Can You Mix Wegovy and Marijuana?

• • Wegovy is a GLP-1 agonist drug used to help people with type 2 diabetes lose weight, reduce their blood sugar, and resolve their insulin resistance.

• • Wegovy isn’t without side effects—nausea and limited appetite are the most common.

• • Cannabis is safe to combine with Wegovy. In fact, using medical marijuana during your GLP-1 agonist treatment could help you achieve your nutritional goals, prevent (or treat) nausea, and support your mental health on your treatment journey.

If you’re interested in trying medical marijuana treatment for a chronic illness, you might be wondering how it interacts with your current prescription or all-natural treatment regimen. Do you have to stop taking your prescriptions for cannabis to work? Is it safe to combine medical marijuana with certain medications?

In many cases, the answer is yes. This is the case for Wegovy—a drug prescribed to people with type 2 diabetes, insulin resistance, or high blood sugar. It’s generally considered safe to combine Wegovy and medical marijuana. And this is great news.

Why?

Because medical cannabis could actually complement your Wegovy treatment. In this guide, we’ll explain how and why patients combine GLP-1 agonist drugs like Wegovy with medical cannabis to reach their health and wellness goals.

Wegovy: A Quick Primer

Let’s start with a quick overview of how Wegovy works and some of its common side effects.

Mechanism of Action

Wegovy is one of a few drugs called GLP-1 agonists. These drugs are primarily designed for people with high blood sugar.

Patients living with type 2 often develop insulin resistance. Why?

• Insulin is like a key that unlocks your cells and tells them to accept blood sugars for cellular energy production. When your blood sugar is high (due to diet or other factors), your pancreas makes extra insulin to compensate.
• Over time, your cells can stop unlocking when insulin knocks—later still, cells might stop responding to insulin altogether, and your blood sugar can continue to climb as your cells respond to insulin less frequently and absorb increasingly fewer sugars.

GLP-1 agonist drugs can adjust your insulin production, which encourages cells to absorb sugars normally again. They also mimic the feeling of satiety, helping patients decrease their overall calorie intake.

Common Side Effects

Unfortunately, Wegovy and other GLP-1 agonist drugs (like Ozempic and Mounjaro) often carry side effects. Some of the most common include:

• Nausea
• GI discomfort
• Reduced appetite
• Headache

Researchers and medical experts aren’t exactly sure why these side effects occur, but they can significantly impact patients taking GLP-1 agonist drugs:

• Nausea might lead to malnutrition – While GLP-1 agonist drugs make you feel fuller (which helps curb appetite), this effect in combination with nausea might make you hesitant to eat anything.
• Headaches can lead to fatigue and brain fog – Chronic headaches are exhausting, and they can take a toll on your day-to-day executive functioning over time. They may even keep you from thinking clearly.
• GI discomfort can impact bowel regularity – In the face of changing eating patterns and GI pain, you might experience changes in your bowel movements that could disrupt your everyday routine.

Cannabis and Nutrition

How does cannabis fit into this conversation? It’s time to talk about “the munchies”—the appetite stimulation that can occur when using some strains of medical marijuana.

Munchies 101

Some (but not all) strains (or subtypes) of the Cannabis sativa plant can make you feel hungry. There are a few important things to know about this phenomenon:

• It’s avoidable – Everyone responds to each strain of cannabis differently; a stain that’s widely reported to induce the munchies simply might not produce this response for you. If you’re trying to avoid the munchies, you’ll just have to experiment to find a strain that doesn’t produce that effect.
• You can seek it out – Of course, the opposite is also true—if you’re looking to use the munchies to your advantage (or just boost your enjoyment during meals), you can seek out “munchy” strains.
• Some non-THC strains can stimulate appetite – While many people associate the munchies with THC consumption, appetite stimulation isn’t a THC-exclusive effect. Even if you’re looking to avoid THC intoxication (by using CBD-only products), you can still seek out “munchy” strains if you so choose.

Using the Munchies for Weight Loss, Weight Gain, and More

We know what you’re thinking: “Why would you seek out the munchies if you’re trying to lose weight with Wegovy? Wouldn’t that defeat the purpose?”

Weight loss isn’t the primary goal of taking Wegovy and other GLP-1 agonist drugs—their primary job is to repair your insulin resistance. People taking Wegovy to normalize their insulin processing may want to:

• Lose weight – If you’re looking to lose weight while on Wegovy, cannabis can still help you reach your goals. You can either avoid “munchy” strains or use them to increase your enjoyment of healthy dishes like cold salads and fresh fruits.
• Gain weight – Depending on your health profile, you might be looking to gain weight or build muscle during your Wegovy treatment. This is where the munchies really shine: they can help you boost your overall calorie intake and motivate you to meet your nutritional goals.
• Maintain weight – If you’re happy with your current body composition but your blood sugar is high, Wegovy can help. But you may need some additional motivation to maintain your typical calorie count since GLP-1 drugs can decrease appetite—enter medical cannabis.

This is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to cannabis and nutrition. Check out our full guide to learn more.

Cannabis and Wegovy: Why Combine Them?

While we touched on a few potential use cases in the previous section, let’s explore a few more ways you might use cannabis to supplement your Wegovy treatment.

Nausea Treatment and Prevention

While cannabis can stimulate your appetite, it has many other superpowers—including mitigating nausea.

Since nausea is one of the most common side effects of GLP-1 agonist drugs (and Wegovy is no exception), some patients might pair their GLP-1 drug with medical cannabis to prevent nausea. This combination offers a few key benefits:

• Limiting nausea – Knocking out nausea is a benefit of its own—who wants to feel like they’re on the verge of vomiting?
• Improving drug tolerance – Severe nausea can prevent patients from titering up to a full dose of a GLP-1 drug or continuing their treatment at all. Cannabis has the potential to change that, improving patients’ drug tolerance (and, perhaps, treatment success).

Boosting Nutrition

We briefly explored why GLP-1 patients might seek out the munchies, but let’s dive deeper.

There are a few factors that might lead you to eat less while you’re taking Wegovy:

1. The drug suppresses appetite.
2. The drug makes you feel full—even if you haven’t eaten much.
3. Nausea might disrupt your regular eating patterns.

Since you’ll likely find yourself eating less while taking Wegovy, you might have a hard time getting the vitamins, minerals, and nutrients that constitute a balanced diet.

However, many strains of cannabis can both stimulate appetite and relieve nausea; patients can leverage both of these effects to support their overall nutrient intake during Wegovy treatment.

The munchies might help you adjust to new foods in your diet (like healthy alternatives to snacks), encourage you to eat wholesome foods, or increase your overall eating enjoyment—all of which can help you meet your nutritional goals.

Supporting Mental Health

Living with (and treating) any chronic health problem can take a toll on your mental health; insulin resistance and high blood sugar are certainly not exceptions. Plus, patients taking GLP-1 drugs often face social stigma, especially if they’re primarily using these drugs for weight loss.

Whether you’re anxious about taking a new medication, worrying about side effects, or feeling isolated from your social group because of your health issues (or chosen treatment), medical cannabis can help you manage your mood and overall mental health.

In fact, we’ve written two complete guides that might help you: read more about using cannabis for depression or cannabis for anxiety.

TeleLeaf: Cannabis Care Made Simple

If you’re looking to alleviate side effects, boost your nutrition, or support your overall mental wellness while taking Wegovy, medical cannabis could be an excellent complement to your GLP-1 agonist drug treatment.

However, the first step is getting access to legal, regulated, dispensaries-grade medical marijuana. TeleLeaf is here to help.

We connect prospective medical cannabis patients with informed, empathetic providers who can recommend medical marijuana treatment. Our licensed clinicians can help you decide if you’re a good fit for medical cannabis and start the process of applying for your medical card.

Reach out to schedule a virtual appointment now.

Sources:

Medical News Today. Wegovy and Interactions: Supplements, Alcohol, and More.
https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/drugs-wegovy-interactions

Mayo Clinic. GLP-1 Agonists: Diabetes Drugs and Weight Loss.
https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/type-2-diabetes/expert-answers/byetta/faq-20057955

GoodRx. Why Does Weed Make You Hungry?.
https://www.goodrx.com/health-topic/cannabis/why-does-weed-make-you-hungry

Journal of Clinical Gastroenterology. The Effectiveness of Common Cannabis Products for Treatment of Nausea.
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35258504/

The Harvard Gazette. How ‘Ozempic Shaming’ Illuminates Complexities of Treating Weight Problems.
https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2024/02/how-ozempic-shaming-illuminates-complexities-of-treating-weight-problems/