I love the moms in our group because we are the women who take matters into our own hands. We all get asked a lot of the same questions over and over again. How to dose is a big one.* Most of us start with the spreadsheet calculator shared by the Realm of Caring. Two years ago I used a scratch piece of paper shoved in a binder to do the math. My friend Olivia? She taught herself how to code and wrote an app. You can go to Apple to download her CBD calculator here.

Frank Chavez, Flying Panther Tattoo

When she first submitted it to Apple, they rejected it. But she’s had to fight long and hard for other supportive benefits for her beautiful daughter so she’s used to this. I asked her to share her journey with us:

“About a year ago, we received our first bottle of Charlotte’s Web in California for our daughter, Justine Marie. Like others, we were welcomed by the ‘New Home New Hope California’ Facebook page. As I read the many posts of triumphs and hardships, I noticed that there were a lot of questions about dosing. I also found myself constantly playing with numbers on a scratch piece of paper and phone calculator. Inspired by the many individuals who have contributed their time and talents towards the cannabis movement, I decided that I was going to write a dosing app for CBD to help others (and for fun). I like numbers and music and symbols. I decided that this is how I wanted to contribute.

I figured and thought to myself – How hard could writing an app possibly be? So I started with a text book learning a computer language. I told friends what I was about to do. 1 month later and 2 text books later, I had come up short and had failed in my binary adventure. I slowly talked myself out of it and closed the books and hoped that everyone that I had told would soon forget. Ssssshh, I said to myself. A few months had passed and summer was soon approaching and the thought of the unwritten app was gnawing at me.

Not wanting to look like a failure, I went back to the computer. This time I got a little bit smarter and grabbed every free resource within reach, Google, You-Tube, and finally iTunes University. It was the iTunes Stanford University Professor who knew Steve Jobs personally that really put things in binary and real life perspective – literally. Steve Jobs had died a few years ago and his passion drove him. Suddenly, after failing and then being inspired, solving my computer science problems were not an issue! Things were clicking in my head. A few days later, I had a CBD app running and working. I had friends look at it and test it out. I had many critics telling me it looked somewhat amateur. Did I take it personally? I cannot lie. I did! So back to the drawing board for several weeks.

Soon, I had an app ready for the Apple iTunes team to inspect for approval! It took exactly 7 days for them to get back to me. We reject your app - was their ultimate response. Did I take it personally – I sure did! It hurt me like a knife. Their response was ‘This app may cause harm to others if used.’ I questioned myself. Was I causing harm to others? Am I causing harm to my daughter? A smart ER doctor told me once, ‘You’ll question yourself.‘ – TM. I recalled that I’ve seen a dosing calculator app for anesthesia. Who in the world has anesthesia medication laying around? I thought to myself - anesthesia can kill someone. Then I remembered that there are no documented cases of anyone dying from marijuana. So I submitted again. And I got rejected again. Did I take it personally? I sure did! I had to support my app with medical resources they say. After a few more rejections, my soft exterior suddenly became a hard tortoise shell.

Should I challenge these folks at Apple who appeared to know nothing about what cannabis can do? I decided to give them the little facts that I knew and keep working with them while being respectful in my response. Someone told a group of us at a fundraiser meeting ‘Always be kind‘ - RM. It was good advice because Apple owed me nothing so I better be nice. Boy, was that ever difficult. But kindness did pay off in the end. In late August, I finally got the emails that I had been waiting for. It said, ‘The following app has been approved and the app status has changed to Ready for Sale.‘ There was an email for both the iPhone app and iPad app.

The lessons I learned from this software adventure and engaging with others is to always be kind, be humble, believe in yourself, never give up, and ultimately contribute to others – no matter what!”

THANK YOU OLIVIA for supporting our children and our movement! You can download her CBD dosing calculator app here.

* To avoid drug interactions, please speak to your physician before adding CBD or any cannabis product to your child’s treatment plan.