Are you tired of coughing up a lung from smoking your medicine through a bong? Fatigued from countless trips to the Head Shop? Dissatisfied with your vaporizer? Sick of waiting an hour for your edibles to kick in? Well… I’m mostly ok with everything, too, but as it turns out, there’s another method of consuming Cannabis that scientists are saying is not only healthier for you, but actually allows your body to absorb more weed than you’re used to.
That’s right, I said Juicing
To see the process in action, at least for the first time, is even more terrifying and tooth-grating then hearing or reading about it. Just imagine: a big, beautiful, lush, flowering cannabis cola (that’s the big bud on the very top of the plant) being chopped up like regular produce and tossed into the top of a milling machine. All of the flowers and leaves are juiced, leaving stems, stalks and roots to be discarded or boiled down for CBD and other 79 Cannabinoids that science is just beginning to become familiar with.
Non-Psychoactive, but Radicals, Man
When cannabis is heated, either by baking or using a water pipe or vaporizer, the THC-acid in the plant in converted into the renowned chemical we all know and love that causes the much sought-after effect colloquially known as “being really high”.
Juicing cannabis does not heat the THC-acid (or other beneficial cannabinoid acids) and therefore does not produce the same “stoned” effect as heated or even cured cannabis.
Fear not! There’s still a really good reason that you should juice your weed. Apart from the fact that raw cannabis juice has tremendous healing properties that should be accessible to anyone with inflammation or tumors (it’s amazing for both and provides none of the terrible side effects commonplace to medications and treatments for those diseases), scientists say that by juicing the plant your body can absorb 60 times the amount of active ingredients that it normally could through smoked or heated cannabis. The juice has also proven to improve cell function and reduce damage caused by free radicals (hence the dumb title of this section). One of the big reasons cannabis juice has such incredible healing potential is the promotion of something known as two-way cellular communication. Let’s take a look.
Your Body’s Been Growing Weed Right Under Your Nose This Whole Time and Didn’t Even Tell You
The main cause of inflammation in the human body is something called one-way nerve traffic. When this occurs, the body is constantly attacking its own immune cells and the immune cells are unable to communicate to the nerves to tell your brain. “Hey, cut it out”
Miraculously however, when cannabinoids are presents, a two-way communication is made possibly helping to end the inflammation. Few people know that the body produces its own cannabinoids through an enormous and intricate system science calls the Endocannabinoid System.
I’ve tried several times to write an article on this particular topic but it’s just a little too complicated. Hopefully you’ll understand why (it never got written) after a quote from Wikipedia:
“The endocannabinoid system (ECS) is a biological system composed of endocannabinoids, which are endogenous lipid-based retrograde neurotransmitters that bind to cannabinoid receptors, and cannabinoid receptor proteins that are expressed throughout the mammalian central nervous system (including the brain) and peripheral nervous system. The endocannabinoid system is involved in regulating a variety of physiological and cognitive processes including fertility, pregnancy, during pre- and postnatal development, appetite, pain-sensation, mood, and memory, and in mediating the pharmacological effects of cannabis. The ECS is also involved in mediating some of the physiological and cognitive effects of voluntary physical exercise in humans and other animals, such as contributing to exercise-induced euphoria as well as modulating locomotor activity and motivational salience for rewards.”
Am I right? What is important, I guess, is that the Endocannabinoid System is the reason we get high from cannabis at all. It’s a sort of biological lock and key system where the molecules have to be the right shape to fit into the pigeonholes in our brain. It shouldn’t be surprising really considering we likewise have cellular systems named after opium and nicotine. The endocannabinoid system is responsible for modulating a crazy number of physical systems, including (but not limited to): appetite, energy balance, metabolism, stress response, immune function, female reproduction, autonomic nervous system, analgesia, sleep, physical exercise, and thermoregulation.
Oh, also important is a condition called “Endocannabinoid Deficiency Syndrome” or EDCS. You guessed it: it’s a medical term that means your body isn’t growing enough weed, and it’s apparently pretty commonplace. EDCS has been linked to Fibromyalgia, Migraines and Irritable Bowel Syndrome.
Higher Ground (and Plant Count)
So what does it all boil down (or squeeze out) to? Juicing raw cannabis is a much healthier way to consume the plant for almost all of the same maladies one might smoke or eat it for normally. Granted, cannabis juice doesn’t get you high, but because it lacks that psychoactive quality the end product is so much more appropriate for an over-the-counter consumer market. People with chronic pain unable to medicate throughout the day or forced to do it in secret would have an opportunity to feel the comforting effects without risking their jobs and well-being. A serious consideration of this new technology would require a serious reconsidering of current plant count laws as the chronic user would typically juice a whole plant each day and require a new seed or clone to be planted daily to replace it.
Until then, why not come down our Denver or Northglenn store and scope out the stunning selection of water pipes, vaporizers and other accessories at 710Pipes!