Be yourself; Everyone else is already taken.
— Oscar Wilde.
This is the first post on my new blog. I’m just getting this new blog going, so stay tuned for more. Subscribe below to get notified when I post new updates.
The 7th Letter Story
In this blog I will be discussing the creation of 7th letter wellness and the family of our team.
First, there is Gavin, my brother and the owner of 7th Letter Wellness. The strongest male figure I have in my life, the decision maker and the executioner. Since we were young my brother and I have always wanted to own our own businesses. We have always wanted to be the man, and to not work for the man. Next, there is my sister, Kendall who is an investor and partial owner of 7th Letter. She is an eager go getter that has taught herself everything she knows. Kendall lives in Houston, Texas and works in sales for a company called Pro Chem, from being a rookie in the Pro Chem business at age 19 she was rookie of the year and had the most sales of any sales agent in the nation, but she didn’t stop there. Since she is not in the area of our shop she is mainly an outside sales rep who creates wholesale orders and spreads the word of our company out in Houston.
Then there is our incredibly loyal employee Dylan, who joined the team a few months into the storefront being open. Dylan is an alumni of my fraternity Pi Lambda Phi, and i met him when I was pledging during alumni weekend, from that moment on I knew I needed to keep his creative, smart mind on my team. He runs the day to day life in the shop and coordinates events for our team to go out and show support to our loving community.
Lastly, there me, Carter, I am the head marketing agent for 7th Letter wellness. While I am still in school, I am just working part time. My job includes taking care of the social media platforms, creating content to post on the social media, as well as flyers, billboards, and much more.
In this blog I want to talk about the true origin of 7th Letter, well to start this off you need to know about my father, Kenneth Kilby, ken for short. In his life he has had a lot of medical issues, including multiple heart attacks, strokes, and blood clots. With that being said my father had to go through surgeries on his heart from the clots in his left ventricle, now he has a device in his heart that pumps his blood throughout his body called an LVAD. The surgery to put the LVAD in his chest was about 2.5 years ago and he went through some insane pain from the surgery and even in his day to day life. Our father was in so much pain and no medicine were strong enough to help. Then my brother thought to start dosing my father with CBD, that day his life was changed for good. At first, I was not a full believer in CBD but after seeing the results it had on our own father my brother knew this was the path he wanted to pursue.
Now 7th Letter is a common word used in almost every household in the Chesterfield, Va area. We opened up in a little under a year ago today and we have had nothing but success in helping and healing people in the community.
Are All CBD Oil Carriers The Same?
To start this blog off I will be discussing the differences in CBD oils and if all CBD oils are the same. Well to start this blog you will have to know the components of CBD oils and their differences of bioavailability within the body, or in simpler terms the absorption rate of the CBD in the body.
First, the components you will need to learn to really understand this blog is 1. Carrier oils, and 2. THC content.
HEMP SEED OIL
The first component we will discuss is the carrier of the CBD within the oil itself. There are a few options that people use as their carrier, number one being hemp seed oil. Hemp seed oil is an oil that comes from the seed itself when it is cold pressed, or frozen and put under a press with great force. Hemp seed oil is one of the most efficient carriers because it contains your healthy fatty acids known as omegas 3, 6, and 9 as well as numerous proteins. In my personal preference hemp seed oil is a great candidate for a carrier oil but it’s not the best.
MCT OIL
Next, we will discuss the benefits of MCT oil. MCT oil is a supplement made from a fat called medium-chain triglycerides, but most people know it as a biproduct of coconuts. A benefit of using MCT oil as their carrier oil in CBD is because the molecules in the oil are smaller than those in most fats you eat, thus making it easier to be absorbed into the bloodstream. MCT oil also helps improve absorption because it does not need stomach acid to be broken down in order to be absorbed. Differing from different carrier oils which will diminish the CBD molecule in the stomach acids while trying to be absorbed.
EMU OIL
Lastly, we have emu oil, which is an all-natural oil derived from the emu bird. Emu oil is known for quickly penetrating joints and muscles making it a prime option to use as a carrier oil in a CBD product. Emu oil also contains essential fatty acids that lead to the fast and effective absorption into the body.
Overall, with the three main carrier oils, hemp seed oil, MCT oil, and emu oil, which is the most effective? Through scientific trials it all depends if there is THC within the CBD itself, for a broad spectrum I would say that the hemp seed oil is the most effective, but for a full spectrum oil containing a minimal amount of .03% or less I would recommend the MCT oil for maximum bioavailability.
How 7th Letter Wellness is Doing in this Pandemic
First, I wanted to start this blog off by hoping you all are healthy and happy in the historic pandemic. In this blog I will be discussing how 7th Letter Wellness is doing in this time and the precautions we are taking to keep our community and staff healthy.
First, we have closed the internal portion of our store, so people are not allowed to get out of their cars and come inside the store itself. Since people are not allowed to shop inside we have had google come by and take 3 dimensional pictures of our shop so the consumer can shop virtually and contact free.
We also have a 7th Letter booth set up outside our store so people can pull up to my brothers shop , get out of their car and have a 6 foot distanced conversation with one of our CBD specialist about the products that are right for them. If we have a customer new to CBD or even just new to 7th Letter we have the booth set up outside we also have a small cart that we roll out to them with our best selling items on their to kind of guide their purchase and actually allow the customers to see and view the products they could potentially purchase.
On the cart that gets rolled out to the customers contains one of every size of and different mg per dose of our oils and gummies, also on the cart you will see out topicals as well as our famous hemp flower. In this pandemic we have seen a boost in sales in our hemp flower and at this time we are trying to figure out why people are smoking CBD more than taking it by oil, but I’ll tell you we are not complaining.
At 7th Letter Wellness we are taking multiple precautions to keep our employees and the community of Chesterfield County safe and healthy. First when a customer pulls up to the store there is a sign to honk and we will come service you. Some of those precautions we are taking is that obviously all of our employees must wear a mask for facial protection, s well as wearing gloves when interacting with customers one on one. When the customer has purchased an item, we always wipe down the card and bag the product with the debit/credit card along with the receipt.
By taking precautions we have been able to stay open and continue to serve our community.
How CBD Has Helped Me
CBD can affect people differently; in this blog I will discuss how CBD has benefited me in my everyday life. Personally, I started taking CBD a little over a year and a half ago for multiple reasons.
First, I will talk about the first time I ever came into contact with CBD, the first time I ever saw CBD was three to four years ago at a vape store, I used to vape heavily so I went through many bottles of juice and tried many different flavors and brands, but three years ago I was at nags head beach in North Carolina and saw that a certain juice brand that I really enjoyed also made a CBD juice that was an additive to nicotine juice. That means that you would mix the two juices together and fill the vape with it. At the time I found no effects of the CBD juice but was still very intrigued. I personally have always enjoyed cannabis and any biproduct of cannabis.
The next time that CBD came up in my life was when my father went through a lot of health issues and my brother and I thought of trying to dose him with CBD to help with his pain levels. After dosing my dad with CBD for a week we could already see the difference in him and he was absolutely seeing results from just a few doses of this magical cannabis biproduct.
After seeing the benefits of CBD from our own father my brother created a CBD store in Chesterfield County, Virginia called 7th Letter Wellness. When he first thought of making a store I instantly became more impressed with the effects of CBD, from then on all I did was research CBD, this consisted of any material I could get my hands on. From that day on I have used CBD daily.
Nearly 3 months after the store was open I dislocated my elbow and was in tremendous every day. Once I was able to get ahold of our 7th Letter topical the relief was incredible. I would apply the salve to my elbow every couple of hours and it helped tremendously with my swelling and pain levels. The 7th Letter salve is a solution of CBD, CBG, and turmeric which are all anti-inflammatories.
Now that my elbow is all healed I still use CBD every day, now I dose more for my anxiety, I haven’t always had anxiety it actually has arose in the past 6 months and with CBD I have been able to keep it under control in ways I never thought imaginable.
Top CBD Companies
With cannabidiol or CBD becoming such a huge market there are a lot of different brands and companies of CBD, but do they all “work”. Since there is such an abundance of CBD companies how will you pick which brand is right for you? In this blog I will be discussing my top two CBD companies.
For me picking which company is most effective is difficult, in my time testing out different CBD and different companies a lot comes down to preference. I have been taking CBD for a little over a year and a half now, and if I could guess how many companies I have tested I would say around 50. Since my brother owns a CBD shop in Chesterfield, Virginia companies around the united states have sent us product testing packages with their top sellers from their product selection. Those packages normally contain a few of their oils in tinctures, a pack or two of gummies, and normally a topical salve.
The first company I will discuss is 7th Letter Wellness, located in Chesterfield, Virginia. The 7th Letter company opened up nearly a year ago and is growing tremendously. 7th Letter Wellness caries a variety of products from a multi-patented proprietary formula that has an increased bio-availability (absorption rate) up to 20 times greater than traditional CBD. This means that 7th Letter CBD can get into the bloodstream faster, anywhere from 10-20 minutes and last longer, up to 12 hours. For a traditional CBD it can take up to 3 hours to be absorbed with only 8% actually being absorbed, and will stay in the bloodstream fro up to 10 hours. 7th Letter also carries a variety of great CBD gummies and salves.
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Next on my list will have to be Lunchbox Alchemy, mainly known for its THC products also has a great name for itself in the CBD industry. Lunchbox is known for it’s incredible yet pricey gummy they call Squibs. Within their squibs they use a full spectrum CBD for a maximum terpene profile, including taste and smell.
Lunchbox Alchemy also carries CBD oils for for direct absorption which is also a full spectrum oil, which contains the minimal .3% THC. They have three great flavors in their oils including pepperment, blood orange which is my personal favorite and original.
CBD and Anxiety
CBD or Canabidiol is a recipe for many things, but at the top of the relief list is anxiety. Millions of people struggle everyday with anxiety that can alter their day to day life. Anxiety medicines play a key role in the pharmaceutical industry and is a big money builder for big pharma. Another way to sooth your anxiety without the zombie feeling from taking a benzo is the natural cannabanoid CBD. CBD has a wide range of potential theraputic and medicinal effects on the nervous system. We tend to hear a lot about CBD in the context of treating epilepsy, multiple sclerosis, and nerve pain. But there is also the potential for treating a range of neuropsychiatric disorders, from trauma and depression to stress and anxiety.
Anxiety is a broad term that recovers a whole spectrum of feelings and experiences, from everyday worries and fears about the many challenges in your life. Anxiety disorders can lead to panic attacks, cause obsessive-compulsive behavoir and trigger symptoms of post-traumatic stress.
A study done in 2013 in current neuropharmacology demonstrated the link between CBD and neurogenesis in humans. And a 2016 animal study showed that CBD can produce a fast ating antidepressant and anti-anxiety effect by stimulating serotonin transmission in the brain. Serotonin is the chemical in our brain that promotes happiness. Serotonin levels can change widely from day to day with people that have nervous disorders.
There are many ways that CBD can help with anxiety relief but the best way to really get a hold on your anxiety with CBD usage is getting a consistent CBD regiment, as well as finding the right CBD for you. Growing up I didn’t have anxiety until about six months ago. For me, finding the correct regiment was crucial. I personally dose twice a day, once in the morning with a 20 mg dose and once at night before bed with another 20 mg dose. I personally have tried several brands of CBD and this might be a little biased but I would say 7th Letter Wellness oils help me out the most with controlling my anxiety.
With that being said your next step is to find out what CBD works for YOU, again I have tried many different companies CBD and not all are the same. It took me trial and error before I was able to get my anxiety under control. When testing out CBD for anxiety take it slow, you want to start with a small dose preferably around 10 mg’s for a few days and decide if it is working for you. If that 10 mg dose is not working try 15 to 20 mg’s.
What’s In Your Pipe?
In this day and age if you are purchasing any type of cannabis whether marijuana or hemp through legal dispensaries or the black market you might not be able to depict what you will be smoking, is it cannabis indica, cannabis sativa, or hybrid?
To be able to fully tell what is in your pipe I will break down the differences between the three types of cannabis, indica, sativa, and hybrid.
As cannabis connoisseurs I’m sure you have heard of the different types of cannabis but in this blog I am going to break them down a little further into detail just so you will be able to know the difference.
Originally there were only two types of cannabis, indica and sativa, but after generations of crossbreeding it is rare to find pure indica or pure sativa strains. With the amount of time that people have been crossing strains the cannabis plant is more predominately a hybrid, whether indica dominant or sativa dominant.
First, cannabis indica, this type of cannabis is typically shorter with wide leaves, and tight dense buds. An indica strain will usually be associated with more body sensations also known as a body high. The indica plant is more of a downer compared to the other two and is recommended for nighttime use. An easy way to recognize cannabis indica is if you get sleepy or tired after consumption, as well as its darker purple and green colors. One way to remember the definition of the plant indica is “in-da-couch”. Some of the most popular indica strains include granddaddy purple, bubba kush, and grape ape.
Next, cannabis sativa, this plant is typically taller with long leaves, with a less dense and somewhat feathery buds. When a sativa strain is smoked it will normally produce a cerebral feeling. Traditionally, sativa strains are more uplifting and euphoric and are recommended for early morning and daytime use. The reason this type of cannabis is recommended to smoke during the day is because it will keep you awake and will not prompt you to be tired. A quick way to recognize cannabis sativa is looking for fluffy, light green and orange buds Some of the most popular sativa strains include sour diesel, pineapple express, and green crack.
Last type of cannabis is a hybrid. The cannabis hybrid plant is a crossbreed between an indica and sativa plant. Again there are very few pure indica or sativa strains now, most of them are a hybrid of them both. Within the hybrid plant there is normally a dominant scale of sativa or indica in the plant overall, for instance 60% indica and 40% sativa. There are also even split hybrids of 50% indica 50% sativa but they are more rare. Some of the most well known hybrid strains are blue dream, gelato, and girl scout cookies. These strains are recommended for afternoon and nighttime use since they will always have a little indica in them that could make you tired and drowsy.
So next time you pack your pipe, look at the plant that you are smoking and try to depict if it is cannabis indica, cannabis sativa, or a hybrid, this can introduce a whole new love for cannabis whether hemp or marijuana.
CBD Products
Its seems as almost every product you can think of is now being infused with CBD, but what really is CBD? CBD or Cannabidiol is a phytocannabanoid discovered in 1940, and is one of the 113 plus identified cannabanoids in the cannabis plant and amounts for up to 40% of the plants extract.
The most effective CBD product is an oil or tincture, the tincture is a small, normally 30 ML bottle that is taken two to three times a day. You can dose the oil by getting one ML of oil and dropping it under your tongue into your sublingual glands. Reasoning behind putting the oil under our tongues is because those sublingual glands have the fastest and greatest absorption rate of any of the glands in our body. Once the oil is under your tongue to you let it sit there for 30 to 45 seconds and swallow with water.
The next product I will discuss will be a CBD topical. A topical is any cream, lotion, or salve that is infused with CBD and can be applied directly to the skin. Topical’s are best known in the industry for their pain and inflammation reduction. The 7th Letter Wellness family has created a profound topical with the infusion of CBD, CBG another great anti-inflammatory, as well as turmeric which most of you might recognize as another great anti-inflammatory. Our 7th Letter salve also has bee’s wax, and multiple essential oils for smell since the turmeric additive does not smell very pleasing. The combination of all of these makes our 7th Letter salve one of the best on the market.
Next, I will be discussing CBD edibles. CBD edibles can come in all shapes and sizes, whether they are gummy’s, teas, chocolates, drinks and many more. For our 7th Letter brand we have a variety of gummy’s ranging from 300 mg 30 count packs which contain 10 mg gummy’s, we also have a 600 mg 30 count pack with each gummy containing 20 mg per gummy, then we have our gummy tubs containing 100 count gummy squares. The tubs come in two different mg count, our first tub contains 100 ten mg gummy’s adding up to 1000 mg, we also carry a 2000 mg tub still containing a 100 count but each gummy has 20 mg of CBD.
So whether it is an oil, topical, gummy or any of the other CBD infused products for your daily intake, all of them should help reduce stress, anxiety, arthritis pain, depression, inflammatory pain, nausea and much more.
When trying to find out which is the right product for you I always recommend starting with an oil because they have the highest absorption rate, especially when using 7th Letters oils, and the most benefits according to the absorption rate.
The Difference Between Hemp and Marijuana
To start this blog off I would like to say that both hemp and marijuana play key roles in our society today, but what really is the difference?
As the demand for CBD continues to skyrocket, the CBD industry has developed into a quiet unique market that is different yet still closely related to the cannabis industry, even after its controversial reputation and shifting legalities. Since CBD has had such an uproar in our community lets get the facts right just so you know the difference.
Cannabis is a genus of flowering plants in the Cannabaceae family and consists of Cannabis sativa, Cannabis indica, and Cannabis ruderalis.
Overall, hemp and marijuana are simply broad classifications of cannabis that were adopted into our culture, however there is more to the cannabis plant than hemp and marijuana.
Hemp
First, lets discuss hemp, hemp is a term used to classify varieties of cannabis that contains 0.3% or less of THC content by dried weight. This definition was not legitimized until when the Agricultural Act of 2018 was passed. Hemp has been used to describe non-intoxicating cannabis that is harvested for industrial use of its derived products like hemp rope, paper, and new biodegradable hemp plastic.
Nowadays the main use for hemp that the average person knows is for its potency of CBD and other cannabanoids. While hemp contains less than 0.3% THC, it is rich in CBD which has multiple benefits including, anti-inflammatory, neuroprotective, relief of anxiety, OCD, PTSD, and many more.
Marijuana
Next, I will discuss marijuana, marijuana is a term used to classify cannabis that contains more than 0.3% THC (go figure) by dry weight, and can produce a psychoactive feeling known as a high once smoked.
While the use of this term is widely used in American culture it represents a misrepresentation of cannabis, while most individuals in the industry see this term as “racist”. In early American history the term marijuana was non-existent and cannabis was mainly used to classify the plant, mainly because at the time no one knew the difference.
The term marijuana was a negative correlation coming from Mexican immagrants coming into the United States after the Mexican Revolution. Recently after, stories and rumors began to surface warning Americans of the dangerous and homicidal tendencies caused by “Mexican Cannabis” or “locoweed”. As the negative perception of cannabis grew, the government began regulating cannabis more vigorously.
By 1927, 11 states had passed anti-marijuana laws and by the 1930’s anti-marijuana propaganda and the fear of the “Reefer Madness” had begun.
In conclusion the difference in hemp and marijuana is not huge, the main difference is the THC content by dry weight. With hemp only allowing to contain 0.3% and marijuana to contain more than 0.3% THC. But when you are pulled over by to police you better know the difference!
Legalization of Marijuana
First I would like to start off this blog stating that I think that marijuana should be legalized in all 50 states of the U.S. but with that being said in the United States has a few different ways of legalizing. For marijuana to become legal it first has to be decriminalized or made (something that was previously illegal) permissible by law. which means it is now legal to posses or handle to a certain amount. What I mean by legal to posses up to a certain amount means that one is able to posses certain small amounts, for instance one gram up to two ounces (can vary by state), the reason that there are certain amounts you can carry is so that other people will not distribute the plant itself.
At the federal level, cannabis remains a prohibited substance by way of the Controlled Substance Act of 1970. Under the CSA, the Drug Enforcement Administration classifies cannabis as a Schedule I drug and is also determined to have a high potential for abuse, and no accepted medical use.
The second stage in the legalization process is that the state will recognize the medical benefits of cannabis and legalize it medically, so people with doctors written notes are able to obtain normally high grade cannabis for its medical uses. A few reasons to obtain a medical card include a bad back, insomnia, loss of appetite, and much more. A quick fun fact is that California was the first state to effectively legalize medical cannabis is 1966, when voters approved Proposition 215
The last stage in legalizing cannabis is for recreational use or relating to or denoting drugs taken on an occasional basis for enjoyment, especially when socializing. Cannabis is harmless and has zero scientifically found side effects, other than sitting on the couch and eating a whole bag of chips that is.
In the United States 26 different states have decriminalized marijuana, from Vermont to New Mexico, even to Alaska.
The legalization of medical use has spread to 33 of the 50 states. With that being said Hemp has been decriminalized in all 50 states, but hemp and hemp derived products are only allowed to contain up to .03% tetrahydrocannabinol, or THC.
Carter's Blog 