My Red/Near Infrared Light Therapy Experiment

[Chris]

Tthere are two versions of the Vielight thing--the 633 is LED, the 655 is a laser, and more expensive. And might be more effective. But you would have to be careful to not shine it into your eyes, though it is so low powered that I think a casual glance would be unlikely to do damage. I just don't know about acupuncture points, but since the effect seems aimed at surface blood vessels, I am a bit doubtful

 

[Aspen]

Oh, so my unit is much warmer, it feels like the sun when I get closer. I think heat is good, if it's not too much for us.

Yes, I miss being able to have hot baths and drink hot tea, etc... I used to love anything hot! That’s one of the psychological benefits of the light therapy for me, a few minutes of feeling good and warm without a crash afterwards.

 

[Aspen]

I’m finishing up week 2 of 10 mins/dose x 2 doses/day, with a one day break every week. I had PEM 2 weeks ago after going to an appointment, but it only lasted 6 days. Days 3 & 4 of PEM were bad, but I improved very quickly after that. I also put myself into cognitive PEM this week after letting myself getting stuck down a rabbit hole of nutrition research, but it only lasted 3 days. My shortest PEMs yet.

So far my sense of the light therapy is that it’s giving me extra cushion, adding leverage to my other health strategies. I don’t think I’ll improve long term with just the light, I’ll have to keep being extremely vigilant with pacing and addressing all aspects of health. But it gives me relief from the worst aspects of being bedbound, which increases my sense of encouragement and motivation too.

 

[Chris]

@Aspen-glad to hear that it is still being helpful.
To return briefly to the issue of acupuncture, I believe there are low powered lasers designed specifically of this, and they should be much more useful than the Vielight nasal units, which are designed to spread their light rather widely. My problem with acupuncture is, though it does seem to work well for some things, I cannot bring myself to believe in the real existance of meridians, and so remain rather suspicious. Maybe someone can point me to some hard evidence to shift my view.
Whereas I have at least some idea of what LLLT does and how it does it--up to a point, though now higher frequencies are coming into play--910, 1070, and other targets, including the 4th state of water within the cell body and stuff like that, and I have some catch-up work to do--one day.

 

[Chris]

@ aspen ; if you are doing 2 x 10 mins a day, you are giving yourself a pretty high total dose, depending on your distance from the light--it is possible you are overdoing it a bit--as you know, that is possible--you won't get sick, but it may have less effect.
Besides the Ari Whitten book, here is a blog critique of the BIOMAX 900 model --fairly close to yours-that strikes me as intelligent and honest and worth a read.

graspingforobjectivity.com/2019/08/red-light-therapy.html/

 

[Aspen]

@ aspen ; if you are doing 2 x 10 mins a day, you are giving yourself a pretty high total dose, depending on your distance from the light--it is possible you are overdoing it a bit--as you know, that is possible--you won't get sick, but it may have less effect.
Besides the Ari Whitten book, here is a blog critique of the BIOMAX 900 model --fairly close to yours-that strikes me as intelligent and honest and worth a read.

graspingforobjectivity.com/2019/08/red-light-therapy.html/

I’ll read this in time, good suggestion. I feel good about the dose I’m at, since I‘ve seen improvements from the 9 min dose. I’ll stick to this for a while though, not in a rush to titrate up. I tend to get a gut feeling that builds over a week or so and that’s how I know I want to try a higher dose.... Not very scientific, haha, but it’s worked for me so far. Trusting that my cells are giving me the ok once they feel they can handle more. I think Whitten suggests 10-15 mins/dose for severely ill folks, either once or twice a day. Occasionally I only do 1 dose/day and it doesn’t seem to make a difference in my energy, but my muscles feel much more relaxed in the evening and overnight.

 

[Aspen]

@ aspen ; if you are doing 2 x 10 mins a day, you are giving yourself a pretty high total dose, depending on your distance from the light--it is possible you are overdoing it a bit--as you know, that is possible--you won't get sick, but it may have less effect.
Besides the Ari Whitten book, here is a blog critique of the BIOMAX 900 model --fairly close to yours-that strikes me as intelligent and honest and worth a read.

graspingforobjectivity.com/2019/08/red-light-therapy.html/

Actually you got me thinking maybe I remembered the dosing instructions wrong so I went back to check. Whitten says up to 10-12 mins for fatigue (not 15), but severely ill folks should start out with 1/2 or 1/4 of the dose and possibly shouldn’t need to go up that high. Since I’m feeling ok with 10 mins at a farther distance from the light maybe I could do a shorter dose closer to the light to get a bit deeper into the tissues. Plus you’re probably right that 2 doses/day is overkill. At the beginning my dose was so small and I felt it made a difference to do it twice, but I’m in a different zone by now. I’ll make a few tweaks and see what happens.

 

[Chris]

Hi, Aspen---you actually seem to be controlling your use very well, but take note if/when you stop improving, I think. And it may be wishful thinking that improvement may go all the way to full recovery--though of course it just might--I don't think anyone certainly knows! You might be a first!

 

[Aspen]

Hi, Aspen---you actually seem to be controlling your use very well, but take note if/when you stop improving, I think. And it may be wishful thinking that improvement may go all the way to full recovery--though of course it just might--I don't think anyone certainly knows! You might be a first!

Haha, one can always hope! Your dosing suggestion got me paying attention to my symptoms in a different way - like I said, I am seeing improvements in drastic reduction of PEM, but I’ve also noticed more muscle aches the last month or so, which lines up with my higher dosing. I had chalked it up to my magnesium deficiency til now, since it takes a notoriously long time to reverse that deficiency even on high dose magnesium. But the Grasping For Objectivity woman says she got muscle aches at a slightly too high dose. I’ve only been watching for extra fatigue/headache, so I may be missing a more nuanced clue. It’s definitely worth experimenting with. I’ve also only been guessing at how close I’ve been to the light, given my mobility challenges, but I’ve got my kids to set me up with a measuring tape now so I’m all set to get more specific.

 

[Chris]

@Aspen, I guess that you have discovered that Whitten has put the whole of his book free on the net?

 

[Aspen]

@Aspen, I guess that you have discovered that Whitten has put the whole of his book free on the net?

Oh! No, I bought an electronic copy of it off Amazon. But it was only a few dollars.

 

[Aspen]

After measuring my distance from the light, 6” is about 2-3” closer than I was originally doing. I’ve reduced my light time to 6 mins, 1x/day at a distance of 6”. I do like the 6 min dose better than the 10 min dose - @Chris you were right! The peak of benefit was so subtle, I didn’t even notice I passed it. I was too distracted by my spike in MCAS symptoms when I was titrating up, I guess. Good lesson for me not to make too many changes while I’m not stable. I don’t have the brain capacity to attempt the math, but I am curious to know the difference in strength of the 2 doses, given my change in distance. With the 6 min dose, the total benefit to my energy is slightly better, but more noticeably I’ve seen less muscle aches and better sleeps than the longer dose.

I do miss having 2 doses/day, although it’s likely just a psychological comfort, feeling like the light is self-care. I did a second dose one day and felt less muscle aches in the evening, but I also had started taking a new amino acid supplement so I wasn’t sure which one was making the difference. I’ll probably experiment with 2 doses/day again once I’m more confident I’m able to attribute changes either way to just to the light.

 

[Aspen]

Oh, I’m also going to try a 4 min dose for a few days and see what happens, since last time I was doing 6 min doses I wasn’t as close to the light.

 

[Chris]

Sorry not to have noted that you had already got the Whitten book. Sounds as if all is going pretty well, and you feel confident enough to do a little experimenting. And one does not have to make every day the same, I am sure!

 

[max_yazhbin]

Hey folks, here’s a little diary of my experience with IR/NIR light therapy. I’ve been using it for 2 weeks... been wanting to post about it sooner but I’m starting from a severely ill place and haven’t had the energy til now... I’ll post a little at a time over the next week or so to catch up on the stages I’ve gone through so far.

Why this light?
I bought an Orion 1000: https://www.orionrlt.ca/products/orion-1000 I’ve been reading other people’s IR/NIR posts here for months and had a feeling it would help me a little, but initially I thought the price was out of reach and I don’t have access to anyone who can build one for me. But then I qualified for CPP Disability and got some backpay, went back to the Orion website and their full-body machine happened to be 40% off. I bought it the next day, happy serendipity. I chose Orion because they have a good track record with Olympic athletes so I figured the quality was good, and they have free Canadian shipping. I had also been reading up about all the $100s I could spend on trying supplements that may or may not increase my energy, and I figured well, at least an IR/NIR is a one-time purchase that could benefit me for years, plus if it doesn’t help me much my family could use it anyway.

Illness history:
I’ve been ill since October 2019, sliding between a 0.5 and 2.5 on the severity scale. Before using the light I had been a level 1 since about October. Unable to sit up or do anything except walk to the bathroom, often needing help with that. Struggling to tolerate food and spending most of the day totally incapacitated, usually with 1-3 hours of feeling a little less ill in the late morning/mid-day.

I received the light in the mail on Feb. 5, 2021 and started using it the next day. I’ll leave you in suspense for the rest til I have another little burst of energy.

I did novothor which depends on where you get it, one session is $40-$80, and it helped with my chemical sensitivities but it only worked for a day. I don't have anything local or my own vehicle so I cannot go everyday to run that experiment.

 

[Aspen]

I did novothor which depends on where you get it, one session is $40-$80, and it helped with my chemical sensitivities but it only worked for a day. I don't have anything local or my own vehicle so I cannot go everyday to run that experiment.

Hi @max_yazhbin I’m glad it seemed to help, although it must be frustrating not to have better access to it.

 

[max_yazhbin]

its not that bad, its another piece of evidence for me that I have a mitochondrial problem

 

[Aspen]

I started doing a 4-6 min dose 2x/day about 10 hours apart this week instead of 6 hours (I can’t quite make it to 12 hours apart before getting too tired... my kids tease me for being old... ahhhh teenagers ). I LOVE IT! I got my first Pfizer a week ago Friday and it has knocked me for a loop, lots of fevers and aches and inflammation. Having the second dose farther apart makes a huge difference. Since the vaccine, my resting heart rate rises about 30 bpm higher in the afternoon/eve than in the morning. But I turn the light on for a few minutes in the eve and literally just watch my heart rate creep down about 20 bpm. Noticeable relief of the inflamed feeling in my back, neck and thighs. Much less restlessness at night. Ahhhhhhh.

 

[Chris]

Glad it is helping some!

 

[tyson oberle]

My head feels clearer, and overall I feel slowly better (still using that Platinum Bio300 for a few minutes each morning--but it is going to be replaced by a Platinum Biomax 900 soon--I am interested in their use of 4, not 2, frequencies--may act a bit more like two slices from the sun's beamings, under which we evolved. More importantly, this new series can be used suspended from a stand, so that I can place it over my bed and relax while I absorb this good stuff.

So did you buy the Platinum Biomax 900?

Thanks for the note, and for introducing me to a hitherto unknown to me brand. Actually it looks very like my Platinum bio 300 unit that I have been using for about two years, though that has separate switches for the Red and Near Infra Red sections, and is available in three versions--all Red, all NIR, or 50/50; I got the 50/50, and now rather wish I had got the all NIR for more effective action deeper.

I don't know the differences, but can you tell me why you think that the all NIR would be better than the 50/50? If you have the 50/50 can't you just use the NIR mode? And why do you think that you don't need to use the Red mode?