Lithium

[andrewcb]

Has anyone tried Lithium? My buddies dad had a ton of them and I took a small does, 300 mg, and it didn't do anything for my visuals but when I was driving my buddy starting laughing and said "you look like your on something" and I told him I know I can't stop grinning right now lol, I had a smile on my face for a while idk why. Then I got home and I felt decent mentally wise. I might grab all the lithium from him since he don't take it and just do in a small dose of 300 mg 2x to 3x daily. It is just scary the side-effects of this stuff would cover 2 pages if you printed it out lol.

 

Any input would be awesome

Thank you

Andrew

[Puppeteer]

Uhh, yeah, as you've said, Lithium is a powerful thing and really needs to be respected. If you wanna take it it would be very wise to find a specialist who's willing to work with you, and if not, really do your research, keep a log of what's going on, etc. I've considered it now and then but always concluded that it's not worth the hassle and probably not the most applicable treatment for my symptoms anyhow. Best of luck

[Syntheso]

Curious.. has anyone given lithium a go?

[BigPapaChakra]

I was recently looking into it. There are a few studies on thyroid hormones (T4 and/or T3) effectively treating Schizophrenia, and it appears that lithium at the wrong dose can actually cause hypothyroidism, or make subclinical hypothyroidism more noticeable, which can cause a great variety of mental problems.

 

At a rather low dose, it seems to enhance myelination, neurogenesis, and more. Paul Jaminet recently wrote this blog about mineral waters as an undervalued dietary supplement, in which he lists some that have a small amount of lithium. 

 

"“Trace” Minerals sound so insignificant

 

…but they’re not! One of the most important trace minerals is lithium. While high-dose supplementation of lithium may impair immune and thyroid function (these doses are prescribed for psychiatric disorders), an optimal lower dose (but higher than what Americans typically take in through food) is linked to longer lifespans and lower rates of mental illness. Areas where tap water has the lowest lithium levels have higher suicide and homicide rates.

 

Rather than splitting lithium supplement pills to get small enough doses, one could get low doses of lithium through mineral water. “Lithia waters”, mineral waters high in lithium, were a craze in the late 1800s and early 1900s due to numerous testimonials on their miraculous health benefits. But most mineral waters actually have quite low lithium levels, so you have to look hard to find a water that provides enough to equal very low-dose supplements.

If you can find a brand that has somewhere between 0.1-0.3 mg per liter (or more) of lithium, it may produce some beneficial effects. Gerolsteiner, for example, contains 0.13 mg per liter. It might not take much to produce benefit — microdoses of lithium as small as 0.3 mg per day have been shown to improve cognitive impairment in Alzheimer’s patients. Note that diets low in plants and seafoods typically have lower lithium levels, and lithium concentrations in plants varies widely (Texas and western states have much higher lithium levels in soil and water than the rest of the country)."