hi
@caledonia.
thank you for your response. sorry about the late and long response. i am not thinking clearly.
band aids sound good.
i am wary of methylation cofactors since they (magnesium, zinc) make symptoms worse that are on Fred's methyl trap list. (ie. confusion / sluggishness, some other things.) i think i have been in a mild methyl trap situation that has seriously built up over 6-8 years due to high folic acid and low b12 intake. Rich's SMP suggests a b12/folate ratio of 5:1. Fred suggests a ratio of more than 1. Ben Lynch suggests about 1.2. my ratio is about 0.2. no one on PR has improved methylation with a ratio like this. i am hopeful the cofactors will have the expected response once i reduce the folic acid so it is lower than the b12. does this make sense?
Not sure. I think there are some other things going on, which I will describe.
what other snps do you mean?
I was referring to your BHMT SNPs, which would impede the secondary (backup) methylation pathway. So if the primary pathway was methyl trapped, a way out could be to work on the secondary pathway with sunflower lecithin. Then if that was running better, you would hopefully feel better and be able to adjust the supplements for the primary pathway.
thank you for your list of supplements.
- i am considering 5htp, but it depends on b6, which i seem short on.
- theanine caused paresthesia, poorer sleep, lower mental clarity and increased allodynia and better stools. i think the methyl groups in theanine resulted in more folic acid being metabolised and using up b12. i don't have any better idea.
- i might test gaba.
- magnesium made the panic worse and increased paresthesia.
- i am considering taurine, but vaguely recall some involvement with magnesium.
- i take about 2g of potassium gluconate.
- i take Now Super Omega EPA. i will look into the fish oil you mentioned.
- i am currently wary of the methylation cycle since zinc (a catalyst for bhmt), b12 and magnesium seem to increase confusion / sluggishness. i don't know if everything else in the methylation cycle will do the same. i could test a toothpick worth of phosphatidyl choline / lecithin, i guess.
Mag makes panic worse, and you're taking 2g of potass. It's possible that you're not taking enough potass, therefore adding mag will cause potassium deficiency symptoms. (As an example, I'm taking 3780mg of potass split into 4 equal doses throughout the day.)
Note - just saw Kathevans post on too much potass causing issues. There is a sweet spot for potassium. Too much or too little can both make you feel bad.
My low potass symptoms are more like panic type symptoms - bouts of rapid pounding heartbeat, feeling anxious, could also have twitching feet at night like low mag will cause. Also ringing in the ears. Most of this seems to happen at night and it wakes you up.
My high potass symptoms - feeling kind of toxic and nauseous, metallic taste in the mouth, chest pain.
i can't think of a better approach than to get stable by reducing methylfolate production via reduced b2. however, this causes chest pain and shallow breathing.
what do you mean?
these are my detox snps: CYP1A2 164A>C +/-, CYP1B1 L432V +/+, CYP1B1 N453S +/-, CYP1B1 R48G +/-, CYP2C9*3 A1075C +/+, CYP2D6 S486T +/+, CYP2D6 100C>T +/+, CYP3A4*1B +/-, NAT2 R197Q +/-, NAT2 G286E +/-, GSTM1 Unknown due to 23andMe.
Your detox SNPs look ok - there doesn't seem to be an issue with glutathione SNPs. So then you would look at your methylation SNPs. You have an MTRR (B12 SNP) but no MTHFR. Therefore, genetically, B12 would seem to be your worst problem.
i have mercury toxicity, but am dependent on 600mg alpha lipoic acid. i tried reducing it, but energy dropped like a stone. sigh. could this cause sluggishness / confusion?
Yes - this could be the root of many (or all) of your issues.
According to Andrew Cutler, the ALA will chelate mercury, but if it's only taken like once a day, the mercury will then redistribute back into your tissues and brain, causing all kinds of problems.
The correct way to take ALA would be to take a very low dose (like 25mg or even less) every 3 hours both day and night for a couple days, then take several days off. There are several supports that need to be taken along with this to alleviate various symptoms that go along with chelating mercury.
If you stopped the ALA, there would be a redistribution of mercury for awhile, but it should eventually stop and then you should feel better. I did a trial of chelation with ALA (the wrong way) in March, and it took a good month to two months before I felt recovered from that. My symptoms were flu-like muscle and joint aches, extra fatigue and loss of energy, transient anxiety/depression, OCD death thoughts as well as brain fog. So yeah - not good.
Also, if I raise my rate of methylation above the very low amounts I'm using, I get similar flu-like muscle and joint aches and extra fatigue and loss of energy. I believe that, at least for me, methylation is causing more mercury redistribution. However, it may not be going to the brain like with the ALA, so that's a plus.
So I think the way out is to do Cutler style chelation, which I looking into doing for myself.
For you, I think the next step would be to forget everything I said about other supplements, and get off ALA to let all the redistributed mercury settle back down again. You might want to consult with the Frequent Dose Chelation Yahoo Group before proceeding. They might have some ideas on supports that would help you through the redistribution, such as DMSA.
https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/frequent-dose-chelation/info
In general, mercury affects methylation by affecting MTHFR and MTR/MTRR as well as CBS. So it's like having SNPs in those areas, even though genetically you may be ok. If you already have some SNPs in those three areas, it makes those areas even worse.