I Tried CBD Pajamas (and They Were Surprisingly Legit)

We are living through the astronomical rise of CBD-everything, from workout drinks to Mother’s Day-marketed gummies, so the Rec Room staff wasn’t too surprised to learn about CBD sleepwear through the PR fairies. Admittedly, it came with a collective Slack chortle. How would that even work? was the reigning, but sincerely curious, question. How would it dose us? How long would it last? 

Personally, I wondered if it wasn’t a tempting option for an almost-30-year-old who wants all the mellow, feel-good benefits of cannabinoids without having to smoke, and who is too lazy to make weed butter because of that one time they might’ve passed out at a Justice concert in 2012. In my perfect world, I get to go to bed and have CBD sprinkled over me by the Sandman. In theory, CBD clothes and sleep accessories come pretty damn close to my ideal method of administering the stuff. 

A recent IFAI Smart Fabrics Conference was big on the topic of CBD clothing, hosting a session called “Clothing: The Next Frontier for Drug Delivery” by the CEO of Nufabrx, a CBD pain relief clothing line, on the exciting possibilities of fabric to deliver medicine in the future. Nufrabrx actually weaves its CBD into the yarn, which releases gradually through contact with body heat, and lasts in potency for about 20 to 30 washes. 

Think about it: How bananas is it, really, that folks have been working hard all this time to innovate CBD intake methods? These days, people are getting COVID-19 tests up the bum, and for a few hundred bucks, you can buy a personal IV drip like Bethany Frankel, for when you want to hydrate but your glam squad is putting on your face. Stranger things have happened in our lifetime than CBD sleep stuff. With nothing to lose and everything to gain, I tested three different CBD sleepwear accessories to let you, friendly reader, know if they work: CBD socks, CBD pajamas/loungewear, and a CBD pillow. 

I really like HUE in general, which is something to consider when you’re buying a product that will (eventually) be drained of its CBD juice after 30-ish washes; they’re one of the more cost-effective and quality brands for tights IMO. Just ask my still-standing, Zooey Deschanel-era HUE stockings at the bottom of the drawer. 

HUE’s sleepwear sets come in black and grey, and def gave me that Fresh Crisp Stocking high when I opened the package. There’s a kind of film over the fabric, but I’m guessing that’s something to do with its CBD treatment. Unlike Nufabrx, it’s not clear if this set is woven with CBD threads or crop-dusted/infused with CBD oil. I appreciated that they were pretty low-key in their design, and have a chill cannabis leaf design around the waist of the pants that kind of made me feel like a UCSB frat boy studying Poli-Sci, but would at least help me tell them apart from the other leggings I own. 

My biggest hope was to drift to sleep faster and with less anxiety, awakening from my pupal CBD bliss the next morn’ with electric butterfly brain. My greatest fear was reenacting that part of Lord of the Rings where Frodo gets cocooned by that douchey spider, and his BFF finds him passed out the next day with super dehydrated skin. (RUDE!) 

After about 45 minutes of having them on, around 9 PM, I realized I was walking from room to room of my apartment kind of aimlessly. I realized I was super relaxed. I realized I felt… kind of stoned? “That’s wild,” said my roommate to my stoner bb brain. She was also trying out a set, but traditionally (I have known this ho for a decade) has a higher tolerance for cannabis and CBD stuff. I peeled mine off, because of the LOTR spider fears, but she has worn her set not only to bed, but also around the house during the day. “I don’t know if it’s the placebo effect,” she said, “but it definitely relaxed me before bed and I just feel kind of chill as I wear them. I can see wearing these during a restorative yoga session, for sure.”

Rating: 5/5 stars for my roommate, 2/5 stars for me. They kicked my ass. 

I always have a hard time falling asleep. I have a history of falling into insomniatic cycles, and am generally high-anxiety (hence: the CBD sleepwear set freak-out), so the socks seemed like a better option for my testing the waters of CBD clothes. Now, if you’re like me and have leathery feet, you probably sleep with socks and lotion on anyways. (Not in an Of Mice and Men-way. But also, kind of.) I slid these babies on (which also come in blue, pink, and navy) and finally felt like I knew what my roommate was talking about with the “chill vibe” she got from her sleep set. I felt mellow, but not super drowsy, like a human sunset lamp. When I asked her how they went over, she said she barely felt anything. Another friend told me he wore his all day at work, and was starting to feel a little *too* mellow by the time he got home (no kidding??), but by no means incapacitated. 

Rating: 3.5/5 stars for the median collective experience

So this is not a HUE product, obviously, but a pillow made by SensorPEDIC. I was stoked for this one because I wanted nothing more than to just smash my face into a cloud of CBD and peace out of my conscious brain. I enjoyed rolling over this (squishy, yet firm) pillow during my weeknight slumber and have to say: I slept great. I like my pillows to be dollar style pancake flat, so I wish there was more variety in softness. But otherwise, I had a very even sleep. My roommate and I both tested it overnight, and agreed: We slept soundly. Only she had lucid AF cannabinoid droid dreams, but we slept soundly nonetheless.  

Rating: 3/5 stars for me, 4/5 stars for my roommate

If you don’t want to smoke weed, but miss the spacey, mellow effects of weed minus the "high" (and love the very real results a placebo moment can have) CBD sleepwear might be it, my guy. Of course, CBD affects everyone differently, so it’s just a matter of trying this stuff out for yourself to see where you land. While pajama sets were a little too intense for me (or maybe that’s just tight pajama sets, in general?), I’m also a long string bean who gets drunk off two glasses of wine and high off of one puff of a joint. In that light, the socks and pillow were the perfect fit. If anything, all of this stuff re-oriented me towards focusing on my sleep life, which is perhaps half of the battle. Basically: Do you need new socks? Do you want to try something different, and cry less during this pandemic? Give some of these try-hards a shot. They’ll tuck you into bed better than anyone else has lately.