I bought two packs of these
cbd capsules, which are decarboxylated plant material, but taking just one hurts my stomach enough that I cant do it anymore for fear of harming my stomach. Other reviewers mentioned stomach aches, but mostly loved this product.
Is there an easy way to make it into a tinciture? Or should I eat these pills with special foods to help avoid stomach damage?
Man if it is causing stomach aches for you, don't consume it. CBD should not cause stomach aches. I do note that those capsules do not specify ingredients, formulation etc. Remember, 20mg is .02g of CBD. That is a very low dose, which is not likely to be fully absorbed in the body as CBD due to the effects of gastric fluids in the gut on cannabinoids (decomposition/degradation). The .015g of THC they report is also a very low dose which is not going to be very bioavailable due to the gut again.
The first thing that I would do in your position is to pour the contents of a capsule onto sensitive scales and see what it weighs. This will allow you to work out what % of the capsules contents are the cannabinoids according to their stated levels. This may give some vague hints as to what it is that you have in your capsule.
From the description of the manufacturer, this sounds like ground up, decarbed chemotype 2 (that is, a variety that has roughly 1:1 THC:CBD) flower, which is then tested and CBD oil added to get the standardized level of CBD (sometimes these cultivars don't get a perfect balance).
I would never consume capsules like this. In fact, I do not recommend using oral capsules of activated cannabinoids, since these formulations end up with poor bioavailability of the active compounds (ie: the cannabinoids get drastically changed in your gut and you end up absorbing their decomposition byproducts). Capsules from some vendors, for some people may work in some cases, sure, but this is an inconsistent way of getting cannabinoids into the body in their original or desired form.
I know that there are some alleged major developments (mostly claimed by the pharma companies that own the formulations, so we take this with a pinch of salt until we find independent research) now with transdermal pro-drug preparations, which provide more consistent, constant dosing over a given time period and achieve better bioavailability of the desired compounds in the desired form.
I strongly recommend not using these kinds of products, especially capsules containing mostly plant material. It is just as likely that the stomach ache issues are related to decomposed plant material left over from decarboxylation process. If you simply heat a bunch of plant material and put it in a capsule, that decomposed plant material could definitely cause stomach irritation for some people - hell chlorophyll alone can cause that minor unpleasant gastrointestinal effects for some people.
One more issue. The website selling this product does not provide lab test results. This is a major warning signal IMO. Always demand test results when buying alleged cannabis medicines.
