EP #4: Illuminating the World of CBD: History, Challenges, and Benefits

Ever felt confused about the difference between hemp and marijuana? Well, you're not alone. Join me, your host, Marilisa Lawless, as we illuminate the fascinating world of CBD, its history, and acceptance. Together, we'll unravel the story of Charlotte's Web, a pivotal CBD product that changed minds and lives, and also, sadly, pay tribute to its namesake, Charlotte, who tragically passed during these challenging pandemic times. 

Dive deeper as we navigate the labyrinth of CBD's legality in the US, from its ancient cultural roots to the modern-day conundrum surrounding hemp and cannabis plants. We'll discuss the FDA-approved Epidiolex and its limited availability, highlighting the trials faced by the CBD industry. In the face of persisting backlash and misconceptions, we'll also explore CBD's proven benefits for anxiety, sleep, and pain relief. Sign off with us as we wrap up this episode, your one-stop answer to all things CBD.

Explore our wide range of organic products here: https://www.hempdelsoul.com/ or email us at HempDelSoul@gmail.com

Chapters

• 0:02 The History and Acceptance of CBD
• 6:58 History and Legality of CBD
• 20:27 Hemp Del Sol Podcast Wrap-Up

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:02

Welcome to the Hemp Del Soul podcast. All health, no high. Here's your host, Maril isa Lawless.

Jeremy: 0:15

Hello everyone and welcome back to another episode of the Hemp Del Soul podcast. I'm your co-host, Jeremy Wolfe, and I'm joined by none other than your host, Maril isa Lawless. How have you been?

Marilisa: 0:29

I've been awesome. Life's good, you know. Glad to hear.

Jeremy: 0:33

Glad to hear. So kids are home from school today because of, I think, excessive flooding was the explanation A lot of rain so I thought, in honor of the kids being home from school, we do a history lesson today.

Marilisa: 0:49

Oh, okay, so not in school I'm going to pull them into the room.

Jeremy: 0:53

Here we're going to talk a little bit about the history of CBD, so why don't you start off by kind of giving the distinction, like a historical overview of the distinction between hemp and marijuana and the distinction between both and how this delineation is that the word delineation, delineation, delineation it's influenced CBD production.

Marilisa: 1:21

Yeah, perfect. So it's the history lesson is good. Yeah, the kids of Florida's had over a hundred inches of rain so far this year and we're not done the area yet. So, first off, marijuana and hemp are both cannabis. They get lumped together as being just one thing and they're not. So if you had a pie chart you know and I know that on audio we can't really see this, but if you had a pie chart and two separate pie charts next to each other one's marijuana, one's hemp the marijuana pie chart would be the majority of that pie would be THC with a sliver of CBD. The hemp side would be primarily CBD with a sliver of THC. It's the easiest way to distinguish between it. So, yes, they're related, but they are not the same and that's the basic difference.

Marilisa: 2:17

Hemp historically has been used. I mean, George Washington was building things with hemp, you know. It's been in this country for hundreds of years and it's generally been used for the industrial side. Remember when Macrame was real big? You know most of the jute made macrame, like making macrame hangings and pot holder things and all of that was hemp. They called it juice, but you know but it was all hemp-based. It was all hemp, hemp rope. So it's very strong. It's a good product. We're trying in the town of Davie to get more involved with the hemp industry. The mayor wants to grow hemp. She wants to have somebody take on the project of growing hemp again and growing it here in the town of Davie, along with trying to get more people to understand the difference between marijuana and hemp.

Jeremy: 3:07

So Let me ask you a question. I'm just curious. Yeah, I've heard that before that they I mean they used to make all sorts of things with hemp paper. Did the fall off of the use of hemp core was it correlated or did it correspond to the government movement against drugs in the 60s? Or did it fall off prior to that due to something else? No, it was.

Marilisa: 3:32

it's always been used industrial. It's always been used on the industrial side. It hasn't really fallen off, I'm guessing. With the advent of concrete we stopped using hemp creep. We stopped using some of the building materials that hemp was creating due to construction and the changes in environment and changes in things. That's all I don't. I haven't really explored what happened with hemp and why we stopped using it, because it's still being used by Native cultures.

Jeremy: 4:01

But it just seems like in our at least the post 60s society, it's kind of associated in many people's minds with marijuana. I mean, it's obviously changing as it gets legalized, but there's this demonization of the plant that was largely induced by the government campaigns to eradicate it from society, Absolutely.

Marilisa: 4:22

Absolutely, and the government's been doing research. They've been doing research on marijuana for many, many years and they're calling it basically just cannabis. So that sort of goes into how the two of them came to be together. So cannabis is still the parent, so to speak, or, you know, the grandparent. So we've got marijuana and hemp on two different sides, simply because of their ingredients Hemp always used industrial, marijuana used recreationally, and now you know, for in many states it's used medically, some states it's even legal, completely legal. We've got I think it's 38 states where marijuana is completely legal. I'm not not sure about that, or maybe it's just the medical side, but I don't know as much about marijuana as I do about hemp.

Jeremy: 5:14

We're making progress, clearly. So, mary Lisa, the story of Charlotte's Web, yeah, inside it, as, I guess, a turning point for CBD awareness, can you maybe share the origins of Charlotte's Web and how it contributed to the acceptance of CBD for medical purposes?

Marilisa: 5:33

Right. So CBD really wasn't a thing Prior to the Stanley Brothers who created Charlotte's Web and sort of tried to help this little girl who was having these horrible, horrible epileptic seizures. And so they decided to try and give this a shot. And so they actually started crossbreeding or creating hybrids with marijuana and decreasing and decreasing and decreasing, mixing it with hemp and, to the best of my understanding, to really pull out the CBD, and they realized that the CBD was helping with seizures. It was helping to either eliminate or decrease significantly the amount of seizures kids were having. So Charlotte Fiji, back in 2011, this is when this all started to come about Her mom was desperate to find help for her and these guys these five brothers, I think, as five brothers took it on and started creating in the lab and they created this CBD product from him and when they were giving it to her, it decreased her seizure significantly and she was functional. She actually died during COVID. They think that she had COVID, but she ended up having some medical complications and she was 13.

Jeremy: 6:56

And she just died in 2020. So the Charlotte's web. This is obviously recent. If she was, you know this is 2011.

Marilisa: 7:05

Cbd's 2011 is only, you know, 12 years ago. So the the I think it's called a piteolox. A piteolox is an FDA approved CBD oil. It's prescription only and the government created it and it's really hard to get a prescription for, but it's also not given to children. So the FDA has been, they've been testing, they've been doing stuff in the background and they do know that it is effective. The FDA is super rigid about what it will or will not allow, but at the end of the day, it was. It was just these brothers who had this farm trying to figure out how to help this girl, and they were successful. She lived. You know, like I said, she lived until she was 13. The seizure started when she got what they believe was COVID. She was really sick. It was all during the beginning of the beginnings of COVID, so they weren't really sure, but her whole family ended up ill and she ended up in the hospital and all that, but she was 13. So for those eight years, she had a better life because of CBD.

Jeremy: 8:21

Let's go back in time further Further. What societies did they first start seeing records of marijuana, cannabis, hemp being used? Going back, and are these plants indigenous to most most places, or where do they? Where do they stem from? You talk a little bit about the origins of this in human history.

Marilisa: 8:46

Well, most of what I know is that it's been in the US and in Europe. The US it was mostly hemp that was being grown. Marijuana was being grown as well. It grew better in the colder climates up in the north and hemp can grow anywhere. It just created differences in the plant and what they notice is what marijuana, with the higher CBD content, actually was more helpful to people. So it's it's. It's been all over the place. I don't really know where it completely started, like where the first plant came from, but it's been grown in Europe and in the US for centuries.

Marilisa: 9:30

So each culture has its own thing. They don't know of any specific cultures that used marijuana as part of their ceremonies, like we see with tobacco in the native. You know, in the first nations they use tobacco, south American they use the Iowaska. In New Mexico they're using peyote. They're using different substances for their, their shamans and whatnot, but I don't know of any that use marijuana.

Jeremy: 9:54

So, when it comes to production of hemp versus cannabis, I know that there's a distinction, obviously, between the male and the female plants. The female is the plant that yields actual cannabis, right that buds, and then the male is it doesn't flower.

Marilisa: 10:11

Is that that true? That's true with cannabis, for whether it's hemp or marijuana, remember, cannabis is the parent, so it's it's both sides. I haven't done as much research on the beginnings of the plant growth. I know that hemp is at full, you know, has grown six, eight months, you've got a crop and the industrial hemp is on the rise again. So there's many different ways in which it's been used. The marijuana piece I'm not real sure about where that's been used Historically for any kind of rituals or shamanistic gatherings. So I think somebody found that by mistake.

Jeremy: 10:59

As is often the case with this kind of stuff. So let's go back to the legality for a moment, Cause I know we were talking before the show that you're. You're encountering some resistance in terms of promoting your own business as it pertains to CBD right now. So where are we at right now? What's the state of affairs as it pertains to CBD?

Marilisa: 11:20

Okay, so there's multiple layers. So one is that it's not FDA approved. It's not a drug, it's a supplement, but it's not FDA approved and people look for that FDA approval. If it was a medication then you would be looking for FDA approval, but because it's a supplement you're not. So that's one piece of the legality side. So my merchant services, who I've been with for five years that I've had this, this company, they're you know they wanted the certificates of analysis. I've submitted all the certificates because everything I carry is third party tested and you really do want to see that in any product that you're selling that you, you want to know that it's been third party tested, that what is in that product is what it says on the label. So they're giving me a hard time about particular products that are considered part of a functional line that a doctor created, and so now they're saying that what I'm doing is illegal and it's like no, it's not.

Marilisa: 12:22

In the US hemp is 100% legal across the US. Federally, it is legal everywhere. There is no restrictions except the THC level. The THC level must be less than 0.3% In order for it to be hemp, in order for it to be legal. Marijuana is higher and you'll see it in a lot of the dispensaries. On the CBD side you'll see the marijuana dispensaries adding CBD to their product because they know the CBD is really the most beneficial.

Marilisa: 12:54

And for years all I've been able to say is, anecdotally I see it help with anxiety. I see it help people sleep. I see it help people feel better. They're aches and pains, whether it's a topical, whether it's an ingestible. It's kind of crazy Some of the backlash that I get and I consider myself to be an educated, smart, educated woman, business owner, psychotherapist, herbalist.

Marilisa: 13:23

I mean I've got a list of things that I do my research and so I get it that this is not dangerous, that nobody has ever died from either marijuana or hemp. There's never been an overdose of either. You know, the worst thing that happens is people get hungry and they sleep. That would be the worst thing and some people want to sleep and some people want to have more of an appetite. But it is a little bit disheartening the pushback. So even on social media, I find the social media pushback overwhelming. We're supposed to have this certification called legit script that charges $800 for the application, $1600 a year, and yet they won't certify anything that you can ingest, which means the gummies, the capsules, the tinctures. And yet every single ad you see on social media is an ingestible, it's a gummy, it's a tincture.

Jeremy: 14:21

I see it all the time. It's crazy yeah.

Marilisa: 14:24

And so I was not willing to compromise my integrity and lie and say, no, I don't sell those things. Because when I reached out to the company, what their response was is that, well, we certify them, but we have no way to monitor what they do once they put the ads together, it's up to the company that's putting the ads out there. And I was like all of the social media companies are doing this, it's 100%, it's across the board. So it's kind of crazy, but my integrity is worth more. That's why I have certificates of analysis, that's why I do my research and, as I said, cbd has only been around since 2011.

Marilisa: 15:03

Charlotte's Web is still around, still producing products, still putting stuff out there. They're still a good company. I carry a different line, but again, it's a good company. I carry the Veritas Farms or Veritas Farms, depending on how you want to say it as a primary source. I have Purewell, I have Crystal Creek. These are companies that I've researched and want to, and I feel comfortable carrying their products and comfortable selling these products. There are good companies out there.

Marilisa: 15:34

Charlotte's Web was just the pioneer. They were the ones that were out there saying, hey, this is helping her, this is giving her an opportunity and a new life, and Charlotte was. You know it really helped, and other mothers have jumped on. I can remember the movie I think it was with Susan Saran and called Lorenzo's Oil, and it was about seizures. He was a young boy having seizures and so the mom was going crazy trying to figure out what. What do I do to help my child? And parents are willing to do anything. I have a special needs child. I've been willing to do anything, any alternative treatment other than strictly Medicaid. You know medication should be a last resort, not a first resort. So yeah, that's, that's about where I'm at with with CBD and wanting to get all this stuff out there. I just want to educate the public, just educate yourself. It's the most important piece you can do and don't be so afraid to try new things.

Jeremy: 16:39

One last question before we wrap up. I'm just curious. I'm going through in my mind Ever since Charlotte's Web, obviously, there's been research done on CBDs. Has there been a push to, I guess, get it away from the world of supplements into more of a medical space for use, or is that something that hasn't been?

Marilisa: 17:01

discussed. That's been going on in the background. That's what the Epidolux is Epidiolux E-P-I-D-I-O-L-E-X. It's a hard one to say.

Jeremy: 17:12

Epidiolux.

Marilisa: 17:13

Yeah, it's a CBD oil, but it's a prescription CBD oil, so the government's been in the background about creating this Initially. And Marinal Marinal was a pill that was medical marijuana basically that they were given for cancer patients and this is used for seizures. So we know it works. We know that it helps. We don't know all the mechanisms. We know that our brains have an endocannabinoid system and that this stuff helps our neurotransmitters fire better, depending on what it is that you need. And again, like a supplement, it's not going to help everybody, but it is there and through word of mouth and people talking to each other, that's what's going to get the government to do. More is more push, with people saying hey, this works, when are we going to do more? I welcome regulation. That's what makes companies better and stronger in the most, you know, for the most part. Sometimes it gets lost in lobbying and all that other political stuff, but at the end of the day, it's a good product, it's a good chemical.

Jeremy: 18:24

Awareness is key and just deprogramming society from that association with cannabis and of course, remember other drugs and laziness, and it's becoming more and more mainstream. But I still think there's a large swath of society out there that just see it as another evil drug.

Marilisa: 18:46

That looks to bad, right? Well, remember, read for Madness. Did you ever see that movie?

Jeremy: 18:50

Yeah.

Marilisa: 18:51

You know that was. The government took control of medical or took control of marijuana and then put that movie out. There's a whole thing around that with marijuana, but the government's been there in the background and that's what our government does. You know, it's really about word of mouth at this point and friends telling each other hey, why don't you just try this? I see how you're suffering, I see you're not sleeping, I see that you're in so much pain. At worst it doesn't work. There's no real side effects that I've ever heard about, seen nothing, even medications. They talk about liver toxicity as one of the side effects, but I haven't seen any studies that have talked more about that, showing actual evidence that this is the stuff that's happening.

Jeremy: 19:41

Yeah, there's so many layers to this, with big pharma companies and the government. Yeah, it's a very, very complicated issue, but, again, awareness is key, just having conversations like this and making the public aware and, like you said, trying it out, and if it works for you, great, and if not, no harm, no foul.

Marilisa: 20:00

Absolutely, absolutely. As a you know, I'm in the medical field. I am a marriage and family therapist. That's considered medical because the brain is part of the body and you know, like medical doctors, it's an oath you take to do no harm. At the end of the day, I don't want anybody to be harmed by anything that I do or say, and that's again why I do my research.

Jeremy: 20:23

All right, very well, we'll end it there. Maril isa Always a pleasure.

Marilisa: 20:30

Yes indeed.

Jeremy: 20:32

Thanks everyone for your next month. Yeah, Looking forward to it. Have a wonderful. Is it Friday? No, it's Thursday. Well, have a good weekend. Everyone thanks for tuning in and we will catch you next time. Everyone, take care.

Speaker 1: 20:49

Thank you for listening to the Hemp Del Soul podcast. Explore our wide range of organic products at hempdelsol. com. That's H E M P D E L S O U L. com, or contact 954 854 1039.