Unless you are one of the very few who experience the paradoxical effect (the exact opposite of what the effect should be), the following is true for most users of CBD products:
Some people find large doses of CBD (probably 300 mg or more) can help insomnia and help a person sleep.
Dr. Goldstein, MD says small (such as the commercial size dose of 10-30 mg) doses of CBD are alerting for most people if you need to keep awake for a project. For people dosing only small dose CBD-rich products, most need to stop taking/inhaling any more CBD by around 3-4pm of their day or they won’t fall asleep.
Also for those NEW to cannabis of any kind, I have experienced that if someone has never consumed cannabis of any kind, or is returning to it after decades of not consuming it, even very small doses of CBD alone can cause cannabis side effects of dizziness, euphoria, enhanced senses, and other effects that new marijuana THC users experience.
CBD newbies MUST be cautious of balance, motor skills etc. when first beginning to use CBD in ANY DOSE AMOUNT.
IN ADDITION, some scientific tests have shown CBD as a whole plant, full spectrum, or flower bud experience for sure, and possibly even as an isolated compound, can enhance and trigger estrogen responses of the endocrine system (women or men) when consuming it. Just as THC-rich marijuana products can.
The suggestion is that care needs to be given to not consume it if you are suffering from any hormone dominant cancers or endocrine issues, like certain breast cancers, or Hashimoto’s disease.
