Posted by bleauberry on March 24, 2008, at 20:23:34
In reply to 5htp, posted by RealityBites on March 23, 2008, at 18:19:17
5htp turns into serotonin. Tryptophan in your diet does also, but it has stiff competition from other proteins that crowd it out. If your symptoms are from low serotonin chemistry, 5htp could help. If not low serotonin chemistry, it might help some or not at all. Some doctors think anything more than 25mg a day is a high dose, while others consider 100mg or more a day as perfectly routine. You have to feel it out yourself. I say start very low and work up as tolerated.
Typically doctors start patients at 50mg and work up to as high as 300mg-500mg. I am sensitive, and I can tell you 5htp has the potential to be powerful. For me, I started at 10mg (1/5 of the contents of a capsule) and worked up over two weeks to 50mg. That was all I could take. Any more than that felt like a strong drug to me. My depression is primarily the anhedonic, lack of pleasure, lack of motivation kind. 5hpt did not help that, made it worse actually, but did help in terms of makinig me calmer, more stable, and awesome sleep. Very similar to ssri drugs, it basically numbed my emotions somewhat.
10 years ago I tried it and back then I immediately started at 50mg 3 times a day. It kicked in fast and I felt pretty darn good. Then a new doctor took me off it and sent me down the miserable road of drug after drug after drug. When I went back to 5htp, it never worked the same. But at least I do know what it feels like when 5htp works. Back then it worked great. Nowadays not. A lot has changed in my brain chemistry since then.
poster:bleauberry
thread:819573
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/alter/20080110/msgs/819729.html