CBD Research - How CBD Works for Weight and Appetite
HOW DOES CBD AFFECT WEIGHT AND APPETITE
We almost loathe writing this article.
How many substances have come and gone as a wonder cure for weight loss.
It's a veritable wasteland of cheesy marketing and potentially bad health effects.
We didn't want to color CBD in the same light since there's quite a bit of research at the National Institute of Health on the benefits of CBD.
Then came Diabetes.
As research increased on how CBD works with Diabetes, new information came forth on the interaction of CBD and our body's mechanisms for:
- Appetite
- Energy use
- Gut function
- Brown fat
- Healthy weight maintenance
These ties directly into having a healthy weight.
Now...in today's world, healthy usually means lower.
Yes, there are those who can't put weight on but it's not THE epidemic.
We'll cry them a river in another article!
Here's the deal....when you read the first section on modern research regarding weight gain and appetite...
You're going to realize it was never a fair fight!
We'll get to that soon.
Let's then look at how CBD works with weight and appetite in depth.
Based on research.
We'll include the new cutting edge research on intraepithelial T lymphocytes and CBD! (you won't want to miss that!).
No schlocky advertising wizards!
You can always jump to the list of 3rd party tested CBD here:
Otherwise, jump to any section here:
- A modern look at why we gain weight
- The endocannabinoid system relationship with weight appetite
- CBD reviews for losing weight and reducing appetite
- How much CBD to take for weight loss
- What's the best CBD to take for weight loss
Let's get started.
A Modern Look At Why We Gain Weight
Yes, there's the pure physics of too many calories and not enough activity.
That doesn't explain why some people can eat whatever they want and never seem to put on weight.
Check out new research below that might affect this trait!
Or more importantly, why some people will pick at their food and not eat much at all!
There are obvious genetic differences between us that affect appetite and metabolism.
New research is saying the situation is much more complex than that.
There are effects of:
- Antibiotics
- Hormones in food and our environment
- Gut bacteria effects (very important!!)
- Preservatives and Pesticides
- Genetic differences in how we absorb and process nutrients
When you're eating that scone, its not just flower, oil, egg, and lemon.
There's so MUCH more than figures in depending on how it's sourced and how your body processes it.
Before we jump into the endocannabinoid system's influence and CBD directly, let's touch base on these.
Otherwise, we're just fighting the tide!
Antibiotics
You may say, I haven't had antibiotics in years!
Yes, but your food probably has.
Especially meat if it's not organic or it IS from restaurants.
It's not just the hit of antibiotics given an animal who shows symptoms of being sick before slaughter.
Big ag figured out a long time ago that you can fatten up animals at a ridiculous clip if you gave them antibiotics.
There's a knock-on effect in the body:
The bacteria in treated mice activated more genes that turn carbohydrates into short-chain fatty acids, and they turned on genes related to lipid conversion in the liver.
Read the article. Please.
It will shed so much light on one aspect of why we're all getting bigger.
More information here:
Recently the FDA issued a somber report: Sales of antibiotics to use in pigs, chicken, cows and seafood rose 20 percent between 2009 and 2013. About 32.6 million pounds of antibiotics were going into the animals we eat, and most of those drugs were given in low doses to promote faster growth or prevent disease in crowded livestock pens.
That was back in 2013.
When you read these articles, you'll notice they inevitably end up talking about our gut bacteria.
All roads end up there in this section so we'll hit that last!
Next, hormones in our food, our environment, and us.
We'll start with the basics.
Our internal hormones are directly tied to weight and appetite.
For example, as estradiol (one version of estrogen) goes down at menopause, it results in weight gain.
Many women think that estrogen is just for reproduction.
They're used to the monthly cycling of estrogen and progesterone.
It's so much more with functions throughout the body and brain!
The protective version of estrogen (called estradiol) directly affects metabolism and weight:
Ovariectomy results in body weight gain while estradiol administration results in a reversal of weight gain.
Keep in mind that the actual chemicals in the body that govern energy use, metabolism, and weight maintenance are...drum roll, please...
Hormones
If these hormones are out of balance, a direct impact is weight gain.
Here's a great look at the hormones of appetite and weight gain:
As a simple example of the interplay between hormones and weight, the stress hormone cortisol drives the conversion of blood sugar into fat.
More stress...more fat retention.
Then there's insulin which is responsible for managing sugar in the body. It's a hormone itself.
More importantly, there's a direct tie between estrogen and insulin.
A healthy estrogen level helps to manage insulin in terms of converting sugar to fat or sending it to muscles.
That is one reason weight gain can increase significantly during the cycle and at perimenopause.
Look...to put a point on it...the chemical ghrelin that actually makes you feel "hungry"...is a hormone!
Leptin, the chemical that makes you feel full?
Hormone.
We rest our case honor!
The article above is a great read on how hormones affect weight.
Keep that idea stowed away as we get into the endocannabinoid system.
Gut Bacteria and weight
The microbiome, as it's called, is all the rage these days.
It's the collection of bacteria in our gut that almost operate as a separate organ!
The importance is only now being realized especially for the proper function of our immune response.
Evidence is emerging that the intestinal microbiome is intrinsically linked with overall health, including obesity risk.
If you need an "ah-ha" moment on the effect of gut biome on healthy weight, look what happens when bacteria from obese mice are transplanted to healthy mice:
when the distal gut microbiota from the normal mice was transplanted into the gnotobiotic mice, there was a 60% increase in body fat within 2 weeks without any increase in food consumption or obvious differences in energy expenditure
60% increase in body fat.
2 weeks.
No change in food consumption or activity.
This is crazy!!
The gut biome and weight relationship could fill pages and pages. Check out CBD and the gut here.
You can learn all about it from the article above.
Next stop...something that impacts both hormones and gut biome.
Preservatives And Pesticides
Maybe we're not as smart as we think we are.
The many things we put in our food supply have been shown to directly affect weight gain and general health.
As a quick example...
Exposure to a particular type of pesticide called organochloride was linked to a weight gain of 9½ pounds over 50 years.
That's one of many pesticides that can be found in our bodies at any given time.
What about our favorite...glyphosate?
It's a neurotoxin after all and thanks to big ag, we all have it in our bodies now.
It's even found in umbilical cord blood.
Via its effect of a specific member of our gut biome and its effect on bile salt:
Impaired bile salt deconjugation by gut bacteria results in significant weight gain along with elevated plasma cholesterol and liver triglycerides in mice.
Then there are preservatives.
One example of their lovely effect on weight can be found in how they affect hormone signaling for hunger.
Without that signal telling us we're full, we're more likely to keep eating and gain weight.
Again, there are as many examples of their effects as there are preservatives.
Finally, there's us!
Genetic differences in how we absorb and process nutrients
We all have our own genetic bag of tricks to deal with.
Some deal with how we absorb or metabolize (or don't) certain nutrients:
- MTHR and B12
- MTRR and Folate
Two very common variants (thought to be at about 40% of the population!)
There's a gene for every nutrient we need to process.
Zinc. Vitamin D. Manganese.
You name it.
The gut biome has its own nutrient requirements and duties.
The bacteria in your gut can actually signal hunger to your body!
If we're taking in lots of empty calories or dead food, our bodies and the gut bacteria may be sending signals that they are starving for nutrients!
So...what can we do about all this?
- Eat organic if possible
- Eat lots of vegetables
- Learn what your body needs based on genetics and histamine pathways
Basically, one-word ingredients.
Apple. Cabbage.
No butylated hydroxytoluene (common food additive)
Goodness, we covered a lot there on why we gain weight.
What about the endocannabinoid system?
The Endocannabinoid System Relationship With Weight Appetite
The endocannabinoid system is about 600 million years old.
We all have one and we share this system with most multicellular lifeforms.
Sorry insects, you're not invited to this party.
Here's a quick visual:
The endocannabinoid system is all the rage these days.
Why?
Well researchers didn't know much about till recently and it turns out it is tasked with balancing other key systems:
- Immune system (resides in the gut and works with micro-biome mentioned above)
- Endocrine system (hormones!!!)
- Neurotransmitters
Right away, we see some key areas for weight and appetite.
- The immune system governs inflammation and response to outside chemicals.
- The endocrine system governs the levels of weight and appetite!
That's the linchpin for healthy weight and appetite.
There's also the food addiction angle in that many of the "decisions" of appetite are made in the hypothalamus where some of the roots of addiction itself arise.
Let's look at research before we jump into CBD specifically (which acts on the endocannabinoid system).
We'll start with appetite and end with weight (because isn't that the general flow!)
Endocannabinoid and Appetite
Is there even a relationship there?
Turns out there is:
It is now confirmed that endocannabinoids, acting at brain CB1 cannabinoid receptors, stimulate appetite and ingestive behaviours, partly through interactions with more established orexigenic and anorexigenic signals
It's not just appetite though...
Specific insights into the potential role of endocannabinoid-CB1 receptor systems in central appetite control, peripheral metabolism and body weight regulation
More specifically, the hormone ghrelin (your hungry feeling hormone) is administered via the endocannabinoid system in your body.
Researchers used so-called "knock out" mice that do not have CB1 receptors.
When given ghrelin, they did not exhibit an increase in appetite!
Ghrelin did not induce an anorexigenic effect in CB1-knockout mice. Correspondingly, both the genetic lack of CB1 and the pharmacological blockade of CB1 inhibited the effect of ghrelin on AMPK activity
Let's look at the other side of the coin.
Satiety. Feeling full. No longer hungry.
That's leptin primarily.
Turns out it's directly intertwined with the endocannabinoid system as well:
These findings indicate that endocannabinoids in the hypothalamus may tonically activate CB1 receptors to maintain food intake and form part of the neural circuitry regulated by leptin.
We keep coming back to the hypothalamus.
Check out the CBD and addiction page here to see why that's so important.
Some issues with weight are tied to circuits of addiction rather than balance in hormones.
But we already knew that!!
To wrap up this section...
Mounting evidence, reviewed here, indicates that cannabinoids can act to increase food consumption, and cannabinoid CB1 receptor antagonists/inverse agonists reduce food intake and suppress operant responding for food rewards
We literally just spelled out the actors of appetite.
They are all actors on the endocannabinoid stage!
What about weight??
Weight and endocannabinoid system
Hormones govern the incredibly complicated system of balancing calorie intake, energy use, and the resulting fat creation.
All hormones.
We see this when it goes awry such as with Diabetes (see CBD and Diabetes).
Let's look at one aspect of this very complex system.
So-called Brown Fat.
It's the good fat that actually causes the body to use up calories!
Brown fat is primarily used to create heat and as a result, burns up calories.
We use to think that babies had more of it and we lost it over time.
Turns out that adults can create more brown fat.
Cold exposure will do it.
Guess what else will?
Cannabinoids.
We'll touch on this below in the CBD specific section (hint hint).
It's not just fat though...there's an entire system at play here with the gut and microbiome playing a major role:
Interestingly, the endocannabinoid system was recently shown to control several metabolic functions by acting on peripheral tissues such as adipocytes, hepatocytes, the gastrointestinal tract, the skeletal muscles and the endocrine pancreas.
Finally, the food addiction angle:
The hedonic component of hypercaloric nutrition (24) could possibly be targeted by a CB1 antagonist, which might be able to diminish the possibly addictive aspect of food intake in some individuals, in combination with decreasing orexigenic drive and lipogenesis.
Hedonic is just a fancy word for habit-forming.
Basically, for people dealing with obesity, there's a part of this condition that is more addiction than purely calorie/energy expenditure.
Again, check out the CBD and addiction page for info.
The reward system is definitely in play here for obesity!
You can also learn about CBD and the gut for more information on how it works with the microbiome or mini universe of gut bacteria here.
That's a whole other article!
Finally, let's get into CBD.
CBD Reviews For Losing Weight And Reducing Appetite
We looked at the bigger picture...the endocannabinoid system above.
CBD works within this system to either boost or reduce activity at the various CB receptors.
In this way, it can have different effects.
CB1 activation in the brain is known to stimulate appetite (hence the munchies with THC).
CBD, however, doesn't directly stimulate the CB1 receptor.
In fact, in some of the earlier studies for other issues, one noted "side effect" was a reduction in appetite:
This is thought to occur in the CB2 receptors throughout the body but most importantly in the endocrine system which actually governs appetite.
This one aspect points to how much misinformation is online regarding CBD.
Most sites will proclaim that CBD is an appetite stimulant!
They're either incorrectly showing results for cannabis (high in THC) or THC itself which is an appetite stimulant.
So it's CBD Isolate (so much for the "entourage effect" if we're trying to lose weight!).
Appetite stimulants can be important for HIV and cancer patients but the vast majority of us are trying to move the dial the other way!
That's CBD.
Also, CBD works with the immune and endocrine system which governs the key hormones which drive hunger (Ghrelin) and satiety (Leptin).
The first signs of their interaction came about while studying anorexia:
Ghrelin and endocannabinoids exert orexigenic effects which may facilitate nutritional restoration. Leptin and endocannabinoids may exert anti-depressive and anxiolytic effects.
Balancing the interplay between these key hormones is the role of the endocannabinoid system which CBD supports.
Let's look at some specifics.
Research is showing that CBD directly (and positively) impacts these aspects of our energy metabolism system:
- Browning of fat (a good thing)
- Boosting mitochondria (power plants in cells) thus increasing energy use
- Decreasing gene activity responsible for new fat creation
Keep in mind that the research is all pretty new with CBD with lots more coming.
The endocannabinoid system is expressed throughout the entire metabolism/energy pathway so we expect to see many more results as the research comes in.
We'll add the new information as we get it.
We'll leave it with this:
In conclusion, the current data suggest that CBD plays dual modulatory roles in the form of inducing the brown-like phenotype as well as promoting lipid metabolism
"Lipid metabolism". Breaking down fat.
Yes, please.
Now, let's get a cutting edge.
A brand new piece of research found that the presence of certain cells in the gut slows metabolism and increases the risk for related diseases.
When that cell type wasn't as prevalent...
“The mice become metabolically hyperactive and, even when consuming a diet very high in fat and sugar, are able to resist metabolic diseases such as obesity, hypertension, hypercholesterolemia, diabetes, and atherosclerosis,”
Wow! Their assessment...
The cells are called intraepithelial T lymphocytes (or natural IELs), and when they are not present, researchers discovered, the metabolism of mice goes into overdrive.
Overdrive!
What does that have to do with CBD?
Oh, just this:
CB2 ablation (removal) increased numbers of intraepithelial CD4 T-cells in small intestine
Basically, you reduce the function of endocannabinoid receptors (where CBD does its work) and you get more of those cells and consequently, less metabolism.
We want to see more research on this but it could explain CBD's effects on diabetes, weight, energy, and a host of issues!
For more information, check out CBD and the Gut or CBD and Diabetes.
How Much CBD To Take For Weight Loss
A general wellness dosage of CBD oil is about 25-30 mgs per day.
Make sure to start slow and test how your body responds.
Most of the research on more serious issues have dosages up to 300-600mg.
It's even been studied up to 1500mg with a strong safety profile.
It might make sense to go up the scale if you have serious consequences of obesity and/or diabetes.
Always work with your doctor (preferably a naturopath who doesn't just hand out scripts) with CBD or any supplement!
What's The Best CBD To Take For Weight Loss
We recommend CBD isolate to avoid histamine and allergic issues that can accompany "full-spectrum".
It concerns us that many people will try full-spectrum, have a bad response, and give up on CBD.
There are so many people suffering and CBD itself has a lot of research on its ability to help!
Check out the full spectrum versus isolate article for more details.
The CBD Isolate options by price (IndigoNaturals has free shipping so pricing is equivalent):
Of course, it needs to be 3rd party tested free of:
- THC
- Solvents
- Heavy Metals
- Pesticides
- Bacteria
- Mold
It also needs to have a sufficient amount of CBD ITSELF in the bottle.
That's why we screened the big brands for total CBD and most importantly...
Cost per MG of CBD!
That's what really matters.
We need to be able to afford it.
Check out the comparison of CBD oil here.
Of course, let us know your results on CBD and weight!
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