First Supplement Log

[Nicholas]

ENVIRONMENTAL CONDITIONS:

- Physically demanding job (lactate, FFA, cortisol, ammonia?)
- Smoker (vit. c loss, potential overstimulation of pituitary....i.e. prolactin/cortisol?)
- Suspicion of endotoxin problems on occasion
- Suspicion of recovering fatty liver
- High-stress life, in general (cortisol, everything)

SYMPTOMS:

- Tendency to hold fat *only* on each waist-side (not belly) - otherwise pretty lean
- Sensitive nipples (mild gynecomastia)
- popping joints (though less)
- spider angioma (2-3)
- very slow hair loss for past 5yrs.
- intermittent (like once a month) feelings of extreme depression (accompanied with fatigue)
- intermittent (every couple of weeks) inability to concentrate
- tendency towards obssessive behavior

DIET:

I've fine-tuned my diet over the past couple of years and i don't currently see any issues with it. A month or so ago i lowered my fat percent to about 15 and noticed intermittent blood sugar/fatigue issues went away. I have a very varied diet getting all the nutrients, minerals, aminos, balanced everything, etc.

Diet has gone a very long way in improving so many issues over the years but now i'm realizing that i have certain environmental factors that need to be addressed....and probably can't be addressed with diet alone (or at least in a reasonable time-frame). Specifically, i want to counteract any damage from my job, rectify any lingering fatty liver issues (and therefore better FFA, estrogen, PUFA detox), use a more intensive therapy for hair health. Targeting these issues supplementally would also be targeting the root issues involved in angiomas and blood vessel disorders.

SUPPLEMENTS I'M INTERESTED IN:

- Taurine (liver, hair, fat-solubles absorption, etc.)
- Lysine (endotoxin serotonin)
- Aspirin (liver, endotoxin, cortisol, estrogen, FFA, etc.)
- Energin (lactate, FFA, ammonia, liver, etc.)
- Vit. C (liver, endotoxin, cortisol)

The only supplement in this list that may be a bit excessive is the aspirin....but it seems so multi-purpose and a good filler. I have already experimented with the Taurine and Lysine but not in a controlled manner....and the other supplements i haven't really used at all, especially in a controlled manner.

DOSAGES:

- TAURINE (1000mg/day) [breakfast]
- LYSINE (5OOmg/every 2 days) [empty stomach]
- ASPIRIN (100mg/day) [bedtime]
- VIT. C (1500mg/day) [breakfast]
- ENERGIN (10drops/day and work up) [lunch]

i am taking pretty low doses, but that's partly because all of these things i do get in my diet and i believe i absorb most of it, too. Also want to avoid excess....and the b-vitamins seem like they may have the most complications with excess if i'm not hypothyroid (as far as i know).

QUESTION:

1. Is it really necessary to take K2 with 100mg of Aspirin? I do get both K1 and K2 in diet....k1 from regular collards.
2. Couldn't supplementing Vit. C cause issues with Iron? (even when taken with meals with low iron?) And wouldn't excess Iron storing kind of negate all the other efforts i am taking supplementally?

I will report progress here. Thanks for reading and offering any thoughts.

 

[tara]

My hunch would be that with 100 mg aspirin and lots of greens you may not need supplemental vit-K to protect against aspirin, esp. if you are eating occasional liver. Though you may decide to try it at some stage for liver health or other reasons.

I wonder if 1500mg vit-C is a bit high for daily use?

 

[answersfound]

This is way too technical and way too specific. Why not just use foods with the occasional supplement, here and there? I don't get it. Some people go off the rails.

 

[Peata]

I don't think that's an excessive amount of supplements, but I'm curious why the vitamin C?

 

[Nicholas]

post 108045 This is way too technical and way too specific. Why not just use foods with the occasional supplement, here and there? I don't get it. Some people go off the rails.

i was very explicit in my post that i already have diet squared away and am now logging a *few* supplements to address issues that i have not been able to correct with diet or make changes in my life. This is really the first time in two years that i've used supplements in a concerted way. If you're doing an experiment, just like with dietary experiments, you want consistency with your variables to really see what's going on. I'm not just going to take random occasional supplements that i am not fully convinced that i need to use - and if i use them, i would only use them in a very specific way and for a very specific purpose.

 

[Nicholas]

post 108044 My hunch would be that with 100 mg aspirin and lots of greens you may not need supplemental vit-K to protect against aspirin, esp. if you are eating occasional liver. Though you may decide to try it at some stage for liver health or other reasons.

I wonder if 1500mg vit-C is a bit high for daily use?

thanks, yeah i have the feeling that the greens is enough - and the fact that i don't have bleeding gums or slow wound healing. will talk about the vit. c below...

 

[Nicholas]

post 108046 I don't think that's an excessive amount of supplements, but I'm curious why the vitamin C?

because i am a smoker and smoking depletes vitamin C.

 

[Nicholas]

UPDATE:

I decided to stop the aspirin because i really didn't have a specific purpose for taking it....and i sensed that it didn't agree with me hormonally.
so the supplements i'm using are Taurine, Lysine, Vit. C, and Energin (b-vitamins).
As i mentioned, i wanted to take the Energin to help buffer any damage from my physically demanding job. I believe it does help, and is even synergistic with Taurine.

RESULTS SO FAR:

The taurine is still dramatically improving my hair thickness and quality (haven't really been monitoring any re-growth). The Lysine and Vit. C i do now at nighttime before bed (1500mg of the C and 1000mg of Lysine). This combo has been a godsend....not only because it's probably giving me the C that i have been lacking all this time being a smoker. I noticed that the Lysine seems to have improved my sense of hunger even more - i get really pure food cravings now....not that stressed kind of hunger feeling when i am depleted. And another reason i wanted to try the C+Lysine combo was for broken capillaries on my face. This combo has specifically reduced them. I can only imagine they will get smaller and smaller....maybe disappear....but at least they don't feel like a point of inflammation anymore (sometimes one of them would swell throughout the day). So if anyone is interested in a combo for skin health, vit. c +lysine can be useful if diet has not done the trick yet. Vitamin C is part of the steroid hormone pathway....so it could also eliminate the need for having to take pregnenolone if someone was wary of taking it.

 

[Nicholas]

post 108044 I wonder if 1500mg vit-C is a bit high for daily use?

do you know of any problems from taking too much? my only concern was if it affects iron absorption even if i take it before bed and don't eat for 8hrs. do you know if it's true that your body eliminates the excess vit. C?