aquariusgirl
Senior Member
- Messages
- 1,736
Kurt or anyone
what lab markers would indicate a need for electrolytes?
thanks
what lab markers would indicate a need for electrolytes?
thanks
...I was always puzzled at the very high dosages you were using for Metafolin, while I was hearing from people on the Simplified Treatment Approach that they were having to limit it to much smaller dosages to avoid intolerable detox symptoms. Some people use a wet toothpick to pick up a powdered daily dose, and even that much blows some of them away!
...The folinic acid can help to support the folate metabolism until methionine synthase can be brought up, and this is important for forming new RNA and DNA, for producing new cells, such as the blood cells and the cells lining the gut, which are replaced relatively rapidly.
With regard to glutathione, we have had a pretty big conflict, I think. Here I have been suggesting that glutathione depletion is what leads to the onset of most cases of ME/CFS, while here you have been saying that it is about the worst thing a person can take, based on your experience with it. Is that still your view of glutathione, or has it been changed as a result of your new thinking concerning how folic acid impacted your treatment in the past?
Kurt or anyone
what lab markers would indicate a need for electrolytes?
thanks
Danny, don't know if this helps, but I only take the B6 with magnesium chloride, they seem to be synergistic. I think B5 is indicated in some cases and not B6, have you tried B5? Magnesium is the elephant in the room here in my opinion, it is important in methylation and probably depleted by some of the co-infections present in CFS. I did start without methylfolate, but I was using B6+mB12+magnesium chloride+ester-C, and I believe it was the combination that worked, not just the B12. I had tried each of those before alone, including B12, and never had this positive, calming response before.
Danny, don't know if this helps, but I only take the B6 with magnesium chloride, they seem to be synergistic. I think B5 is indicated in some cases and not B6, have you tried B5? Magnesium is the elephant in the room here in my opinion, it is important in methylation and probably depleted by some of the co-infections present in CFS. I did start without methylfolate, but I was using B6+mB12+magnesium chloride+ester-C, and I believe it was the combination that worked, not just the B12. I had tried each of those before alone, including B12, and never had this positive, calming response before.
Actually I find that I need more than just potassium, I need all four electrolytes when things are improving. I take a liquid form that has all four, but add extra potassium chloride and magnesium chloride. LOTS of extra magnesium.
The Jarrow B-right has 400mcg of folic acid - so, if I'm understanding what Freddd's saying correctly, that may be not the best choice for some either?
Dan,
I'm sorry you've still got some of the worst of your symptoms - but glad if that's what's helped you work out the next best step on your alpine path! What Cutler says is at least reassuring.
...I have tried the methyl B12 lozenges BTW (1000mg). I'm not sure where the most ideal place is to keep them until they dissolve but I find under my top lip between 5am (I have to get up then for my puppy anyway) and 7am works fine and. for me anyway, it's no extra strain on a sore mouth.
My Methyl B12 trial came about because my holistic heal stuff was held up in our customs service - don't know why - yet some iherb things did arrive, so I thought I'd see what happened in 48 hours - a la Kurt! I had an initial decrease in anxiety/tension, then prickly skin on my forearms followed by a prickly sensation inside my forehead - if that makes sense. Nothing too scary though.
Best,
Anne.
From what you are reporting, if folic acid has the attached glutamate molecule to the tail, then couldn't by upping my b-right and adb12 that contain folic acid, raise my glumate levels, which are already elevated?
Sorry if this is a dumb question. I am so brain fogged at the moment. I am just trying to understand so I can figure out a way to proceed on with the protocol.
Fred, any thought/suggestions are greatly welcomed by you too. For that matter, anyone's are appreciated.
The bottom line is, when I get start-up symptoms or suffered ill effects from past detox attempts, my anxiety, insomnia, depression, and fatigue greatly increase to intolerable levels.
Thank you for the advice.
Hi Kurt,
Do you take mag chloride internally, or as mag chloride "oil" externally?
I too have found (so far anyway) that I need more sodium than potassium, and used to find a lot of benefit from Recup. But haven't taken it in years -- too expensive. Very puzzling too why Blasi never found a distributor in the USA.
Anyway Kurt -- does the chloride form of magnesium cause less diarrhea? And how much do you take? Also...do you take a calcium supplement to balance it?
p.s. One more question (for now): Do you require as much or as many doses as Freddd is taking of b12, etc., to keep your symptoms reduced? I know the info is here somewhere, but I still don't quite understand why Freddd needs to take so much b12/methylfolate each day before he starts regressing...
Danny,
I usually take only one mag chloride tablet by Alta per day. Sometimes a half tablet works as well. If I don't take the mag chloride, the B vitamins do not seem to have as much positive effect on the nerves. No, this does not cause hypermobility in the digestive system for me, I believe mag chloride is better absorbed in the gut than many if not all other forms, and I have tried them all. But I don't generally have that problem anyway, so don't know if that will help in your situation. What I have found is that the effect Rich and Freddd talk about requires magnesium chloride and B6 taken together with the B12, for me and others who have tried this approach. And Vit-C. I suspect some people need B5 instead of or in addition to B6, depends on your genetic details probably. These are all required for methylation, I originally found this from a methylation diagram someone posted, it is right there in the methylation cycle, you must have adequate B6, magnesium, B12 and vitamin C. And all of these can be depleted, in my experience with CFS, for whatever reason. I don't get a benefit from bypassing the proposed methylation cycle block, or simply supplementing with B12, when I am not supporting the entire methylation cycle like this. I have tried the other protocols, this was required to get everything working. I need far less B12/methylfolate this way, but can't speak for Fred or why he needs so much.
Hi, Freddd and the group.
I think the following is the explanation of why taking folic acid together with one or the other of the chemically reduced folates (either folinic acid or 5-methyl tetrahydrofolate) will interfere with absorption of the latter. My main source of information for the following is the book “Folic Acid and Folates,” edited by Gerald Litwack (2008):
Folic acid is the oxidized form of folate and is the most commonly sold form of folate supplement. It does not occur in significant amounts in natural food sources of folate. It has a long shelf life, which is an advantage commercially, but is not directly usable by the body until it is converted to chemically reduced forms of folate. Since 1999, it has been required that it be added to processed grains in the U.S. in order to decrease the number of neural tube birth defects, such as spina bifida, which are caused by folate deficiency, and this has been found to lower the rate of these birth defects. Some other countries also require this. There is still some controversy, however, over possible disadvantages of adding folic acid to the diet. There has been some published evidence suggesting that the function of natural killer cells can be inhibited by folic acid, and this raises the question of possible increased cancer risk, but the evidence is not very strong for this, and it remains an unsettled issue.
The folic acid molecule incorporates one glutamate molecule in its “tail.” The reduced folates found in natural foods have several glutamate molecules in their tails. When the latter are ingested, all but one of the glutamates are removed by the enzyme glutamate carboxypeptidase II, anchored to the wall of the gut, before the folates are absorbed.
The glutamate molecule is doubly ionized at the pH present in the gut, and this gives folic acid and the folates a double negative charge on their molecules. Because of this charge, they are not able to diffuse very readily through the lipid membranes of the cells lining the small intestine (enterocytes), so they must have active transporters in order to be absorbed in significant amounts when received in food or taken as supplements (unless very high dosages are used, so that the concentration in the gut rises above about 10 micromolar).
There are several types of transporters in the body that can bring folates across cell membranes. It has been found that in humans, most of the folic acid and reduced folates are absorbed by means of the so-called proton-coupled folate transporters (PCFTs). These absorb the folic acid and reduced folates by coupling their transport to transport of a proton (hydrogen ion) and bringing them in together. This takes place primarily in the early part of the small intestine, where the pH is still more acid, because of stomach acid, because of the need for hydrogen ions (acid) in this transport mechanism. The transport is driven by the gradient in hydrogen ion concentration between the lumen (inside space) of the gut and the inside of the enterocytes, where the pH is more nearly neutral (pH 7).
I think the key to the interference of folic acid to absorption of the reduced folates occurs right here. The reason is that the affinities of the PCFTs for folic acid and for the reduced folates are comparable to each other. Therefore, these species are in competition for absorption by the PCFTs, and if there is a high concentration of folic acid in the gut lumen when the reduced folates are taken, there will be less of the reduced folates absorbed.
I’m going to carry this a little further to include what happens after absorption into the enterocytes: Some of the folic acid is reduced by dihydrofolate reductase (DHFR) in the enterocytes, but most of it is transported to the liver as folic acid. On the “back side” (basolateral membrane) of the enterocytes, there are what are called “multiple drug-resistance transporters,” and these are able to transport both folic acid and the reduced folates out of the enterocytes and into the blood in the portal vein, which flows to the liver, again with similar affinities. I haven’t found out yet which transporters are the dominant ones that bring folic acid into the liver cells. I do know, though, that most of the folic acid reduction by DHFR occurs in the liver, so folic acid must be transported into the liver cells.
The DHFR reaction to reduce folic acid to dihydrofolate is a slow reaction in humans in general, and the range of rates of this reaction varies by almost a factor of five among different people, so some people are not able to utilize folic acid very well. The result is that folic acid enters the general blood circulation and can have a half-life there of several hours.
The natural function of DHFR is actually to reduce dihydrofolate to tetrahydrofolate, which is part of the pathway for making thymidylate for DNA synthesis. It happens that this enzyme is also able to reduce folic acid to dihydrofolate, which has made possible the use of folic acid as a supplement, but this is a very slow reaction.
Folic acid competes for DHFR with the normal dihydrofolate reaction and slows it down. This may be another point at which folic acid can interfere with the normal processing of folates in the body. In addition, the DHFR enzyme plays a role in reducing dihydrobiopterin to tetrahydrobiopterin (BH4), which is needed in the synthesis of nitric oxide and the neurotransmitters serotonin and dopamine, as well as in the conversion of phenylalanine to tyrosine. Again, folic acid may slow down these reactions as well.
I think these are the issues involved in the competition of folic acid with the reduced folates and the reactions of DHFR in the body.
In addition to what I've discussed here, there is the possibility of an individual person having various genetic polymorphisms, which can affect the transport and metabolism of folic acid and the folates, and cause changes from the normal functions that I have discussed above.
Best regards,
Rich
So, the sublingual use for 60 minutes to absorb adb12 also would absorb a lot more than usual folic acid? This might be a factor in the folic acid in the Country Life causing worse and quicker deficiency symptoms.
Drex13 -- I think it's Freddd's position that both folic acid and to a lesser extent folinic acid my be depleting methylfolate in a percentage of folks -- not in everyone.
Drex13 -- I think it's Freddd's position that both folic acid and to a lesser extent folinic acid my be depleting methylfolate in a percentage of folks -- not in everyone.