In our conversations with fellow older stoners, one of the most often-heard reasons that seniors share for turning to cannabis is to see if it will help them to get a better night’s sleep. Getting a consistently good night’s sleep is challenging for many seniors and cannabis tends to work well for some as an alternative to pharmaceuticals. Some may also find that a combination of thc and a mild sleeping pill can be particularly effective. Even though there’s still pharma in the mix, the less is more philosophy still applies.
In the olden days, one of the (not always pleasant) facts of partaking in cannabis was that you had no idea the strain that you were actually smoking and it was largely a crapshoot (the first time you tried a new bag of weed) as to whether you were going to feel energized or be ready to take a nap. Nowadays, the mystery has largely disappeared through lab testing and detailed strain information that’s provided on most cannabis dispensary purchases.
Stating the obvious, strains matter for sleep. That doesn’t mean that if you’ve loaded yourself up with sativa leaning thc all day and night that you’ll have trouble sleeping, but It wouldn’t make sense to turn toward Indica strains in the evening, as they contain the terpenes that people believe assists with sleep.
Cannabis can be consumed in many ways, including smoking, vaping, edibles, tinctures, and topicals. Each method has its onset time and duration. For sleep, capsules or distillate syringes might be preferable for some people since they often provide longer-lasting effects compared to smoking or vaping. However, the onset of effects from edibles, etc. can take much longer (up to two hours or more), so be sure to factor that into your timing and when you are hoping to go fall asleep.