I used to think “microdosing” meant taking a single hit of a joint and then putting it in a plastic bag. So when I heard of Stokes Mint Micros, I wondered if it might fit the microdose-shaped hole in my heart. The container looks more like a film canister than a pill bottle and the mints themselves look like the missing link between Tic-tacs and Altoids.

They’re dosed at 5 milligrams THC per mint with twenty mints per bottle and they cost $14. One of the benefits of micro dosing is you regulate your high to stay functional throughout your day. But I tried my new minty friends on a Saturday night to see how many mints it took for me to go from functional to not functional.

I convinced my partner, Jake, to join the experiment, and we took our first mint at 8 pm, right after dinner. I should note that at the time, Jake and I were on a nutritional cleanse during which we were eating like hunter gatherers. We couldn’t have sugar or booze, or smoke anything, so you can imagine how geared up we were to try some sugar-free cannabis mints.

Test 1: How did it taste? Good. It was a traditional minty mint, as in not Wintergreen or Spearmint or any other poser mint. It found the faintest cannabis aftertaste, but Jake couldn’t detect it at all.

Test 2: Did the mint actually freshen our breath? We breathed into each other’s faces to check. We’d eaten a garlic-veggie thing for dinner and the mint masked the garlic smell entirely.

Test 3: Dosage: Different for each of us. Test 3 took place over the course of the entire night.

After we took our mints, we walked a mile to the movie theater near our house to see The Shape of Water, Guillermo Del Toro’s new movie. On the walk, I didn’t feel high the way I do after smoking a joint, but I did begin to notice things. This was about twenty minutes in. We passed a building whose purpose I’d been puzzling over for years. I cupped my hands over the glass to peer into the window. I could see bunk beds in each room. And by staring through the glass doors at a bulletin board in the foyer, I deduced that it was a college dorm.

“You’re high,” Jake said.

“Am I?” I didn’t feel high, I just really wanted to figure out what went on in that building. The tingly body high I almost always get when smoking weed wasn’t there, just a fun curiosity.

“Yup,” he said. We’ve been together for four years, so by now Jake knows what high me looks like.

By the time we got to the movie theater I’d been laughing at the same joke for five minutes and Jake hadn’t felt anything. We both took another mint as the trailers rolled at 8:45 pm (45 minutes after the first mint). Many edibles take longer to work but the mints’ packaging claimed they worked quickly.

Here I will pause to say that The Shape of Water is a lovely film. Whether I have the microdose or Guillermo Del Toro to thank, I don’t know, but I was riveted. The movie was colorful and dazzling and dealt with important themes like love and trust and identity.

I felt the corners of my mouth creep up and stay up the way they normally do when I smoke sativas (The Stokes Micros are made with sativa), I yelled at the screen like it was a horror movie, and I cheered at the end (which I will not spoil for you).

“What did you think?” I asked Jake as we left.

“It was alright,” he said.

“What?! Just alright?” I couldn’t believe he was saying this about what was now my favorite movie.

“I could tell you liked it,” he said. “But I think I could have used another mint.”

Looking back on our night, I would recommend Stokes Mint Micros to anyone interested in controlling their high carefully. It took about twenty minutes for me to notice the first cannabis in my system, and Jake didn’t feel anything until he was two mints in. He reported a tingling sensation that eased into a gentle body high. Meanwhile, I was blazed on two mints.

I’d recommend getting to know what dosage is right for you by starting small and ramping up. If you’re extra sensitive, try starting with half a mint and seeing how that goes before you take more. If you’re less sensitive start with one, wait 45 minutes and if you haven’t felt anything, try another. You can simply rinse and repeat until you’re just the right amount of high and, of course, minty fresh.

Viola Selby is a writer and Journalist living in Oakland, CA. She left the rolling green hills of Asheville North Carolina, for the slightly less green hills of Northern California. But it was only here, in the Sunshine State, that she found exactly the kind of green she was looking for.

Where the grass IS greener.

Author: Viola Selby

Cannabis Culture

my first time microdosing on cannabis

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