Anxiety sucks. I totally get it.

The racing mind.

The restless feeling inside your body.

The panic and feelings of doom that you can’t make go away.

The incessant worrying.

It’s one of the worst feelings you can experience. I know, I’ve been there. And for many of you it’s totally illogical. Your life is great. You have so many blessings to be grateful for. Yet, you can’t stop the anxious mind from taking over.

For the past twenty-two years I’ve been in the trenches with people helping them find their path back to health. The patients I work with often have multiple health problems; weight-loss resistance, thyroid conditions, brain fog, depression, chronic fatigue, digestive issues, and chronic pain.

But without a doubt, one of the worst conditions I’ve watched my patients go through is anxiety.

There are two ways you can approach anxiety; treat the symptoms or get to the root cause. I find that if you try to calm the symptoms you make very slow headway. One of the quickest ways to turn the anxious mind around is to understand why it’s racing.

When it comes to mental health, we are so conditioned to think that it’s our life situations that are creating our thoughts. Although life situations can have an impact on our brains, equally as impactful are areas of our body like our digestive system that produces neurotransmitters that effect our thoughts and our endocannabinoid system that balances our nervous system.

I have written many articles on the gut brain connection. If you are struggling with any depression, anxiety, brain fog, memory loss I can’t emphasize enough how improving your gut health will change how your brain functions.

Yet, today I want to talk about a system that is not given enough attention; the endocannabinoid system.

The endocannabinoid system is a biological system which plays a massive role in many of your body’s daily functions such as:

  • sleep
  • appetite
  • metabolism
  • mood
  • memory and learning
  • immune function
  • digestion
  • pain

WHAT ARE CANNABINOIDS?

Just like hormones are chemical messengers for your endocrine system, cannabinoids are the chemical messengers for the endocannabinoid system.

There are many different types of cannabinoids, but overall they all fall under two categories: endogenous or exogenous.

Now this is where this system gets really interesting…

Endogenous are produced on the inside of your body. That’s right. You actually make cannabinoids.

The cannabinoids produced naturally by your body are known as endocannabinoids. They interact with cannabinoid receptors to regulate basic functions including mood,memory, appetite, pain, sleep, and whole lot more.

There are also exogenous cannabinoids meaning you have to get these cannabinoids from the outside of your body.

There are over 31 different varieties of exogenous cannabinoids. They can be found in two different types of plants; marijuana and hemp. CBD that is extracted from marijuana will also contain THC. THC is the psychoactive part of the marijuana plant. CBD extracted from hemp contains no THC.

CBD RECEPTORS SITES

Remember that receptor sites are like catchers mitts that sit on top of the cell and catch chemicals that need to be brought into the cell for cellular function.

Your body has two types of CBD receptors; CB1 and CB2.

CB1 receptors are found throughout the body, but are mostly present in the brain and spinal cord.

They are concentrated in brain regions associated with the behaviors they influence.

For example, there are CB1 receptors in the hypothalamus, which is involved with appetite regulation, and the amygdala, which plays a role in memory and emotional processing. CB1 receptors are also found in nerve endings where they act to reduce sensations of pain.

CB2 receptors are found in the peripheral nervous system. They are especially concentrated in immune cells. When CB2 receptors are activated, they work to reduce inflammation. As many of you know, chronic inflammation is responsible for most diseases in the body.

Because of CBD’s ability to reduce inflammation, many foreword thinking doctor’s are turning to it to help patients with chronic pain, cancer, and many mental illnesses.

CONDITIONS HELPED BY CBD

The research is vast and impressive on the numerous conditions that CBD can help with. In fact, at first glance it will appear that CBD is a miracle cure. One thing to keep in mind is you’re your body has a physiological need for CBD. It has receptor sites that need to be filled with CBD so that it can your brain and immune system can function normally.

This doesn’t mean we should all run out and go smoke weed. In fact, at another time I will write about the long term harmful effects of THC, especially on the growing brain.

But with the right CBD oil at the correct dosage, research is proving that you CBD oil is helpful in:

  • Relieving pain and inflammation
  • Has anti-psychotic effects
  • Reduces anxiety
  • Helps fight cancer
  • Relieves nausea
  • Helps seizures, epilepsy, Parkinson’s and other neurological diseases.

Where I am seeing CBD oil work the best in my clinic is with anxiety and musculoskeletal pain.

The research on CBD and anxiety is impressive. If you are a research geek like me, here is a great website with several studies done on the anti-depressant and anxiolytic effects of CBD.

https://www.projectcbd.org/anxiety

For musculoskeletal injuries, I prefer the suave that you rub directly on the injured area. We are currently using this miracle suave with several of our athletes that have overuse injuries. It no doubt speeds up the healing and reduces pain, allowing athletes to get back out into competition quicker.

Dosage requirements is unique to every individual, so it might take some testing to see what dosage fits best for you. I recommend my patients start slow and build up as needed. I also see benefits for my patients when they use CBD oil consistently.

CBD has the ability to bring the body back into homeostasis. If your mind is over activated, it will calm it. Or if your inflammation switch is turned on, it will turn it off. There for it is best used on a consistent basis, not necessarily an as needed basis.

The other important reminder on CBD is that you get a pure source. Hemp & Marijuana can pull heavy metals from the soil quiet easily. As I have written many times, heavy metals are damaging to your brain and in our clinic we spend a lot of time pulling these metals out. You will find that the cheaper the CBD oil the more toxic and less effective it may be. So this is not a supplement you want to pick the cheapest one.

For more information on the healing benefits of CBD oil, be sure to join my Resetter Tribe on Facebook. I will be sharing articles and teaching about the magic of CBD in that group over the coming weeks.

Hope this helps! If you have great success with CBD oil I want to know. Or if you have any questions, reach out. I can always be contacted at drmindypelz@familylifewellness.com

Have an awesome day!

Dr. Mindy