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Dr. Bob is Robert Hsiung, MD,
bob@dr-bob.orgShown: posts 1 to 8 of 8. This is the beginning of the thread.
Posted by Batman55 on August 23, 2009, at 1:10:20
I just ordered the Jarrows 100mg l-theanine capsules (contains SunTheanine) and thought I would try it to help me relax before sleep. As well, the other reason I wanted to try it is I'm quite a coffee drinker and sometimes I can get a bit "addled" from nighttime coffee. I hear that theanine can counteract the caffeine jitters. I tried it expressly for this purpose tonight, took 2 of the 100mg capsules about 40 minutes ago.. and so far my mood has gone from "slightly irritable" to "slightly relaxed" and back again.
My expectations of theanine: slight increase of mental clarity, slight relaxation, better sleep. I'm basing these suppositions on past experience with drinking concentrated amounts of caffeinated green tea, as I noticed a "clarity" and sometimes a "focused calm" very much unlike coffee. But the jitters I get from tea--all tea, in fact--make these benefits useless.
Does theanine have an "irritable" start-up effect? If so, can I expect this to even out with repeated usage?
The last concern is I do take an SSRI, Paxil 30mg, and have for many years... how would I expect theanine to affect this, or vice versa?
Anyone have any tips? I'm new here, please guys... don't leave this thread blank!
.............................................
Some background info:
My official diagnosis is generalized anxiety disorder. LAter on, another shrink "agreed with me" that I have terrible inattentive ADD. Later on from my own research--I found several learning problems consistent with Non-verbal learning disorder--and then self-diagnosed Asperger. Yep, I've "got some problems"...
Posted by nolvas on August 23, 2009, at 11:50:25
In reply to L-theanine questions !?!, posted by Batman55 on August 23, 2009, at 1:10:20
L-Theanine has a very mild anxiolytic or relaxing quality. You'd do much better to completely remove caffeine from your diet. In fact it's absolutely essential in my view if you suffer from anxiety, lack of sleep etc. Caffeine's principal mode of action is as an antagonist of adenosine receptors in the brain.
http://health.howstuffworks.com/caffeine3.htm
Continue to ingest high levels of caffeine and eventually your body is likely to produce high levels of cortisol, cortisol is an anti stress hormone but it has very damaging effects on your health if you have high levels all the time. Look at cushing syndrome for an example of all the negative effects of cortisol. (Caffiene ingestion is not linked to Cushing syndrome, but stress is now being recognised as a possible factor)
Caffeine causes stress in the body, and will definitely keep you awake. Taking L-Theanine to counteract the effects of Caffiene is definitely not the solution. Part of the solution is to eliminate or drastically cut down the consumption of caffiene.
L-Theanine at least for me doesn't touch my anxiety, it also appears to leave me with an anxiety hangover, as in I generally feel worse after the mild effects of L-Theanine have worn off. As for taking L-Theanine with SSRIs there's not enough information to make a decision either way. Just to be safe I probably wouldn't take it with SSRI drugs.
Posted by Sigismund on August 23, 2009, at 14:44:47
In reply to L-theanine questions !?!, posted by Batman55 on August 23, 2009, at 1:10:20
>I tried it expressly for this purpose tonight, took 2 of the 100mg capsules about 40 minutes ago.. and so far my mood has gone from "slightly irritable" to "slightly relaxed" and back again.
That sounds like what you can expect from it. It's not bad, I found it useful, but just a bit.
Posted by Batman55 on August 23, 2009, at 23:24:49
In reply to Re: L-theanine questions !?!, posted by Sigismund on August 23, 2009, at 14:44:47
> >I tried it expressly for this purpose tonight, took 2 of the 100mg capsules about 40 minutes ago.. and so far my mood has gone from "slightly irritable" to "slightly relaxed" and back again.
>
> That sounds like what you can expect from it. It's not bad, I found it useful, but just a bit.After the 200mg dose, I found that there was a "mental clarity" but it only lasted for about 20-30 minutes, much, much shorter than the same effect I remember from multiple cups of green tea. Perhaps there was something else in green tea that caused the distinct "relaxed focus," or maybe the organic variety works better than the synthetic (Suntheanine) type??
Once the benefits were over, my mood went lower and I actually felt depressed, and that lasted for hours, until I woke up in fact. I'm not sure if I'll be trying L-theanine capsules again, not any time soon at least. It sucked. I don't quite know why it misfired on me. Maybe I took too high a dose for the first time??
Posted by Batman55 on August 23, 2009, at 23:32:00
In reply to Re: L-theanine questions !?!, posted by nolvas on August 23, 2009, at 11:50:25
> L-Theanine has a very mild anxiolytic or relaxing quality. You'd do much better to completely remove caffeine from your diet. In fact it's absolutely essential in my view if you suffer from anxiety, lack of sleep etc. Caffeine's principal mode of action is as an antagonist of adenosine receptors in the brain.
>
> http://health.howstuffworks.com/caffeine3.htm
>
> Continue to ingest high levels of caffeine and eventually your body is likely to produce high levels of cortisol, cortisol is an anti stress hormone but it has very damaging effects on your health if you have high levels all the time. Look at cushing syndrome for an example of all the negative effects of cortisol. (Caffiene ingestion is not linked to Cushing syndrome, but stress is now being recognised as a possible factor)---------------------------------------------
I can see the logic in caffeine causing anxiety, but I can tell you for sure that anxiety is more-or-less my usual tendency even without any caffeine in my system.Regardless, new research has borne out that dopamine plays a bigger role than expected in anxiety disorder especially social subtype (tick) and of course ADD (tick). But I choose not to take another medication. Caffeine helps these problems, albeit in a temporary way. Yes there is a downside, but not enough for me to look toward Wellbutrin, Strattera, or any other psych drug for the attention problem.
I don't mean to sound like a disagreeable child, as really I'm just trying to clarify my viewpoint on these things.
Posted by nolvas on August 24, 2009, at 15:15:39
In reply to Re: L-theanine questions !?!, posted by Batman55 on August 23, 2009, at 23:32:00
That's ok, we're all different, some things that work well for others can be useless for others.
Posted by Batman55 on August 28, 2009, at 2:57:12
In reply to L-theanine questions !?!, posted by Batman55 on August 23, 2009, at 1:10:20
Hi all,
I was just gonna ask if it would be "agreeable" to open up the Suntheanine capsules and mix the powder into a drink, say tea for instance. I don't like any kind of pill on an empty stomach (apparently theanine is more effective taken on an empty stomach) so this would bypass that problem, at least.
As well, I'm wondering if adding the synthetic form of theanine to regular green tea might make for a better effect overall. I'm thinking there has to be some way to better utilize this stuff, which has been something of a letdown so far.
Lemme know,
Batman
Posted by Jimmyboy on September 13, 2009, at 20:54:12
In reply to Re: L-theanine questions !?!, posted by Batman55 on August 28, 2009, at 2:57:12
Hey batman,
From what I read, L-theanine has not just an effect on GABA but it also raises dopamine in some parts of the brain, this could be the cause of the "clarity" feeling that you are getting from it.
This thread from M&M has a lot of info on theanine if you are interested and have the time
http://www.mindandmuscle.net/forum/index.php?showtopic=14521&st=30
This is the end of the thread.
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