Anyone who’s interested in CBD and its benefits is bound to be interested in the different CBD formulations and how they can alter the compound’s effects.
Let’s take a look at three of the main CBD formulations – hemp oil, MCT oil, and alcohol and CBD mixes, and if they’re worth a shot, or you should just stick to the basics.
Hemp Oil VS CBD Oil
The main difference between industrial hemp plants and other cannabis plants is their purpose. While hemp plants are cultivated for their fiber and nutritional seeds, other cannabis plants are grown for their cannabinoids and their psychoactive and medicinal properties. This inherent difference is reflected in the plants’ resin content, and respectively, their CBD content.
This is why industrial hemp contains little to no CBD, and therefore, any hemp-derived CBD oil is bound to be far less pure and chemically diverse, not to mention full of other contaminants and toxins that hemp “attracts” from the soil by default.
In fact, CBD oil that came from hemp is probably more of a byproduct, like a little bonus some hemp farmers are trying to make from their hemp leftover that was cultivated for a whole different purpose. It’s no wonder that the FDA doesn’t grant hemp-derived CBD products any legitimacy, whether for nutritional or medical purposes.
Alcohol and CBD
The science is still unsure of the nature of the relationship between alcohol and CBD.
On the one hand, some research has shown that CBD can mitigate the toxic effects of alcohol on the body.
However, CBD, being a relaxant that also lowers your inhibitions, be it in a generally non-psychoactive way, can be somewhat tricky when combined with alcohol, as the latter has paradoxically similar effects, but a much more distorted and amped up version of them.
This is why experts believe how CBD and alcohol mix depend on the dosage, but perhaps even more, on the way alcohol affects you in the first place.
“If you’re a happy drunk, then CBD could make you a happier drunk,” James Giordano, professor of neurology and biochemistry at Georgetown University Medical Center, tells Tonic. “If you’re an angry or violent drunk, the CBD may certainly disinhibit some of that.”
Because of these highly individual and thus somewhat unpredictable effects of CBD and alcohol mixes, the FDA prohibits bars and restaurants from serving alcoholic beverages infused with CBD.
CBD and MCT Oil
MCT is touted for its various physiological benefits, like boosting energy, endurance and metabolism, while lowering cholesterol and blood sugar levels, so it’s certainly interesting to see how it interacts with CBD.
To understand the MCT and CBD interplay, it’s important to define what MCT is essentially – medium chained triglycerides, or medium-length fatty acids, opposed to long ones, which means they are much easier to be digested, metabolized, and ultimately converted into energy by the body. MCT is basically the best of both coconut and palm oil, purged from their long-chain triglycerides.
This is why when combined with MCT oil, CBD is much more readily available for the body, especially considering that cannabinoids are stored in the fat tissue. This way, the body burns more fat as well, making for an absolute win-win.
CBD has enough benefits as it is, but from the above three formulations, the one that’s really worth a shot is the combination with MCT oil, while alcohol experiments are always tricky and strictly individual, whereas hemp-derived CBD oil is not something to be excited about.
