By: Loren Lee Chiesi
Emily Kyle is a New York-based registered dietitian & nutritionist and a trailblazing cannabis entrepreneur.
Her namesake website is a portal to cannabis-infused medicine, recipes, and lifestyle rituals with a bright, distinctly feminine flair.
Miss Marijuana interviewed Kyle get her take on medicinal cannabis, how marijuana supports the female body, gender equality in the cannabis industry, and being a CannaMom fighting against social stigma and inequality.
Loren Lee Chiesi: You’re a practicing nutritionist. What is the intersection between the healing elements of cannabis and healthy living?
Emily Kyle: I started my business in 2016. But two years ago, when I started to specialize in treating inflammatory and auto-immune conditions, I realized many of them had started to include cannabis and CBD in their treatment plans.
It was a blessing for me when CBD (the chemical in marijuana plants that relieves pain and inflammation without the high) became mainstream and legally available.
It exposed a gateway for me to start using CBD with my patients, and eventually a spectrum of cannabis treatments.
It was like a perfect storm: the ending of cannabis prohibition at the state level, more open-minded attitudes towards marijuana as medicine, and increased interest in alternative medicine options for chronic illnesses.
Now more than ever, people are looking for reliable, safe, and educated ways to include cannabis into their wellness lifestyles.
LLC: What were some of the first cannabis products you began using as a nutritionist to help treat your clients?
EK: The passage of the 2018 Farm Bill (which legalized hemp production) got me started discussing CBD with my clients.
CBD is a safe bridge into the world of cannabis-for-wellness because there’s no intoxication, no high, and minimal negative side effects.
So for people who are opposed to using cannabis for these reasons, it’s a path to incorporating the many therapeutic properties of cannabis that are safe and effective.
Right now, we are just at the tip of the iceberg in understanding the capacity of what cannabis and CBD can really do for our overall wellbeing. That will only broaden exponentially in the next few years.
LLC: Absolutely, the cannabis industry is evolving rapidly. The idea of who a cannabis user is has changed a lot – in the last decade especially. What was your idea of a typical cannabis user growing up?
EK: Like most other people, I considered cannabis a street drug. It was on the same level as alcohol; I wouldn’t have considered it a “hard drug.”
I had my first experience with weed at 16, when my former boyfriend offered me some. That’s a pretty common story amongst my peers.
At the time, my impression of cannabis users was very, very male-dominated. All the stoner films always focused on young men that were slackers, lazy, and airheaded.
Weed was steeped in bro-culture. I never saw myself reflected in that culture. Unfortunately, I still think that stoner culture image is so prevalent now.
LLC: How did you educate yourself about medicinal cannabis? Did you attend trainings or receive any special education?
EK: Yes, and I have been a cannabis user for the last 10 years, at first to help manage my anxiety. All I knew at that time was that I smoked weed, and it helped me.
But as I started discussing CBD use in my practice, I began to see the parallels among cannabis, health, and nutrition.
I knew I needed to get more formal education in order to talk about cannabis-for-wellness with confidence.
So I went back to school to the Holistic Cannabis Academy, which was recognized by my credentialing body for nutrition continuing education credit.
It was a 30-hour long program, and it set the foundational scientific knowledge I needed to communicate with people effectively about medicinal cannabis that is rooted in science.
I plan to continue my education because we’re still in a sticky place. Most of the research that was done on cannabis over the last 50 years was against cannabis, so there is still currently a huge gap between anecdotal experience and what science says right now.
LLC: Keeping that gap in mind, what are some medicinal uses of CBD, that people might not already know about?
EK: Where I’ve seen the biggest results is with rheumatoid arthritis, the painful swelling of the joints, especially in the hands, knees, and shoulders.
With an anti-inflammatory diet and the use of both CBD sublingually and in creams and salves, I’ve seen significant improvements that have been life-changing.
My grandmother suffered with RA, and I witnessed how much pain she was in almost daily. Now, I wish I could have given her this natural and therapeutic option to try.
So, I get really excited to see it work for those folks with RA.
For women specifically, in terms of reproductive health, there has been great success using cannabis suppositories and topicals to alleviate cramps due to menstruation, premenstrual inflammation, endometriosis, and even symptoms of menopause.
Lots of people aren’t talking about this, but cannabis can also help increase female sexual satisfaction and arousal using topicals.
While there is much more research to do, it’s well-established that there are a ton of endocannabinoid receptors at the top of our uterus.
Essentially, our female reproductive system is wired to respond to cannabis. Research hasn’t made all the connections yet, but there is a lot of hope and discovery for female health and medicinal cannabis.
LLC: That sounds like a bright future! Can you suggest some products that would be effective for pain and for pleasure?
EK: Hemp is the plant that all cannabinoid products are derived from. I use cannabis as an umbrella term for all products that contain cannabinoids, but there are differences for medicinal purposes.
So what you can look at is the ratios between THC and CBD.
Some will be 1:1, having the same amount of THC and CBD. The standard, full spectrum CBD oil has a high level of CBD and very low-to-no levels of THC. For pain, it’s best to get a higher THC ratio.
For anxiety, sleep, and stress, it’s best to try high CBD and lower THC. People have different sensitivities to cannabis, and THC can cause anxiety in some people, so I recommend starting out with a high CBD products and then baby step your way up to higher THC until you find what works best for your body.
Willingness to experiment and listen to your body is so important for women, because our bodies haven’t even been studied as extensively as males in scientific research trials.
I recommend keeping a daily journal of how you feel while using cannabis so that you can track your own reactions and progress to see objectively what is working and what is not. CBD products are expensive right now, so if it’s not working, there’s no point in continuing.
But if it does – and for many, many people it will – it’s a safe, natural investment in your overall wellbeing.
LLC: Tracking is a brilliant idea. Cannabis seems like a panacea for female reproductive health, would you agree?
EK: Well, I don’t think that’s a coincidence. From a botany perspective, the male cannabis plants are useless for medicinal purposes.
If you’re a grower and you get male plants, you have to weed them out. So even at the very basic root level, it’s the female aspect of the plant that has all the magical, chemical cannabinoid compounds and medicinal properties.
LLC: Unfortunately, we don’t see that female presence in the cannabis industry currently. Most cannabis companies and stores are male-owned. As a female entrepreneur, what made you want to jump into this space?
EK: Fifty percent of the population is female, yet 90% of the cannabis industry is male-dominated.
Circling back to that idea of the “stoner bro” image of cannabis users, I had no female role models, I knew no women who were talking about using medicinal cannabis successfully – or even admitting to it recreationally.
There are a lot of successful, health-minded women who want to use cannabis to improve their quality of life. I want my work to be a lighthouse for these like-minded women.
LLC: Do you have any opinions on why there is such a gender discrepancy in the cannabis industry?
EK: There’s so much social stigma, even now, surrounding women who use cannabis, especially if they are mothers, or have young children in school, or work certain jobs.
The stakes are just higher, and there is so much judgment from both men and other women.
I’m blessed to have a created a job where I have the freedom to speak up, and I want to extend that umbrella of shelter to other women who may not feel as comfortable being open about their recreational or medicinal cannabis use.
LLC: Along your journey, were there any female cannabis pioneers who you looked up to?
EK: Yes, my mentor, Janice Newel Bissex. She’s a leader in the dietetics field, and I met her at conference where she was presenting on cannabis.
I could not believe she was talking about weed to healthcare professionals! I got to talk to her backstage, and she really inspired my career.
She paved the way and told me, “See, I talk about cannabis, and my career is fine, and the world did not implode.” She gave me the confidence to feel like I could do that, too.
I also love and get so much support from social media CannaMoms like @highsocietymama, @themommyjane, @totallyblunt.ca.
LLC: CannaMoms is a clever term. You’ve alluded to the public shaming towards moms that use weed. Can you talk about your experience with that: as a public figure, businesswoman, and mother?
EK: There’s a pressing social stigma that cannabis users can’t be successful, motivated, or attentive.
Society has a fierce grip on the long-held belief that we are just lazy people who sit on the couch and get stoned all day.
In many ways, it’s still perpetuated in our culture. It’s just not accurate or justified. Just consider cannabis in relation to alcohol.
Wine is “mommy juice,” and people don’t think anything of having a cocktail with friends in front of their children. Yet, the rates of addiction and domestic disruption that are caused by alcohol abuse far outweigh that of cannabis.
I know from personal experience that if a woman comes out as a joint-rolling mama, you get threats of reports to CPS and blacklisted from the playdate circles.
But the truth of it is that my kid is happy and healthy, I’m a successful business owner, I’m an educated woman, and I’m a responsible parent. There are many more moms out there like me.
LLC: That’s such an empowering stance. While we’re discussing stigma and disparity, it’s a well-documented fact that the BIPOC community is disproportionally affected by cannabis prohibition, especially when it comes to possession, use, arrests and incarceration. Can you suggest any BIPOC that we can support and follow?
EK: I’m so glad you asked this, because we have so many problems in the cannabis industry when it comes to social equity and systemic racism.
The @bluntblowinmama sells these great shirts with inspirational phrases on them that speak to my soul.
I also adore the content by @plantbasedmaryjane and @cannaclusive on Instagram.
I use my platform to highlight the social justice issues that need to be included as we move forward with federal legalization.
It’s not fair that I, a white woman, can publicize and profit from growing cannabis in an illegal state and not be put in jail.
If history portends, that would not be and has not been the case for Women of Color. I support the Last Prisoner Project, which raises funds to help prisoners incarcerated for cannabis offenses to get out and rebuild their lives.
To learn more about Emily Kyle’s work, visit her website: https://emilykylenutrition.com/ or contact her directly via email at emily@emilykylenutrition.com.
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Loren Lee Chiesi is a writer who focuses on health, wellness, and cannabis culture.