Best Benefits Of CBD For Women With Menopause
Menopause is the time in a woman’s life when menstruation stops permanently. This happens to women between their mid-40s and early 50s, though it can come earlier or later than this for some women. Menopause isn’t classed as an illness, but there are often symptoms that follow which you may want to seek treatment for.
The main symptom of menopause is hot flashes, where your body’s temperature increases rapidly. These are known as vasomotor symptoms (VMS), and usually bring on feelings of warmth that become less intense after a few minutes. Other VMS include headaches and sweating.
Most cases of menopause will be classed as ‘natural’, meaning that no external treatment is required. But if your menopause symptoms are severe, or if you want to take medication to ease ease menopause symptoms of VMS, there are ways CBD oil could help.
So what exactly is CBD oil?
Cannabis contains two major hormones called tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) and cannabidiol (CBD). These have completely different effects on the human body while also working together in many cases.
The cannabis plant contains two major hormones called THC and CBD
THC is psychoactive, which means it’s the part of cannabis that gets you ‘high’. It produces this feeling by binding to your brain cells’ cannabinoid receptors. If enough THC attaches, it stimulates cell activity in your brain that makes you feel ‘stoned’.
CBD lacks any kind of psychoactive effects, but it can still bind to your cannabinoid receptors. CBD is anti-inflammatory and doesn’t stimulate cell activity in your brain, so you won’t feel high or stoned when you take CBD products.
What Is CBD Oil?
The use of hemp for medicinal purposes dates back to ancient times; it’s also known that hemp was used as a food source many years ago. In recent times, though, there have been huge leaps in understanding how CBD oil works and what it can be used for.
In the US, for example, anyone with epilepsy can take a prescription drug called Epidiolex. This has a high level of CBD within it and has been shown to help patients who suffer from seizures. There are currently over 100 recorded studies on CBD, all of them discovering new ways that this cannabinoid could benefit women’s health.
How Can CBD Oil Help With Common Menopause Symptoms?
The first step is to describe exactly how menopause happens and why VMS occurs as part of it. Just like cannabis plants contain high levels of THC and only small amounts of CBD, women’s bodies contain high levels of estrogen and only small amounts of progesterone.
At the start of a woman’s reproductive cycle, her ovaries produce eggs that contain large amounts of estrogen. This has an effect on the lining inside your uterus, which makes it ideal for a fertilized egg to attach itself to. If you’re pregnant, this is exactly what happens; but if you’re not, then a hormone called progesterone halts further production of estrogen until the next month.
After the egg is released from its follicle, it can’t get fertilized so nothing more happens in your uterus until the next month when another egg becomes available… But not every month does an egg become available. When you reach perimenopause and then menopause, it’s because your ovaries are no longer producing eggs – or because the eggs they produce can’t be fertilized anymore.
The lack of estrogen production in the uterus means that this lining breaks down, causing vaginal bleeding to take place instead. This happens for around 4-5 days at a time, making it seem like your period is coming early every month. Now you see why VMS occurs! Menopausal symptoms happen when women have less estrogen in their bodies than usual, while their uteruses are trying to get rid of the lining without any help from estrogen levels.
How Can CBD Oil Help With Hot Flashes?
CBD works by attaching itself to various receptors within your body. In the case of hot flashes, it attaches to two receptors called TRPV1 and CB2, both of which are responsible for regulating your body temperature.
In some cases, CBD will work through attaching itself to these receptors – but there’s more to it than that.
For example, a study in 2011 showed that levels of TRPV1 increase when you have a hot flash. When scientists gave rats an injection of capsaicin – which is what makes chili peppers so spicy – they found that this caused TRPV1 levels to rise significantly. The more TRPV1 you have in your body, the less likely you are to feel a hot flash.
Similarly, another study on mice from 2013 showed that mice with low levels of TRPV1 have less severe hot flashes than usual. However, stimulating the body’s production of these receptors does not always have this effect! This is where CBD can come into play…
CBD has been shown to stimulate the release of anandamide – a compound that activates both CB1 and CB2 – inside your brain. It also stimulates FAAH, which is an enzyme that breaks down anandamide. By inhibiting this enzyme, more anandamide remains active within your brain.
Another study showed that rats who were injected with THC had lower amounts of serotonin in their brains. Serotonin plays a key role in regulating your mood and feelings, so balancing it out with CBD can help reduce anxiety disorders and depression. It may also improve your sleep disturbances, which in turn might make hot flashes less severe.
So if you’re experiencing anxiety disorders or depressed because of your menopause symptoms, then it’s possible that CBD can help improve this for you – alongside reducing the severity of your hot flashes, of course!
How Can CBD Oil Help With Mood Swings?
Although menopause is usually associated with physical symptoms like hot flashes, vaginal dryness, fatigue, etc., many women experience mood swings during this time too… And at least one scientific study has shown that these are linked to changes in our hormones. This doesn’t apply to all cases of post-menopausal mood disorders, but it might explain why some women become more irritable as their estrogen levels drop.
In one particular study, 55 patients suffering from pre-, peri- and postmenopausal mood disorders were asked to take a daily dose of either estradiol or a placebo for six months. By the end of this, those who had been taking estradiol reported feeling less anxious and depressed than usual, whereas those who took the placebo didn’t notice any difference.
Estrogen plays an important role in maintaining your mood throughout menopause, so if you’re suffering from anxiety or depression then finding something that mimics estrogen might help. CBD does this by attaching itself to these receptors within your brain. There’s also some evidence that CBD legal products might reduce the effect of cytokines on your body – which are proteins that can cause inflammation and, in turn, depression.
Another study showed that estradiol (one of the main estrogens produced by your ovaries) will regulate serotonin levels within your brain. Serotonin is known as the ‘happy hormone’ for a reason; it helps lift our moods and makes us feel happier, whereas low levels of it can make you feel sad or even depressed. So increasing your level of estradiol to maintain elevated serotonin levels will help to improve your mood naturally.
How Can CBD products help with Sleep Difficulties?
Approved nonprescription CBD products can help you get to sleep, and it can even help improve REM sleep.
It’s common for women to feel restless during the early stages of perimenopause. At this stage, estrogen levels are still relatively high so CBD will have no effect on your body – but if you’re overweight then losing excess weight might give you a better shot at a restful sleep.
Once you enter menopause, however, hormone changes, night sweats can become extremely disruptive to your sleep. So what does CBD do that might make it useful as a sleeping aid during this stage?
Because levels of estrogen decrease as you reach menopause, the production of melatonin will also decrease. Melatonin is a hormone that regulates your sleep-wake cycle, or circadian rhythm. By keeping the levels of estrogen in check, CBD helps maintain higher levels of melatonin – which means better sleeping patterns overall!
CBD can also help you get to sleep more easily by binding to adenosine receptors on your brain. As well as reducing the production of cortisol, thus allowing you to relax more easily.
How Can CBD Oil Help With Joint Pain?
One study has shown that both THC and anandamide cause pain relief when applied to the skin. THC, does this by binding itself to CB1 receptors in your brain, whereas CBD does it by attaching itself to other receptors throughout your body. They are also much more potent than estradiol, so you’ll need much lower doses of them in comparison if you wish to avoid psychoactive effects.
Another study has found that when applied to the skin, anandamide reduces sensations of joint pain and itch – which can be both annoying and painful for menopausal women!
Bone density is a big concern for many women as they reach menopause. Studies have shown that CBD can help to regulate bone density throughout this time, making it an effective treatment option for osteoporosis and degenerative bone diseases.
In conclusion, CBD oil for menopause symptoms can be very effective. It will not cure your condition by itself, but you can use it alongside other remedies like black cohosh or magnesium supplements to reduce the number of hot flashes you get during the day.
Estrogen replacement therapy has often been used to treat menopausal women, but it’s not without its downsides. Estrogens that are administered orally might cause an increased risk of blood clots, while hormone replacement therapy has been linked to an increased chance of breast cancer. CBD relieves these symptoms by giving you some of the benefits of estrogen without any of the risks associated with it.
Some women even notice that using this reduces their anxiety and depression too, which makes life a lot more manageable.
Please leave any questions below, and I’ll answer them with another article soon!
You may also enjoy reading this article: 5 Natural Ways To Boost Your Energy Levels
