Sydney, the Weed Matchmaker

Yo, sacred space holders, plant medicine aficionados, and Jews in general: have you seen this?

This is antisemitism staring at you in the face.
And I cannot tell you how much it hurts, because I have a story about the Psychedelic Somatic Institute (PSI) and my personal healing.

After experiencing the horrors of October 7th, 2023, I went searching for answers on how to brace myself for the changes that I would undoubtedly face as someone in an active war zone. That's how I came across PSI. I saw how well my treatment resistant depression and psychosomatic pain responded to Esketamine and wanted to explore the place where soul (psychedelic therapy) and body (somatic therapy) intertwine. Saj Razvi's videos about the Psychedelic Somatic Interactional Psychotherapy (PSIP) modality seemed to target exactly what I wanted to add to my personal and professional practice alike.

A friend of mine doing her psychedelic cannabis training through Medicinal Mindfulness Academy and I were supposed to meet up to talk about creating a kosher women's training through PSI. What we'll be talking about instead is how much we are mourning such blatant antisemitism in the psychedelics community.

Jean, I think you're really onto something with your work at the Psychedelic Somatic Institute. Feel free to reach out to this Zionist for Peace if you'd like to think of ways we can use your modality to heal instead of hate.

Want to know what a session with me looks like?
It might start out a little something like this...

I don't need to tell you how difficult things are right now in Israel. If you're following any sort of news source, you'll know that these are trying times.

But we need not be alone in this journey.

That's why I'm putting together a group of women to share their dreams, grow from their traumas, and collectively manifest a better tomorrow.

(Don't know what an "integration circle" is? Ask!)

Location: Mazkeret Batya, Israel
Details: Contact Sydney, The W**d Matchmaker, at 052-477-7002

Last week, I posted about how I ally myself to the communities that I serve as a cannabis educator, specifically cancer patients. (I'm the lady donating her hair.)

Here's what I loved most: everyone agreed that cancer patients are worthy of radical compassion. In fact, I was downright inspired.

B"H most of us haven't been there, but there's a true problem when it comes to the judgement we carry about cannabis

And that's what I want to talk about today: compassion.

A few days after my post, a dear friend came over who was recently diagnosed with breast cancer. She won't even drink alcohol, let alone use ma*****na, but I wanted to give her the space to ask whatever she needed. By the end of our talk, all she could say was, "Why don't they teach this in hospitals?"

For most of us, cannabis was taught as something to fear, something that will ruin your life. To say, "I'm ready to learn otherwise," is truly an act of self-compassion.

Cancer should be your burden, not a medicine.

How many people are out there with conditions that cannabis is known to ease, but are too afraid because of what they were taught 30 years ago? How can I relieve them of this emotional deadweight?

I've been inspired to create on-demand lessons geared toward various conditions that I can speak to generally. No live person that might judge you, just someone providing information about cannabis in relation to specific conditions. And I'm starting with cancer.

Here's where I need you:

I'm looking to enlist the help of current or previous cancer patients from a variety of backgrounds to share their experience with me, as to keep my content relevant and helpful. If you feel that's you, please fill in this contact information form: https://forms.gle/yH1mGhF9K8q1yjG78

Selected participants will either be compensated with a live lesson or gifted access to the finished course. Anyone who shows interest in participating but is not selected will be sent a 20% off code for the finished course upon its completion.

Picture: Every day is breast cancer awareness day!

As a cannabis educator, I strive to show compassion to the communities that I serve. That's why about every 3.5 years, you'll catch me with an exceptionally short haircut. Blessed with a thick head of hair, I grow my locks expressly to donate to others.

Usually my hair goes to זכרון מנחם Zichron Menachem, an organization in Israel that provides wigs for those that have lost their hair due to medical conditions. Sometimes it goes to Wigs4Kids in the United States. But this year, my donation is especially personal.

After 6 years of endless fighting, my cousin, Evan, lost her battle with cancer at thirty-four. While she would have been honored for my hair to go to patients like her, it wasn't Evan's passion project.

Evan was all about protecting the voices of the "Other." She was a strong ally to the LGBT+ community and a fierce defender of women's rights. Most notably, she used her short time on this planet to spread Jewish joy to the next generation. (Her heart was forever at Jewish summer camp.)

When I went for my donation cut, the hairdresser mentioned that while my daughter's hair wasn't long enough to donate, that I could sell it for a wig.

And this is where Evan's causes and my hair come together:
A group of friends is trying to raise funds for a family in need to have a little breathing room as they welcome their first child into the world while caring for a dying loved one.

This is my fifth hair donation.
With every other cut I have thought about cancer patients in general.
This time, I have only 1 on my mind.
What would this cancer patient want?
She would want a mother to never have to choose between food and diapers.

To raise tzedakah (charity), I am selling 7 virgin dark blonde braids (40cm+ plaited) and 2 virgin light brown braids (30cm+ plaited) that my daughter contributed. (-It's her third time donating and she's only nine!)

Why am I posting this publicly?
Because there is strength is community.
And that's really what charity funds are about- relying on your community

So...

1) If you know of a wigmaker that buys hair, send me their contact details (or send them this post).

2) If you would like to contribute to this fundraiser, you're more than welcome to do so directly (DM me for the link), or schedule a session with me and I'll contribute 20% of what I make on your behalf.

3) Think about the good you do in the world and do it.

With all my heart,

--Sydney

No posts since August? There's a reason for that.

Like most everyone in Israel, I've been going through my share of hard times. First it was the passing of my mother-in-law. Then, there was the anniversary of October 7th. I took some time to decompress in California, only to lose my cousin to her fight with cancer.

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As an educator, my goal is to help people through knowledge.

For months, I held off accepting new work because I felt so broken inside. How can I promote wellbeing when I, myself, am so flawed?

That's when I realized that my pain should be an asset to what I do, not a hindrance.

For example: who knows more about electroconvulsive therapy (ECT)? -A psychiatrist that can recite statistics, or someone who's actually received the treatment? At one point, I might have told you "the psychiatrist." As a former ECT patient, I would 100% tell you the patient is the better POV.

Cannabis has been only one of many wellness practices that I have used to recover from active suicidal ideation and to moderate my pain and depression. And that's when I began to ask myself: to how many treatment centers and alternative wellness practitioners have I gone searching for answers? To how many workshops and courses have I attended so that I could add more healing modalities to my proverbial toolbox?

One of the things my multitude of ailments has pushed me to do is explore cutting-edge medical therapies- treatment options that few physicians may know of, and even fewer people have received.

How many hours (and $$$) could I save someone by telling them about my experience with a treatment? About the bureaucratic pathway it takes to receive that therapy, what to expect, and what my outcome was?

How much exhaustion from the hassle of shopping options could I save someone simply by saying, "You have X condition? Have you heard of Y or Z treatments before?"

I'm not pivoting in my business so much as I'm adjusting to what's more comfortable.
Because I'm not just a wellness educator; I'm also a patient.
And I'm not just any patient; I'm a psychobiological researcher.

So if over the next few months you notice a shift in how I describe my work (e.g., "Cannabis+ Educator, Cannabis Consultant with a Patient Perspective, Alternative Practices Educator, etc.), or see additional offerings under my services without proper links, please pardon my pixie dust. I'm a one-woman show!

Wishing you light!

I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but I ran into this LITERALLY on Rosalind Franklin's birthday (she would have been 104, what up??), and I felt it was a sign from the universe to say something.

Background: I'm currently taking the Psychedelic Journeywork Course through Fungi Academy and this fun factoid caught my attention.

tl;dr: Okay, so MAYBE, but no.

While it would be REALLY cool to say that Francis Crick's inspiration for a helical structure model of DNA was from an L*D trip, it's probably just a myth.

I base this on:

1) Watson and Crick published their findings in 1953, a time during which L*D was not as widely known or available. It's not a total no, but the story is speculation at best.

2) The research for which Watson & Crick are famed was based on stolen data. These men purposefully abused their positions of power. They took the DNA X-ray diffraction findings of Rosalind Franklin and did not credit her. Franklin, a Jewess researcher in crystal radiography, was barred from holding an academic position because of her gender. While the particular structure of the model may have been the work of Watson and Crick, the findings on which their model was based were plagiarized. The inspiration came from Rosalind Franklin's stolen work, not L*D. And that won them the Nobel Prize.

When Watson & Crick's subterfuge was found out, it was too late for Franklin to receive her credit. She'd already passed away, and the Nobel Prize is not given posthumously.

See, mom! I am doing something with my Master's degree!

*d

Tonight was night two of Efu Nyaki's live webinar on healing relational trauma through a lens of transgenerational connection provided by EntheoNation . Once again I was transported to a place of feeling uncomfortable, partly because the topic hits so close to home, and partly because it's so far from my comfort zone of the standard bio-psycho-social model of psychology. What do you mean that I'm supposed to talk to my ancestors? You want me to do this sober? Ma'am, is Papa here in the room with us?

But maybe he is. Maybe if I just expand my idea of reality for a moment - to consider the off-chance that my passed ancestors can hear me - would it be so bad to say "thanks" for all they've given me?

Sometimes my greatest hindrance to healing is myself. Although I trained as an academic at some of the most liberal campuses, I still carry with me the snootiness of, "This isn't science," instead of sitting back and learning.

For two nights, I witnessed this fairy godmother-come-to-life work her magic with folks seeking healing from all over the globe. Whether or not any of what she does is based on hard science, doesn't matter. These lives were touched in profound ways, and THAT is real.

Why do I give so much credit to behavioral neuroscience?

Why do I invalidate other paths just because they don't follow scientific methodology?

And most importantly, how can I change this tendency towards judgment, as to accept the wisdom that was shared with me and be grateful for that?

Checking your flower is important. I'm not saying you need to break out your jeweler's loupe every time (because of course you have one lying around), but just giving an overall evaluation of your bud can tell you a lot about what you'll be putting into your body.

Due to Israel's strict laws about libel, I'll be omitting the name and brand. If you're concerned, I'm happy to discuss my findings with you in DMs.

Today I opened a strain from a company that up to now, I've felt I can safely rely on. Of course their lower end will be lower end for a reason (less terpene content, fewer trichomes), but I've never looked at one of their buds and thought, "What IS that?!" until today.

This strain was not "lower end." It was smack-dab in the middle. In fact, I was about to forgo my usual up-close visual check before grinding and partaking, so I did a double double-take (quadruple take?) when I saw what I did.

Small holes dotting the flower.

My first thought was missing trichomes. -Except these holes are far too large to be trichomes.

Next up: seeds? Nope, too small to be seeds. "But what if the plant went hermaphroditic and these are just small seeds?" Still nope. I ground the flower and didn't find a single seed. (Although this would be a VERY close answer!)

Okay, what about the flowers just being brittle, causing easier physical degradation? That would leave larger patches, not tiny holes.

I looked at the pistils. They verged on brown. The trichomes were more white than milky. So what I DID know is that this flower had been harvested later than it should have been. This still didn't answer my question, but it gave me a good place to start.

I'd like to thank growers on Reddit for answering my question and teaching me a really cool new fact: what I saw was damage due to auto-trimming an over-ripened plant.

But isn't most inflorescence harvested by auto-trimming? What's up with this batch?

When a cannabis plant is past full maturity (which I could tell from the color of the pistils and trichomes), calyxes (which carry seeds when fertilized) may continue to grow and plump. Auto-trimming is aiming for bracts and stems. A swollen calyx both resembles and is in the immediate area of bracts.

So what are these holes?

Where swollen calyxes used to be.

Why did this happen?

Because the growers were going for maximum quantity and not maximum quality of their harvest.

While there's no reason to toss this bud- the holes are simply cosmetic- it's not a strain I'll be buying again. This is a batch that should have been used for concentrates or pre-rolls (at best). I'm saddened that any grower would look at this and say, "Yes, this is good enough for my clientele." Because it's not.

If you're a cannabis company and reading this, please take to heart that this is a patient's medicine. What I've been sold is a subpar product. This lack of care makes me rethink whether or not a business has my best interests in mind.

Today's cool new thing that I learned about: the, "Why?" behind hermaphroditic cannabis plants.

While I've known about the existence of hermaphrodites (plants that produce both male and female gametes) for the purposes of quality-checking my cannabis, I've never really thought about the reasons it would occur. "Nature just be like that sometimes," usually covers these things, but I am feeling so inspired by this reason:

When cannabis plants undergo stress, certain changes may begin to occur in their phenotype (observed characteristics), blurring the plant's general nature of being dioecious (having distinctively either male or female gametes in a given individual). Since the organism's goal is to grow and pass on its genetic information, if it's put into shock, it may start taking on characteristics of the other s*x as a last-ditch effort to reproduce before death.

That is, if a plant feels like it's going to die, its final wish might be to completely change what's been written in its DNA to, "IDK I'm just trying to survive."

And we're not talking about everything being categorically a dumpster fire, here. For example, a plant can go into shock by changing its lighting schedule, putting unnecessary strain on the plant to grow 'round the clock.

One little thing can seem really big to an individual plant. And that plant might feel threatened enough by it to override its genetic s*x for the sake of continued existence.

tl;dr: Cannabis plants can have a midlife crisis so bad that they start to override their own DNA to become hermaphroditic.

At some point I'll answer why hermaphrodites matter in cannabis quality.
But for now, let's focus on the following:
Cannabis is existential AF.

Photo credit: 2fast4buds.com

Today's post is inspired by my mother who asks me the following questions on a weekly basis:

1) Are you still doing your cannabis thing? (Sure am!)

2) What are you called again? (The W**d Matchmaker.)

3) What's "w**d matchmaking?" (See infographic.)

4) Do you think cannabis is right for me? (Sorry, mom.)