Better Together
by Tricia Brown BSN, RN, NC-BC
For as long as I can remember, I have heard the saying “relationships are the most important thing in life.” From religion to philosophy, the importance of relationships has been discussed for centuries. We can also find scientific knowledge revealing different ways in which relationships are meaningful. For example, the quality of our relationships is the best predictor of happiness, and individuals with strong relationships tend to live longer and be healthier.
One of the biggest advantages of science may be that it helps us look beyond our human relationships. For instance, our relationships with pets and other animals can impact our health and happiness. Our lives are affected by relationships with organisms we cannot even see. Researchers are continually discovering ways that our relationship with bacteria impacts our health, from digestion to energy production.
Just like our human relationships, we want the relationships happening inside our bodies to be positive and harmonious. As a nurse coach, I want my clients to think of all their relationships through this lens. If relationships are so important, how can we leverage these relationships to help us restore and/or enhance our health?
The first step to improve our well-being is awareness. Specifically, becoming aware of the relationships in both our lives and our bodies. In this issue of Bloom, we explore the concepts of symbiosis and dysbiosis. From a broad lens, I think of symbiosis as “healthy” relationships and dysbiosis as “unhealthy” relationships. In this way, a symbiotic relationship benefits our health in some way, whereas a dysbiotic relationship leads to disharmony, or dis-ease.
Again, in working toward restoring and enhancing health, how do we prioritize our relationships with things that benefit our health while also addressing our relationships with things that are barriers to health? For example, an unhealthy relationship with microbes in our digestive tract may give us discomfort, let alone distress or disease. We may decide to eat healthier foods and avoid unhealthy ones as an approach to improving our gut biome and resolving dysbiosis. Importantly, to support symbiosis, we need to not only learn about our partners, but also how we get along together. In a way, this is natural for us.
When we learn about food and nutrition, we often learn about it through the lens of specific relationships that its components have with our bodies (e.g., oranges have vitamin C, which is crucial to our immune function; or that our bodies need protein for growth and repair, and we learn about the food sources that best meet this need).
We also have a relationship with food in terms of how it makes us feel (both physical and emotional). Of course, aspects of our relationships with food may be known (like allergies) and unknown (a nutrient absorption problem), and lived and experienced (like food insecurity or eating disorders).
This feeling component is also true for cannabis, as it is a plant we are consuming. As a cannabis nurse, I need to learn about the plant and how it works with our bodies. We know cannabis consists of various molecules like cannabinoids, terpenes, and flavonoids. We also know that cannabis interacts with our bodies through various receptors, other pathways, and that we have various routes of consumption. Science has shown that the whole plant, rather than its separate parts, provides the most effective medicine.
How do we find the right medicine for our particular health condition or goal?
Certainly, a discussion about our symbiotic relationship with cannabis must include the endocannabinoid system (ECS), which is the main bodily system that interacts with cannabis.
The ECS has large tasks, such as helping us maintain balance and communicating with other systems. It also plays an important role in daily functions like eating and sleeping, and it can help us with specific tasks, like providing an immunity boost, easing anxiety, or alleviating pain. It continually performs its work inside our bodies, yet we are often unaware.
Our bodies have these endogenous cannabinoids that serve as chemical messengers, but we can also influence the ECS with phytocannabinoids, like those found in the cannabis plant. How can we establish a balance with our endocannabinoid system to enable it to function optimally? First and foremost, we want to engage in behaviors that support ECS tone or functioning, which means being conscious of our ECS and its role in our overall health.
Science has provided us with numerous studies that demonstrate the impact of our daily habits, including what we consume (food, drink, social media, etc.), how we move our bodies, who comprises our social support networks, how well we sleep, and how we manage stress, on our overall health. In short, healthy behaviors establish a terrain where the ECS functions optimally. Certainly, easier said than done!
Fortunately, we also have a plant that appears to have been specifically designed for us. Indeed, with its entourage of impacts, we can often feel the benefits of cannabis without knowing much about the plant or its relationship with our bodies. But we do need to understand how cannabis supports our health from an individualized perspective. For example, to maximize the therapeutic potential of cannabis, a patient with Multiple Sclerosis may need to learn about and explore cannabis chemovars known to be effective, not to mention different routes of administration, dosing, and possible drug interactions.
When we work together with cannabis and make healthy choices, the plant will work symbiotically with our ECS. When we engage in a thoughtful, informed partnership with cannabis—and with our bodies— we create space for health. Because in the end, just like with any relationship, healing and growth happen when we collaborate.
