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low vit.D = depression (in me)

The first two months of 2014 I tumbled into a depression.
It was very bad. By the end of February I was suicidal.

I knew it was chemically caused but could not figure out by what. Progesterone, Lithium, Omega3, stopping with Methylation, nothing helped.

Knowing it had a chemical cause was not enough to keep me sane or wanting to be alive. The mind is no match for emotions. It was shear stubbornness that kept me alive.

Days before I was to have myself committed I upped my vit D.
45 minutes later the depression lifted.

I felt so betrayed.

Afterwards it's logical:
- methylation eats vit D
- Winter eats vit D
- my levels were already fragile due to one receptor being busted (VDR Taq)
- I had halved my dose in October because doctor said so
- vit D is a hormone and has functions all over the body, especially the brain
- vit D is involved in uptake of nutrients, signalling of the neurons and everyting

recommended bloodlevels for vitamine D3 are 60 to 80
for me, bloodlevels should probably be higher. I now supplement to symptoms.

MS people aim for levels as high as 100

Not all depressions get caused by lack of a hormone or vitamine. Probably most aren't. But mine was. Perhaps it helps another ill person. vitD is crucial for ME/CFS people.

I am still very angry this happened to me. Mostly my self esteem is bruised, I thought I was smarter than this. :s
Of course it takes weeks to recuperate from this roller coaster. grrrr.

I took a daily dose of 25 mcg (=1000 IU) and got the shortage. I fixed it with temporarily daily dose of 75 mcg (=3000 IU)
Now my daily maintenance dose is 50 mcg (2000 IU)
I stopped methylation for the time being

story in longer sentences at http://marvellogic.wordpress.com/2014/03/20/when-feelings-are-lies/

Comments

I agree that vit d is very important. Curious what dosage you are using.
 
@Vamah, 1000 IU gave the steep shortage. 2500 IU fixed it.
my daily dose will be 1800 or 2000 IU per day from now on.

@Misfit Toy, it helps me with energy. The bottleneck with yours must be with some other element than vit D :(
 
I'm having a very negative experience with vitamin d by contrast. I took only a few thousand iu several weeks ago and started retaining calcium and losing magnesium. Because I ddidn't stop taking foods that are enriched with vitamin d I got into a loop of losing magnesium.

The last several weeks have been horrible with using bottles of magnesium and kegs of epsom salts and I still can't tolerate any calcium. I've lost so much sleep. I then got too much magnesium for a few days and missed more sleep. Then this week I tried having tiny amounts of calcium and missed every second nightks sleep. No calccium the last two days and one good sleep now tonight no sleep just awake till dawn.

It's so far outside my normal experience that the vitamin d is the only possible cause.
I really hope nobody else ever has such an awful experience from vitamin d.
 
@L'engle Wow really? that is not even that much I wouldn't expect any issues like that unless you were going above 10,000 I.U. a day! I know there is a correlation between vitamin D and hyper parathyroidism.. this can cause calcium retaining, have you ever looked into that?

@WoolPippi I am so sorry to hear about your negative experience but so glad to hear vitamin D fixed it for you! I can relate to what your talking about I was recently having issues with suicidal ideation and impulses too for no particular reason though.. One of the things that helps is taking something to reduce glutamate toxicity, and quinolinic acid reducing supplements.. Anything to reduce the levels of these two things as they can easily induce all kinds of weird psychological havoc.. Mine happened because the Lyme in my brain was causing excessive amounts of both of these..

L Carnatine, and Turmeric help to exponge these things, as well as a very low glutamate diet, though It doesn't sound like this is what was going on with you per say..

Didn't know about methylation causing low vitamin D either! That explains a lot as my level was at 30 even with supplemental 5000 I.u. for the past few months and working in the sun five days a week...

Glad to hear you are doing so much better!

Todd
 
@martial. Yes, I'm retaining calcium and losing magnesium. It is very severe and I'm missing entire nights of sleep. My insomnia was minor before. I think lithium orotate has made me very sensitive to vitamin d, as I never had a problem in the past. I'm cutting out all foods that have any calcium or vitamin d in them now as the effects are so terrible. I got 2 hours of sleep last night and tonight isn't shaping up any better so far. I am justing riding this out and trying to keep it from going on. When I was actually taking the vitamin d supplements I started getting discomfort in the parathyroid area. That has gone away but the side effects are still there. I use 4 lbs of epsom salts many days in order to get rid of the low magnesium leg cramps. It's like I have an entire other illness on top of my original condition right now.
 
I finally figured out what is causing this process to go along. I drink cocoa powder in rice milk as a magnesium source but it also contains a significant amount of calcium. Hidden calcium and vitamin d in my diet have kept this going.
 
@woolpippi. I hope you are recovering well. It's incredible how being either high or low in a nutrient can cause so much trouble! Sorry you suffered so much this winter.
 
The same happened to me. I still feel physically rubbish but increasing vit D from its low level has definitely improved my mood.
 

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WoolPippi
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