Cannabis (medical marijuana) can be a perfectly good and safe medicine when used correctly. But there are always people who find fault with everything, and they complain:
- It’s unsafe (not really)
- It’s illegal (not in 16 states)
- It’s not effective (that’s not what dozens of studies have shown)
- People will pretend they are sick to get it (that never happens with prescription drugs?)
- Smoking joints isn’t medical (I agree: use a vaporizer or edibles)
- But, but…people are getting high from it! (generally, no, but what if they are? It’s just a harmless side effect)
Perhaps I can’t solve all the world’s problems, but there’s one thing I know how to do and that is put ideas together. So I put together Canna Caps, added a cannabis strain that’s high in CBD, mixed with an irresistable predilection for alliteration and got Pot Painkiller Pills*.
Pot Painkiller Pills take a lot of objections out of the discussion. They’re safe, effective, inexpensive, provide a consistent dosage and predictable effects, are in a form that most people associate with “real medicine”, and will not get the average person high with a single dose. So, once you’re familiar with the effects, you might just be able to go about your day pain-free without having to worry about being too loopy to drive, work, or talk to people without giggling.
The Search For The Holy Green
The seeds of the idea for Pot Painkiller Pills were planted — no pun intended, I swear — when I first found out about the function of CBD, one of the primary components of cannabis. CBD works alongside THC, and at certain ratios provides pain relief far greater than even typical indica strains that are noted for this particular benefit.
I found two strains available in Northern California to experiment with. Omrita-RX3 had the highest CBD level I could find anywhere, and worked better than I expected: all pain simply disappeared, without any feeling of numbness. I heard about another high CBD strain called Harlequin that was also supposed to work wonders. The bad news was that there was none to be found anywhere; the good news is that a friend of mine was able to acquire some Harlequin clones and started growing them.
So, fast forward a few months and I finally got hold of 1/4 ounce of Harlequin fan leaves, which is about my favorite kind of stuff for edible products (especially because I’m heavily into recycling and a lot of people just throw this stuff away!). Harlequin leaves have high CBD levels even before flowering, in fact, so it’s ideal for this sort of thing.
Capsules Made Simple
And by now, I’ve developed an even easier method of preparing oil for use in Canna Caps than the one in my original article:
- Grind the cannabis to coarse powder. I call this “small particle size”.
- Put it at the bottom of the cooking vessel (I use a mini Crock-Pot).
- Add enough liquid coconut oil
to cover the cannabis.
- Heat at 180°F to 220°F for 2 or 3 hours, mixing and stirring every 15 to 20 minutes.
- Let the mixture cool to about 100°F, then filter and load into #0 capsules (see the original article for details; I’m using the smaller-size capsules now).
The End Result
What you end up with — or at least, this is how it worked here — are single-dose capsules that will remove pain without getting you high. There is relatively little THC in these capsules due to the already low level in Harlequin.
Of course, everyone’s body chemistry, tolerance level, and pain level are different, so people who need more than one capsule for their pain might end up with enough THC to get them high. But these will be still and always safer than any of the addictive prescription opiates available…which generally get people high anyway!
And speaking of recycling…after I filtered the oil, I was left with an oily mass of ground cannabis and before throwing it away, wondered if there was any useful medicinal properties left in it. So I stuffed some into the larger #00 capsules and tried one. It turns out that even though I had extracted much of the active CBD, the larger #00 capsule size and the actual plant material combined to make this an “extra strength” capsule that’s essentially free! Take that, Tylenol!
For those who are interested in numbers, I started with the 7 grams of ground leaves and ended up with 30 ml. of infused oil, which yielded 44 capsules (#0 size). The recycled plant material gave me another dozen or so “extra-strength” #00 capsules. These didn’t exactly get me high, but I could feel them (and of course they were even better for pain). Pretty good results for an afternoon’s work.
Pot Painkiller Pills may not be the Holy Grail of medical marijuana, but they solve a lot of problems that many people have, without causing more.
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*I generally never use the word “pot” any more unless I’m being facetious or reminiscing about the 60s and 70s, but there you are.
SO i just got my wisdom teeth taken out couldn’t smoke, used these things (from a dispensary) didn’t get me high but the pain was gone, almost like an opiate in the fact that pain is gone and you feel tiny bit heavy but not like the opiates in the fact that there is no constipation, you actually want to eat, and you don’t feel like crap after it wears off.
not sure what you were thinking when you said you left out decarboxylation
you decarboxylated the thc when you heated it at 180 – 200 degrees for 2-3 hours
Hmm…perhaps. What I meant was that I left out a separate, specific decarboxylation step. I know it will be decarbed to some extent by the process, but I never rely on that alone, especially with relatively low temps like 200 or less.
Ive been making CBD capsules for almost a year now, and can completely concur with you…they’re really effective!
Lately I’ve been experimenting with raw juicing the leaves instead of making capsules, based around the groundbreaking work of Dr. William Courtenay. This way there is no decarboxylation at all, and the leaf retains all of the terpenoids and flavonoids, which are useful too.
Blessings upon your journey.
KB
Hello Kind Kine :-),
I’d love to hear more about your experiences. I don’t have very good access to a solid supply of fresh leaves, or I would have been doing that juicing stuff myself. I’ve read a lot of Dr. Courtenay’s work and am very impressed with his reported results!
Nugs and hugs,
Old Hippie
I have been very interested in the juicing of raw leaves, though I have not had a chance to try it, as I live in a state that does allow for the use of mmj. If there is any info you can give me, it would be greatly appreciated! I am looking for a treatment for migraines, muscle spasms, severe back pain. I feel like the CBDs would be a much greater help to both my husband & I, rather than the THC (which he relies on now). HELP! Anyway to pull CBDs over THC I am most interested in, please contact me with any info! TIA!
Well, the foremost practitioner of juicing AFAIK is Dr. William Courtney, and you can read many of his articles at http://www.cannabisinternational.org/articles.php. I have not tried this to any extent myself, because I lack access to fresh leaves, but I know one individual online who claims it has almost totally cured his asthma symptoms. The biggest problem in the MMJ world right now is getting access to high CBD strains of cannabis, but if you can find some, you might try the usual methods (smoking, vaping, edibles, capsules) before trying juicing. You might also look into making oil (steps 1 through 7 here) from any strain of cannabis and rubbing it into muscles and for back pain. You will need lots of fresh leaves to juice; IIRC Dr. Courtney recommends 10 leaves a day. There’s also some criticism of juicing here for contrarians. Good luck and write back if you have any specific questions!
Hey O.H.!
This looks by far the easiest to do in my situation. It’s focused on CBD and doesn’t seem to make you too high. I know I won’t find the strains you were lucky enough to find, but it’s a start.
I found a friend who can help me. At least, I think it will work. I am applying for SSDI and I will probably wait until that clears before I do any of this. I would still much rather do all of this legally in Oregon. I called the number and they are currently processing applications from early April. I’d need to take a couple of trips – one to see a doctor/pay the fees/turned in the application. Once it’s approved I’d go back with my card, rent a place for a while, and test it out. Perhaps if I’m doing it legally, SSDI would approve.
I’d much prefer to test all of this out in the Bay Area. I could probably crash with friends, so I wouldn’t need to rent a place. I lived in Sunnyvale/San Jose for High School and University. Trouble is, California does not have reciprocity with Oregon. Yay.
Your blog and advice are invaluable! You truly have no idea. I trust your information far more than other sites. I think that’s important for you to know.
Best to you,
Lisa
Thanks so much for your encouragement and kind words, Lisa. You’re right…that’s what keeps me going!
Now, I do want to clear up one more thing here. You should seriously read this article which reminds people that it’s not just the strain, but the dosage. I can take just two MFLB hits of any strain, even the infamous White Widow, and feel positive and beneficial effects without getting high. And if you go slowly and carefully, you’ll hopefully also be able to alleviate your symptoms without getting high or dizzy, once you find the right strain.
I have recently acquired several Medicine Man seeds supposedly high CBD content, and have started them on 24 hrs of light. after three weeks they are growing the best I have seen. my question regarding making the capsules is do i dry the leaves before grinding?
Well, depends on what you’re trying to do. If you want to make capsules specifically for pain, then yes, you should decarboxylate the leaves, grind them, then make oil and stuff everything into capsules. If you wanted the systemic benefits of high-CBD cannabis, you could juice 10 leaves a day and drink the juice.
I am a serious chronic pain patient, degenerative disc disease, osteoporosis in lumbar, osteopina in hips and am on opioid pain mgt however with a lot of drive to do so, excercise and cannabis I’ve been successful in reducing my percocet intake by 75%.
Along with this opiods comes constipation and the daily use of laxatives. Along with the reduction of that opioid use comes the reduction in the use of laxatives. I would give almost anything to find a cannabis based item that would permit me to have at least a couple days a week with NO opioids as I have not had an opioid free day for 3+ years. Problem I have found with the edibles is a continuation of that constipation and I am eager to hear from anyone who has seen this problem ended with any kind of cannabis based product.
Well, first of all, the question would be: Do you live in a legal MMJ state (or Canada)? Because it’s much easier to talk about strains and choices if you actually have choices!
I don’t usually talk about this second subject myself, but I had all kinds of mixed gut problems for quite a long time (decades). I’m not going to say they all went away, but all my reflux, acid stomach, and gut-twisting toilet sessions have gone away since starting on MMJ. I’m far more regular too, although I have to keep up with my exercise and fiber (and occasional raisins) for that to all keep working properly. I attribute that to more relaxed internal muscles, as well as me being more relaxed in general. Doesn’t sound scientific, maybe, but there you are.
Thanks, this is good information. I kow if I can reduce them just a little more I’ll be home free so the trials of the edibles begins!