No luck with edibles or vape

Hi all, this is my first post but I have used the site for information many times in the past. I have been using cannabis to treat a couple conditions for around five years now and have always wanted to be able to medicate without smoking.

I have tried edibles a total of probably thirty times. Each time I prepared it myself using recipes and how to’s online. I do not have access to dispensaries so this is currently my only option. I am willing to believe I made mistakes in the process many times, but I’m a pretty smart guy so I’d assume I’ve nailed it at least a few times. Each time I’ve shared the edibles with others they get absolutely annihilated but I get next to nothing. I once made a batch of cookies that my at-the-time wife ate half of one cookie and was overmedicated to an extreme an hour later. I ate a whole one and felt nothing. This was far from my first attempt and I was growing frustrated so I figured I was going to cut the crap and go all in. I ate the whole rest of the batch. About an hour in I started to feel a bit of a lift, similar to right after you take a big toke but before it actually kicks in. I smiled and thought, “Here we go!” Nothing. It never increased from that point and lasted for about ten minutes. I have played around with decarb temps and times, cook times, ingredients and everything else I could think to do.

I have also tried vaping many times with the same results. I have tried the dry herb pens, tabletop models, and have made three attempts at making e-juice and have never achieved anything more than a slight “teaser” high.

I have searched and searched on this and many other forums. Many people have expressed similar experiences but the only responses anyone ever offers are either “me too” or “you’re just using shitty/not enough weed” and that’s not even acknowledging the legions of know-it-alls just straight up calling bullshit.

Is this simply a case of me having unfortunate body chemistry? Is it a sign of an undetected ailment? What can I do differently? I am tired of smoking but giving up the one medication that rendered my entire medicine cabinet obsolete is not an option. The side effects alone of all the junk the VA used to give me were unacceptable, add the fact that they were much less effective and you can see why I would be unwilling to go back. For the record, the only ailment that I’ve heard was potentially associated with a lack of effect from edibles was a poor functioning liver but that does not seem to be the case as I get mine checked twice a year.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

 

Thanks Galaxy, the lecithin thing is something I thought was silly when I first heard of it so I never looked into it deeper. I found a small-batch cannacap recipe with it that I made last night. I used MCT oil from Onnit. The only lecithin I could find given the amount of effort I was willing to put in was in the form of gelcap supplements. I popped and squeezed them into a dish then measured with a syringe. I ended up only making five caps because I tasted the oil and it is delicious so I saved the bulk of it to cook into something. The smell is phenomenal, I think it is begging me to go into some peanut butter cookies. Maybe even with chocolate chips. I haven’t had a chance to take the caps yet, but I’ll keep you posted when I do.

 

That recipe definitely sounds more potent than anything I’ve ever made. I don’t have regular access to hash though and by the time I’ve spent the money and effort getting ahold of it or making it myself, I would have a hard time rolling the dice and potentially letting it all go to waste. The thing is, I shouldn’t have to find something that would couchlock your average gentleman just to feel something. I think there must be something physiologically preventing THC uptake. I’m hoping maybe someone who has had similar issues and found a solution will find this thread and chime in.

I’ve thought of a few possibilities but I know neither how to test nor remedy them. First off, my liver. I specifically ask to have it checked as part of my regular physicals twice a year. I’m always told it is “normal” but what does that even mean in context? I know that it does it’s job and does it well enough that my body will survive without issue on my current diet. Now, just the fact they can tell me it is in good enough condition to sustain me doesn’t tell me anything about whether or not it processes a specific enzyme the same as another, “normal” person. Secondly is gut health. A person’s gut is a micro environment and no two people will have an identical makeup so I wonder if there is as specific something (or lack thereof) that keeps me from absorbing THC like most people would. I have recently started taking acidophilus and the last batch I made of e-juice seemed to have an effect on me when eaten. I can’t be too sure though because I never tried enough to be considered a dose, just tasted a few times throughout the process and licked the utensils afterwards, and I was also smoking periodically so the perceived effects may very well have been placebo. Taking the acidophilus and trying these caps with the lecithin in them should give me about the best chance for success. If not, I think it’s about time to stop wasting time/money/weed and just accept that smoking is my only option.

 

I ate the caps last night and baked the remaining oil into a batch of pb cookies (from a mix). I don’t know if it was the lecithin or acidophilus that did it but it finally worked! I somehow got the dose exactly right too. I ended up eating about half the oil I made which started with 1.5g dried flower. I decarbed then put the material into a small Pyrex with the MCT and lecithin, placed the Pyrex into a crockpot, covered and cooked for 2 hours. When I made the cookies, I didn’t even strain, I wanted the flavor of the roasted bud and I enjoyed it greatly. For the record, I intentionally used a recipe I’d used before with no luck. The only differences were the addition of lecithin and the addition of acidophilus to my daily supplement regimen.

The result is pretty promising. I would definitely be able to find more elevation from the 1.5g if smoked but the duration would not match, or I could space out the tokes to last as long but intensity would be diminished. I am very excited about this. With a little more experimentation I should soon be able to limit smoking to when I just need a quick “pick-me-up”

I also tried a new decarb method that seems to have worked like a charm. I wondered if it could be done in my airfryer since I knew from past cooking experiments that it held a much more consistent temperature than my oven or toaster over. I sealed the ground material as well as I could into a foil pouch, placed that into the basket, put a Pyrex cup onto it to hold it down (it gets very windy in there), then set the temp to 250 (which actually runs at about 237) for 40 minutes.

 

Now if I could just figure out why I have never gotten anything from vaping my life would be complete. With the vaping I am totally willing to believe I’ve been doing something wrong. I had a tabletop unit (I don’t remember brand or model) that I used every day for a few months and experimented with different temps and draw methods, never could get anything worthwhile out of it. I had a dry herb pen for a while too that was no help. It’s been probably a year and a half since I’ve tried vape and I’m considering buying another tabletop unit of some sort.

One interesting fact is that when I first started smoking as a teenager I didn’t get high probably the first thirty or forty times I smoked it. My friends used to be amazed at how much I could smoke while they were stuck in a stupor. I honestly believed that was all there was to marijuana; a lovely smell, an enjoyable smoke, and just a bit relaxing. I thought my friends were “acting drunk” to be cool, kind of like that old Adam Sandler album, “I’m sooo fucked up!” Then one day it was like a switch had flipped and I was getting stoned right along with the rest of them. I’ve often wondered if that switch could be flipped with the edibles and vape, so I’ve tried them persistently.

Does anyone have any recommendations for a tried and true vaporizer that won’t break the bank? I’m no cheapskate, but I do live on a fixed income so the more inexpensive the better as long as I’m not buying some junk unit that will end up convincing me that vape is a myth or some shit.