IH >> a plea for help despite the fact that much has been said already.

CausticSymmetry wrote:chipdouglas - Salivary DHEA is okay too.

Chlorella does work to remove heavy metals, but humic/fulvic acid is works better.

Took note of that.

In regard to extrasystoles which I've had (though they've lessened noticeably), is there anything to the best of your knowledge : whether DHEA, iodine or any other supplements which are relevant to my condition, which can actually increase the frequency/severity of said extrasystoles ?

Even more of a reason to take Iodine:

For example, it can increase the sensitivity of insulin receptors and thus help with diabetes. Similarly, it can increase the sensitivity of the receptors for neurotransmitters (serotonin, dopamine, GABA) in the brain. Thus, depression may lift after taking iodine. It can also increase the sensitivity of receptors for testosterone and FSH/LH.

Histidine and Histamine. Histidine is the precursor for histamine. Anti-histamines are used to control runny noses, hives, and itching. Iodine inhibits the conversion of histidine to histamine, thus reducing itching, hives, etc.

Iodine and Heavy Metals. When taking iodine, there is GREATLY increased excretion in the urine of arsenic, mercury, lead, aluminum, and other toxic metals. Iodine is selective in that it leaves the essential metals (e.g., iron) and removes the toxic ones.

Joejoebaggins - Great info, thanks.

Chipdouglass - Off hand, I'm not sure, I'll have to look into it.

IH : what should Dopamine feel like ? Let's say L-dopa for instance : should one feel alert yet very calm while on it ?

Also, are you familiar with Dysthymia ? I find some info on it, but it doesn't seem to have been studied that much as opposed to clinical depression for instance.

Thanks

chipdouglass - Just my opinion but dysthymia is just a term that the American Psychiatric Association uses via their Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) to classify a real condition their pseudo science will never acknowledge, which is adrenal fatigue.

The APA uses classifications of symptoms using the DSM to determine "appropriate" drug therapy.
There is no real testing for this, other than observable symptoms or descriptions by patient or professional.

Dopamine has two popular sides of the coin, euphoria, feeling great, but too much is anxiety ridden. There is a balance, but correcting all the systems with respect to dopamine regulation can help resolve this issue.

Iodine, and glandulars in my opinion would be the best foundation to fight this.

CausticSymmetry wrote:chipdouglass - Just my opinion but dysthymia is just a term that the American Psychiatric Association uses via their Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) to classify a real condition their pseudo science will never acknowledge, which is adrenal fatigue.

The APA uses classifications of symptoms using the DSM to determine "appropriate" drug therapy.
There is no real testing for this, other than observable symptoms or descriptions by patient or professional.

Dopamine has two popular sides of the coin, euphoria, feeling great, but too much is anxiety ridden. There is a balance, but correcting all the systems with respect to dopamine regulation can help resolve this issue.

Iodine, and glandulars in my opinion would be the best foundation to fight this.

I strongly agree with you on the DSM failing to use any testing for this except for observable symptoms. It may not feel or look this way at times, but I share your views on medicine overall, that is, there's too much lobbying, lucrative vested interest for most in the business to really want to address the real issues. Cancer is one such area standing out, which I prefer not to delve into since it's not on topic, but we both know what it is like nonetheless and how we feel about it.


I went to see my internist this week (I must admit he's one nice, respectful and humble man--I wish all health care practitioners were like him), regarding that elevated HCT reading I got as a result of a physiology class. What he said is that since our in-house testing used capillary blood instead of venous blood, there was very likely too much blood cells shown. Indeed if my hct's actual reading was 63, that'd be worrisome, but I'm pretty certain that was a skewed test result for the above mentioned reason, since all of my previous and recent veinous hct values are fine.

I also talked to him about my libido, and this is not something he can help me with, except for referring me to a psychologist. While, I do not discount the whole psychological thing, I'd dare say that there's a 90% chance my issues aren't of psychological etiology.

What he said about me, which he also recognized to be a problem he's felt for as long as he's been in medicine, is that I'm too cerebral, meaning that there's not much place for leisure or pleasure in my life.

Does it change anything (so far as the effect I should normally get from Mg) if the Mg formula I use (which is a citrate leftover) if the Mg supp. I'm using has 250 mg malic acid in it ? Mind you there's also 250 mg Mg per caps. I'm going to need yet another bottle soon so next time I'm getting magnesium orotate.

I've noticed that at times, but not everytime, Mg boost my libido.

chipdouglas - Well stated I think, regarding everything you have said.

I think the "cerebral" factor is a natural need to know that is always burning. I'm sure that at time it would be more convenient to be totally carefree, but that usually happens in the absence of being stimulated mentally so to speak.
Short story shorter, I'm probably just telling you what you already know if I'm even on track.

If everything falls into place, then ideally your catecholomines will be rationed and not over stimulated or under stimulated.
Moving the dopamine closer to the normal spectrum.

chipdouglas - Funny, I almost forgot I've got both Mag Malate and Mag Orotate with me. I much prefer the Orotate.

Two reasons, the Malate can cause some gastrointestinal issues, and it's not as well absorbed, but it is still very good.

The Malate is helpful in energy production.

Something that's going to appear kind of weird to some reading it, but which I feel might help you help me is this :

I was reading that kids suffering ADHD require lots of caressing/being massaged or touched in a soothing manner.

Well, while not being a kid anymore, It's amazing, how much caressing I need. Like right now, I'm sitting at the computer, and next to me is my girlfriend massaging my arms, shoulders. back. If I don't get this sort of stimulation, I literally go nuts on the web after a while. I've been this way for a very very long time now. Imagine what my gf has had to go through....I require a lot of attention. Typing this feels totally pathetic to be honest.

Perhaps it was not needed for me to bring this up, but it's ok, I can deal with it--while I wasn't compelled in any way to mention it, I feel ok about it, at least I'm being totally honest.

chipdouglas - What you mentioned made me think of a few things I had not mentioned before which could help you--other than the iodine and glandular recommendations. That is NeuroIntegration Therapy or better known as bio-feedback.

The basic idea behind this is that you have four regions of the brain which emit certain waves, such as delta, theta, alpha for example. In some with ADHD some of these move to slow and in others too fast. This therapy corrects the speed, so that the brain and "learn" to rebalance itself.

http://www.clearmindcenter.com/NeuroFeedback/index_f.html

The other treatment that would help in this area, which is very, very relaxing--like massage but more lasting, is called Frequency Specific Microcurrent, or FSM for short. It can really help with adrenal fatigue, depression and many other internal problems, especially physical. www.frequencyspecific.com for more info.

CausticSymmetry wrote:chipdouglas - What you mentioned made me think of a few things I had not mentioned before which could help you--other than the iodine and glandular recommendations. That is NeuroIntegration Therapy or better known as bio-feedback.

The basic idea behind this is that you have four regions of the brain which emit certain waves, such as delta, theta, alpha for example. In some with ADHD some of these move to slow and in others too fast. This therapy corrects the speed, so that the brain and "learn" to rebalance itself.

http://www.clearmindcenter.com/NeuroFeedback/index_f.html

The other treatment that would help in this area, which is very, very relaxing--like massage but more lasting, is called Frequency Specific Microcurrent, or FSM for short. It can really help with adrenal fatigue, depression and many other internal problems, especially physical. www.frequencyspecific.com for more info.

Thanks IH--by the way, I don't think my ADHD issue was as bad as it is before I started experiencing low libido. I have a moderate case of ADHD, at least that was my diagnostic. I'll go through the links you posted tomorrow....off to bed now...so thanks again.

chipdouglas - I used ADHD as an example, not so much referring to your case. Incidentally, ADHD is usually low dopamine, so if you really did have that (which in my opinion is a made up diagnosis by the APA) it would be a dopamine paradox.

CausticSymmetry wrote:chipdouglas - I used ADHD as an example, not so much referring to your case. Incidentally, ADHD is usually low dopamine, so if you really did have that (which in my opinion is a made up diagnosis by the APA) it would be a dopamine paradox.

Do you write that it'd be a dopamine paradox because you've seen my BEAM test result ?

Chip -
I have for the most part been keeping up with this thread and have to say, that your negative attitude is a big part of your problem.
I have never heard a grown man whine and complain so much.

scottyc33 wrote:Chip -
I have for the most part been keeping up with this thread and have to say, that your negative attitude is a big part of your problem.
I have never heard a grown man whine and complain so much.

Funny you bring this up, cause I have been thinking the same towards myself. I'll have to be careful in my comments here, in order not to come across as going against what you wrote/posit.

I'm an open book, that is, I do not like most men keep things bottled up, so this is point #1 that makes me different. I know that I'm very different in this regard, but I see this as an upside--and no, I'm not playing for the other team.

I wonder what's come first though, the negativistic attitude or the issue I've faced for the last 10 years. While I'm not saying the low libido issue came first, this alone could largely effect how a man feels about himself, how he doesn't feel he can measure up to male standards sexually speaking (regarding potency). I've come across texts showing a link between suicide and male sexual dysfunctions.

Also, am I complaining because I'm slightly depressive or because I've exhausted every single local ressource ? These are relevant questions.

I'm known to have an atypical personality, and while I may appear online to be a pussy, I assure you, I can be the complete opposite in real life, so it's hard to realy size someone up from web postings. But I grant you the fact that under *certain* circumstances I do whine, but then, lots of men DO SO silently, so what's the difference ? In a way, one could say I have enough guts to be true to myself.

I apologize if I sound a tad defensive here, but I've been blasted elsewhere on the web, and didn't appreciate it one heck of a bit. I try and remain nice and courteous to folks as much as humanly possible, and I appreciate when comments are made to me in this way.

Perhaps you simply meant to help me open my eyes about this, but I remain skeptical to a point, hence the above paragraphes.

I really want to emphasize that a lot of men have been raised to behave as males under strict expected male behavior guidelines. That is, it's probably socially not accepted for any male to whine even though he may have valid reasons to. May I remind you that I've been looking for help for the last 10 years--whatever the étiology of my issue, the last 10 years have been pretty gloomy.

At this point, I feel like the past is repeating itself once again, and I even regret posting this thread. Would you make it clear whether your comment was made to help or to actually vent your anger at my thread ?

If it proves that you wanted to help, than you're more than welcome, but if the latter, then, well...you know how I feel about this, and I'd prefer that you do not comment from now on. Empathy is the ability to understand what one is going through, without actually adhering to it <<<hint hint.

I've gone on this 5-years course of study at age 36. I was already working as a lab technician, but decided on a career change. That alone, is quite a challenge in and of itself--people areound me keep telling how they wouldn't do it, even those with higher learning degrees. That on top of my personal issue that I've been haunting the web about.

Don't get me wrong though, and I do not buy that I'm THAT negative, because I've been holding a positive outlook about my situation, and know that very soon I'll get better.......things have already improved to some degree so it's going to keep improving. I truly hold this outlook on my life overall.

Chip - I don't have any anger toward your thread. Nothing written on a message board is really ever really going to make me angry.

By the tone of your posts you sound very defeated and down on yourself. I am a big believer in the power of the mind to influence the body. It seems to me, your mental state is not only NOT helping but could in fact be hurting your cause. I'm not in any way judging - just making some very high level observations based on your posts in this thread.

I agree that many of our current cultural ideas of what it is to be 'male' are total BS. For example, here in the US you are a 'man' if you mindlessly follow the local sports team, consume large amounts of red meat and/or otherwise over-eat and can drink cheap beer excessively.

Personally, I think real men seek to constantly grow and learn, think independently, follow their own course in life despite what people think and yes, they don't act like pvssies and complain - instead they get pissed and take action to change things for the better.
I know that I MUCH prefer to get pissed then depressed. At least anger can be channeled into constructive action. Depression usually leads to inaction and hopelessness.

Again, I will not judge as I have no idea what the last 10 years have been like for you. However, you shouldn't under-estimate the ability of your mind to help (or hurt) you get where you need to be.

chipdouglass - Yes, absolutely. Your BEAM result was a major clue. But I had a feeling that you had that figured out prior to that result. As mentioned before, so called ADHD from a dopamine standpoint is the opposite from your scale. They are not introspective, they need more dopamine.

Personally, I think real men seek to constantly grow and learn, think independently, follow their own course in life despite what people think and yes, they don't act like pvssies and complain - instead they get pissed and take action to change things for the better.
I know that I MUCH prefer to get pissed then depressed. At least anger can be channeled into constructive action. Depression usually leads to inaction and hopelessness.

This is my attitude towards life and what a man is as well. It's as if I wrote it! Must be a Rochester thing, eh Scotty? heh.

Chip--

I definitely understand your situation, and it's tough to stay optimistic when over all of this time things haven't been falling into place despite overwhelming research. I'd like to think that now you are finally at the end of that road, and all of that research will pay off. I'll help in any way that I can, and you certainly got IH and the other forumers behind ya.

scottyc33 wrote:Chip - I don't have any anger toward your thread. Nothing written on a message board is really ever really going to make me angry.

By the tone of your posts you sound very defeated and down on yourself. I am a big believer in the power of the mind to influence the body. It seems to me, your mental state is not only NOT helping but could in fact be hurting your cause. I'm not in any way judging - just making some very high level observations based on your posts in this thread.

I agree that many of our current cultural ideas of what it is to be 'male' are total BS. For example, here in the US you are a 'man' if you mindlessly follow the local sports team, consume large amounts of red meat and/or otherwise over-eat and can drink cheap beer excessively.

Personally, I think real men seek to constantly grow and learn, think independently, follow their own course in life despite what people think and yes, they don't act like pvssies and complain - instead they get pissed and take action to change things for the better.
I know that I MUCH prefer to get pissed then depressed. At least anger can be channeled into constructive action. Depression usually leads to inaction and hopelessness.

Again, I will not judge as I have no idea what the last 10 years have been like for you. However, you shouldn't under-estimate the ability of your mind to help (or hurt) you get where you need to be.

Initially, it's what I thought, but as I wrote : once bitten twice shy (although those weren't my exact words). Your intentions are good, so I have no problems at all with that. I actually like people to give it to me straight most of the times--not always easy, but this way we avoid beating around the bush and often times problems come to an earlier resolution. One of the main issue with the internet, is we can't hear or see people we write to, and that often leads to misunderstandings.

One thing about me is I'm WAY over the top in analyzing, that is, an overanalyzer at the personality level though, it's not a pathology, at least not yet. I often try and laugh at it, just so things are not as bad as they often are self-esteem wise. It's good to laugh at onself, and I do it quite a bit at times.

I strongly agree with you that it's MUCH better to get pissed than depressed--strangely, I have one heck of a hard time to get pissed, like I used to. It may crack a smile on your face (and that's probably my objective typing this). but I miss being the pissed off dude that I used to be. Physically speaking, I'm far from being weak, but at the personality level, I'm like a kitten at times, and I hate being this way. I don't know what's wrong with me that causes me to not get pissed off. I can't recall what was that comedy I watched last year, but there were a bunch of football players and one of them to play a trick on one of their team player substituted their pro-steroid with estrogens, so that dude got whiny like hell and kept crying and being ever so gentle..........

Um, come to think of it, this sounds almost like me, but of course I do not cry. Only thing is I'm whiny--ok, that was the humor segment of this thread--it needed one for balance.

On a more serious note though, I do wonder what's happened to me that caused me to be unable to get pissed. One side of me that's not that nice (trust me) is that I tend to pile up lots of frustration and abuse, but when I blow my top, I get pretty violent, and that's ugly. I literally lose it bad, but I mean bad. Normally, I should be able to get moderately pissed and then let people know about it, but I'm always worried that I'll get people mad with me--isn't this way silly of me !! I mean, if someone slaps me in the face (in the literal sense of it) shouldn't he expect to get hit back ? Answer is yes, but for some reason, I tend to not show my real potential except at the very last minute. Friends of mine have often disagreed with me on that, telling me that I shouldn't be afraid of showing my true potential. I'll stop here cause this is getting beside the goal of this post LOL.

CausticSymmetry wrote:chipdouglass - Yes, absolutely. Your BEAM result was a major clue. But I had a feeling that you had that figured out prior to that result. As mentioned before, so called ADHD from a dopamine standpoint is the opposite from your scale. They are not introspective, they need more dopamine.

I've just looked at my BEAM test result again, and I'm not sure I can make total sense of it's interpretation...

On the P300 (dopamine scale) I rank at the high end of the range at 9.3, however in the line above it says that normal expectations are 10 Microvolts. So I have a 7% decrease in DA output as noted on the last page.

On the TOVA test (Test Of Variables of Attention) both : ''variability'' and ''commission'' are circled. Variablity is connected to a lack of consistent attention during the test (dopamine) while 'commission'' is tied to anxiety (Gaba). In this report, I'd ten to think that I have too much DA as opposed to GABA, giving rise to anxiety, but on the other hand, on the very last page, it shows a 7% decrease in DA.

Under : ''General neurotransmitters effected'' it says :

Ach is up by 7%
Dopamine is down by 7%
GABA : down by 3%
Serotonin down by : 4%

I wish I could post it in this thread so others can see what the BEAM report looks like. IH saw it though.

The way I see it is no that I have true elevated DA, but high DA relative to GABA and serotonin. Is this the way you assessed it too IH ?

I've always been overstimulated or the nervous type, and the question is : does this show low or high DA ? Normally, I'd tend to say it shows high DA, but on the other hand, doesn't giving stims to ADHD kids calms them down ? DA has many receptor subsets, and each seem to produce different outcome.

nidhogge wrote:Personally, I think real men seek to constantly grow and learn, think independently, follow their own course in life despite what people think and yes, they don't act like pvssies and complain - instead they get pissed and take action to change things for the better.
I know that I MUCH prefer to get pissed then depressed. At least anger can be channeled into constructive action. Depression usually leads to inaction and hopelessness.

This is my attitude towards life and what a man is as well. It's as if I wrote it! Must be a Rochester thing, eh Scotty? heh.

Chip--

I definitely understand your situation, and it's tough to stay optimistic when over all of this time things haven't been falling into place despite overwhelming research. I'd like to think that now you are finally at the end of that road, and all of that research will pay off. I'll help in any way that I can, and you certainly got IH and the other forumers behind ya.

Thanks for the kinds words Nidhogge--I sure appreciate that--I mean this alone cheers me up to some extent. Feels good to know there's some support behind, especially when locally, I've exhausted all resources, except for psychological counseling, which I'm starting to think might be of benefit.

Ok, got to hit the books now...ttyl

chipdouglas - You could actually post your BEAM results I think on this forum, pretty much all kinds of media can be displayed. Look at the host image icon for example.

Say someone has ADHD or ADD, they usually have low dopamine. Class II narcotics such as Ritalin, act on phenylethylamine or PEA, which converts to dopamine. Of course, there are totally natural ways to increase phenylethylamine without these narcotics.

In your case, having too much dopamine can cause more anxiety. So a prolactin agonist would actually help you, or a anything that increases seratonin.