Is it safe to use CBD during pregnancy?
What you should know about CBD during pregnancy
Given its action on fertility and menstrual pain, more and more women are wondering if it is possible to use CBD during pregnancy. During this particular time, it is crucial for child development to favor natural solutions to the discomforts of being pregnant... can CBD help relieve them? Let’s review this together.
CBD during pregnancy: a promising lead
The solution to relieve painful symptoms
Though for most women, pregnancy is a period filled with fulfillment and excitement, it is also accompanied by transformations that are difficult to endure. Many symptoms that CBD is known to relieve.
It is the most known sign when talking about the first trimester: nausea and vomiting. A symptom that may seem harmless, but that can quickly poison daily life, preventing some women from eating normally. They then run the risk of dehydration and lack of nutrients. CBD can help relieve this feeling by stimulating the production of serotonin in the body.
Expectant mothers also have to deal with a variety of pains, from uterine contractions to headaches caused by hormonal disruptions and breast sensitivities. These are all discomforts that CBD could relieve by intercepting pain and inflammation signals.
But conceiving a new human being is not all about physical discomfort. The prospect of motherhood and the many preparations that come with it can create anxiety for the mother-to-be. A symptom for which cannabidiol is very useful: in addition to stimulating the production of serotonin, the molecule balances the baroreceptor, responsible for blood pressure and respiratory discomfort. Pretty useful, right?
By acting on anxiety and pain, which keep more than one pregnant woman awake, CBD can also relieve sleep disorders.
It is little talked about, and yet prenatal depression affects nearly one woman in five. An affliction that the molecule can help relieve by acting on parameters related to the mood as sexual desire or appetite.
CBD has therefore an important potential to relieve many problems during pregnancy.
An aid to embryo development?
It seems that the potential of our favorite molecule does not only concern the future mother. Indeed, CBD could help the development of the embryo.
Already present at the creation of the embryo, the endocannabinoid system plays an essential role in its development. A study on mice, which have a system very similar to ours, has shown that the consumption of CBD during pregnancy would promote the proper development of the embryo through its interaction with CB1 and CB2 receptors, responsible in particular for nerve and brain activity.
To learn more about the endocannabinoid system, feel free to read our article on the effects of CBD.
A substance that should be used with caution
Despite this important therapeutic potential, CBD remains a substance that should be consumed with caution.
Smoking CBD: the one thing you should avoid during pregnancy
During this particular period, it is strongly advised not to smoke CBD flowers. Their combustion indeed releases carbon monoxide (CO), which will take the place of oxygen in blood. Consequence? The organs of the mother and the fetus are not sufficiently oxygenated any more. The CO also has harmful effects on the vessels, in particular those of the cord.
If you still want to consume CBD by inhalation, we recommend you turn to a CBD vape or heat your CBD flowers with a vaporizer.
A molecule that has yet to be more thoroughly studied
Most of the medical profession is still reluctant to use CBD because of the insufficient number of studies conducted on the subject. Here again, the molecule is still suffering from the bad reputation and the harmful effects of its cousin, THC.
Although it is present in very small quantities in CBD products authorized on the market, the THC molecule is able to cross the placenta and would be potentially dangerous for the development of the embryo and even the growth of the child thereafter.
However, many elements suggest that CBD would not represent the same risk as conventional cannabis, with higher levels of THC.
On the one hand, CBD has been shown not to affect the same receptors as THC and even blocks some of its effects by compensating with its own connections or even by directly reducing its influence on the receptors.
Moreover, CBD does not leave any trace on the maternal milk, contrary to THC, which would be present there up to 63%.
New studies specific to CBD would therefore be welcome to see a little more clearly. It would be a shame to miss such a therapeutic potential ...
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Cake it easy,
Joséphine