Despite making tremendous strides in legalizing and de-stigmatizing cannabis, misconceptions remain about cannabis and how it affects motherhood. Women, and mothers specifically, continue to face social ostracism when it comes to cannabis consumption. Nevertheless, many influential and successful mothers in the cannabis industry have persisted and endured. Four of them participated in the Farmacy Cannabis Lecture Series on Motherhood & Cannabis: Kikoko Co-founder Amanda Jones, Hello Again Founders Carrie Mapes and Patty Papas, and Mindful Living & Empowerment Coach Jessica Gonzalez. The webinar offered an insightful look on how women in the cannabis industry broke the glass ceiling and shattered expectations through all stages of motherhood.

Before she became Co-founder of cannabis wellness company Kikoko, Amanda Jones traveled the world as a journalist for 25 years. Never expecting to become a cannabis entrepreneur, Jones learned that one of her friends was suffering from terminal cancer and struggled to find cannabis products that titrated properly or had healthy ingredients. At the time, there was an opportunity in the cannabis market to provide low-dose products for women who “don’t want to ride the crazy train always,” as Jones put it. “Particularly for a mother, you don’t want to be ravingly high.” Despite initially receiving pushback from critics who assumed their products would be laughed off the shelves, Jones and Kikoko Co-founder Jennifer Chapin unveiled a successful low-dose product line that catered to female cannabis patients.

Similar to Jones, Carrie Mapes and Patty Pappas didn’t expect to be involved in the cannabis space. As stay-at-home moms with five children between them, Mapes and Pappas started looking at cannabis and recognizing its healing potential as a viable treatment option for menopause. They cited Kikoko and their low-dose product line as inspiration for getting involved with cannabis. “We looked left and looked right and realized there’s an entire space in these dispensaries that isn’t addressing women of our age with these particular problems,” said Mapes, who recognized that smoking and vaping weren’t and shouldn’t be the only options for mothers seeking relief with cannabis product.

For Jessica Gonzalez, trying to stay afloat as a stay-at-home mom with two children led to struggles with depression and anxiety. Prior to getting involved with cannabis, Gonzalez resorted to self-medicating with alcohol and prescription drugs. She was familiar with cannabis, but initially didn’t believe it was meant for her. Gonzalez was initially under the impression that cannabis was a wellness medicine that only relieved chronic pain, not the symptoms she was experiencing. She decided to research cannabinoids and its effects on the human body, particularly the endocannabinoid system (ECS), a molecular system responsible for regulating various processes in the body. Like the other featured guests in the webinar, Gonzalez understood there was more to cannabis than THC. When she got around to educating other mothers about the benefits of cannabis on social media, she had an epiphany: “[Cannabis] is a gateway drug to health and wellness.”

Glass House Group’s Community Outreach Manager Kandice Hawes-Lopez, the webinar moderator, shared her personal story of cannabis and how it intertwined with her life as a mother. For the first 15 of the 18 years she spent as a cannabis activist, Hawes-Lopez revealed that she was scared to have kids because of horror stories she heard about mothers having their children taken away because of cannabis. When she was pregnant, Hawes-Lopez worked at a dispensary and often wondered whether there would be a time that she felt uncomfortable with people feeling uncomfortable around her to a point that she had to leave her job. Fortunately, she never encountered that situation. “It’s nice that [mothers] don’t have to worry about that,” Hawes-Lopez said.

“We don’t have to worry about the fear of losing our children. We’ve come a long ways in society.”

Learn more about the Motherhood & Cannabis webinar by visiting vimeo.com/farmacycannabislectures.

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