haidut
Member
calliandra said:haidut said:One possible reason is that allithiamine is fat soluble and crosses the blood brain barrier much more easily AND also accumulates in tissues including the brain. I am not sure to what degree regular thiamine Hcl accumulates in tissues. So, in theory even if you stop taking it you should be able to function normally for longer until the stores get depleted down to the level that gives you deficiency symptoms.
Thanks, Haidut.
Yes, it does build up. I know because in the beginning I needed two 50mg capsules of allithiamine several times a day to control my symptoms (about 300-600mg daily). After a month or two, I tapered off so that I was only taking it on about half of the mornings, and also before exercise, and if my fatigue appeared. I cut back because a blood test showed very high thiamine levels, and Ii became concerned that a buildup might affect my other Bs (don't biotin and thiamine share a transporter?) and create a new problem that I couldn't easily fix. Over the past week, I've had to start taking allithiamine at high doses again since my fatigue came back.
I would like to know if my symptoms are due to thiamine deficiency or something else. A thiamine deficiency doesn't really make sense to me. I eat well, I don't drink at all, I have taken a B-complex for decades. Before I tried allithiamine, I had a Spectracell test that showed good WBC levels of thiamine, so that would indicate I don't have a transporter problem. I just don't see how I could be low in thiamine!
And yet the allithiamine works.
Yesterday on the forums here I read about thiamine neutralizing ammonia (viewtopic.php?t=5749) .
Could I have an ammonia problem rather than a thiamine problem? What would that look like?
Ammonia symptoms are very much like low thiamine - fatigue, inability to sleep well or concentrate on tasks for too long, trouble with short-term memory, etc. Based on the studies I have seen pretty much anybody over the age of 30 has some ammonia problems due to sluggish liver and/or kidneys. You can check by taking some ceylon cinnamon (1g-2g) before going to bed. If you state improves then it's likely ammonia and not low thiamine that is the problem.