Posted by Jimmyboy on December 23, 2007, at 11:16:08
In reply to Re: Help med induced sex dysfunction » Jimmyboy, posted by bleauberry on December 23, 2007, at 5:32:32
After trying every med on the market for the last 12 years without success, I did finally find something that has worked well, although its rather unorthadox. It took me a long time to accept that supplements could work as well ( or in my case much better) than prescription meds.
First off I found out I had food allergies to gluten and corn, so I cut that out of my diet, which has definitely helped.
Next, I did some research on inflammation and depression, which led me to beleieve that if I could raise my prostaglandin E 1 levels that it would be very beneficial ( PGE 1 levels have been shown to reduce inflammation , and PGE 1 levels are low in depressed patients as well as too high in manic patients - it is known that having more can boost your mood). PGE 1 is made from GLA so I started Evening Primrose , which contains GLA --> which in turn can be converted to PGE 1 ( good) or PGE 2( bad). There is an enzyme called D5D that controlls which way the GLA goes , that is either to PGE 1 or PGE 2. If you disable the enzyme the GLA goes down the favorable pathway to become only PGE 1. I found some studies that said the compound "Sesamin" disables the D5D enzyme, so I started taking that. Well the combo of Borage Oil ( contains higher percentage of GLA that Primsorse) + Sesamin. Immediately cleared up my brain fog, made me much more active, optimistic, etc. Basically it wiped out the depression fast and has continued to work great for over 2 months. I also noticed, slowly the crippling anxiety I felt has disappeared and all panic attacks have ceased.
But the down side was also a slowly creeping up of less sex drive and functioning. Felt kind of like SSRI side effects. Well come to find out enhancing GLA can in a round about way raise serotonin in parts of the brain. This is what I attribute to the slow erasing of all of my anxiety. Which is great, but I am trying to deal with the sexual side effects.
Right now I am looking at small dose of 5ht2 antagonist lke Nefazodone, Mirtazapine, Trazodone or minasarin to add in. Hopefully it will be successful.
JB
poster:Jimmyboy
thread:802159
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20071213/msgs/802242.html