CBD for Anxiety Relief

My Experience with Anxiety

No matter if you’re in and out of the courtroom, the class room or your kids’ rooms as you gather piles of dirty laundry, we all deal with a degree of daily stress. And then there are those seasons in life where you just can’t seem to catch a break as life’s curve balls knock you down time and time again until you’re left feeling broken and helpless.

I’ve had an honest-to-goodness panic attack where you feel like you can’t catch your breath sufficiently and your shirt feels like it’s closing in around your neck, choking off your airway; where your heart is pounding so hard, you can feel it’s vibration booming on your ear drum and then there’s that pit in your stomach that feels like a giant heavy ball of looming dread growing by the second. I felt that when I was stuck in a traffic jam on my way to the hospital following my dad’s sudden stroke. Throughout my life, although not as intensely, I’ve had bouts with those same feelings… before new client introductions as a speech therapist or before speaking in front of a room full of people. Now, imagine struggling with that dreadful panic, day in and day out; some days worse than others but never really escaping it or knowing what will set it in motion at any given moment. How awful would that be?!

For 18% of Americans who struggle with panic disorders and clinical anxiety, that is their reality. Most cannot stop their life to cater to it. They go to work and take care of their kids. They look fine on the outside but inside, they’re unraveling. Most days they can power through but,at the end, they’re left emotionally and physically exhausted. They are my customers. They are my friends and family. They are all around us and maybe it’s you.

Anxiety is one of the top 3 reasons that people walk through our door. Weeks into taking CBD daily for chronic pain, I found myself asking Mother Google if CBD was good for anxiety. I had noticed those pre-session panic attacks becoming less frequent. I also observed that I was falling straight to sleep and staying asleep instead of going over any awkward encounters I’d had that day. After all, I had struggled with anxiety-induced insomnia for years. I found scientific studies that shed light on why my doom and gloom feels were slowly shifting to more of a calm, go-with-the-flow demeanor. It was good to know but I was only a CBD consumer at the time and counted it as a bonus side-effect to my chronic pain relief. These days, as a shop owner and staunch advocate for this miracle plant, I try to educate myself on the science daily.

Consistency is Key

But first, you should know, the effects of CBD oil are not earth-shaking. It’s not a sudden burst of euphoria jolting you out of your pit of despair. The response is different for everyone but there are a few ways to combat that anxiety using CBD. With a daily regimen, you can begin that journey toward attaining total mind and body balance. The relief is gradual but very real and recognizable and consistency is key. Instead of a miraculous turn-around, it’s more like a giant ball of yarn that slowly rolls down a path, unraveling the tangled mess of negative emotions and feelings. It becomes “the absence of” instead of “feeling something” (like a pill). If you are looking for a more “as needed” approach, vaping CBD is the most efficient way of getting relief fast. You’re introducing CBD directly into your blood stream that continues straight on to your brain for that instant relaxing calm. Edibles can have a similar effect just not as instantaneous. However, by getting onto a daily regimen of ingesting the oil twice a day, the hope is that your CBD will become more of a preventative and keep that anxiety from even creeping back up on you in the first place. Here’s why:

CBD and your Endocannabinoid System (ECS)

CBD interacts with receptors found throughout your body that are part of a regulatory system called your Endocannabinoid System (ECS). This highly important and underutilized system seeks to bring you back to homeostasis, that optimal balance. When your ECS runs smoothly, a few incredible things happen: your nerves calm, mind clears, mood improves and immune system functions optimally. You just feel good! When hormones are out of balance, things go wrong and you feel the consequences. Hormones are essentially the bridge between mind and body that give you your sense of identity. The hormones in your brain are called neurotransmitters and they transmit signals from one neuron to another neuron… or muscle… or gland cell, etc. Each one is responsible for a specific function and together, your overall state of health and well-being. Serotonin affects mood, appetite and sleep… dopamine deals with cognition, motor control, motivation and reward mechanisms. Endorphins for pain… glutamate for memory and so on. When these neurotransmitters are out of balance and not communicating effectively, you can feel the effects in many forms including anxiety.

And then there’s our good old fashioned American diet. When we consume foods that contribute to a build-up of inflammation in our gut, science shows it can impact our mental health. Have you heard of the “gut-brain connection?” Termed our “second brain” by scientists, our enteric nervous system consists of some 100 million neurons embedded in the walls of our gut stretching about nine meters. Even 95% of our serotonin is in our gut! Much research is being done to identify how our “second brains” effect our mood and overall mental state.

CBD Oil as a Daily Dietary Supplement

Whether it’s due to an imbalance in the head or the gut, I highly recommend you do your own research on how CBD can be an effective treatment for your own anxiety and depression. If you had a vitamin B12 deficiency, things would go wrong and you’d seek out supplementation. Most of us are walking around deficient in cannabinoids because our brains are not producing enough to combat our toxic diets and environments. CBD is a Phyto-cannabinoid that can step in and pick up the slack. So just think of CBD oil as a daily dietary supplement with prescription strength power yet without all of the nasty side effects. My customers are always telling me stories about how relief from anxiety has impacted their life and they are so amazing and reignite my passion for this stuff every time. I’m going to be sharing some of those stories with you soon. Start your own journey of natural healing today and watch what happens.

For additional information of CBD and Anxiety Relief visit:

https://www.leafly.com/news/health/cbd-for-treating-anxiety

https://www.projectcbd.org/cbd-for/anxiety