• Welcome to Phoenix Rising!

    Created in 2008, Phoenix Rising is the largest and oldest forum dedicated to furthering the understanding of and finding treatments for complex chronic illnesses such as chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS), fibromyalgia (FM), long COVID, postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome (POTS), mast cell activation syndrome (MCAS), and allied diseases.

    To become a member, simply click the Register button at the top right.

A B2 story

Violeta

Senior Member
Messages
2,895
Chaga mushroom is a good source of absorbable SOD.

Yet, its most potent ingredient is a special substance known as superoxide dismutase (SOD). This is an enzyme with great potency. Its function is to halt oxidation, especially the toxicity of a free radical known as singlet oxygen. This is the type of oxygen which is responsible for oxidizing and damaging the tissues, which results in aging. It is the same oxygen which rusts a nail. SOD blocks this damage by quenching the singlet oxygen free radical. The SOD content per gram of chaga is exceedingly high and accounts for many of its historical powers. Tests performed on North American Herb & Spice’s wild chaga prove that it contains some 10,000 to 20,000 active SOD units per gram. This is an exceedingly high amount, far higher than that found even in typical SOD pills. The typical SOD pill contains from 200 to 2,000 units per serving. So the difference is considerable. Plus, the type in pills is virtually impossible to absorb, while the wild chaga type is well-utilized by the body.
 

Freddd

Senior Member
Messages
5,184
Location
Salt Lake City
@Freddd
I have shelved the ALC and now have the fumerate and am proceeding with caution. I will have quite a story to tell, if this works. Instinctively, I have been drawn to carnitine and have had 4 failed attempts to incorporate it. I have put the ubiquinol idea on hold as per your suggestion.
I am topped up on the adB12 but still take about 8 mg a day. Hopefully, there is no downside to this. An extra antinflammatory doesn't sound like a bad plan.
Also, I am toying with the idea of a late afternoon top-up of mB12 as I seem to be low in the morning. But no changes until the carnitine fumerate is sorted out.
I should reread the files....should this be taken on an empty stomach? OK with food .... or OK but have to increase dose? brad

Hi Brad,

The l-carnitine fumarate, or any kind for that matter, needs to be taken on an empty stomach 30 minutes before eating or 2+ hours after. That way it is absorbed instead of digested to amino acids. I found that several doses per day of MeCbl worked better than 1 for me. On the LCF I would suggest 125mg perhaps as a first dose to see how you respond. It knocked my socks off. It was also the end of any abnormal fatigue, get rid of the last of depression and allowed my muscles to recover and rebuild.
 

stridor

Senior Member
Messages
873
Location
Powassan, Ontario
@Freddd
3rd day on l-carnitine fumerate and while not out of the woods yet, I'd be crashing by now if it was acetylated. I have been burned by carnitine so many times that it will take some time before I trust it. But already I am wondering about the chemistry and "why" there would be a distinct difference between the two.
My impression was that I had less brain-fog at work today but was totally drained by the end of the day.
You took the highest doses of mB12 that I ever heard of. I am on a different path than you but I certainly respond to the rest of your protocol. I will be adding another 500 mcg of mB12 in the afternoon for a total of 1500 mcg a day and do this for a week. I wasn't going to change anything until the dust settled with the carnitine experiment but I don't imagine that this will throw a wrench into the works.
I know that your time is valuable and I have appreciated you helping a guy on 3rd base. brad
 

Violeta

Senior Member
Messages
2,895
@Violeta
Thank-you. How do you circumvent the problem of SOD absorption? I assume that this is taken transdermally? brad

In that paragraph, I think they are comparing the manmade SOD that comes in a capsule to SOD that is contained in the chaga mushroom. I think they are saying SOD from mushroom is much more absorbable. I think, too, though, that if you make a tea and use the tincture, those are both much more absorbable than powdered chaga in a capsule. You could even put some drops of it under your tongue and it would go directly into your bloodstream.

I'm very picky about herbal teas, or actually any liquid, but chaga tea does not taste bad. It tastes a little bit like coffee, but I don't need to add a ton of cream and sugar like I do with coffee. This is the first medicinal tea that my dog will drink, too.

I bought mine from somewhere that sells white birch tree extract, too. I have some skin issues, so I went for the birch extract, too. I add that to my tea.

When I don't have a headache or abdominal pain, my worst issue is fatigue, and it seems to be helping with that pretty much. I still take a little bit of reishi, too, but mostly I am focusing on the chaga.
 

stridor

Senior Member
Messages
873
Location
Powassan, Ontario
@Violeta
I have eczema, psoriasis, folliculitis, seb derm, and have had 2 types of precancerous skin cancers. I am also no stranger to tinea infections.....so white birch extract is good?
 

Violeta

Senior Member
Messages
2,895
The birch tree is what the chaga mushroom grows on, and it is where the mushroom gets...well here's a link about the birch.
http://www.chagamountain.com/bibatiandpo.html

I have a spot that was precancerous and also am prone to either eczema or psoriasis. The chaga is good for the cancer, and the birch adds an extra amount of the acid that's good for the cancer.

I don't know if you've ever read about uric acid as being a cause of psoriasis and eczema, but I had to cut way back on purines, and now when I add them back into my diet, it's very noticable how much it affects my skin. The very good news is that these mushrooms somehow help with uric acid metabolism.
 

Freddd

Senior Member
Messages
5,184
Location
Salt Lake City
@Freddd
3rd day on l-carnitine fumerate and while not out of the woods yet, I'd be crashing by now if it was acetylated. I have been burned by carnitine so many times that it will take some time before I trust it. But already I am wondering about the chemistry and "why" there would be a distinct difference between the two.
My impression was that I had less brain-fog at work today but was totally drained by the end of the day.
You took the highest doses of mB12 that I ever heard of. I am on a different path than you but I certainly respond to the rest of your protocol. I will be adding another 500 mcg of mB12 in the afternoon for a total of 1500 mcg a day and do this for a week. I wasn't going to change anything until the dust settled with the carnitine experiment but I don't imagine that this will throw a wrench into the works.
I know that your time is valuable and I have appreciated you helping a guy on 3rd base. brad

Hi Brad,

The carnitine has a serum halflife of maybe 3-6 hours. A second dose can make all the difference in afternoon letdown.

The LCF is the actual transport variety needed to carry the fats. This is assumed to be made by the body as needed. Apparently not so for many with CFS/FMS, part of the abnormal fatigue problem perhaps.

Another thing that is an illusion of time is that you are seeing the end product that took more than 10 years to produce. I have experimented systematically with MeCbl in many ways of taking it, whole ranges of injections, amount absorbed by urine colorimetry. I titrated the MeCbl and AdoCbl just as I suggest everybody do. I titrated to achieve the best healing I could. I'm still experimenting.
 
Last edited:

stridor

Senior Member
Messages
873
Location
Powassan, Ontario
@Freddd
Not just for freddd, all input welcome. As I have increased LCF, for the first time in a year I experienced the symptoms of over-methylation.
mB12 - 1 mg injection in a.m. and 0.5 mg injection in afternoon
adb12 - 8 mg divided through day
mfolate - about 2 mg today which is more than I usually take (1200). I don't measure mfolate, I just open capsules and pour it in letting my instincts dictate the amount I take.
LCF - 750 mg in 3 doses - this was the first day at this dose and will decrease back to 250 twice/daily

I will cut back on the mfolate and LCF tomorrow. Any ideas? brad
 

Freddd

Senior Member
Messages
5,184
Location
Salt Lake City
@Freddd
Not just for freddd, all input welcome. As I have increased LCF, for the first time in a year I experienced the symptoms of over-methylation.
mB12 - 1 mg injection in a.m. and 0.5 mg injection in afternoon
adb12 - 8 mg divided through day
mfolate - about 2 mg today which is more than I usually take (1200). I don't measure mfolate, I just open capsules and pour it in letting my instincts dictate the amount I take.
LCF - 750 mg in 3 doses - this was the first day at this dose and will decrease back to 250 twice/daily

I will cut back on the mfolate and LCF tomorrow. Any ideas? brad

Hi Brad,

Let me ask you. Would you really expect to turn on ATP production and it not have an effect? You should be celebrating. Just turn down the amount of LCF.


Cut back on the LCF. How much did you take. If you took a 750 mg dose, cut back to about 100mg maybe 4 times a day. It can avoid peak effects Also, if you are getting too much excitement from any given dose, it won't be much and you can cease incrementing that day. It is one of the only things you can titrate and have it control rate in a reasonably straight line fashion. Really. You don't want to go 36 hours without because having the ATP shut down again can cause all sorts of problems. TITRATE. Tomorrow it will have faded substantially. Try the much smaller dose. Find a dose that puts it UP some or you will not adapt to a normal sttation and will be trying yourself in semi starvation to keep from going through the effects of returning to normal. You sound like you have real healing within your grasp and are about to discard it. You might try listening to the person who has actually tread this path and healed rather than the ones who hacve no idea of how to heal or what the correct effects of LCF are. Unless you were totally methylation deadlocked to ATP lack then you are experiencing mitochondria startup having nothing at all to do with methylation per se. If you are going to protect yourself from possibly healing some things you ought to at least tell a story that makes sense by what the LCF does. LCF builds up over a number of days, about 3. TMG also can moderate the stimulation for many people.

Also, changing methylfolate will do nothing at all about it because it has nothing to do with the folate. Folate can neither increase this or decrease it until you get into methyl block. That is based on a false hypothesis and would not be a good choice. All it will do is give you more folate insufficiency symptoms on some level or another, another weird effect to now deal with.

And an added thought- that you got an increase is an indication that your body is being limited in how much ATP your body can make, not by the usual feedback mechanism but by an accident of not being able to make the carrier of fats to mitochondria which is NOT a vitamin because every body is supposed to be able to make all they need given the amino acids. That is also why specifically LCF works so much better for most of us. ALCAR worked not at all for me.

The amount of LCF that is useful has a limit. You may find that 600mg a day is all that is useful. There is a ceiling. Also something that can happen at about that level and it appears to be involved with muscles and mitochondria, healing or growth or increase in capacity.
 
Last edited:

stridor

Senior Member
Messages
873
Location
Powassan, Ontario
@Freddd
Thank-you for your response, it was very helpful at fleshing out some of my thoughts on this.
So, I started with 250 mg of LCF daily and at your suggestion increased to twice a day about a week ago. That helped with the afternoon fatigue and I seemed to be tolerating it well. Yesterday I tried 750 mg but as I said, I also took some extra mfolate.

My LCF dosing was at 5 a.m. 11 a.m. and 4 p.m. - all on an empty stomach. Symptoms began after lunch with brain-fog and language/information processing difficulties. An emergency at work kicked in "what I call my norepinephrine system" and brought me back to where I could function again. (I have had this before and the usual thing is that I will be super-fogged and something will catch my interest and my mind will partially clear). Perhaps unrelated - I was called upon to stand for longer than I can usually bear and did better than I could have anticipated.

Later, around 6 p.m., and incidentally after a dose of mfolate, the fog settled in hard again. I took some niacin and it cleared back to baseline (I always have some fog). The response was direct and occurred within several minutes after putting the niacin under my tongue.
It sure fit the bill for my understanding of over-methylation. I lived a whole year with methylation block. Worst year of my life not knowing what was happening to me. I am not trying to be contradictory, just giving my take on things. I feel pretty good this morning.

The one thing that is likely unrelated but I don't want to leave any stone unturned is that I do not take extra potassium, nor have I ever. The only time in this whole protocol that I wondered about that was when I started LCF and I had some strange muscle contracting - not cramps - my ankle would flex on its own. It only lasted a couple of days on a very intermittent basis. Nothing since.

So I took LCF 250 mg this morning and will cut back to the twice daily dosing for a couple of weeks before I explore the upper limits again. I will also be more cognizant of how much mfolate I am taking.

Thanks again Freddd for your help and for figuring all this out in the first place. Are you going to write a book? brad
 

Freddd

Senior Member
Messages
5,184
Location
Salt Lake City
HI Brad,

After you get to the steady state carnitine, then biotin can turn up the thermostat, D-ribose and perhaps a few other things. B1, B2 and B3 adjust the methylation in some ways and affects potassium and folate need. If you turn on "muscle healing" you may find you need more potassium, or not, but at least watch.

I found that the brain fog retreated with MeCbl, AdoCbl, l-methylfolate, LCF, zinc, SAM-e at least. It was multi factor and balance related.
 

helen1

Senior Member
Messages
1,033
Location
Canada
Since reading freddd's post a week ago on this thread about when to take carnitine, I've been taking carnitine 30 mins before food instead of an hour after. Then I tried taking it twice a day yesterday after reading freddd's post that taking an afternoon dose can be helpful with fatigue. I was awake most of the night even though tried extra magnesium and niacinamide to try to sleep. I didn't do anything else that was different.
Any idea why this might have happened?

I'm on a methylation protocol:
adB12: 2 g
mB12: 2 g
mfolate: 333 mcg
LCF: 400 mg

Plus B complex, vit C 1 g, vit D, vit E, COQ10 50 mg, multi-minerals, lithium orotate 5 mg, omega3s, cod liver oil, SAMe 30 mg, digestive enzymes, DHEA 10 mg.

Thanks for any ideas.
 

Freddd

Senior Member
Messages
5,184
Location
Salt Lake City
Since reading freddd's post a week ago on this thread about when to take carnitine, I've been taking carnitine 30 mins before food instead of an hour after. Then I tried taking it twice a day yesterday after reading freddd's post that taking an afternoon dose can be helpful with fatigue. I was awake most of the night even though tried extra magnesium and niacinamide to try to sleep. I didn't do anything else that was different.
Any idea why this might have happened?

I'm on a methylation protocol:
adB12: 2 g
mB12: 2 g
mfolate: 333 mcg
LCF: 400 mg

Plus B complex, vit C 1 g, vit D, vit E, COQ10 50 mg, multi-minerals, lithium orotate 5 mg, omega3s, cod liver oil, SAMe 30 mg, digestive enzymes, DHEA 10 mg.

Thanks for any ideas.


Hi Helen,

I would suggest, if taking multiple doses, to take smaller doses. Maximum effect for a given dose reaches maximum in about 3 days. It may be that 2 doses adding up to 300mg might be more effective spread out than 1 dose of 400mg. Perhaps the second dose is half the size of the first dose as one is filling in that which has already used, not trying to reach a higher level. This is about titrating to find what is effective without keeping you awake. Also, the TMG may calm the excitatory effects to some degree. It worked for me and many others.
 

howirecovered

Senior Member
Messages
167
Hi Brad, just wanted to let you know that I finished going through the genetics information you gave me and made notes underneath each gene section on http://howirecovered.com/my-genetics/ though I did not really find much on FUT2 except for confusion!

This is what I wrote after researching:

FUT2gene encodes the fucosyltransferase 2 enzyme which determines “secretor status”. Non-functional enzyme resulting from a nonsense mutation in the FUT2 gene leads to the non-secretor phenotype. It has been shown that non-secretor individuals show significantly reduced bifidobacterial diversity, richness, and abundance. This is significant because intestinal microbiota plays an important role in human health.

FUT2 has been called a robust genetic predictor of vitamin B12 levelsby Harvard researchers but so many genes are involved in B12 statusI can’t make heads or tails of it yet.​

So, although I told you I did not have gut issues, I'm now more committed to probiotics.

Thanks again for your kind help getting me started on the latest stage of my journey with genetics. generally speaking, It seems that I was already by chance supplementing according to my genetics. Basically, it looks to me like I have a lot of genetic reasons for pursuing methylation support and I feel pretty confident now that my case is not a simple heavy metal toxicity situation...
 

stridor

Senior Member
Messages
873
Location
Powassan, Ontario
You're welcome.
I guess the FUT2 has an effect on B12 levels and this is made worse if a person also has GIF (gastric intrinsic factor). You are more susceptible to norovirus and Crohn's than the average person. But I guess that it is not pivotal in your symptoms.

It is funny how the supplementation thing goes. But we are mammals after all. If we deprive rats of a nutrient and then supply several water sources and one of these includes the missing element, rats will drink from that source. We have the same innate capability but we override ours with fats and sugars. Otherwise, there would be a good chance that we would leave the grocery store with the things we needed to support health.

Still if we listen closely we can still tap into some of that....
I told my Dr that I was C677T++ or 677/1298 plus I said that I likely had MTR++. I ended up having C677T++ and MTRR++x2 and the TCN2++. I was close and if I knew there was anything called a "frailty gene", I would have guessed it as well. I figured this out by my response to the things that treat them.
I'll check out your site. brad
 

stridor

Senior Member
Messages
873
Location
Powassan, Ontario
Great job on the site @howirecovered.
This is the type of thing that we should have on PR. So many people showing up with questions about 23andme. There are a lot of people here and collectively we could have our own SNPedia.
 

howirecovered

Senior Member
Messages
167
You're welcome.
I guess the FUT2 has an effect on B12 levels and this is made worse if a person also has GIF (gastric intrinsic factor).

well that's where I got really confused - the Harvard study I linked to shows that the mutation is an indication of HIGHER serum B12 if I remember correctly and my brain isn't too addled...
 

howirecovered

Senior Member
Messages
167
There are a lot of people here and collectively we could have our own SNPedia.

without a doubt! in fact, many Google searches on these genes point to PR pages... But then once you get here, it often leaves you with little information you can actually use. Then again that's true of all the genetic information. Most often, treatment info is lacking. Suppose we are 10 or 20 years ahead of our time :D