Cumin (Cuminum cyminum): Possible PEM Blocker

[Aspen]

I’ve been taking cumin for about 2 weeks now, maybe a little longer. To make a long story short, it doesn’t eliminate PEM for me, but it reduces my PEM fatigue by about 50% and almost eliminates PEM-associated body pain.

Longer version of the story: about 10 days ago I had a run of 3 PEM-inducing activities over 6 days (plus I wasn’t quite recovered from my previous PEM activity). Way too much activity, but I couldn’t figure out how to avoid it. I’ve been in waves of PEM ever since. I’ve had 3 days (not consecutive), where I felt too heavy and exhausted to eat solids or speak, which is my normal PEM response. The rest of the days I’ve been running at about 50% of baseline physical energy with some body pain in the evenings but not too bad. My cognitive energy has been between 50-80% of baseline. Having more cognitive energy than previous PEMs has made it difficult for me to rest as much as I usually do during PEM, I have a feeling I might possibly recover faster if I would just pretend I don’t have any brain capacity, haha!

Not sure how this is connected, but my mood has been consistently blah this whole time, which isn’t usual for me. I generally feel very low for 1-2 of my worst PEM days, and then I bounce back to my normal stable/positive mood. I haven’t gotten any very low mood days since using cumin, but I’ve been lower than usual for longer. Makes me wonder if there’s a cofactor involved that’s affecting my mood, or maybe it’s just a consequence of a different expression of PEM.

I’ve been taking 1 tsp every 24-48 hours. I take a dose as soon as I feel inflammation or fever building... It’s very interesting to feel the cumin effect wearing off so noticeably, the difference is quite stark. On my worse days, I need a tsp every day, but on milder days a tsp will last 2 days.

I’m getting my 2nd Pfizer tomorrow, and my first dose sent me into a bad flare so I expect my cumin experiment to be sidelined for a while as I recover from this one. But thankful that I know about cumin this time around anyways, as it may help reduce the severity of the reaction.

 

[xebex]

Intersting I’m also needing to take a teaspoon every day or maybe every 2 days. It’s not stopping me from crashing but it does seem to be helping with the PEM that would normally occur after a crash.

 

[seamyb]

I'm taking probably about 5 teaspoons a day. I'm a recovering alcoholic, so anything that makes me feel better gets binged on.

 

[Aspen]

I'm taking probably about 5 teaspoons a day. I'm a recovering alcoholic, so anything that makes me feel better gets binged on.

 

[Strawberry]

Maybe this is why I haven’t had a sore throat in 6 months. Rest, and all the cumin? Even though I never took it religiously?

 

[Aspen]

I think I have to stop taking cumin, at least not as often as I’ve been using it. I’ve been developing what could be signs of hypoglycemia over the past week - extreme hunger, especially in the mornings (I normally rarely feel hungry), extreme thirst and craving for sweets, shakiness and anxiety, unusually low mood like I mentioned, and a rising heart rate. I feel almost like I’m in worsening PEM the last 3 days, my resting heart rate is almost 20 bpm above normal, but based on my activity this should have been stabilizing by now.

All the articles linked earlier in this thread mention hypoglycemia as a possible side-effect, so I’ll just stop for a bit and see if things stabilize again on their own. I’m sure if I only use it 1-2x/week I’d avoid all the unpleasant stuff, since I only started noticing this recently.

 

[Aspen]

I almost forgot to report one thing - cumin stopped my poison ivy rash! I always get it throughout the summer from petting my dog after she runs through the woods (even bedbound, that plant finds me!). I got my first patch of rash this season a couple of days before I started taking cumin. A few hours after my first tsp of cumin, I noticed the rash was gone. Now that I’ve paused the cumin, the poison ivy rash is back. Super interesting.

 

[seamyb]

I almost forgot to report one thing - cumin stopped my poison ivy rash! I always get it throughout the summer from petting my dog after she runs through the woods (even bedbound, that plant finds me!). I got my first patch of rash this season a couple of days before I started taking cumin. A few hours after my first tsp of cumin, I noticed the rash was gone. Now that I’ve paused the cumin, the poison ivy rash is back. Super interesting.

Possibly the suppression of cytokines that cumin causes.

Were you unable to fix the feelings of low blood sugar with carbs? I've been taking tons of the stuff and have never experienced this.

 

[Aspen]

Possibly the suppression of cytokines that cumin causes.

Were you unable to fix the feelings of low blood sugar with carbs? I've been taking tons of the stuff and have never experienced this.

No, I couldn’t fix it… I was drinking pure maple syrup the last few days before I stopped using it, and still couldn’t shake the symptoms. But I was totally fine within 48 hours after my last cumin dose. I have trouble eating enough in general, and I’m severely intolerant to most grains and pulses, plus potatoes and rice, so most of the carbs I get are from vegetables. I suspect it’s just related to my limited diet.

I will keep experimenting to find out my threshold, I’m sure using it 2x/week will be fine. And maybe one day my MCAS will taper off and my diet will get better so I don’t run into such problems…. One can hope!

 

[Wishful]

I almost forgot to report one thing - cumin stopped my poison ivy rash!

That's really interesting. Maybe it's another data point for figuring out why cumin works for PEM. I do think it involves cytokines.

 

[Rufous McKinney]

Not sure how this is connected, but my mood has been consistently blah this whole time, which isn’t usual for me.

I have an odd opinion about certain psychological states.

they arrive when we feel a bit better.

when your just massively wiped out in an awful PEM crash- you can't even muster alot of these emotional states.

also perhaps something tied into how we perceive sickness behavior.

 

[Rrrr]

Well, I have a cumin update too. I started last week on 1/8 teaspoon and over about 5 days built up to 1-2 teaspoons per day. Within 2 days of starting even that low dose, my mood got better and my energy level got better and better.

I actually think what happened is that my energy level increased, and that improved my mood. I started to be able to do more, AND I started singing, loudly. Singing was a real sign that something good was happening. After all, I only sing aloud when I'm doing better. (This time, I found myself belting out Dolly Parton's "I Will Always Love You." Yes, that was my spontaneous song of choice that I suddenly found myself singing at the top of my lungs. Not a pretty sight, but still a good sign in terms of my energy.)

This is still early days, of course. And as soon as I state this improvement "aloud", I'll crash.

I am grinding up whole cumin seeds in a 15 year old small coffee grinder dedicated exclusively to (for?) spice grinding. I have cooked with cumin a lot in the past, I use it in Indian (South Asian) and Latin American dishes. So I already had a lot on hand. I had bought 1 lb of it about a year ago, I guess. I get it from Amazon prime delivery, for $16 for 1 pound, and it is organic (Frontier brand, I think).

I'm taking it sometimes on a near empty stomach and sometimes with food. I put it in the palm of my hand, throw it in my mouth and swallow with some water. So I never really taste it too much. Taking on a completely empty stomach once made my stomach a bit weird. But then I ate a bit of food and all was good.

By the way, I'm dealing with a medication induced stomach ulcer right now, and thus I can't tolerate most of my usual meds and supplements because they burn my gut, that includes needing to stop my usual antiviral medication Famvir, which I take for for Epstein Barr Virus (EBV). So I'm thrilled to say that I can tolerate the cumin without it hurting my stomach (due to the ulcer). It is kind of shocking actually. And the cumin may even be helping my gut heal. Last night I had a bit of vinegar in my salad dressing and that was a mistake. The vinegar hurt my stomach ulcer. But I took some cumin and the gut burning disappeared soon after.

One last note: After going off the famvir (due to the stomach ulcer), it took about 4 or so week of doing fine, but then it felt like my EBV skyrocketed. I felt very very sick. I am pretty sure that was due to my EBV no longer being suppressed by the famvir.

Well, since taking cumin, I am doing better on that front. So that leaves me with this KEY QUESTION:

I found references to Cumin being antiviral, regarding Herpes simplex 1 (and 2?), but have not found anything about cumin working against EBV.

Have any of you found any research regarding Cumin and EBV?

 

[seamyb]

Well, I have a cumin update too. I started last week on 1/8 teaspoon and over about 5 days built up to 1-2 teaspoons per day. Within 2 days of starting even that low dose, my mood got better and my energy level got better and better.

I actually think what happened is that my energy level increased, and that improved my mood. I started to be able to do more, AND I started singing, loudly. Singing was a real sign that something good was happening. After all, I only sing aloud when I'm doing better. (This time, I found myself belting out Dolly Parton's "I Will Always Love You." Yes, that was my spontaneous song of choice that I suddenly found myself singing at the top of my lungs. Not a pretty sight, but still a good sign in terms of my energy.)

This is still early days, of course. And as soon as I state this improvement "aloud", I'll crash.

I am grinding up whole cumin seeds in a 15 year old small coffee grinder dedicated for spice grinding. I have cooked with cumin a lot in the past, I use it in Indian (South Asian) and Latin American dishes. So I already had a lot on hand. I had bought 1 lb of it about a year ago, I guess. I get it from Amazon prime delivery, for $16 for 1 pound, and it is organic (Frontier brand, I think).

I'm taking it sometimes on a near stomach and sometimes with food. I put it in the palm of my hand, throw it in my mouth and swallow with some water. So I never really taste it too much. Taking on an empty stomach once made my stomach a bit weird. But then I ate a bit of food and all was good.

By the way, I'm dealing with a medication induced stomach ulcer right now, and can't tolerate most of my usual meds and supplements, including my usual Famvir for Epstein Barr Virus (EBV). So I'm thrilled to say that I can tolerate the cumin without it hurting my stomach (due to the ulcer). It is kind of shocking actually. And the cumin may even be helping my gut heal. Last night I had a bit of vinegar in my salad dressing and that was a mistake. The vinegar hurt my stomach ulcer. But I took some cumin and the hurt disappeared soon after.

One last note: After going off the famvir (due to the stomach ulcer), it took about 4 or so week of doing fine, but then it felt like my EBV skyrocketed. I felt very very sick. I am pretty sure that was due to my EBV no longer being suppressesd by the famvir.

Well, since taking cumin, I am doing better on that front. So that leaves me with this KEY QUESTION:

I found references to Cumin being antiviral, regarding Herpes simplex 1 (and 2?), but have not found anything about cumin working against EBV.

Have any of you found any research regarding Cumin and EBV?

I noticed the effects a couple of hours after the first dose. If it was doing this through its antimicrobial properties it would take at least a few days of steady dosing.

It also has immunomodulating and antioxidant properties. I suspect this has more to do with it.

However, chronic infections would both cause something with these properties to help. So maybe it can help on multiple fronts.

 

[Wishful]

Singing was a real sign that something good was happening.

My prime sign is actually noticing that my home is messy, and feeling like tidying up and even cleaning. So sad that it happens so rarely.

 

[Rufous McKinney]

My prime sign is actually noticing that my home is messy, and feeling like tidying up and even cleaning.

thats my first sign when I drop into a bit better spot, too- I'll suddenly decide to dust something off.

 

[Rufous McKinney]

Well, since taking cumin, I am doing better on that front

well this is encouraging! And that its not bothering your stomach!

I haven't quite mobilized myself yet but I'm imagining it now- cruise over there, come back with cumin. Cured.

 

[Martin aka paused||M.E.]

Too early to tell if it helps, but: it's the first flavor I've tasted since I have the tube and it's delicious. So thank you for this little moment of happiness @Wishful

 

[Rrrr]

My prime sign is actually noticing that my home is messy, and feeling like tidying up and even cleaning. So sad that it happens so rarely.

Me too! When I'm feeling a bit better, I suddenly start to clean. So both singing (I am NOT a singer) and cleaning are signs that I have more energy.

 

[Rrrr]

I should have added something more to my original "I'm Trying Cumin Report" which I posted yesterday. I should say that I am likely in a perpetual state of low grade PEM, as I am always pushing myself past my limits.

 

[Wishful]

I should say that I am likely in a perpetual state of low grade PEM, as I am always pushing myself past my limits.

I think such a state is quite possible. If PEM is triggered by immune system activity, shouldn't chronic inflammation of various sorts cause chronic PEM? Then, if cumin is inhibiting something in that immune system pathway, it would reduce PEM and give a feeling of increased energy.