Carolina Vazquez Mitchell’s journey to becoming an esteemed cannabis scientist, who runs both an award-winning cannabis brand and cannabis consultancy, doesn’t have the board room and corporation-backed beginnings one might assume. Instead, it all started with her passion for science, while working in labs starting at age 16 in her native Guadalajara, Mexico. This evolved when she moved to Los Angeles, where she learned to speak English in order to enroll in University of Southern California’s PhD program and work.

Fascinated with how our bodies interact with substances, whether it be food or drugs, Vazquez Mitchell utilized her diverse background in gene therapy, chemistry, biophysics, and pharmacology, to find evidence-based solutions to our body’s needs and ailments.

Cannabis is her answer to one of the most common issues Americans face, nearly 70 million of adults, in fact: Sleep.

Dreamt is the first cannabis brand to present a science-backed solution for sleep. Featuring a blend of THC, CBD, melatonin, valerian root and specific terpenes, Vazquez Mitchell’s formulation is designed to help us get better, and more importantly, more restorative sleep through the night.

We’re thrilled to interview Carolina Vazquez Mitchell to kick off HigHER Frequency, stories of BIPOC womxn leaders in cannabis, who are impacting the future of this industry with intentional and revolutionary businesses and products.

Read on for highlights from the full interview and learn her story, her vision and motivations for dreamt and Ciencia Labs, as well as how she rests and restores her own balance in life.

Did you consume cannabis recreationally before working in the industry?

My first experience with cannabis was in college in Mexico. I got an edible, a brownie, but I ate the whole thing, and I had a horrible experience. I was 18 and I decided to never eat edibles again for ten years. But, then I came to the States and I heard that cannabis was totally different than in Mexico.

I also started to develop a lot of problems with my sleep. Maybe it was because I was far from home, from my family, and was in a new city. There was pressure from school. So, I started using cannabis for sleep. I just smoked flower and I liked it. But the problem was I smoked to fall asleep but had to smoke again if I woke up [in the middle of the night], and again, and again, throughout the night. Also, I have always been a very active person and would go swimming before class at 6 a.m. And after three months of smoking, I couldn’t swim, and my lungs couldn’t breathe properly. So, I had to stop smoking flower. But I looked for other options, like edibles.

And I started to read more about cannabinoids and understanding how they affect your body, your sleep, how they were being metabolized, the differences between inhaling cannabinoids, smoking, vaping, edibles, and the different matrixes that you can use for different edibles. So, it’s when I started learning everything.

How did you finalize your sleep formulation that combines CBD, THC, melatonin, valerian root, and various terpenes?

When you are inhaling cannabinoids, they go directly from your lungs into your blood system, and from your blood into your brain. So, [the body’s response] is very quick. But, since they’re very quick, the effects also go away very quickly, in about two to three hours.

So I was like, OK, I like inhalable because they’re very quick and I like edibles because they can last eight hours. But, I don’t want to have to smoke over and over again during the night. What can I do where I combine the two effects? So, I started to study the metabolism and pharmacology pharmacokinetics, everything about cannabis, and how they affect sleep.

The only cannabinoid that really affects sleep is THC. That’s due to the fact that THC interacts very strongly with the CB1 receptor, which is the one that is directly involved in the sleep cycle. There is the CB2 receptor, but that receptor is in the immune system and is located in your body while the CB1 receptor is located in your brain.

A lot of products have only CBD and people believe that CBD helps you with this sleep, but it doesn’t really. It helps you to relax, but it doesn’t help you to fall asleep.

THC is the only thing that I know that can improve or affect your sleep. However, THC and CBD can reduce REM sleep and REM sleep is essential for memory, for learning, creating new synapsis, and simulating all the new memories and everything that you learned during that day. And if you don’t have that phase or reduce that phase, you are literally preventing your brain from restoring and creating new memories. Sleep is not only about resting, it’s also a process for your brain to restore and to be able to perform its best the next day.

And what’s happening with all the cannabis products in the market is they only have cannabis [in it]. They don’t have anything that improves REM so, you are not having the best sleep that you can. That’s why I created Dreamt. Dreamt has melatonin, which directly improves REM sleep and is the hormone that helps you fall asleep during the night.

We put Valerian Root because the chemicals in the root increase GABA in your brain. Valerian root helps you relax and is also a treatment for insomnia.

And finally, we have six terpenes, three of them are found in cannabis. Limonene increases serotonin, which is the precursor of melatonin. By having enough serotonin in your brain, you’re able to create your own melatonin and so you’re able to fall asleep properly. We have Myrcene, which has a relaxing effect on muscles to prevent any involuntarily involuntary motor movements when you’re sleeping. We have linalool, which has been shown to directly decrease anxiety and promote relaxation.

Share your experience as part of Eaze’s Momentum program. How has it supported your business?

They fell in love with our product. And they saw that we were very true science rather than just like marketing a product.

We were very proud to be selected. We were the only company in Los Angeles that was selected. And it was a wonderful experience because I have seen a lot of companies that try to support equity, but I haven’t seen people really doing something like this. Eaze gave me fifty thousand dollars and gave me three months of classes. They connected me with people that are leaders in other industries, including cannabis, amazing networking, amazing support in law, marketing, in PR, and manufacturing. It was impressive.

Is there anything new on the horizon for dreamt or Ciencia Labs you can share?

For dreamt, besides the vaporizer, we have a tincture and a shot. We are also going to launch a gummy soon, in about a month or so.

For Ciencia Labs, we are planning to have other brands in the market that target other specific issues besides sleep, everything holistic.

Now, we’ve gotten to know the visionary and power boss side of Carolina, but as a huge champion of balance, we want to get to know who you are when you’re not working!

I like to keep myself healthy and work out. On the side, I like to volunteer and I like to save animals from the streets. I saved my husband. [laughs] I like to save like kittens from the streets. And so far, I’ve saved about 60 kittens. I take them from the street, and I foster them at home until they are grown and I give them for adoption.

I also like to work on projects for other companies and develop products. I’ve always heard people say “I’m doing what I love.” and I thought “oh, that’s bullshit, I won’t ever work for something that I love. But now, I love it.

For the full interview, check out the HiVi’s IGTV episode here.