5 Ways to be Mindful with your Cannabis Use
One very unfortunate thing about managing chronic symptoms with cannabis instead of conventional pharmaceuticals – my medicine is not covered by insurance. That means each trip to the dispensary is a pretty significant out of pocket expense – especially for someone on a strict budget! So I do my best to be a little more mindful with how I use my medicine – I thought you might be interested in practices I use (or am starting to use) in an effort to make my medicine last a little longer!
Being intentional with your medicine = less trips to the dispensary! Saving you time and money!
Be Intentional With Your Purchases
Amount: The first thing you will want to figure out is how much product you want to buy at a given time – whether you set a weekly, bi-weekly, or monthly budget for yourself, setting a limit before you walk into the dispensary is a great way to prevent yourself from going overboard!
There are a few things to consider (besides your budget) before making your purchase, the first is to outline the symptoms you are most likely to be needing to manage with your cannabis use. Whether you’re needing to manage chronic pain, or you need something to help you sleep at night, or something that will calm your social anxiety, or help with digestion because you have a big dinner planned later in the week – knowing ahead of time what you are going to medicate with is a good place to start! Even if you are using cannabis more for recreational or spiritual practices, you can still benefit from setting intentions for your cannabis. Knowing ahead of time the types of effects you are looking to accomplish with your high is a great way to navigate the strains or products you might want to try.
Next you will want to think about when and where you will be when you’re needing to medicate. Are you at home or out in public where you cannot openly consume cannabis? Are you looking more for a discreet way to medicate, or are you wanting more of the classic smoking (or vaping) experience? This will help you target how you will be consuming your cannabis – flower, oil, tincture, edible, or topically.
Use Your High Wisely
I sort of touched on this already, but setting intentions for your high is key! For example, say you struggle with social anxiety (like me) but there is a concert coming up that you would LOVE to see live, so you make sure to have a vape cartridge on hand that has the right THC:CBD ratio and optimal terpene blend to help you push through your anxiety to have a great night with your friends and enjoy the entire concert without a panic attack! OR Say you have a big family dinner coming up where you know you’re going to eat all sorts of food that might not sit well with your digestive system (anyone with gastro issues can relate to this!) – so you make sure to have an edible on hand to consume with your dinner to help aid in that digestion process! This is something I am still working on always having on hand – I am technically gluten intolerant but due to my already limited diet (thanks to ARFID/picky eating), I still consume gluten pretty regularly. I know this is probably really not good for me in the long run, but I just plan ahead! When I know that I am going to have digestion issues with a heavier meal, I will have an edible with dinner and I am able to digest the meal like a normal human! It’s pretty amazing!
Being intentional with your medicine = less trips to the dispensary! Saving you time and money!
Log Your Consumption
Another good practice to get into is to keep a journal or log of your consumption – this will help serve as a record of what worked and what didn’t. Especially while you’re in the process of finding the right products for you, keeping tabs on the severity of your symptoms and how often you’re medicating is very beneficial (for both you and for your doctor to see how the medical marijuana is working for you)! I have been testing out the GoHigher Journal and really like it! It has pages to log your symptoms before you medicate and then a check in for after you medicate so that at a glance you’re able to see how well that product alleviated your symptoms. They also have fun coloring pages and journal prompts to help you practice mindfulness while medicating! (Use the code LADYJANE20 at checkout for 20% off your purchase of the GoHigher Journal!)
If you rather keep a digital record of your sessions – the Releaf App is a great tool to have on your phone! This app allows you to store data for the strains/products you try, track your medicating sessions and even has the ability to create reports, give insight to your product history, and connect you with a cannabis doctor!
I have used both of these methods on and off for a while, but I also made myself a chalkboard that is broken out with information on the two strains I typically have on hand at any given time – as well as space to record what times I medicate each day throughout the week. I like to use this as a quick reference for me to check back on to see which days I may have needed an extra session or two and evaluate what was happening that day that caused me to use more.
Reflect on what worked & what didn't work
Another smart practice to get into check back in with yourself after you medicate to evaluate how well the cannabis is working for you. But… if you’re anything like me, high or not, it is hard for me to remember to check back in with myself after I medicate! I get too in the flow of whatever it is I am doing and before long its time to medicate again and I haven’t logged the first session! So I started setting alarms for myself on my iPhone to circle back with myself and do a mental scan of how I am feeling post-session. Depending on what consumption method you used, checking in at 30 minutes, 1 hour, and so on, will give you a good reference to understand how well and how long your cannabis will work for you. Edibles are tricky so you might want to extend your timeline out a little while longer for those as they can take 30 minutes – 2 hours to kick in depending on your metabolism and the make up of the edible, and effects can last anywhere from 7-12 hours.
The Releaf App that I mentioned above will even send you a check in notification to follow up with the sessions you log in the app!
Planning Ahead
Anyone struggling with chronic health conditions can tell you how unpredictable symptoms can be from day to day, sometimes even one hour to the next feels very different. The beauty of medicating with cannabis is that you can treat it symptomatically instead of taking a bunch of preemptive pills, but along with that comes the need to have what you need on hand! It is a good idea to try and always have a high dose tincture or even a higher strength flower or oil on hand that can help break through those heavier pain days. Keeping an extra stash for those days will take a load off your mind and make you feel better prepared for your next flare up!