 Good day, my lovely listeners! You are listening to the Forty Autie podcast. Tune in every week to explore inspiring stories and insightful information that dive headfirst into the world of autism and mental health. With all those tantalising tongue twisters out of the way, let's get into the show. Today's podcast episode is proudly sponsored by Timo, the award-winning app designed to support neurodivergent people just like yourself with routine and scheduling. Head to your app store and type T-W-I-M-O to learn more. Welcome back, loyal listeners! You are listening to the Forty Autie podcast. Today it is a very strange day. It's been a combination of sunny and rainy and muggy outside. Today we're going to be talking about something that actually I have a lot of experience in in terms of my own research and my own experience. We're going to be talking about CBD. We'll look at how it benefits people. Some of the possible drawbacks to it and a few ways that you can use CBD and buy CBD for your own personal use. Of course, I and my guests are not registered medical doctors, so if you have any questions or queries or concerns about using CBD, make sure that you check with your GP. Today I am joined by the founder of the CBD company, Plant Fire. She's working towards a diploma in CBD and medical cannabis. She's an autism parent and also an advocate for mental health. She's previously worked at the Social Group Fusion, where she supported childrens and teens with additional needs and autism. She's also worked within many local youth groups to help them access mainstream provisions. I'm joined by Stacey. Stacey, how are you doing? I'm good thank you, how are you Thomas? Not too bad. Had a bit of a strange day today. During lockdown I've picked up an old game that I used to play when I was a teenager. It's called RuneScape, have you heard of it? No, I mean, how old are you Thomas? Because when you were a teenager I was probably much older, so it's probably way after my time of still playing video games. It was, I'm 23 years old. I was going to say my video game days were like Sega Mega Drive, the very first Nintendo. Yeah, so at the time you were playing video games I was probably way too old for doing that. Well, I would say that I'm pretty too old to be playing RuneScape again and today I had a plan. I was going to do this quest that was supposed to take me like an hour and it ended up taking me about three hours and a half so I've missed out on at least two hours of editing time so I need to slap the back of my hand and make sure that I get it done today. Yeah, you'll have to work late now. Yes. Anyway, how are you doing? I'm good. We've just finished some isolation so enjoying the freedom of being out again, eating out at a restaurant but we're in a local lockdown here so even though I'm allowed outside again there's still a lot of restrictions because we're in Liverpool so we're on the highest tier at the minute. But it's just nice to be outside so yeah, I'm grateful today that I got to be outside the house. Yes, I can imagine. Why did you go into isolation? Was it someone in your family that contracted it or yourself? No, it was school so actually I didn't have to isolate but there's only me and my son at home so because he had to isolate obviously by proxy that meant that I couldn't go anywhere because I can't leave home alone obviously so yeah, he was sent home from school because the child had tested positive and then we were home for about four or five days and we got another text to say another child had tested positive and they added another four days to our sentence so we did a bit of a long, yeah it felt like a sentence, goodness me. It was tough, it was tough on me this time around but I think it was more tough on Carter, my son this time around, he struggled, he really affected towards the end his mental health and it consents me that if we did have to do another stint of isolation which is possible with him being in school and around kids that he just wouldn't cope with another one. Fingers crossed we're going to be extra careful as much as we can so that we're not, we couldn't do that again, it was not fun in the slightest. Yeah because I think that in sort of the grand scheme of things I could cope quite well with sort of the full-scale lockdowns and going into it and coming out of it but I imagine that those routine changes on a constant basis or at least just you know small routine changes could destabilise. I think it's more this time around with everyone else just carrying on with life like in our immediate family and stuff it was quite difficult to be the only ones at home so he was missing out on things like people's birthdays and little things like that so that he really just and he's only just got used to going back to school so I think getting that taken away again you know adjusting to a new normal back at school and then literally being back home again and that was the second time he's had to isolate since just he went back to school in September so even though it was the shortest time probably we've had to stay at home since the pandemic we really struggled both of us with the being at home so fingers crossed no stricter things are enforced. I can imagine it it is probably quite tough definitely I think it's not it's not just autistic people that struggle with that stuff it's having to isolate and be on your own is yeah no definitely it's quite like a contrary to the advice that people give for like depression and mental health and stuff like that because you know it's hard but you you get yourself out to socialise and feel better and then to have that confinement yeah you got to think about like the elderly people as well who aren't to grips with the the many forms of calls and video calls that you do have the internet yeah no that's it's completely their contact with people must be like very very very limited there's a lot of a lot of worries around it but I've also I guess I've also seen some positives you know like people picking up things that they hadn't done before the hobbies they've developed a lot of sort of independent coping strategies and ways to entertain yourself it's kind of like being a kid again isn't it you're not allowed to go outside yeah even for business to be fair from a business point of view we were sort of forced to think outside the box and you know really reassess what we were doing and you know stuff like that and I think a lot of companies have been in the same position where they've sort of been forced to make changes or directions that they probably wouldn't have even thought about previously but now they have realised that they're quite beneficial to what they're doing so yeah there's there's some positives in there as well so just to give everybody like a little bit of a background I know I did an intro and sort of displayed out some information but could you give us a background to who you are what you do for work and you know some of the things that you did before when you were working in youth groups yes of course so I'm a single mum to one gorgeous little boy he's nine and he was only recently diagnosed with autism actually during lockdown so we did it all over video which was fun I'll call it but yeah so we've only had a recent diagnosis but obviously as most people will know these things are quite apparent from quite a young age so it's something we've we've lived with for quite some time yeah I was made redundant last year from my job so I was in my previous role for quite a while but I've always wanted to work for myself and with everything going on with my son and we were looking at assessments and you know ADHD assessments and stuff this was sort of the perfect opportunity for me to go right I've always wanted to work for myself let's let's let's do it let's let's try now so I gave myself till November last year I was like right we finished give yourself to November see how things get on and if you've managed to make some headway with a business then great if not I can start looking for a role I knew I had payment from redundancy to keep me going so I knew that was good and yeah we just sort of flew with the CBD business it started out as retailers so we used to sell over a hundred different CBD products a hundred yeah I think it was actually more than that a hundred different lines I got very excited with that you see it was for migraines and I used a vape didn't really sit well with me it worked really well but I've never baked before so yeah I thought I wanted to look at different options and then it came across the drops and when I used to go to the wholesalers I've been a kid in a sweet shop you know I was just totally in love with CBD loved the benefits and that you could get it in anything you name anything at all and you could put CBD in energy drink shower gel everything like I've seen mattresses pillowcases I'm still confused about those actually because I'm not really sure how that would work but and whether you have to like really redo your CVD in it as it won out but that's a whole other topic but yeah so we just used to stock loads and different products and it was through being in the industry that we sort of came across the fact that one it's so difficult to navigate even as it as someone who knew quite a lot about CBD it was still quite confusing like sometimes I'd have to read the packaging of all four times and and still not quite understand what was in it or how much it should take or you know it was very very confusing it's kind of weird because a lot of products that I've looked at they they use different labels they'll do like per milliliter and then the milliliters will be a bit often it's just like I don't want to have to do maths yeah like this is what I was so we were just looking at stuff like that it was like I'm gonna minute it says on the front one thing but when you read the back it says another thing there was no sort of structure you couldn't just go okay every brand has the same information on the label like he said everyone was different so it made it super confusing then you know it was like do I need a bath bomb do I need a face cream do I need a muscle rub do I need drops do we need a drink you know there was so many options that it was overwhelming we gained some very loyal customers who bought from us they could buy them products in lots of different places but they bought from us because they liked us as a company and how we operated and the advice and the information we shared and how honest we were you know if someone messages me about CBD and asking you know for advice I'm always hugely honest with them I think if you're honest enough with people and you know share honest advice then you will gain customers anyway you know I don't believe in the hard sell or pushing things so we gained quite a loyal following in that way and I just decided one day I was just like right we need to make our own like we need to make a product that's easy so people can just buy it without having to ask a million questions not that we mind the questions but you know not everyone has the time to do research online just to buy a product do you mean it's meant to be helping your life and it was becoming a bit of a hindrance and that's also where our product stands from and we worked on them for a very very long time we work with a company who has their own farm so they have a farm in Scandinavia all the hemp is grown outside so it's slow grown in the sunshine no greenhouses no chemicals and then it's manufactured in very small batches we don't have to produce a huge amount of CBD at one time meaning if we don't like something we can change it very quickly and if we want to improve something we can change it very quickly because we haven't got that mass production going on and we just fell in love with this company because they've got the same ethos as us but yeah going back I've done lots of different roles over my life that I've contributed to help me be able to run plan fire the way you do I've been a teaching assistant I've studied law I've worked at solicitors I've done so many different roles you know I've worked in beauty I've worked in business development could you tell us about your experience you know with social groups and working within youth groups I began my work in Korea as you would put it with social services in Liverpool and they decided to bring an initiative called fusion which was about young people and adults with additional needs accessing mainstream social activities what they found was that there was lots of things in place for the specific groups so there was specific sessions if you wanted to go to a youth group you could do between 6 and 9 on a Tuesday there was a special group and it was all children with additional needs and they could all go there at once and you know this is great like I'm all for that I'm really bad advocate for that I think it's amazing but a lot of these children and maybe had I mean we don't like to use high function anymore do we but you know they were they were paper capable to go along to a mainstream session they just needed a little support to do so a little bit more understanding a little bit training maybe just someone there on hands if they needed them and so that's what we started to do we started with children and young adults to get them into mainstream provisions and make sure that they could access it and they were with other children there or young adults their age of all different abilities that's quite an important thing to do because yes you can kind of you know people people either go for that they go for the black and white approach like we need to go in for all of the special needs divisions and provisions and stuff for we need to stick them in mainstream mainstream or you were doing was kind of supporting middle-brand yeah so it was it was making sure that they were able to access it you know and we will we would meet with their families and we would we would ask them about what things they would need to be able to access it what can we do to get them into a provision what do they like to do let's find them something that works I am from that stemmed friendship groups these were for young adults and teens who could go out and do what young adults and teens wanted to do so go into the movies go into pizza hut you know go and shopping so we just and it was just they had control of it we were there to support them this wasn't like this is what we're going to do they would decide we'd sit down every six weeks and we go right what do we want to do in the next six weeks they decide some stuff they want to do whether it was going over to Cheshire Oaks whether it was just going out for dinner going to McDonald's you know going to the pot anything that they wanted to do and we just supported them to be able to do that and that was it and it was I've got such good memories of those times and I met some really amazing amazing people and I grew up with my brother was Tim and Leo so we had a lot of additional needs a lot of medical needs and from being around him and at the hospital a lot I was around children with additional needs and a lot of physical needs then so this to me was just normal Jeremy and that was just like it didn't phase me at all even that quite a young age I was only like my late teens early 20s now when I think about that that's pretty madness that I would be in charge of so many other people you know it's it's quite a grown up job when I think of it but I think I was a very from how I'd grew up I was sort of forced to grow up a little bit quicker than other children you know I I like to help out my mum and my dad and you know offer them support this was just really natural to me but now when I think about it it is a little bit crazy like to think that I was in such a huge it's very managerial and yeah I imagine that in a lot of cases people around that age would shy away from a lot of the workers a lot of the staff that works in fusion and took part in the groups were only around my age but they all came from backgrounds where they lived they'd lived it themselves they they wait the schools maybe or they they had family members with autism or you know other physical or medical needs so they were used to it Jeremy and but what was nice then was that the people and the young adults in the group weren't being traipsed around town with a 40 year old guy like go and come on who wants to do that when they're a teenager we don't we were closer in age so you know it made it acceptable to them and that's what it was all about it was well being fully accepted and fully treated as an hate to say the word average I'm doing a quote here but you know just like an average adult like anyone else would be able to do you know they wanted to do the same things they just wanted to go and spend two hours in HMV when it existed listening to CDs and you know all that type of stuff that's all they wanted to do they didn't want no special like key worker to take them out on a trip they just wanted to hang out with the mate when was your son diagnosed and did it have much of an effect on your life did you have to change a lot well to be honest we kind of already knew so it didn't change our life at all because he was any diagnosed during lockdown so at the minute we're struggling because we have gone through the diagnosis process we've had a diagnosis but we haven't had any follow-up appointments we haven't been seen by the AISD nurse so we've got no support at this moment in time we're sort of just like in a limbo at the minute but it hasn't changed because of the background I came from like I said when Carter was struggling with things I implemented things anyway that I'd learned so it hasn't changed our life too much the diagnosis at all really but it was tough to learn because I expected when we got a diagnosis to suppose most people will be familiar with this you it's not an easy process you fight for a long time to get these things it's it's constant constant and I kind of felt like once I've got that diagnosis that I'd be relieved I thought it's like you focus for so long like get them once we've got a diagnosis once you've got a diagnosis and we got a diagnosis and nothing changed and I was absolutely devastated I felt that's the point of it isn't it yeah I was I was grieving diagnosis so you can get the get support for it and we just I remember it and I just couldn't stop crying and I was thinking this is ridiculous why am I upset I knew this was coming we already kind of knew this we knew what the outcome was going to be we actually wanted them to get the diagnosis so we can get the support and we fought this for years and now I'm upset about it it seemed really bizarre and it took I'd say both a good week for me to just get my head around it and go right what now like what do we do now and then it was the what now well actually there's not really much we can do because there's no one to speak to at the moment we are still waiting to see the pediatrician I didn't even know to call I was like who do I even ask for help because I literally have that little clue because of everything going on and I do understand that these some people in a much much worse position than us so I am grateful that we are able to manage but it it sort of covid has taken its toll on us it's it's a very it's a very weird one a postnat diagnosis suppose we are very fresh out of the diagnosis process and we probably haven't processed that very much right now yeah I talked on that on the podcast recently to a lady called Michelle Brogas the Brogas not Brogas be Rogers she sort of makes living off supporting parents who who were going for a diagnosis or have just got a diagnosis and she says that there is kind of that stage of where it's kind of like a reality check and you sort of go through the stages of grief and it's very strange to hear it from like being an autistic adult myself but I can I can kind of understand because I mean even if you are looking looking for it you're trying to get it it must be very strange sort of see it written down in paper grounded in reality was he diagnosed with like AST AST one and they haven't actually said that he said they don't give a gradens anymore so they've just literally she said it's just actually a autistic spectrum disorder or not kinds of things like they don't use like yeah how are you supposed to to know what level of ability they're going to have to to be independent yeah I have no idea I mean these are questions yeah that I probably wanted to be asked but obviously at the time when she's initially said it I couldn't quite get my head around everything to ask and now that it's been so long I don't know who to ask and you know so we'll have that play we're like so we've been ringing like the community people like maybe they'll be able to help but we can't get in touch with them and you know we had an incident with self-harm and recently which was quite scary and you know again no one to who do you reach out to do you mean it's always just this like we're stuck in limbo at the minute that's a tough reality of yeah being autistic there's very high rates of mental health and addiction and and I mean I don't I don't think that autism is necessarily a bad thing as it as a standalone thing but no the autism diagnosis I guess brings those extra possible elements up to a you know a high rate you know it's it's gotta be a bit nervy you know as a parent yeah cuz like you said it I suppose I was a glutton because for my own knowledge because I already knew so much so I already kind of knew a lot about the struggles that someone I've seen young adults had with it with on the spectrum and you know so I could sort of see how this would affect them long term which was quite scary but also on a positive note I've also know a lot of young young adults and adults who will be god they'll be actually grown-ups now because you know they'll be really old no I think of it who were amazing and you know out there and they were hate to wear these normal again but you know living in a normal like they're able to look after themselves you know it's not I think if I didn't have that experience I could have catastrophised it a lot Jeremy and being like oh my god what's he gonna be able to do but he's great and you know this he's gonna take over the world he's got a little business mind on him you know he's just like oh god if you took over the world it'd just be everyone will be able to play Fortnite and be paid for ebooks oh that sounds alright actually yeah he loves it you can't wait to take over the business he's like I was trying to get him to do his maths homework when he was off and I was like he was going but mum I'm gonna take over your business I don't need to go to school and I was like no you do because you still need to be able to know how to run a business and you need to know math and he was going I know maths and I was like you do not know every maths and I was like okay I've just had an order of 100 bottles and this many bottles have been damaged in transit this many and given like a so many was like yeah I know the answer and just gave me the answer and just like totally ruined the point I was trying to make and I was like so I don't need to do my maths homework and I was like no you still need to do the maths homework and he was like but I've just told you I can do it I was like just made this situation ten times worse but yeah trying to get him to focus on schoolwork is hard because he just wants to be involved in like he just wants to make money basically he's like yeah let's make you want to be rich do you mean like Scrooge McDuff rich swimming in money that's his like life goal basically so yeah I think that expectations and motivation I suppose it's good definitely and he's gonna spend it all on fortnight apparently so you know it's gonna be the richest player and thought yeah he asks me for it drives me saying he's like mum can I have some money to buy a skin and I'm like mate I haven't even got money to buy myself clothes like I'm not buying the character online a hat when I can't even buy a hat for myself like that's ridiculous those micro payments micro transactions shall we get into the meat of the podcast I know we've we've been chatting for at least 40 minutes we obviously like to talk I know you've you've talked a little bit about your CBD company and your stuff at the start so what I really want to ask is you know just just sort of set the set the scene on CBD what is the difference between recreational marijuana you know the the illegal thing that people are not allowed to do in the UK and CBD products so basically it's quite simple CBD is mainly made from the hemp plant although it can be made from the cannabis plant as well and it has to have a level below naught point two percent THC so you will find your CBD products are your products without THC your cannabis products are usually very high in THC THC is the component that makes you feel high basically so that's the the cycle it gives the psychoactive effect to it whereas CBD does not have that so here in the UK CBD is classed as a food supplement only but it has to have below the naught point two percent THC levels anything higher than that is then classed as either medical grade or as an illegal you know drug basically the main difference as you said is THC but can you sort of compare THC to CBD there's a lot of stigma around you know hemp and cannabis stuff like that so but what's the difference between the two so yeah hemp plant has got hundreds of cannabinoids in it and CBD is one cannabinoid oil and then you've got your THC is another one CBD is not gonna give you a high feeling so it will interact with your endocannabinoid system in your body and it will help to regulate various things whereas cannabis and with your your sort of THC in it it still does the same as CBD but it has the THC in which then gives you that high feeling so it's not noticeable so you're not gonna take CBD and go oh my god I feel so chilled it's sort of an absence of feeling probably take it and you'll notice like in an hour you'll go oh god I actually don't feel stressed or I don't feel anxious right now or that pain isn't you know as prominent as it was before it's a bit of a lack of a feeling so you're losing some feeling whereas whereas THC the THC is sort of giving you a feeling of being high and you know you will definitely know you've had THC if you have a high level of THC you will know the problem with that is if you take a lot of THC you can become very confused which can become very dangerous if you're all sort of driving or if you're out walking alone and you know it can cause a lot of confusion and stuff like that it's definitely more of a lack of something rather than it initiates a feeling if that makes sense yeah through my research that the main problems that have come up with THC is the paranoia if someone has a tendency towards any sort of paranoia type diagnosis or schizophrenia it can sometimes exacerbate that and I know that also it's not it's not like it's not been shown to be sort of chemically sort of biologically addictive but I know that just from my experience at university that some people can get quite heavily dependent on on THC I know it does have a lot of beneficial effects yeah like you said it's not addictive in itself but people can become very dependent on the way it makes them feel and also prolonged use of THC from using cannabis and stuff like that can sort of numb your receptors a little bit so what happens is then the next time you use it you need more to get the same feeling like a tolerance yeah so you sort of become very tolerant to it and then you will need next time you'll need more to be able to get them feelings and in terms of CBD could you could you sort of explain because I know that we have this very recently discovered but not very known about system that's only really been come to light recently due to CBD the endocannabinoid system yeah I know that from my research there are like some endogenous endocannabinoids so like anandamide is you know if you if you go for a long run people usually say that you get a run as high that's like that's the anandamide in your body accumulating and it does it does that to bit that system and there's a lot of different different ways that it is activated you know like in in pain and some of the areas that I probably shouldn't mention this podcast so that it is it is quite quite an old and important system and it links into different areas of your your body like your digestive system your brain literally everywhere yeah it's linking up to so much so you see you've got two types of receptors you've got CBD one receptors and CBD it's CBD CB one and CB two receptors CB one are in your central nervous systems and then your CB two are gonna be in like your skin your vital organs your immune system and it's it's just crazy and this is why CBD works so well is because the endocannabinoid system is so vast and your body does already produce you know it don't kind of you know you release that when you're you're working out and stuff like that so if you take CBD while you're working out it's gonna it's gonna be more powerful at that time a lot of people ask me about dosage and stuff and this is the one of the reasons why it's a little bit difficult to give someone and say right this is specifically the dose you take and this is the effect you'll get from it because your body is already producing these already so it depends what you're doing at the time that you take it because your body will react in different ways depending on how much it's already in your system and then you're gonna add to it with your CBD as well and it's a lot to do with your metabolism of CBD so many different height and your weight these loads of research at the minute that's being happening to think that some people could actually have a cannabinoid it's sort of deficiency yeah they found that a lot of people with like fibromyalgia obviously I'm not a doctor these are just studies that I've read people with fibromyalgia migraines their body seems to produce less cannabinoids than it needed to work so by adding in your CBD you were sort of helping to balance that a little bit and that's why probably people were getting such good results in easing the symptoms of migraine and fibromyalgia and stuff so they still like you said it's a very new system that we've come across I mean not new like last year you know but in the last you know it is very recently being added to the human body yeah we just like just put it in one day but yeah so there's still so much that we can learn from that that would that we're learning at the minute with there's so many studies going on and it's so super interesting to know all these different things that we that we could be doing you will just add into something that's already in your body and helping it to work a little bit more efficiently and the reason it can do so many different things is because these receptors are in so many parts of your body so dependent on where needs it that's where the CBD is going to go and do its job so it's very different for different people you know if you're suffering with pain then that's what's going to help it combat if you're suffering with stress or anxiety that's what it's going to help you to ease in that sense as well and I suppose that that's sort of overarching range and variety of benefits give it a little bit of a kind of a a snake oil exactly stigma and I was the same to be honest like when I first started using it my name used it before me for pain and then I used it for migraines and you know I was amazed with it and then I was in loads of research was like how can it do so much it confused me because I was like hmm that can't make sense because why can it just do so much but now that I'm you know studying and really looking into that I can see why it works so effectively and it makes perfect sense really this week we've been talking loads about skin care you know eczema psoriasis acne you know general anti-aging and how CBD interacts with the CB2 receptors in your skin you know it's helping with inflammation inflammation is one of the biggest causes of so many chronic illnesses and there's a massive list of them yeah so so by combat and the inflammation we can really help to ease stuff trying to really put that information out there not just give someone a list of benefits and say there you go that's why it's so great we're giving them the reason why that it's great for that benefit it definitely is could you give us some benefits the main benefits that people see from taking CBD we have just actually completed a survey of our customers just from our new products and it completely aligned with every other survey and study ever done on the benefit to CBD and the top three things that came on top and that people were using it for were stress and anxiety pain and sleep and they were the greatest benefits and even people who weren't looking for those as a benefit so they may have bought it for you know helping with some inflammation in the knee or something like that they've been like now I'm sleeping great as well you know my sleep's improved but they are probably your top three benefits and I'm just gonna put this there like this is in no way saying you can treat stress and anxiety or you can treat fibromyalgia or you can treat or cure you know migraines etc but yeah it's only to help ease the symptoms it's gonna help ease the symptoms if you stop taking CBD that is still gonna be there it's not like you take it for a course of six months and you're gonna be magically better that's not not what the benefit is it's management yeah if you take it rather than treatment a lot of people use it for a skin so it's amazing for your skin I use it twice a day every single day I suffer with psoriasis so especially if I get stressed I will start to get psoriasis on the my hairline just by popping that on it can sort of reduce the inflammation just reduce the redness we've just had a lady yesterday tag was in a post she's been using it with her mask so we're here mask is a lot of people will know they'll start to get maybe spots or breakouts and stuff because of just having something we're not used to on our skin all the time and she's put it on and literally it works so quickly because within like a day she could see the redness of gone the inflammation had gone you know wasn't as prominent the list of benefits is is is endless it's endless but we have found that sleep stress anxiety and your pain relief are the top ones there but it's also great for things like you know as a pre-workout or a post-workout it gives you that extra boost and helps with muscle recovery and you know I can imagine that if you if you find the the task of going to the gym quite a and an anxious thing like with with other people around and stuff that CBD would probably help with that sort of social anxiety definitely there's been loads of studies done with them athletes for the same reason because obviously becoming up to an event or something it can be quite stressful and you know situation so not only does CBD help with energy levels and you know muscle recovery and all that but it helps bring them calm and safe focus then on what they're meant to be doing rather than being distracted you know they're heads all over the place so it's time for a quick mention from our sponsors Teemo if you love visual support in your scheduling Teemo is for you the app was designed for people with ADHD and autism and helps empower users to schedule visual routines that work users say that Teemo can help reduce stress and support executive function which are both two things that I struggle with myself learn more at www.teemoapp.com or just type in T.W.I.M.O. into your search bar thank you so much to my patreon supporters your support means the world anyway let's get back into the show the first time that I ever heard of CBD was I saw it like advertised in like a like a vape shop and I was like hey watch the TED talk or something on it and you know it seemed to be quite big in America it was about the time I came back from Thailand and went in and I tried to do this dude and he said that vaping CBD has been like the main thing that that's helped him with social anxiety and that he would have struggled to maintain a conversation with his customers and stuff like that and I do think that because CBD is classified as a food supplement I definitely think it is something that that does supplement your life and help help that little bit to try and get you that down to a base baseline yeah I also think that people should view it with a little bit more respect although it is a food supplement it is quite a active thing yeah there's companies and stuff in America who have made medication for epilepsy and anxiety and stuff and they use aspect of the cannabis plant to treat people that those are considered to be like medications and stuff so it's a little bit of a weird area like a classification it comes a bit confusing for people and and say and then you know I've seen people selling CBD and given you know advice on using it for cancer treatment and you know I just don't think that as someone on Facebook you should be given medical advice unless you're a medical professional we have got to have a bit of respect for it like you said and and do your research and I'm here as part of an industry I'm here as part of CBD industry and I really want this industry to do well and I want this industry to be a high standard and to do that we have to work together and we have to sort of weed out those companies that are not and not being responsible and take an advantage of people yeah and and we've all got a sort of way together on that and I'm always sharing sort of information on you know how to read a certificate of analysis how to know if you buy from reputable company you know just little things that people can use to then go okay I know what I'm doing there's a lot of aspects to it like I know that there are different types of CBD products you've got full spectrum broad spectrum isolate could you give us a little bit like collect clarification of what the difference is because to when you come at that you know a lot of information yeah sometimes can be a bit overbearing yeah you've not only got to choose a product then you're challenged with what milligram quality you know what type of spectrum it is confusing so you've got your full spectrum and basically that's just it's got all of the different cannabinoids in so you've got THC in there but obviously the THC is very low so it's got to be under the 0.2% a lot of people really love a full spectrum because they get sort of an entourage effect because the other cannabinoids in there are you know they still have really good qualities themselves CBD yeah so they all do like different things themselves and have different properties themselves so you know you get a sort of an entourage effect from that and then you've got broad spectrum which is very similar to full spectrum only it's been purified a little bit more it's a little bit more processed and by processed I don't mean that negative way just mean it's had the THC completely taken out of it there should be no detectable THC within a broad spectrum but you still will get a lot of the other cannabinoids in there you don't get as many as you would in a full spectrum because you know it's been processed a little more we stock both full spectrum and some broad spectrum products and when you look at the specific analysis there's very very little difference between them as a beginner I wouldn't worry about that too much what about isolates isolated so basically they've literally isolated down the CBD so you're just getting your CBD content in that and they shouldn't be very much of of anything else really and some people like that because they just want really focused CBD benefits it's personal preference really on what you like but as I said as a beginner even as not a beginner even as me if I take a full spectrum and a broad spectrum from the same milligram from the same company it's very rare that you will you will significantly feel the difference Jeremy in your mouth wow that's so much different Jeremy I suppose another question another question that kind of want to pitch which I have done quite quite a bit of extensive research and look into this because I know that these things called terpenes yes you know like in America they have different strains of CBD plants that they have and each of them have smells yeah yeah and I know that these compounds that they found in different fruits and vegetables and they they're basically like volatile substances so that they sort of dissipate into the air so you can smell them but they also they've been shown to us as you said to have sort of a I guess maybe not a non-target effect but they change the the effect their own and don't like to call it healing qualities and trying to think of the word I've a word for them but you know some of them are like and can never pronounce the limone limonade limonade there you go you know that works really well with the CBD because it enhances and like the inflammatory the qualities the properties of CBD so that works really well with it and there's lots of different ones and like so many and everyone has a slightly different profile of properties that it can help with again I think as a beginner it's not something I would be thinking you need to take a huge amount of sort of notice of in the very very beginning but it is certainly want your comfortable CBD to do your research it's super interesting and if there's something you're using CBD for there will definitely be and at every in that sort of compliments what you're looking for in that and help to sort of accentuate the properties of the CBD I've tried a lot of different sort of CBD strains like I think it's something called remedy or shower web or something I suppose to have a lot of typings that are to do with quelling anxiety and being more relaxing and I can sort of tell the difference I think it's very hard it's kind of like having like wine connoisseurs or the minute differences and stuff it's super interesting and they do you know there is things there but that's why I'm saying if you're a beginner I wouldn't contain yourself too much yeah but as you become more used to it it's definitely something to look into it's definitely something to be of interest and but you also do have to be careful because you know a lot of companies don't even really know that much about them Jeremy and they're just like oh yeah we should have some of these and it let's put it in and tell people that it's gonna help well anxiety and it does but maybe if you read the certificate of analysis the levels might be so minute that they're not actually gonna make any difference you mean but because it's in there they can tell you it's in there and they're gonna tell you all about benefits of it being there you know it's like when yeah it's like if they're putting a really bad quality CBD out there with virtually no CBD in it they just put but they can write about all the benefits of CBD but that doesn't mean the product's gonna do that because it's got such low levels in I guess another one that that people would find a bit difficult to understand is the milligrams like the the the actual amount of CBD or anything like that that's in a bottle or a vape or tea or yeah like where would you start with someone who has never used CBD before you don't know about the tolerance to it how they're gonna react to it we have a rule and called start low go slow you only need to start really low so we only stock one strength of CBD which is a thousand milligram now the reason for that is you can take naught point two five mil of this and get X amount of CBD in it you can up that dose you can lower that dose when we used to have like a five hundred a one thousand a two thousand a three thousand a five thousand that you know it confused people because again they didn't know where to start and people's minds automatically thought the more CBD the better and that's not always the case at all with the safer pain so say for instance pain if we say that it you need naught point two five milligram of CBD a day up to twenty five milligram a day dependent on your tolerance so you start quite a lot to five milligram which is it's so small like no pin two five milligram like in one dose of our CBD you get sixteen point something sixteen point six milligram of CBD so you can see if you only needed to take naught point two five you're only gonna take a couple of drops of that like you only need a small amount but people automatically think they need a lot and that is definitely not the case always start with the lowest but what you've just got to be careful of a little bit I want to be careful but just so you know in your mind what you're buying because it can be very confusing check the milligram on the front but also check the milk check the ingredients and make sure that's that actual amount in there at one point companies would write on the front say thousands milligram but when you turned it round it was actually only 600 milligram in the bottle because it started out as a thousand milligram but then they put it in smaller bottles so now in that bottle these only X amount does that make sense it doesn't make sense it takes me back to my chemistry exactly it's so confusing it needs to have a thousand milligram in the bottle that's it like that's the only way to do it otherwise it doesn't make any sense it was very very common for that to happen when you'd buy a 10 mil bottle that said a thousand milligram but actually wouldn't have a whole thousand milligram in there it was very confusing so always just check the front check the back to make sure you're getting the same amount of CBD and check the certificate of analysis and it will tell you exactly on there how many milligram is in there and that's all you want to know brilliant so the next thing that the next topic that I wanted to talk about is more specific as opposed to this podcast it's about CBD and autism yeah I've seen a lot of videos on it on YouTube I think Dan from the AFSP world made a video on it I've made a video on CBD just to kind of give the background to my use of it I've tried many different products I've tried the tablets I've tried these these different tablets that have like little balls in that's best increase the surface area they didn't work I've tried the drops I've tried the vapes yeah I'm taking it for anxiety like I've got quite severe anxiety I get very overwhelmed very quickly and and it's it's not you know it destabilizes my day so I've also had quite frequent panic attacks during night my anxiety seems to ramp up as it's getting towards about 10 o'clock and then it sort of dips down which is not good like if you're a working person to get a lot of sleep yes exactly so the thing that helped the most was these CBD teas I tried I quickly found as I was going through through his kind of rabbit hole of CBD research that I am extremely intolerant to it like it has such a good effect for me if I get the right amount but I it's literally the case where I can take it for like a couple of weeks and then I've got to kind of take like a break so that my tolerance can drop back down and but it's had a lot of noticeable effects it's made it easier to socialize it's quite often replaced the other unhealthy things that people do to relax like yeah alcohol it's helped a lot with that so I've had quite a quite a long sort of experience with CBD and it's more or less been quite beneficial to me not beneficial to my wallet definitely makes life a little bit more tolerable for for myself and my ability to function so really what I wanted to ask you off that was do you think that any aspect of CBD could be beneficial to someone on the autistic spectrum diagnosed autistic adult exactly as I said before there's a lot of things that CBD is really well known about with just stress anxiety sleep I know with my son he had finds it really hard to regulate his emotions so his emotions can seem very extreme at times just come out nowhere it kind of loses that grip on them and to have something that can sort of take the edge off that and bring a bit of calm I can imagine is very very beneficial in that state I use it personally for my son we don't sell to under 18s and you know we don't advocate using it for children but I personally as a parent it's something that we do really rely on to help bring him down and help him gain a little bit of control we help use it for sleep obviously he doesn't sleep too well so if you're not sleeping very well like you said stress and anxiety then it has a knock-on effect the next day you're less capable of dealing with stress and anxiety so you've got your inability to regulate your emotions coupled with having no sleep and being sort of extra I don't like to call it grouchy but you know like that end of your tether already before you've even woke up out of bed Jeremy and that's all gonna you're gonna contribute to the rest of the day and how he's able to handle other other things that get thrown out and through life so that means that the slightest little thing then the next day is gonna seem like a huge thing and we could end up with a huge meltdown from the simplest of things because he's just unable to cope so if we can get things like a good night's sleep helping to reduce stress helping to regain a little bit of control when his emotions are up in the air I think that's definitely a positive for people on the spectrum as you said before I don't think autism I wouldn't want to cure his autism that's who my son is and I don't know if you feel the same that that's who you are it's a personality it's just part of your yeah you are however there are things that I would like to change for him and for a lot of other adults that struggle young adults and teens with the increase in stress and anxiety you know people on the spectrum have a shorter lifespan and the reason mostly is from lack of support with mental health and and things like that these can really escalate and you know things like self harm and stress and yeah like all of these things have a really adverse effect on health so to be able to take those things away and not so much away but help reduce those so if we can help someone get a better night's sleep we can help someone feel a little bit calmer and a little bit less you know a little bit less stressed if social situations can be engaged in because a lot of people are under the impression if they've never been around people daughters and they think people with autism don't like to socialize and they don't want to make friends and that's definitely not the case it's not that they don't want to it's just a very difficult thing to do myself he's always wanted friends and he does want to play but what we used to find when he was little is he didn't know how to make those interactions he didn't know how to initiate play with another child when he was like three and four he didn't know what to do and he wasn't at the same sort of capability as they was to join in the games that they were playing and he found that very difficult he also found it very difficult that they didn't follow rules and they didn't do things in the way in a game that should be done so all of these things added to the fact that he would then pull back from socializing because he found it's such a stressful thing to try and initiate do you think that that CBD would help a lot of people who struggle with social anxiety I'm sort of imagining my time at university you know alcohol was quite a big help for me for me going out and meeting people and making friends and going out on dates and stuff do you think that definitely maybe just using CBD could help yeah because people use alcohol like yourself you probably did and it just lowers your inhibitions a little bit you don't overthink things as much and yet you can be a little bit calmer and relaxed you're not so self-conscious about the situation so if you could do that with CBD if you could feel calm enough and a little bit more in control and not so self-conscious and self-aware that you could enter a situation and you know speak to your friends then I think that's a massive plus do you mean that's like a huge a huge thing and you know we would never make statements like you can treat ASD because I don't think ASD needs treating or curing or anything like that anxiety just the other stuff that comes along with it exactly and these things aren't just like common to people on the spectrum everyone deals with this but obviously with ASD these all these things are heightened and you know these things are a little bit more extreme and a little bit harder to control you know they have a lot more stressors than maybe an average person would so I think it's more yeah I think it's definitely you know my child sells CBD to the teachers in school I think you might mention that last yeah he's like we had a chat the teacher asked me for the name of the company she was like her cars had been telling us and I was like oh my god he's trying to get that money so he can take over the world he's like all over it even the other night she had a headache and she took some CBD and he went hey Nan do you know if you didn't know my mom you would still have a headache now it's the same like that there was a situation where my mom got a dog ran into a knee and she sort of went over and she had a knee quite badly she was in a lot of pain I was like well just putting this out there would you like to try some of my CBD tea it will definitely help like literally about an hour after she'd had it she was like probably not good I was like mom you need to stay in bed she got up and it felt completely fine and it was a weird sort of oh it's a miracle kind of thing it's like yeah well I told you it would help it literally shocks me every time like people are so shocked because they expect it to take a while to work so they expect to be used in it for weeks or months or you know to start feeling some effect so they're very very shocked when they use it one time and they feel the effect one time but that is also the thing that you do need to keep on top of it like you can't just take it if you stop using it it will just stop having the effect like the effect only happens when you're taking it I think it peaks around an hour and a half doesn't it depending on how you take it how you've taken it so the things like sublingual so under your tongue the drops and vape and they work really quick so they're really rapid so you should feel them in sort of like I'd say 50 minutes to half an hour tops people usually feel the effects and then they sort of peak and then Peter out a little bit you know which is great for like stress and anxiety because usually by that point you've calmed enough then to be okay if that makes sense I mean you've calmed down enough you've you've regained a little bit of control if you take it in orally so we have the capsules they take a little bit longer because obviously they've got to digest and get into your bloodstream via you know your own stuff but the good thing about this is that is a little bit unknown is that it will actually stay in your system for a little bit longer so then compounds work for a little bit longer so although you're taking a little longer to get them you're gonna feel the effects longer so that's why the CBD capsules are great for regular use so you know you could pop one of them or two every morning and that's gonna you know you're gonna feel the effects for a lot longer throughout the day so yeah it just depends what you're looking for I always say the drops and capsules work so well together because you've got your capsules which give you that sort of baseline and sort of a preventative type of thing where it can help keep you calm before you've got overly anxious or you know just your general well-being before anything occurs and then you've got your drops that you can add in for all your vape if you vape we don't sell those but you know they are really common and really you know really like them you know you can use that if you are having a sudden episode of stress or anxiety or a sudden episode of a migraine or you feel some pain initially you can take that then and it'll be the same with the tea when you're taking the tea you might not feel the effects super quick but you will feel them for a little bit longer than you would yeah with like sleep a CBD sleep is a wonderful sleep I've got to say that in combination with chamomile and valerian that just works. We've got some of the process at the minute which is chamomile and CBD and it's it is delicious and yeah it just calms you enough for bed you know I'm a single parent got a child I've got a house to run and running a business which is a start-up so I'm doing predominantly the bulk of the work myself which is a big job so the time I get in bed of a night my brain hasn't quite got the memo that it's time to go to sleep so I'll often get in bed and be like did I get that ready for school tomorrow you know did I put that meeting in the diary and I find once I've had me CBD every night that I can sort of relax enough to to switch off and get a good night's sleep and I always surprise myself in the morning when I wake up and I'm like oh I've slept all night. From my own sort of research into autism and CBD things like meltdowns can cause a lot of information in the brain it's like how epilepsy probably not as much as epilepsy but you still do have those inflammatory mediators that can cause some damage up there and obviously because CBD is an anti-inflammatory compound that can help a lot with those kind of things but also GI tract disorders which are also very highly common for autistic people it's I know that that can help a lot with the information and the gut and you know things like sleep like a lot of kids are put on different tablets you know I'm on metazapine which is quite a heavy sedative and that to kind of get me to sleep and I used to be on melatonin and yeah you know like I think the difference between you know you could you know in theory use a benzodiazepine to chill you out but you don't really want to because it's addictive and it and it has a lot of consequences and you know there's a lot of horror stories around those kind of things yeah no but they just don't really happen with CBD or as far as as far as we know in our research yeah well that is the thing as well you know we are the extent it's being used it's obviously this has been going back you know like it's one of the oldest medicines kind of assuming like this is we've been using it as a medication unofficially for so many like ridiculous aunties but recently these being a big boom in CBD so we are still getting a lot of studies done there's still a lot of research and stuff to be done and going to but the initial outcomes are very very positive and like you said with it being an anti-inflammatory it's it works for so many things to help ease because inflammation in your body is just not good basically Jeremy like you said unless you're having like an immune response to something sometimes not be helpful but yeah like it's chronic isn't it really so like as well we were talking about in a few weeks back stress and anxiety can cause inflammation and you know so chronic stress can cause chronic illness and can cause lots of other issues and you know like you said my son himself he has always got pains in his stomach he will and it usually becomes after a very stressful day he will have pains in his stomach he becomes very very pale and it's having the stress and the anxiety and everything on top of each other is then manifests itself physically. You're bringing me back to my days at secondary school like no don't take me about that. No, I don't want to go back. It's so cruel and look at his little face and he's drained of life like we've been told on towers for the day and it's been so stressful for him it's meant to be an enjoyable day out but it ended up so stressful that he was he looked so ill and that was like his body's response to that stress of the day. I used to get sick a lot like I'd go home a lot with headaches and stomach aches because of yeah or the stress of school life like all the bullies and the difficulty or you know all the sensory stuff there's so many different factors that causes stress on a constant basis it's just the only things that work for me is CBD or alcohol or benzodiazepines and I don't want to take benzodiazepines and I don't want to drink alcohol all the time so it's it's kind of like a no-brainer for me personally not saying that everybody should you know jump on board that if you don't need it but great option personally it's it's just been so ridiculously impactful in my life it's hard not to it's hard not to jump put jump at the opportunity to make a podcast on it basically yeah it is and people will always be shocked I'm obviously I'm a lover of CBD I came from using CBD myself to become an absolute advocate and using it from my son and my mum you should get my mum on here to talk about CBD she's like CBD is number one fan I don't think there's anything she doesn't use it for I think if someone came in with like a missing arm she's just like she just thinks the information yeah she's just like totally on board with it all there's a lot of like social stigmas around it like if you say I'm using CBD you know some people may think oh god you a drug user totally associated with that we've had people asking me like what does the package come like can you tell from the outside it's just a food supplement like yeah it's like it's completely fine I promise you but like people do still have that like I think she had family staying with her like in laws and she was a little bit nervous about them no one but it's because of its association with cannabis and it's you know people just and I did it myself when I first heard about CBD didn't even cross my mind to use it because I just associated it with getting high with people using it as a as a legal high basically that that was just my I never really gave it too much thought but that's what I thought it was until I tried it at least so the snake oil kind of thing just one of those health kicks that the media latches on another one's jumped on yeah I do think that there are a lot of benefits for the people it's not it's not gonna help everybody everybody you know like one of the funny things about it is that if you don't have a lot of stress and anxiety and you take it you're not gonna feel more relaxed in a lot of cases unless you take an extreme amount of it I guess the last sort of question that I'd want to ask is you know around the downsides of CBD that the main downsides that I could sort of think about is the research you know although we do have research into it it's you know long-term studies have not been have not had the time to be fully create what we need to do more research into it and and that is partially down to the government and that the restrictions around marijuana and any sort of research around anything to do with with marijuana yeah it was like in the state they they were doing a lot of research into sort of cannabis as a medical product but the legislation at the time restricted from using cannabis even for research purposes so it was a very gray area then because then how are you meant to know how things work if you're not actually allowed to use it so in that case they had to create and like synthetic yeah that's a whole bag that's a whole bag of then what happens was they would yeah because they had to do that just to get around the legislation and but then they found there was a lot of side effects that came with synthetic cannabinoids that you didn't get from the natural plant I suppose that the main sort of synthetic cannabinoid that people would know about is spice you know that that yes it runs rampant especially in Manchester you know those packets of synthetic cannabis that people buy it's legal because they keep coming out with different ones but some of them can like destroy people they can be like a thousand times more potent than any normal marijuana yeah that's the problem is that people will then associate they will take enough of spice or the synthetic as they would if they were taking normal cannabis because gonna get and they don't know how it's gonna interact with their body or you know what the strength is on that and can end up getting themselves very in very dangerous situations and making themselves very very ill from it but yeah that's where most of that sort of came from was was sort of being used to for research basically because we couldn't use a natural plant to complete that research so it was a bit of a you know the legislation was there to protect people but then in the end it just ended up creating something which was you know dangerous basically yeah so yeah it is a tough one but talking about the sort of drawbacks of CVD I think that is probably one of the biggest things is that we we haven't had you know there's been enough research for it to be able to be a food supplement so we know it's you know we know it's safe and stuff but there's so much more we need to know about it and so much more we need to know how to take it and dose it and you know there's so much information that we we will be able to find out in the future even that you know like most most things that you will take they'll say to you right these are common side effects we have no real recorded set side effects because there hasn't been enough reported side effects to warrant anything basically which is a good thing but also a negative because people get very nervous about the fact that they can't find what the side effects are but the fact is at the minute we don't have a list of side effects because there isn't enough recorded cases of of any side effects well I suppose like to do that one of the side effects which which is it is known about it would be things like drowsiness and you know if you take it take a high amount of it you could it might be quite dangerous for you to drive or operate heavy machinery or that kind of stuff yeah so you would have to you would have to have taken quite a significant amount for that to you know to to warrant like being but it would also probably contributes to the fact that if you're taking a full spectrum product that has maybe doesn't have lab tests on and has a higher than your usual THC level and you were to take a lot of that then you're going to get that very high and drowsy feeling so it's the accumulation of the THC building up then in your system that's going to sort of give that give that effect do you mean so I guess one of one of the other the other things that are sort of that I've known about is interactions with with medication yeah I guess that is an also also an area that needs to be researched but like do you think that normal regular GPs would know about what interactions CBD has so whenever anyone asks us because they do that's probably a daily basis I get asked they'll say I'll take an XYZ is going to interact and even if I have had someone on the same medication and they've not had any interactions I still would not advise that person to take it I would always still say please speak to you GP and we found that most people's GPs are quite quick and get back to them like they've been able to just you know call them and say hey like can I take CBD with this and they've got an answer fairly quickly but yeah we do have to be careful there is full of very specific types of medication that have had an interaction with CBD so we do have to be careful and you do have to contact your GP to check them what kind of medications do interact I don't know specifically there was just a couple of cases within the US and I think it was something to do with maybe the liver and so yeah so it's always best to check if you're getting any sort of treatment even if it's not medication but you know we've had people who are getting IVF who are waiting for operations for certain things or dialysis or you know there's no harm in just checking with your GP first and going am I okay to think this this is not going to affect what my treatment plan at all and as I said we've never really had anyone well we've had no one come back and not be able to but on the other hand as well you know CBD being used so widely is only a fairly recent thing so more interactions might come to light as time goes on we just don't know right now I guess that that's what makes it so difficult to get into CBD because there is just so much to it yeah you know flying with CBD some country CBD is still illegal so you need to check where you're going and make sure you're not taking your CBD product to a place that you you shouldn't be taking it basically do you mean so you've got there is some you know so we have information like this on the website we don't give information on what places it's legal and illegal even though we have a full list because that can change in minutes do you mean they can change overnight and I would never ever want to put someone at risk the same with drug tests people ask me a lot of the time is this going to show up in a drug test the drug test will pick up on THC level so if you're taking something that has got THC like a full spectrum even in minuscule amounts I'm not going to stand here and put my hand on my heart and say to you you'll be fine don't worry like you'll be totally cool if your work is going to do a drug test like I think that's something that you probably should just be open and honest with your workplace about and say you know I'm going to be using this product is that going to be an issue like Jeremy and just being completely honest about that we do have new regulations coming in in March next year which is a novel food license which all CBD products need to have to stay on shelf after that which I am wholly welcome it will come with standards it will mean that the products that you find on the shelf have been thoroughly checked and they meet the standards of the FSA although just to throw a span in the way because the European Food Standards Agency who initially was bringing about this sort of legislation have done a bit of a U-turn and they are thinking of keeping and putting CBD as a narcotic within Europe however in the UK the Food Standards Agency have sort of said no we're not going to follow suit on that and we're going to carry on with the plan March next year for novel foods applications there's a lot of possibilities in it and there's a lot of way to come with it I'm just excited to be a part of it really it's yeah if you've sat through talking about CBD and you think that it will help and you're willing to go and ask your doctor and try out then you know I can't stop you from making your own mind up I think you've got to wait up see whether it's something that you want to do see if whether you can afford doing it whether it works for you whether there's areas in your life that could could leave an improvement maybe you've got an addiction or a problem with alcohol maybe CBD could help with that I think it's as we've mentioned many times in those podcasts it's always good to check with your GP it's good to learn about it and it's good to sort of hear people's experiences but make sure that you know although it is a food supplement it does have a lot of active compounds in it and it yeah it can be used in in sort of a medical setting so just just make sure that you understand that so that's that's all the questions that I wanted to ask and it's been a long podcast so we'll have to we'll have to cut and chop a little bit no it's fine don't worry about it it's been lovely to chat about CBD I always jump at the opportunity to talk about it as um my girlfriend and family will know yes I'm the same always chatting to somewhere about it so we're at this the time of the podcast where we're gonna sort of round it up and I know we've talked about quite a few things but for you personally which three main things do you think are the most useful pieces of advice or information to take away from this podcast I would say do your research you know we ourselves are trying to make CBD easy to use but just make sure you know the company that you're you're gonna buy from you know that the reputable you've seen reviews you've checked the certificate of analysis you know do your research into what you're buying the second thing would definitely be start slow and go slow so we need to get out of that mindset of the biggest number is the best you know you need to start really small and gradually increase it till you find that sweet spot as we like to say the third would probably be don't be afraid it's not as scary as it sounds there's a lot of information as we've talked about but I'd say just go into it with an open mind to to know that you know if a company is out there selling it within the regulations and within the legislation that they need to that it's it's safe for them to do so so yeah don't don't be scared of it brilliant thank you very much for those now it comes to the open question the one that everybody loves and this I'm asking you this as a mom to to an autistic child yeah what does autism mean to you I think it's pretty awesome I think as a mom it was probably something I dreaded to hear so much but it's made me such an amazing little boy just wouldn't be who he was without without his autism I don't think it's an illness or you know something like that I just think it's something really really cool about someone yeah I think it's pretty awesome that's what we like to call it it's something pretty special and yeah and I think you'll go far because of his autistic traits and and what they mean to him brilliant thank you very much for that I don't know I probably don't need to keep reiterating this for the people who listen to all of the podcasts but everyone has their own opinion and experience and it's it's it's always nice to hear a kind of people's takes on it and yeah thank you very much for that so would you like to give out some links to your stuff anything that you want people to either follow you on or or check up yeah so you can find us on all social media so we have loads of information over on facebook instagram and we'll soon be on twitter I was a bit too old for that so someone has come on board to take over that and we're even on tiktok and you can find us all under the exact same handle which is plant fire which is plant and then h a y a and and that is also the name of the website which has got loads of education and stuff like they're over so if you've listened to this today and you come and follow us on any of our socials drop me a little message and say hi and let me know what you thought of of this episode I would love to chat with you brilliant so if you want to check out the 40 ot podcast on any of the sites it's available on youtube Spotify and apple podcast along with a whole host of different podcasting websites all under the 40 ot podcast and if you want to check out my youtube channel maybe view the podcast over on there if you don't have any of the other apps it's asked by just growth and you can also view my documentary that I made which is called asperge society and it basically goes into the link between autism and mental health something that I did in my student years my time at university it was a final year project so it's it's not the best quality but I put a lot of work into it and if you are a loyal podcastist now I would definitely definitely encourage you to go over to there if you want to stay up to date with my life my advocacy work all the other types of things working with charities working in the media you can find all of those updates on my social medias facebook twitter and instagram all at asperger's growth very easy to find of course so we have just hit the we've just hit the two hour mark it's officially the longest podcast that I've done in a long time um but it's it's been lovely to chat to you thank you so much for coming on stacey oh look thank you for having me i'm sorry for trimming your ear off you've got a lot of editing to do now it's okay it's better to have more content than no content that's what I always say yeah I always really appreciate anyone coming on to talk about their their experiences their their knowledge their topics it's all very nice stuff to hear about and um overall just increasing our knowledge of of the world and the ways that we can manage our mental health and the way that we can manage the the more negative sides to being autistic I really hope everybody has got something from this episode it's something that as I've said I wanted to talk about for a long time and it's finally here so uh very pleased yay anyway I will let you go don't know what you're going to be doing uh but you know like if you if you want to let me know what you're doing listening to this podcast please email me if you are on social media yourself please send me a story tag me in a story or a post tell me what you're doing listening to the listening to this podcast episode I want to know I want to know what were you what you're doing right I'm gonna leave you now see you later folks stay fresh stay keen stay motivated make sure you get yourself hydrated and get some good sleep and I'll see you in the next episode of The Forty Autie Podcast see you later