CBD Dosage: Topical Salve, Oil Drops, Tincture Drops, and Gelcaps

Since we began our operations back in January of 2015, we have always steered clear of giving CBD dosage information. This makes our customers angry, but we are following the law. It’s a choice of aggravating our customers or the FDA, so we default to catering to the ones who could put us out of business.

Once upon a time, when our labels were first made, they said, “Made with healing intention, apply with healing intention.” We believe that thoughts can manifest things, energy, and we believe that one day science will prove that adequately for everyone. But the US Post Office stopped all shipments back in 2015 because my statement on the label could be taken as a healing claim.

That is just one example of why we had to change our labels to be void of information in regard to dosage and a reason why we could never be very ‘out’ with dosage information anywhere.

We still make our products with healing intention. We still want our customers to apply the salve or take the pills or drops with healing, thoughtful intention, but we just can’t talk about that anywhere.

CBD Dosing

In this series of four videos we made, which we call CBD dosage information videos, we are not so much giving dosage information as teaching you how to find your own dosage, with each product.

We are humble farm women who get the plant from the ground to the kitchen to your cupboard. That is the humble service we provide. We are not doctors or scientists and we must point that out whenever anyone asks for dosage information. We always encourage people to keep seeing their doctors, because, when it comes to health, what do we know, really? Your doctor knows what medicines you are currently taking, he or she (or they) know if you are overweight or not and all the other intricacies of what makes up your health.

Five years ago, when I would tell people to consult their doctors, I would think, “Oh, well, I will never hear from that person again”, imagining that all doctors eschew cannabis. Five years later, however, most doctors are completely on board with the healing possibilities of the cannabis plant. Most will tell their patients to experiment. Some discuss how they dose their patients with us.

The CBD dosage videos we made include the following:

The salve
The oil
The tincture
The gelcaps

This article gives you the highlights.

The CBD Topical Salve

The number one thing you need to realize about the CBD topical salve is that it has been designed for absorption. It has been designed to carry the CBD from the outside into the body. If you use too much, you will get sleepy and if you are in pain, sleeping is usually a good thing.

What is ‘too much’? I have no idea. You have to figure that out. It’s different for all people.

Most people apply the salve to areas of pain 1 to 3 times a day
Most people use more at the beginning, and then can use less as healing occurs
Some people get no relief at all from our salve (we are sure that all products don’t work on all people)
Start with a small dab and if you get no relief, do it again. Add another dab. Apply directly to the affected area. Do not put in eyes or ears! (People have reported successfully putting toothaches at bay with the topical salve, though, and we use all food-grade ingredients; we have also had many people report healing mouth burns quickly with the salve)
If you apply a teaspoon a day four times a day and still get no relief, the salve is probably not your solution.
There is approx. 1000 mg of CBD in an 8 ounce jar of salve. That means we have 125 mg of CBD per ounce in our topical salves. A 2 ounce jar has 250 mg, a four ounce jar has 500 mg.
Every jar of salve has a batch sticker that takes you to the test results on our store.

The CBD-Infused Oil Dosage – Regular Strength and Double Strength

Unlike the Salve, the CBD Oil was designed for internal use and people put it in the food, beverages, or dropping it straight on the tongue. This is also a product that you can give to your pet as it has a mild taste and 100% vegan and safe.

Use it for sleep, pain relief, stress relief, waking up, and any other purpose you will explore.

It is an adaptogen which gives your body what it needs – sleep or wake up depending on how you feel.
You can use it for anxiety and pain, and to get off the harmful pharmaceuticals or sleeping pills
Regular strength oil, in a two-ounce bottle, has 500 mg of CBD. A double-strength bottle of CBD-infused oil has 1,000 mg of CBD.
The base is a liquid coconut oil and we cook the plant into it, and strain it the plant out before bottling; a blood orange extract is added to give it a pleasing taste
The CBD in the Oil as well as in the other products is full spectrum, but do not contain any Delta 8 THC and THCV, so you won’t get high.
Most people start with 1/3 of a dropper and wait about 15 minutes to see the effect, weather you use the regular or double-strength
If there is no effect – take another 1/3 of a dropper and wait 5-10 min once again.
Your dosage will strongly depend on a number of factors, like your age, gender, weight, nature of your pain, etc.
Usually, we do not recommend getting more than 2 full droppers, but again, if that’s what working for you – then keep experimenting. There is no fatal dosage. Certainly I would not recommend more than 4 tablespoons unless you are a really big person.
For some people who get no positive reaction to the oil, but who are suffering serious symptoms, we then migrate them to the gelcaps, which we discuss at the end of this article.

The CBD Tincture

Both our tincture and our oil are consumed by dropping the liquid on or under the tongue. The oil, as discussed above, tastes pleasing. The tincture does not!

The CBD Tincture acts like a bitter herb. It helps with immediate absorption into the system. If you take a squirt of our oil on your tongue, you will not feel an immediate reaction. If you put a squirt of the tincture on your tongue, it provides immediate relief.

People who suffer seizures and anxiety attacks keep the tincture nearby.

Most of the time, our Tincture will be useful for fighting anxiety or panic attacks, seizures, and any other cases when the immediate relief is needed.

We only have a regular strength tincture; there was no demand for a double-strength, like with the oil
The tincture comprises about 10% of our sales
The tincture delivers the CBD to the system just like the CBD oil, except faster.
People who want tincture, but can’t handle the harsh taste in their mouth, dilute with juice or tea which slows down absorption only slightly
We use 130 proof or 150 proof grain alcohol and organic plant material and soak and strain. There is no cooking with the tincture. The alcohol pulls the medicine from the plant naturally.
The CBD in the tincture is full spectrum plant, but does not contain any Delta 8 THC and THCV, so you won’t get high.

The Gelcaps

The Sisters are not allowed, legally, to make concentrates in the county that we operate from. ‘Concentrates’ are precisely what the CBD Gelcaps are called. Anything that is pure oil from the cannabis plant, no coconut oil, nothing else, is considered pure plant oil.

We import our gelcaps in very large quantities from Centuria Foods in Colorado and we bottle and bless and subject them to a small prayer ceremony before they are moved to shipping.

Each gelcap has 25 mg to 30 mg of CBD.

The skin of gelcap is not vegan.

This pure plant oil is usually used by people who have the following conditions:

Chronic joint or back pain
Chronic anxiety or sleeplessness
Health maintenance for aging bodies
To mitigate the effects of chemo or radiation
To heal from surgery
Serious illnesses that can’t be treated with a mainstream approach

Sister Kate explains in the dosage video that taking a gelcap every day for healthy people might be overkill. “I take one to help me sleep at night,” she says, “But someone else might take it in the morning to face their day. That’s the magic of the plant.”

We tell folks to start with one gelcap and if there is no relief in ten to twenty minutes, take another. Two gelcaps will put most people between 100 pounds and 130 pounds to sleep. Experiment safely. At the beginning, don’t mix it with anything else. Later, as you get accustomed to how your body reacts, a glass of white wine and a gelcap might be your sleeping potion. In Sister Kate’s case, she takes a tart cherry gelcap at night with her CBD gelcap, believing the two complement each other in getting a good night’s sleep.

Experiment. And then share what you learn.

Remember, the gelcap is the strongest, most potent form of the plant medicine we have. A prick to the gelcap will give you immensely helpful oil in healing a cut or a skin abrasion. It is powerful, and the finding of you dosage must be done with cautious intention and the open mind of a fresh, new student.