Transcription

[00:00:03]

Hello. Hello, everyone. Oh, my goodness. I am so excited to be introducing you to my dear friend and colleague who's joining us here today in our series, where we're taking a look at uncommon pleasures. Everyone, I am so pleased to introduce to you Dr.

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Norelyn Parker. And Dr. Norelyn is a cannabis health and pleasure coach from Sacramento, California, who has seamlessly blended together advanced trainings in the fields of sexology, sex coaching, sexological bodywork, and cannabis education in order to help her clients create canna infused pleasure. And in her free time, you can find her reading at poetry, open mic, nights on a blues fusion dance floor, or playing the ukulele and all around. Norelyn is one of my dear friends.

[00:00:59]

So, Norlin, say hello to the people. Hello, everyone. And hello, Sarah. It's really awesome to be here today. Yay.

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I so wanted you to come and share with us from your font of wisdom, because when it comes to all things cannabis and pleasure, I have a vague awareness that this is out there in the world. And, yeah, I know so very little about it. One of our friends in common, a lovely human named Lucy Rowett, one time she went to California, and while she was there, she picked up for a lube and has not shut up about it since. And so that's one of the things that cottoned me on to maybe there's something here. And then knowing you and all that, you've invested into learning more about cannabis education generally.

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Plus, you're an incredible sexologist, I'm like, you know, I'm wondering, where do you even begin when you're thinking about how cannabis and pleasure might go together?

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Yeah, there's definitely a lot a lot out there right now. And luckily, the laws are changing, so it's making information more widely available. And where I like to start with framing how cannabis can support individualized pleasure is the fact that we all have what's called an endocannabinoid system. So ECS for short. And this ECS system in our bodies plays a critical role in the regulation of disease.

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It keeps our bodies, many of the body systems in states of homeostasis, out of the fight or flight. So if you think of any health conditions or something like anxiety or depression, whether or not it's acute or more or less acute, chronic, less cute chronic. So if you think about this wide array of health conditions that could interrupt pleasure, the way cannabis can help is by mitigating those systems and bringing us back to the symptoms and bringing our systems back to homeostasis. So that's the method that I look at, how it's actually supporting pleasure. And so most often, people think of cannabis and they think of getting high.

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That's typically the first thing, and that's coming from the endocannabinoid. THC. The one that is not psychoactive is CBD. And there's let's see here in our system, you can think of it as a lock and key, and the endocannabinoids our bodies naturally produce. For example, if you're in a state of pain, your body is going to produce endocannabinoids and then they'll fit into the locks or the receptors.

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So when we ingest cannabis, these cannabis like compounds or endocannabinoids are the cannabis like compounds that fit really neatly into those receptors and then enzymes that are responsible for making them and breaking down the cannabinoids. So that's kind of the easiest in a nutshell. And I think that one of the biggest things when talking about to people who are kind of curious, because I, for example, came into this scene in industry and eventually got my certification in cannabis coaching. But way before that, I was someone who was terribly afraid of getting too high. I didn't want any part of it, but I really wanted to experience the benefits of cannabis, especially dealing with my chronic pain conditions.

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And for me, that was in the realm of TMJ disorder. So really tight locking up jaw that created migraines, and just daily discomfort that essentially interrupted my experience of sexual pleasure. And then like in Sclerosis, which is a vulgar skin condition, that's an autoimmune. So those were my entry points. And I said, how can I use cannabis without getting high?

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And the beauty of topicals is that you can't get high from those. And our skin has natural receptors. So there's things like cannabis lubes, cannabis balms, cannabis moisturizers, that are specifically formulated, keeping PH in mind to help do things like relax, just relax the muscles, increase blood flow, which leads to naturally increased sensation, and then actually improve the health of the skin. If you're dealing with something like in Sclerosis or any other skin condition that affects the vulva, is this really specifically. Like genital application or can this be full body or is it different products for different parts of the body?

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I'm kind of curious how that works. Yeah. So when you search cannabis topical, you're probably most often going to first see bombs for like muscle aches or stuff formulated for eczema. So that came first, I think before the products that are specifically formulated for genitals. And right now there's at least twelve pretty wellknown brands wow.

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On the market. So it's definitely becoming more common for the genital formulated. I more often see stuff targeted towards the vulva, but in terms of balms for actual specific health concerns. But then things like the intimacy, lubes and moisturizer that's regardless of gender and helpful for anyone in a very narrow sense.

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Can your vulva or your penis get high even if you don't get high? So in a way, if you're experiencing increased sensation and more blood flow and all and you feel more relaxed, in a way, I do feel like my genitals are high. Right. But it's not psychoactively high. That high stays below the belt.

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Okay. Nothing is happening with my brain psychoactive. Right. Yes, the physical sensations are definitely increased. So, yeah, my generals are high, but not my brain.

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And for anybody listening, what can they expect? Because I think sometimes folks who are kind of curious or I don't know, who grew up like me in the Parker era when we were all told that marijuana use was going to mean that our whole entire lives would fall apart and we'd become worthless in the eyes of society and blah, blah, blah. Like there was so much anti marijuana propaganda growing up and so and we know, just like when it comes to sex and sexual expression, that even when we start opening up to that, those early childhood messages stick with us. So is there something you can say to like, I don't know, just kind of give that preview of like, hey, it's not like you're going to go out and then everything is going to fall apart instead, actually, what will happen is this. And it's actually pretty chill because I imagine that's what it's actually like, but putting my head into that place, I'm kind of curious what you might say.

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Yeah, funny enough, in my school, in elementary school, I recall writing a Parker essay and I won this contest and read my essay in front of the entire school. What? This is amazing. You still have this essay. Wait, pause.

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I bet you my mom does. Okay, well, if you can dig it out and find it, I really would invite you to come back so that we can do a special reading of the Dr. Dr. Norelyn Parker essay. But anyway, coming back? Yeah, tell me more.

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So the way I like to coach my county curious clients is about looking for the goldilocks ratio, which is for many people the goldilocks ratio. Many people say that's one to one. And what I mean by ratio is like CBD to THC. So a lot of people who are like, well, I do want some benefits of cannabis, but I'm going to make sure the product is just CBD and there's 0% THC. And if that's the only way you feel comfortable to start, I support that.

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But there's something pretty magical that happens in terms of how CBD and THC interact and the other spread of endocannabinoids. Those are just the two that you hear about all the time, but there's many others that we definitely we test and we can see the lab results and you can have these different percentages and there's like, CBD will function better with at least a little THC in the mix. So when you go to a dispensary, definitely when you're saying it's your first time, most dispensaries that I've gone to, they have really knowledgeable staff and they can help describe the experience of the specific strains or products and also help you select which ingestion method is right for you. So for the newbie, it doesn't have to be, okay, I'm going to bear through this first high experience and hope that it's not too much. We really coach.

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I coach on starting low and going slow. And we're talking microdose ranges, so we're talking two five milligrams. Like when you go to a dispensary, most of the micro dosing is 2.5 to five and like an average five milligram gummy. And if you want to start out two five mark, you just bite it in half. And so it's really important early on to start tracking your experiences, slash your sex experiences when you start incorporating it.

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And not only are you going to track your physical sensation that you're going to, but before and after tracking things like how much you slept the last night, how hydrated you are. Did you eat this with companion foods? There are certain foods that can increase the intensity of your high or decrease it. Really? Yeah.

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I believe mangoes, I think, have a similar terpene of the same terpenes. So if you take it with certain strains, or I think maybe in a general sense, but and then the flip side goes, there's other foods that you can if you have on hand in case you find yourself too high to help the cannabis move through your system quicker. So it's good to have a first time high, sort of checklist and track things like how much you ate, what companion foods, who you're with, and journal that so that over time you can start to really dial in what strains are good for you, how they make you feel. Maybe the strain or product is good for you during the daytime, but not the night time. Time of day is important.

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So there's all these elements that I have fun helping my clients track to reduce the overwhelm for their first experiences. And then they have confidence to say, all right, I know five milligrams, I'm barely starting to feel it. I'm not going to double it, but I'm going to go up two more milligrams and see what that looks like. Cool. So it sounds like you can take this tapered approach.

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And I suppose this is the benefit to legalization, which is also something we didn't have back in the day, right. That you can actually know what you're getting and you can do it in this very this way, where you're in control and you know what's going on. Right. Just thinking back to experiences, I remember being recounted from when I was a young person, where you're kind of placing your trust in somebody who was essentially doing an illegal activity, and many of them were perfectly nice people. And at the same time, right, you might get something that's far stronger than you were expecting.

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Whereas here what I'm hearing, is that actually there's quite a lot of control that you have in terms of interacting at a dispensary to get the right thing for you. And also what I'm hearing, because I know where the legal patchwork differs around the country, around the world, so around the United states and the world beyond, in some places where THC still isn't available, you can often get CBD products. And so what I'm hearing is that even though CBD has a better effect when it's together with THC in the right proportions, that you can still get some benefit using CBD products on their own. Have I got that right? Yes, that's definitely why.

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Especially even if the THC is available in that person's area, but they feel most comfortable sticking with these 0% THC, there's still benefits to be had, but it's definitely in the states that areas that where you can't get it. I definitely go for it.

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Beautiful. I just wanted to offer that summary to show that even if you're somewhere and you're listening to this and you're like, can't get anything with THC here, check and see if CBD is something that's possible for you to interact with and that there might be possibilities for you there too, to experience these other benefits. If I could add too, there's really great products that help you, like infusion I can't remember the actual name, but like, you can buy an infusion machine at home and it will sit on your kitchen counter and it looks really like just another kitchen appliance. And if you find that prices are because it can get pricey depending on taxes, and sometimes there's double tax, there's like the state tax, there's like the county tax. So you might find that little tin of gummies ends up you're paying double in taxes, unfortunately.

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So if you're able to check your growing laws and you want to grow just a personal amount, I think, for example, where I'm at, not 100% updated on what currently grow, but like six plants, I think was a maximum. That's plenty for one household to create some to process this dry herb versus save some of the shake, which the shake is what you clip off when you buy Bud in a store. It comes like in a dispensary. It's like really pretty and they've clipped off all of the extra dry leaves. Well, when you clip it off, if you save that, you can actually put it into an infusion machine.

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Okay. Extraction probably is a better word. You extract it in like, olive oil and then you can have your own olive oil pincture, or you can make butter, so that makes it more cost effective. And in terms of dosage, there are things to buy that you can test the strength of products you make at home. So all of these things are making it more available for the average person to make prepare and their own medicine or recreational.

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Yes. What I'm hearing here really is that there's a whole spectrum upon which you can engage. And so rather than getting overwhelmed, it's about finding like, what's an initial entry point for you to discover. Is this for you? Is it not for you?

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And I'm wondering normally I know that you have a set of 14 elements that make for a great conscious cannabis use when it comes to sexploration. And I'm wondering, would you like to share any of those either in summary or what those 14 points are? Because I think that's part of your magic is that you know how to integrate this deep knowledge of cannabis and how it works with our bodies and what it can do together with your deep knowledge of human sexuality and what our bodies can do to make a magic. So would you like to share anything with us on that? Yeah, so some of them I mentioned earlier, but like the diet, companion foods, the companions who you're with, your environment, surroundings.

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So, for example, how you process time may change and which ties into these studies that show that cannabis can have an effect positively on orgasm. Is that more in a physical sense? Here's some questions that have arose from these studies. Is it because it's physically making an orgasm stronger, or is it your sense of time and the orgasm longer? So that's definitely something that I talk about in conscious cannabis use to consider your environment and surroundings so that it's supportive, especially if you become more sensitive to sounds or you need certain things to support you in that hydration time between doses, especially when you're first starting out.

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You want to start with maybe maximum two doses a day and play around with the space between those doses. And then when you're more experienced, you can sort of start stacking in a way that can elongate or either the pleasure that you're aiming for or the mitigation of symptoms too, if you know that this time of day, my back pain and like, let's get ahead of that. And in terms of planning sexual experiences with yourself or partner, you can sort of anticipate, okay, I'm going to get ahead of this pain and then prime myself for the sexual experience satiation. So I include tracking on being more in tune into intuitive eating. So I bring up whether or not you're somebody that eats very rigid schedules and like how to plan on that, or if you want to explore intuitive eating styles and see how that affects your cannabis use.

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Movement. I really like talking about movement too, because something like the runner's high, right? So you run and you have all these great exercise endorphins and all the things if you're becoming a regular cannabis user, the way that the cannabis is stored in your fat cells when you run or exercise vigorously, that cannabis that has been stored can come out of, oh, wow, literally get a runner's high. That is kind of unexpected. So my partner, he definitely goes through that, and that's something to embrace for some or prepare for.

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Okay, I might feel a little more lit after this run, depending on how recently, but it's usually not to a level where it's like, oh, my gosh, I'm too high to do anything after this workout. It's just helping people in this wider fabric of being conscious about cannabis use to synthesize yourself to when you approach these edges. Yeah, makes sense. And what I'm hearing, too, in all of these elements is that to me, that just sounds like the practice of becoming conscious in general of self and one's experiences. And so I'm even thinking, listeners, if you listen to all this and you're just like, yeah, no, I'm not going to.

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I think that's even something you can still take away. It's like, well, you know, mapping together who you're with and what you ate and how much you slept and how hydrated you are and how that relates to your sexual experience on its own is a very powerful thing. And then seeing how intimately that could link together with cannabis use and sexual experience is like just adding another layer of potential delight on top of what you already have. Right? Yeah.

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And sometimes in my first sessions with the Can, I curious. It sounds like a lot and things to start tracking. It can for some. Some people eat it right up. They're like, I'm already an analog agenda person.

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And they just like sticker mode, bullet journaling. I work with both types of clients. But if it feels like overwhelming to do all at once, it's tuning in. You don't have to be perfect at this tracking. A lot of times the tracking just is for the eight weeks.

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If I'm doing an eight week session package track over the duration of the eight weeks, and then it becomes more internalized. And beyond the eight weeks, you find yourself not needing to track as much, or you track once a month, or you only track when you've introduced a new product, a new knowledge. So it's not necessarily a system that goes on forever and ever. And there's beautiful. One of my favorite cannabis experience tracking journal is by Gold Leaf.

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I'm a huge fan of that. So it's really beautiful design, simple, and it makes the tracking sexy. So I would love to include a link to that in the show notes so anybody who's curious can go and find this tracker. Because I was going to ask, like, how do you recommend doing that? But thank you for sharing that with us.

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I'm sorry to interrupt. Please. No, there was more on that point, but I'm just like, yes, here we go. There's the tracker. Can you tell that I'm a type A personality anyway?

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And the other theme I'm really hearing and everything that you're sharing, Norelyn is the sense of curiosity. Like, coming to your exploration of cannabis and sex with a healthy dose of curiosity seems to be something that's underlying the entire process. And I think that that's very much in line with my understanding of how we can have the best possible sexual experiences, is that curiosity is often the antidote to a lot of things, right, to some of the shame and fear and anxieties that we can feel around our sexuality. So I'm just curious, your take on curiosity.

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So what I thought of first is the element of the terpene and how fun it is to choose cannabis strains based off of the smell. So terpenes can broadly be understood as like the essential oil of this particular cannabis strain. So most of us probably grew up with thinking of the skunky smell of cannabis long now. There's so many different kinds and my partner, he acts like he's smelling different types of wine. You can get really, really fancy with it.

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That's what I heard that it is kind of you can almost go Somalier levels, right? They all have a nose and I think that's fascinating and that's so sensual too, right? Yeah.

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I worked a couple of harvests several years ago and before they were even cut down, a couple of weeks before the harvest, the smell is intoxicating. I know I wasn't having a psychoactive effect, but I was essentially smelling like the pheromones of this beautiful plant and it like it's really earthy and I could feel like expansion in my chest when I allowed myself to be curious. And so as it's hearing, the smell changes. And then when you have flour that's ready to smoke, one tip is to lean towards the terpene profiles that actually resonate with you. And I compare it very similarly to how a massage therapist will sometimes during intake.

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Of course, they're going to consider the essential oils that would help you with your specific concern, but also intuitively let you know. Even if this essential oil is supposed to be great for your health concern, if you hate the way it smells, there's going to be some dissonance. And it also might be a signal of intolerance for that essential oil, you know, or the hyper sensitivity. So, for example, citrus, citrus terpene is limonene. So that one is typically an energizing type of cannabis strain.

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The black pepper smell is cariothylline and it's like a gastro protective. So you can, you can look at charts online if you're at all curious. And I don't know when you mentioned, like, what my take on curiosity? I think the more you get into this and you see the wide array of cannabis strains and the combinations and remaining curious about how each can interact with your own endocannabinoid system is really expands the possibilities of how it could help you with chronic health conditions or just enhance pleasure. And something from very like the ritual of doing a self care.

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Like, if you're feeling stressed and you're going to combine a CBD bath bomb and you feel like you want to take a high CBD joint and smoke that in your bath before some scheduled partnered experience you have coming up later that evening. You can really make this luxurious experience, even though it started from the fact that you're maybe in pain and you're like, okay, how do I do this? But you flip it around, and I feel like cannabis, for me, has really given me back a lot of my pleasure and opened me up, especially when I felt like I lost a lot due to my chronic health conditions, and it regained ownership over myself through cannabis. In a way beautiful. And I don't know, I feel some kind of sadness in my body.

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And I had this thought, like, I want to check it with you because you're giving such an awesome description of how I don't know, in their way not to sound woo, but just to sound like, okay, we're mammals here on planet Earth. The plants were communicating with you, or they were communicating, and you were able to pick it up, which made me think, we coevolved with cannabis plants, didn't we? Because they're well, some of them are very hardy, right? They can live almost anywhere. And then I don't know, do you see a connection between the way that we've treated our relationship with cannabis and the way that, for example, we treat the relationship with female sexuality, which is almost like, lock it down.

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This shit is dangerous, when actually that's because it's part of the pathway to liberation. Because I'm just thinking about how, like, why do we demonize this so much when actually it sounds like this plant matches and meets a bunch of needs that we have. And, like, so much so that you were talking about it basically being, like locks and keys and look at all of these varieties that can help with all of these things. Why? Why normal?

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And what's your take? Get up on a soapbox and have a ramp, because I kind of feel like having one. It's the same thing over and over. And, like, that's what you know, because here on the Slutty Activism podcast, we're talking about the ways that traditional approaches to dating, sex, and relationships facilitate fascism and what we can do differently in order to bring about change in the world. And I'm just getting that feeling that I often get when it comes to sex and relationships.

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Just now I'm having that about cannabis and the way that there are crackdowns on this all over the world. And it's kind of like, why, like, this is peaceful, what you're sharing with me. Right. And it's only the bullshit that we've done to it that creates violence around it. There are some very clear parallels.

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Discuss.

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Yeah. And I think even in the places where it's accepted the most, like a state like California, the cost as a barrier for many people to access cannabis is really heartbreaking. So even when it's like, okay, it's out in the open. No sigma, you're allowed to grow even. But even the setup can potentially be expensive to start.

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So it's always the first the first thing that started circling my mind when we went, you brought this up, is you've got alcohol. And alcohol is still a huge part of our culture and I don't see any shifts anytime soon in how we say, like, we deserve it. It's Friday, I deserve this, and that's fine, great. But what about consciously consuming alcohol as well? There's a big difference between saying, I worked really hard this week, I deserve XYZ amount, and then find yourself recovering all weekend.

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And that's a huge part of our culture and it's really accepted and that's what it is. And then you take cannabis and. Oh. Yeah, I feel like I deserve this joint and this vape pen and I want to relax with that. And there's just sometimes there's just a very different vibe and then in judgment and people are still feeling like they have to hide from their family or partners, which is even more heartbreaking, especially when the motivation is to enhance sexual pleasure or to have a break from the pain that is interrupting the sexual pleasure.

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You know, all these things. But then you come up against these walls and cost barriers and things like that. So it's wildly frustrating and really, really hard to process. For sure. Yeah.

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Thank you for coming. I didn't mean to lower the mood, but I'm just like, oh, my God. It's a similar sort of thing, right? And that's not to say just like, being a slutty activist doesn't mean you have to just go out and have sex with everyone. It's all about choice.

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And here, like, if you don't wanna, you don't got up. And at the same time, making this something that's accessible to people and deshaming it, I think, is equally as important as when we do that to human sexuality and then the fusion of the two, you know you're onto something. Dr norlin so, one other quick question. Just because we spent a lot of time talking about, like, sort of beginners and the kind of curious, because I think a lot of our listeners will fall into that bucket. And at the same time, I imagine there might be a couple of people here who are like, come on, now, I know what I'm doing.

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What would be your top tip for somebody who's already got some experience either with, like, cannabis or THC CBD products, like gummies or bombs or loops, like something they might not have thought of, something creative? I did love your suggestion about the CBD bath bomb and the joint. As you're warming up to go on an encounter of some sort, I'm wondering, have you got a suggestion of something similar for maybe folks who are already a bit comfortable and kind of know where they sit and maybe just have never thought of before?

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Yoga. Yoga. Combining yoga and cannabis. I believe there's a book called Ganja Yoga that was really popular for a bit. Beautiful cover, too.

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I can see it. Ganji Yoga. So I think combining your cannabis. Experience with physical activity like yoga or what else, massage and giving and receiving massage. And that can be really changes what your experience can be on either end.

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I remember for sure the sense of expansion and timelessness. And when I finally felt more comfortable taking a higher dose and I thought and I was going to massage, perform the massage, and I mean, I easily massaged for nearly 2 hours, thinking it was 1 hour, because, you know, and it was great. And I was just as and for sure the recipient was very happy with a nearly two hour massage. So I think branching out and safely combining it with touched base modalities because you might have already made the connection of, like, sex in cannabis selfpleasuring cannabis is good, but what about other nonsexual things with movement? And I also really encourage trying to make your own when you're I mean, you can start right away if you're just getting into it carefully and perhaps with a guide so that you're not accidentally making something too strong.

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But if you've been an experienced cannabis user for a long time and never tried making it, I think there's something really special about being a part of the process and perhaps knowing the grower and then making the picture yourself. So, yeah, I think those are the top sort of things that come to mind. But, I mean, yoga, too, you could be a newbie of yoga, and I like my little my favorite are some high CBD, low THC, half prerolls that I'm starting to see a lot more in California. And like, one of those half joints before a yoga session is just so nice.

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I love it. Marlin, thank you so much for sharing so generously with all of us here. I know I'm taking away a lot because I'm in the beginner camp when it comes to all of this. And so this has been juicy, and I feel more confident, like I could go out and create an experience even starting from where I am now. And so I'm hoping that others listening to this will have a similar sort of feeling and if they'd like to take it further.

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Norlin, could you tell us a bit about where we could find you if we want to learn more? Yes, so you can find me at cannainfused pleasure coach. And pretty soon I'll be unveiling a eight week program, which I'm really excited about, that will be focused on the integration of cannabis and sexual pleasure. Excellent. Well, and whenever that drops, we'd love to have you come back and share with us a little bit more about what's going on.

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So, yeah, thank you. Thank you. Thank you so much, Dr. Norelyn. And thank you, everybody who's listened.

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So if you're catching the video or if you're listening to this on the podcast itself, thank you so much for spending some of your time and attention here with us. And we will see you again on the Internet sometime soon. All right. Thank you.