Occasional Boron Supplementation

[Nokoni]

struggling to tolerate stress

Lithium deficiency can manifest as difficulty handling stress. Obviously there may well be other things involved, but it's cheap, harmless in small doses, so maybe worth a try.

 

[GenericName86]

Lithium deficiency can manifest as difficulty handling stress. Obviously there may well be other things involved, but it's cheap, harmless in small doses, so maybe worth a try.

I've been considering supplementing some lithium, mainly to increase comt but on reading about it some people experience psoriasis and other eczema issues, now I'm assuming that could be in people already experiencing that and it's just making it worse for some reason but some people claim it's happened out of the blue, obviously other health issues are at the crux or maybe the lithium they used was part of bi plolar meds and has other things in it but i wouldn't put it solely on lithium but i thought it was interesting. Not sure if the type matters in relation to that. I've read the orotate version is the best as it's absorbed better.

 

[Nokoni]

I've been considering supplementing some lithium, mainly to increase comt but on reading about it some people experience psoriasis and other eczema issues, now I'm assuming that could be in people already experiencing that and it's just making it worse for some reason but some people claim it's happened out of the blue, obviously other health issues are at the crux or maybe the lithium they used was part of bi plolar meds and has other things in it but i wouldn't put it solely on lithium but i thought it was interesting. Not sure if the type matters in relation to that. I've read the orotate version is the best as it's absorbed better.

Yeah the bipolar people getting it from a doctor generally take large doses as carbonate and many of them don't much like it. The orotate is available in much smaller doses, and many of the reviews on Amazon are bipolars who are much happier with it. Hadn't heard of skin issues and haven't experienced any myself.

 

[Goobz]

Well my view is that boron is an essential mineral like magnesium, potassium and the rest (likewise for lithium), and that there are negligible amounts in my diet, so yeah I still take it. I continue to experiment with dosage, currently taking about 35 mg boron (or about 300 mg Borax) daily, in divided doses.

I agree, it looks like its essential.

I was just curious, as i know some people take short breaks from it, others take 5 days a week with the weekends off. I was wondering if you’ve ever taken a few days off and felt your arthritis coming back straight away, or if you maintain the benefits for a longer period.

 

[Nokoni]

I agree, it looks like its essential.

I was just curious, as i know some people take short breaks from it, others take 5 days a week with the weekends off. I was wondering if you’ve ever taken a few days off and felt your arthritis coming back straight away, or if you maintain the benefits for a longer period.

I've taken days off, sometimes 2 or 3, but not regularly like Inaut, and haven't noticed a difference.

 

[Nokoni]

I agree, it looks like its essential.

I was just curious, as i know some people take short breaks from it, others take 5 days a week with the weekends off. I was wondering if you’ve ever taken a few days off and felt your arthritis coming back straight away, or if you maintain the benefits for a longer period.

It just occurred to me that the paper I posted above had some relevant information to your question. The guy who discovered the benefits of boron for joints wrote:

"I took 30 mg twice a day, that is the amount of borax that would adhere to a wet finger tip. In a week the pain was less and in ten days the swelling was getting less. In two weeks all pain, swelling and stiffness had gone, so I stopped taking the borax. A year later the pain and swelling returned, and I was still eating food grown on the boron deficient soil. I then took more of the borax and soon got better."

So at a dose of about 7 mg of boron per day, stopping it took one year for symptoms to return, at least for him. Apparently missing days is unlikely to be a problem.

 

[Goobz]

It just occurred to me that the paper I posted above had some relevant information to your question. The guy who discovered the benefits of boron for joints wrote:

"I took 30 mg twice a day, that is the amount of borax that would adhere to a wet finger tip. In a week the pain was less and in ten days the swelling was getting less. In two weeks all pain, swelling and stiffness had gone, so I stopped taking the borax. A year later the pain and swelling returned, and I was still eating food grown on the boron deficient soil. I then took more of the borax and soon got better."

So at a dose of about 7 mg of boron per day, stopping it took one year for symptoms to return, at least for him. Apparently missing days is unlikely to be a problem.

Thanks for the response.

I was curious to hear your experience, as it seems boron could be helping arthritis in multiple ways. If it was fungi in joints, which I believe is a theory for rheumatoid arthritis (Travis' great quotes on this mentioned earlier in this thread) i was wondering if the arthritis would come back, meaning perhaps the fungi returned too.

I take 5mg of lithium orotate now and then and found it to be one of the only supplements that increased my very low levels of deep sleep, as measured by my Oura ring. Sadly my ring has had some battery problems recently, and stopped working, so I can't measure it at the moment. I need to contact the company.

My own borax supplementation appears to be going well, so I need to thank you for your posts in this thread that kindled my interest. I'm taking it for many reasons, but primarily for some suspected mold toxicity problems, fungal problems in my sinsuses, and also to help with estrogen and bone and joint and neurological problems I got after taking an AI.

I've been taking it with low doses of niacin as well, which also has antifungal actions, but Ive taken niacin in the past and this feels like it is helping more than just that. It's been about 7 days now, and the last 4 or 5 I've felt my sinuses pop, fluid move around in my ears where I've had ear infections in the past, and more recently seen white foamy stuff draining down the back of my throat. Sorry if it sounds gross. But for me, this is huge. I think it's killing some walled off fungal infections up there, or helping to. Ive tried so many supplements, antibiotics, thinking it was bacterial... but not enough antifungal things clearly, as this seems to be helping much more.

And my tongue, which has been coated off and on, has turned very clear in a way I haven't seen in years.

My joints are popping pleasantly, and my bones feel better and more solid. For the first few days I had mild pain in my right wrist and fingers where I had some RSI in the past, and now its gone. My shoulder shoulder, which though not painful, has been very unstable, and out of position. It has been popping and feeling like it's sliding back into a better position in my back. It's mild so far, but significant I think. Travis' posts I mentioned talk about how borates kill the fungi in synovial fluid, and I suspect this. I haven't had any painful "die off" reactions, but then again I didn't have painful arthritis to start with.

There are theories that certain conditions like seb derm and Parkinsons are a result of an insufficient response to the malassezia yeast, while painful, inflammatory conditions such as arthritis, spondylitis, etc are a result of an over reaction to it. I think my condition is more in line with the former, insufficient response.

No changes to the seb derm on my face. But I will try some topical borax water on it if it doesn't improve. Also, I'm considering adding some borax to my nasal rinse to really get at any fungal infections in my sinuses.

It's still early days but I'm cautiously optimistic!

 

[Nokoni]

white foamy stuff draining down the back of my throat

Crikey.

In addition to the lithium, famotidine may help with deep sleep. Haidut said this in a Ritanserin thread:

Btw, it looks like famotidine may also be useful as an OTC sleep aid that improves bioenergetics during the night.
"...Radulovacki et al. found that adenosine elevated SWS and reduced waking time in rats. Nicholson et al."9 stated that H,-antagonism may reduce wakefulness, H2-antagonism may increase slow-wave activity and that these effects imply a complementary role of the H, and H2 systems in the control of the sleep process. Inoue & Borbely20 reviewed the role of endogenous sleep substances, including a number of polypeptides."

I experienced that myself.

I've tried Borax water topically. Also Borax vodka, hoping for better dermal penetration, though I seem to remember solubility issues. Didn't notice much improvement with either.

Couple other things for joint issues: Gelatin/collagen and lithium (study attached). In addition to adequate vitamins and minerals, which applies to any condition.

 

[Goobz]

Haha sorry to gross people out. I should add that the white foamy stuff was in very small amounts.

I had an ENT surgeon look in my sinuses with a camera and apparently couldn't find any obvious infection. But they were a bit swollen. I think whatever has colonised them is very far back in the deep sinuses, maybe even in the eustachian tube, so was harder to see. The doc said you cant get a camera up into the eustachian tubes.

Also, in my experience doctors know a lot about bacterial infections and are happy to prescribe antibiotics, but know much much less of fungal infections and how to treat them. I had the fungi confirmed later via a swab.

 

[Blossom]

Here’s another good video on boron. I’m going to up my dose because I was just diagnosed with osteoporosis (today)!

 

[Blossom]

One interesting thing I learned was that boron should not be taken near bedtime or it may interfere with sleep.

 

[Inaut]

I takes mines first thing in the morning with magnesium bicarbonate :)

 

[Blossom]

I takes mines first thing in the morning with magnesium bicarbonate :)

Awesome, I was just taking it whenever before and working nights so it was hard to stay on a consistent schedule. I’m going to try for every morning with magnesium like you.

 

[Blossom]

I takes mines first thing in the morning with magnesium bicarbonate :)

Dr. Jorge said in a YouTube I listened to yesterday that he gave his wife 150 mg of boron per day to reverse her severe osteoporosis. Do you happen to know where he discusses this in more detail? I’m just curious about how long this dose is needed and if people are supposed to drop back to a maintenance dose at any point. I figured you might know.
I’m pretty devastated to learn I have this after 6 years of trying to do everything I could to avoid it. I used to think my mom could have avoided it if she had taken better care of herself!

 

[Nokoni]

Dr. Jorge said in a YouTube I listened to yesterday that he gave his wife 150 mg of boron per day to reverse her severe osteoporosis. Do you happen to know where he discusses this in more detail? I’m just curious about how long this dose is needed and if people are supposed to drop back to a maintenance dose at any point. I figured you might know.
I’m pretty devastated to learn I have this after 6 years of trying to do everything I could to avoid it. I used to think my mom could have avoided it if she had taken better care of herself!

It was because of that video that I increased my dosage substantially. But I wonder if Dr Jorge Flechas' recommendations were based mostly on clinical experience. Given that Rex Newnham got truly spectacular results with 7 mg per day – though for (apparently severe) arthritis and not osteoporosis – it may be that such a large dose as Flechas recommends is not needed. Clinical experience is very valuable, of course, but a well done study is even better. In that Newnham paper I posted (page 6), he talks about a Dr Nielsen who found that

Boron supplementation markedly reduced the urinary secretion of calcium, magnesium and phosphorus. It also increased the amount of oestrogen and testosterone. These hormones were the only known way of reducing calcium loss which occurs after menopause. They found that boron was able to prevent calcium loss and bone demineralization, and this is the way to prevent osteoporosis. Dr. Nielsen concluded his paper in 1986 by saying that regardless of the uncertainty about the specific biochemical mechanisms through which it acts, there is overwhelming circumstantial evidence indicating that boron is of nutritional importance. If boron is not essential in the classical sense, it certainly could be considered beneficial in humans exposed to certain nutritional stressors such as vitamin D, copper and magnesium deficiency. Thus it seems appropriate to recommend that people eat a diet which provides luxuriant amounts of boron. In 1997 he showed how boron is a dynamic trace element which affects the metabolism of the substances involved in life processes, and so affects many body systems including the brain, skeleton and the immune system in a beneficial manner. We need between one and 13 mg of boron a day.

Take as much as you want, obviously, but be aware that tremor can be a side effect of large doses. It could be that you just need more time.

 

[Blossom]

It was because of that video that I increased my dosage substantially. But I wonder if Dr Jorge Flechas' recommendations were based mostly on clinical experience. Given that Rex Newnham got truly spectacular results with 7 mg per day – though for (apparently severe) arthritis and not osteoporosis – it may be that such a large dose as Flechas recommends is not needed. Clinical experience is very valuable, of course, but a well done study is even better. In that Newnham paper I posted (page 6), he talks about a Dr Nielsen who found that

Take as much as you want, obviously, but be aware that tremor can be a side effect of large doses. It could be that you just need more time.

Thank you. I took a high dose yesterday and had excruciating pain in my hips last night. It made me wonder if it was working on my bones that quickly! Thanks for warning me about tremors.

 

[Ledo]

Dr. Jorge said in a YouTube I listened to yesterday that he gave his wife 150 mg of boron per day to reverse her severe osteoporosis. Do you happen to know where he discusses this in more detail? I’m just curious about how long this dose is needed and if people are supposed to drop back to a maintenance dose at any point. I figured you might know.
I’m pretty devastated to learn I have this after 6 years of trying to do everything I could to avoid it. I used to think my mom could have avoided it if she had taken better care of herself!

Really sorry to hear that diagnosis Blossom, talk about frustrating.

I'm starting to question the low estrogen Peat imperative myself. That would be e tough boomerang to take if low E was causing osteoporosis.

 

[jaminhealth]

I supplement with about 9mg of Born most days. Our U.S. soils are very very deficient in Boron and hence we have millions dealing with arthritis...could be a major factor.

I was doing a search of countries with highest Born and lowest arthritis and I think it was Israel but I'd have to look that up again...or others can look it up.

Here is an article:

Low boron, higher arthritis - Green Health Watch

 

[LLight]

Thank you. I took a high dose yesterday and had excruciating pain in my hips last night. It made me wonder if it was working on my bones that quickly! Thanks for warning me about tremors.

It may be killing fungi.

There was a study (done on rats...) that suggested that there could be an interaction between boron and thiamine metabolisms. If you take high doses, maybe make sure that you have enough B1.

 

[Blossom]

It may be killing fungi.

There was a study (done on rats...) that suggested that there could be an interaction between boron and thiamine metabolisms. If you take high doses, maybe make sure that you have enough B1.

Thank you! I’ll be sure to take b1.