Quote: (10-19-2015 06:54 PM)Brodiaga Wrote:
Conclusion so far: I would definitely recommend trying 5-HTP to anybody who suffers from bad mood either occasionally or frequently. I don't know if it's good enough to treat clinical depression, but it seems to work well if you don't feel bad enough to go to a doctor but still want to try something to lift your mood.
Questions to those who have more experience with 5-HTP:
-Is it worth trying to take even more per day, perhaps 300mg?
-Is there a recommended limit to how long you can take this supplement or can you take it pretty much indefinitely? if you take it for a long time, does it stop working or cause any side effects?
Those "placebos" work at a few dozen people I already recommended it to. My entire family is taking it.
However whether the 5-HTP was doing the effect is the question. For most people a good multi like ADAM from Now does the job. Some require more like 5-HTP.
The working dose of 5-HTP is between 50 to 400/500mg. I would not take more.
What many people don't know is that there is actually a major scientific understanding out there on 5-HTP - plenty of studies existing. They are just not financed by big pharma:
http://orthomolecular.org/library/jom/20...3-p167.pdf
One of them
http://www.orthomolecular.org/library/jo...1742072j14
http://science.naturalnews.com/5-Hydroxytryptophan.html
http://science.naturalnews.com/Google-Se...3j534373j8
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.10...8/abstract
Even Cochrane Library - a cooperative of some 100.000 independent MDs around the world assessed that it's definitely better than a placebo, but more studies are needed. Also the study design has to be orthomolecular (meaning higher doses than 10mg or something like that) and Cochrane is not there yet. [Keep also in mind that Cochrane despite still being conventional in medicine refuses to acknowledge 90% of all medical studies claiming that they are either faulty, manipulated, useless or straight out criminal.]
In any case - what those nutrients do is balance your mood and bring you into your natural equilibrium. They don't give you highs, so taking more does not help, but feel free to experiment. Up to 500mg has been tested long-term and is being taken by people around the world. It's still food, so if you don't react badly to it within the first days, then you won't react badly to it after months. I would certainly stop at 500mg, though usually one takes what is necessary and recommended by orthomolecular medicine.
Also the claims that the body somehow gets used to taking supplements and then stops absorbing nutrients through food is pure bogus. That claim has never been proven and frankly makes no sense. All good supplements can essentially be found in food as well - it just gets absorbed faster and at higher dosage than via food. Whenever you eat something, then the body will still digest it and also absorb the nutrients. If your body has no need of it, then it will discard it usually via urine.
And no - the claim of conventional pharma-docs that you only get expensive urine is bullshit as well.
http://orthomolecular.org/resources/omns/v04n21.shtml
Quote:Quote:
"Expensive urine." It is an old saw, and one terrific sound byte. Too bad it is also false.
Urine is what is left over after your kidneys purify your blood. If your urine contains, say, extra vitamin C, that vitamin C was in your blood. If the vitamin was in your blood, you absorbed it just fine. It is the absence of water-soluble vitamins in urine that indicates vitamin deficiency. If your body excretes vitamins in your urine, that is a sign that you are well-nourished and have nutrients to spare. That is good.
Here's another way to think of it: Standing at the base of the Hoover Dam looking up, you cannot tell how much water is behind it. However, by observing the overflow spillway, you can tell. If the spillway is dry and dusty, full of tumbleweeds and foxes are making their dens, there has been a drought for some time, and the water level in the dam must be low. If water is pouring down the spillway, the dam must be full. "Waste" indicates fullness, just as an overflowing cup is unmistakably a full cup. Urine spillage of vitamins indicates nutritional adequacy. A lack of water-soluble vitamins in the urine indicates inadequacy.
"Expensive urine," writes veteran nutritional reporter Jack Challem, is "a bizarre argument because a $50 restaurant meal and a bottle of fine wine also lead to expensive urine, but no one seems to be complaining about those things. Numerous studies have shown, however, that vitamin supplements do increase people's blood levels of those nutrients." (1)
Essentially - what you describe Brodiga is what most people tell me after having started at least a basic supplementation regime with good Multi and some added extras like 5-HTP.
Some noticed a remarkable improvement in mood, others just a small one, but they also became aware of more energy, so that's why they are still taking the stuff - because it works.