On Delta-8 and feeling great

Exploring the Delta-8 cannabinoid and an essay about personal stigma

One of the great benefits of the legalization of recreational cannabis has been the explosion in access to knowledge about the cannabis plant. As someone who came to use cannabis strictly through recreational means, one of the most interesting things for me, so far, has been learning about individual cannabinoids and their various uses.

What is a cannabinoid, anyway? It’s a chemical compound secreted by cannabis flowers. They regulate communication between cells and act to provide relief for a variety of physical and mental symptoms, including nausea, pain, anxiety, and a lot more. Cannabinoids bind to receptors in our bodies, producing different effects depending on which part of the body they prefer. At this point, it’s impossible to say how many cannabinoids naturally exist in the cannabis plant, but suffice it to say there are dozens.

The two most well-known are THC, which is the stuff that makes you feel funny, and CBD, which is the stuff that doesn’t but can chill you out and reduce inflammation, among other things. Nowadays, and regrettably so, you can find CBD in almost everything. Regulation is coming, however, so that will almost certainly change. The wild wild west of cannabinoid regulation (or lack thereof) isn’t limited to just CBD, it includes a variety of others, mainly because they’re not THC, so they have, up until now, enjoyed some sort of loophole. Other cannabinoids you may have heard of include CBG, CBN, THC-V, CBC, and THC-A.

Recently, a friend of mine asked about a small box of tablets he purchased from the brand Level, a San Francisco-based company that specializes in products made from rarer cannabinoids. He gave up THC years ago. But a friend of his implored him to look into Delta-8-THC, which is considered the most similar to Delta 9-THC, a.k.a. Tetrahydrocannabinol or what is colloquially now known simply as THC. It’s supposed to have fewer hard-hitting effects than its close chemical cousin. He bought a pack of Level’s Delta-8 Protab pills at San Diego’s Urbn Leaf to check it out.

“I can’t smoke pot anymore because it doesn’t make me feel good—I get social anxiety and paranoia,” he says. “I also feel pain. I don’t know if THC causes pain or allows me to feel parts of my body that are not right, but it enhances sensitivity.”

Chemically, Delta-8 is different from THC by only one atomic bond. It can produce a high of its own, but it exists in the cannabis plant at far lower levels, so companies like Level are finding value in extracting and concentrating it. Their Delta-8 Protab pills contain 25 milligrams of Delta-8 and zero of THC and CBD. The packaging indicates it’s ideal for consumers seeking a “moderate” high that I’m assuming is intended to be compared to the high THC produces.

Lately, my friend has been having a hard time sleeping, so he started taking half a pill about an hour or two before bedtime. Though he’s sleeping much better after a few weeks of use, he admits that it’s harder for him to wake up. He also once took a whole pill at work and felt pretty stoned, so he has settled on half as his ideal dose.

I have been a fan of Level’s Hangover Protab pills, which have THC-A, CBG, CBD, and Delta-8. These are not supposed to get you as high, though they pack a nice punch, I discovered after ingesting a full pill after days of taking only half. They are also highly effective in melting away a hangover, which I realized after a week of near-daily use while nursing hangovers in my pre-pandemic life (loyal readers might remember that I’m largely off booze these days). I love them, but I also have a higher tolerance for cannabis products than the average bear. Though the Protabs are pricey, splitting them makes for a better high for me and therefore makes them more cost-effective.

As for Delta-8, which is snaking its way into all types of products much as CBD did a few years ago, I like to refer to it as “diet THC.” This mainly refers to the high it gives, which is weaker in comparison to THC but with the same types of feelings. If you or someone in your life is regularly overwhelmed by THC but kinda-sorta likes what’s happening there, Delta-8 is a good alternative to try.

Regarding legality, Delta-8 is legal-ish. Remember that loophole? Delta-8 happily existed within that grey area until this past August, when the DEA updated its list of controlled substances. Thanks to 2018’s Farm Bill, if Delta-8 is sourced from hemp, it’s legal (more or less). If it’s from the Cannabis sativa L plant, it is not.

Another Delta-8 product enjoy are the sparkling drinks (non-alcoholic, of course!) from Wunder. The company’s newest flavor is grapefruit hibiscus, which tastes bright and floral and is made with real fruit juice. It’s a nice mix of sweet and sour. It clocks in at 35 calories with just 4g of sugar. As for the good stuff: the drink also has 2mg THC, 2mg Delta-8, and 4mg CBD. I really like them.

The drinks actually taste good (unlike others) and the low dosage makes for a functional good feeling that I wouldn’t exactly call a high. Let’s call it a vibe. Ugh. I know. Still, you get what I mean when I say that. I am also a total slut for sparkling beverages—I have been on seltzer since I was a kid—so these are perfect for casual consumption. Because they’re not too sweet, they’re also binge-able, too, if that’s your jam.

Wunder drinks are available for delivery in California through Eaze, as well as in dispensaries across Los Angeles, greater SoCal, and the Bay Area (full availability list here.

Things I have had published

For the San Diego Union-Tribune, I wrote about why many people screeching that our recent political climate surrounding the Capitol insurrection was “Orwellian” are mostly wrong. History matters!

This is older but since we’re speaking about cannabinoids, last summer I wrote about CBG for CannabisNow.

For the San Diego Union-Tribune/Pacific I wrote about Mike Shelbo, a glass artist who will appear on Netflix’s season 2 of Blown Away. It’s cool because he’s primarily known for making functional pieces for smoking weeeeeeeed.

I wrote about two different sets of cannabis-related pardons for Forbes. Snoop Dogg is involved. More to come on that, too.

My January column for Ranch & Coast is about CBD for wellness in the new year with a focus on San Diego-made products.

I wrote about buying cannabis with an eye for sustainability for Sierra.

My podcast episode with Johnny Casali, legendary Humboldt grower, is out. We talk about his incareration, shift into the legal market, his farm’s plans for the future, and much more.

Overcoming my personal weed stigma

by Veronica Irwin

(Veronica is an excellent writer and reporter—do follow her work)

“I think weed is a problem when people plan their lives around it,” she said. “If you’re getting stoned when you have things to do, that’s definitely a problem,” she said. “I would never be a stoner,” she said. 

Well, “she,” was me, and now I make most of my money in cannabis as a freelance journalist. Most of the people I talk to work in cannabis regularly. The budtenders at my local dispensary all know my name and text me when there’s something new I need to try. Most of my friends smoke daily, and I met probably half of them at cannabis-related events. 

Talk about planning your life around weed. 

When I was in high school, “I would never be a stoner” used to be my mantra. One reason is that I was an overachiever: captain of the dance team, in most of the school plays, on the honors track, and worked in a stroke research lab during the summer at UCLA. Parents and teachers loved me, and I was proud of that. The idea of being pegged as a “stoner” was horrifying. 

More importantly, my boyfriend of three years didn’t allow it. When I say "allow," I don't mean to imply he was abusive — instead, he was an innocent goody-two-shoes, intimidated by parties and the people who went to them. While I led warm-up stretches with my team, he, our high school’s award-winning drum major, marched the band around the football field. According to our peers, we were a match made in heaven, and any conflict between us became the talk of the town. One difference between us, though, was clear: all I wanted was to smoke weed with my friends, and for him, that would be the end of our relationship. 

For this reason, I never brought up the fact that I was secretly smoking before dance practice. Or that I popped an edible before our movie dates or took dabs in the back room at kickbacks. I reeled off platitudes about how “I would never do weed” to reassure him. 

It's funny to look back now because I ended up leaving that boy for the one who was smoking with me behind his back, and now make a majority of my income writing about the substance. I smoke weed every day (if not multiple times a day) and have undoubtedly "planned my life" around weed, just as my wary 16-year-old self had warned. Unfortunately, that little 16-year-old's voice still makes me second guess myself and holds me back more than any too-strong smoke does from my work or social life. I guess all that shit-talking about stoners in high school embedded itself in my subconscious.

I know I’m not alone in feeling this way — the need to belong is hardwired into human DNA.  Given how long cannabis users are characterized as lazy, stupid, and even criminal, smoking weed can make you feel separated from the pack no matter how many of your immediate contacts partake. Googling “internalized cannabis stigma” pulls up far more results than one might think, varying from peer-reviewed research to Reddit forums. What I still don’t sometimes understand, however, is how I — someone who has written about mass incarceration and cannabis, moms who smoke weed, and patients who consider pot a medical necessity, for example — still find myself worrying about my perception as a “stoner” on a daily basis. 

My own internalized stigma arises in many ways (as we speak, I’m avoiding the cherry diesel joint I rolled last night literally to inspire me as I write). Most of the time, my doubts appear as intrusive thoughts and negative self-talk. I will second-guess myself as I write, wondering, “does this sound dumb?” when I express my love for cannabis, or “will this hurt my career down the line?” when an article is published. I make self-deprecating jokes around my friends who smoke less often, talking about how “my brain doesn’t work,” or “you know I can’t think that hard.” My heart still skips a beat when someone “likes” a cannabis-related social media post of mine, even though, of course, that’s the whole damn point of posting in the first place.

Women, I think, experience this internalized stigma uniquely to men. The cannabis industry itself is still heavily male-dominated, likely because of bias in investment opportunities and other business partnerships. Smoking, in general, is also portrayed as an “unladylike” habit in 21st-century American media representations — often reserved for low-income, masculine-presenting, or “troubled” women (unless, of course, the woman is smoking to seduce a man). Those stereotypes weigh on people like my mother, for example, who chooses to vape over smoking cannabis because she doesn’t want her voice to “get low.” 

The shunning we women feel amongst fellow weed smokers is probably even more familiar to readers of this newsletter: someone who coughs after a bong rip is a “pussy,” whilst another person who shuns particularly potent cannabis might be called a “little bitch.” 

According to the bros, feminine-presenting people supposedly can’t smoke that well — unless we are pegged as “stoner babes,” who are “not like other girls,” and rest in young men’s imaginations as a class of their own.

Also, people of color must grapple with a particularly violent form of stigma that I do not. As a white woman, I never seriously feared prison time for my consumption and have been spared the experience of intimidating strangers for having a blunt in my hand. I also never had to hear the cautions of a parent who feared their child might be arrested, or worse, brutalized. Those fears are not as present in my mind, though one can see how they might be internalized and affect a person’s perception of their own habit (cue J. Cole’s “KOD”). 

Compounding all of this is my long list of mental health diagnoses through the years — whether you want to call it anxiety, depression, or trailing effects of PTSD, none of my friends could deny that I am the queen of overthinking. When I worry about how my weed consumption might be perceived, those thoughts spiral. However, that also means that I have the unique experience of talking to several therapists about my own internalized stigma and will share some tips. Though I’m still figuring out, these have been the most useful:

1. Pause for a moment, and ask yourself why you’re smoking. When I do this, I often become more aware of the physical sensations driving me to pack a bowl. Maybe I’m anxious, or feeling down, or need a boost of creativity to get a project going. In my mind, these are very valid reasons to smoke! 

2. Find a weed doc you trust, get a medical card, and take notes when you meet. I have a notebook full of all my mental health conditions, what the research says about the relationship between cannabis and each of them, along with notes from a good cannabis doctor. Whenever my thoughts start to spiral, I can revisit this notebook and be reassured that this habit has a legitimate, beneficial, medical value in my life. 

3. Look for stoners you like on social media. I know “influencers” get a lot of shade, but there are a couple of people I follow whose online presences remind me that there’s a vibrant, loving weed community out there full of perfectly wonderful people. Some of them also remind me that it’s possible to be a respectable, professional, and successful woman in the cannabis industry. Some of my favorites lately are Elise McRoberts (@elisemcroberts on Instagram) for her sex-positivity, Luna Stower (@luna_stower on Instagram) for her informative posts, and the very author of this newsletter, Jackie Bryant (@jacqbry on Twitter and Instagram) for the simultaneously professional, cultured, and adventurous life she appears to lead. [editor’s note: AWWWWWWWWW, SHUCKS]

4. Make conscious choices. Though not everyone can afford to have tons of products on hand, having a well-stocked stash allows you to pick the perfect medication for your needs on a given day. I find that the more choice I have, the less likely I am to absent-mindedly smoke and, subsequently, convince myself I’m over-doing it. 

With these tips as my guide, my internalized stigma has started to fade. Now, I see my weed-smoking self as more of a Samantha Jones kind of pothead than a Jackie Burkhardt — a grown woman in charge of her own habits and health.

Thanks for being here! Send to a friend if you dug it.