14 replies to this topic

[Transcender]

I am in mid-forties, thin and of asthenic (ectomorphic) build. I am diagnosed with Gilbert's syndrome which may be the cause of my fatigue and overall low energy. All my life I have had digestive problems (abdominal pain, flatulence, indigestion, constipation, sometimes diarrhea etc.); endoscopy never showed anything.

 

I am prone to depression and anxiety. It may be caused by digestive problems or not (it could be the other way around). I am also oligospermic.

 

There have been many cases of cancer in my family (lung, colon, pancreas) and I would like to take same preventive steps about it.

 

Recently, I've noticed an increase in thinning of hair, so that is another area I would like to take care of.

 

I've started taking some supplements, but the more explore the more I am confused. 

 

Dear members of LongeCity community, I would appreciate your suggestions and recommendations for supplements that would help my condition and cover areas of digestion, cancer prevention, mood/energy enhancement, fertility improvement, hair loss stopping, and longevity and wellbeing in general.

 

Thank you

Edited by Transcender, 21 October 2014 - 10:59 PM.

[niner]

Gilbert's Syndrome is associated with a reduction in cardiovascular disease.  It's not entirely a bad thing, but fatigue is a distressing symptom.  To deal with the fatigue and possibly as a cancer preventive agent, I'd try c60 olive oil.  The nearest source to you is Sarah Vaughter's Vaughter Wellness / owndoc operation, which is somewhere in the middle of Europe.  Czech Republic, I think. 

[albedo]

Gilbert's Syndrome is associated with a reduction in cardiovascular disease.  It's not entirely a bad thing, but fatigue is a distressing symptom.  To deal with the fatigue and possibly as a cancer preventive agent, I'd try c60 olive oil.  The nearest source to you is Sarah Vaughter's Vaughter Wellness / owndoc operation, which is somewhere in the middle of Europe.  Czech Republic, I think. 

 

Looks like they are my region: Switzerland ;-)

http://owndoc.com/about/
 

[Transcender]

NIner, thanks for your reply. I will certainly check C60 olive oil. Do you use it?

 

As you said, it could relieve fatigue and help as a cancer prevention. Do you have any suggestions on other areas (fertility, hair loss, digestion)?

[albedo]

Their C60 comes from Solaris Chem in Canada. Any comment on that source?

[albedo]

Sorry, correction to my quote to Niner's reply:

 

Correspondence address (do NOT send cash!)

Vaughter Wellness
Zürcherstrasse 161
CH-8010 Zürich
Switzerland

 

Dispatch Center

Our three dispatch centers are in the EU (Spain and Czech Republic), so there are no customs delays to EU countries.

 

http://owndoc.com/about/

[niner]

NIner, thanks for your reply. I will certainly check C60 olive oil. Do you use it?

 

As you said, it could relieve fatigue and help as a cancer prevention. Do you have any suggestions on other areas (fertility, hair loss, digestion)?

 

Yes, I do use it.  There are a lot of people here who use it, and we have a forum specifically for c60.   It showed a greater life extension in rats than any compound in history, although we are waiting for those results to be reproduced.  Other fullerene compounds have been reported to extend life to lesser degrees in a multiple species.    If I could only use one supplement, that would be it.  There are a number of sites on the web that are devoted to the treatment of hair loss.  Two things that have a low incidence of side effects are Minoxidil and Nizoral shampoo.  There is a report that oral tocotrienols increased hair density in a small human trial, and they are a relatively benign substance.

 

Their C60 comes from Solaris Chem in Canada. Any comment on that source?

 

It's a known producer, not fly-by-night.  I wouldn't worry about it.

Edited by niner, 22 October 2014 - 12:08 PM.

[Transcender]

Are there any other studies on c60 beside that one by dr. Fathi Moussa? It certainly looks promising but I would like to make sure it's safe before I dive into it.

 

When it comes to tocotrienols, I almost placed an order on iHerb for dr Mercola's Vitamin E (with all eight of tocopherols and tocotrienols), but just then I browsed through the first pages of the multivitamin thread here on Longecity and saw that some studies show increased mortality when supplementing with >150 IU of vitamin E!? It adds to my confusion.

 

Jon Barron says digestive enzymes are the most important supplement everyone should use, but critics say your body stops producing its own enzymes if you take them orally. Probiotics are hailed almost as a panacea, but if you use them you can develop SIBO.

 

Another dilemma is curcumin. It is praised as a powerful anti-inflammatory agent with anti-cancer properties, it prevents both colon cancer and hair loss when combined with resveratrol, but then I found it is not good for fertility (some even consider it a contraceptive).

 

Zinc combined with folic acid improves fertility, but zinc supplementation depletes copper which requires supplementing copper which is to be avoided altogether in opinion of many. Folic acid is connected to colon cancer so it better be replaced by other forms of folate.

 

Finasteride is recognized as the cure for hair loss, but it has severe side effects, one of these is permanent erectile dysfunction...

 

ALA is a fantastic antioxidant, but it sucks mercury from your amalgam fillings and takes it to your brain, etc., etc....

 

Things like this make me running in circles and chasing my tail. 

 

That's why I opened this thread in order to avoid making some beginner's mistakes and ask more experienced user for advice.

Edited by Transcender, 22 October 2014 - 02:50 PM.

[niner]

Are there any other studies on c60 beside that one by dr. Fathi Moussa? It certainly looks promising but I would like to make sure it's safe before I dive into it.

 

When it comes to tocotrienols, I almost placed an order on iHerb for dr Mercola's Vitamin E (with all eight of tocopherols and tocotrienols), but just then I browsed through the first pages of the multivitamin thread here on Longecity and saw that some studies show increased mortality when supplementing with >150 IU of vitamin E!? It adds to my confusion.

 

Jon Barron says digestive enzymes are the most important supplement everyone should use, but critics say your body stops producing its own enzymes if you take them orally. Probiotics are hailed almost as a panacea, but if you use them you can develop SIBO.

 

Another dilemma is curcumin. It is praised as a powerful anti-inflammatory agent with anti-cancer properties, it prevents both colon cancer and hair loss when combined with resveratrol, but then I found it is not good for fertility (some even consider it a contraceptive).

 

Zinc combined with folic acid improves fertility, but zinc supplementation depletes copper which requires supplementing copper which is to be avoided altogether in opinion of many. Folic acid is connected to colon cancer so it better be replaced by other forms of folate.

 

Finasteride is recognized as the cure for hair loss, but it has severe side effects, one of these is permanent erectile dysfunction...

 

ALA is a fantastic antioxidant, but it sucks mercury from your amalgam fillings and takes it to your brain, etc., etc....

 

Moussa's paper is the only one on c60 olive oil specifically, but there have been a number of papers on other fullerene analogs.  Moussa's paper was a long term toxicity study, which is more than you get with a lot of supplements and research chemicals.  There was no toxicity found.  In the past two years, c60oo has been used by perhaps ten to twenty thousand people, as well as a large number of animals.   No significant problems have been reported.  There are more animal experiments ongoing, but those will not be published for a while.

 

Maybe you can get tocotrienols without vitamin E.

 

Don't know about digestive enzymes.  Probiotics will not give you SIBO.

 

Curcumin is great except that it reduces testosterone and trashes your libido.  Probably not what you're looking for if you are trying to have kids.

 

Zinc won't be a problem if you don't take too much.  I take 15 mg/day, and I certainly don't supplement copper.  I get enough copper from food.  I doubt that a low dose of folate would be a problem.

 

Skip the finasteride.  Minoxidil and Nizoral are safe.

 

If you take c60 you will have no need for ALA.  Even if you don't take c60, you probably don't need ALA.

[krillin]

You can get Jarrow's FamilE. It has only 60 IU of the alpha. Take with C and CoQ10 to make sure it gets recycled.

 

Folate micromanagement requires some hard choices. If colorectal cancer is your main concern, aim for 298-347 mcg from the combination of diet and supplements. If it's pancreatic cancer, aim for 348-430 mcg. If it's dementia prevention get >571 mcg. If it's prostate cancer get >669 mcg. See these posts for references. 1 2 3 When calculating, multiply folic acid food fortification and  supplements by 1.7 to account for higher absorption. (x2 if on an empty stomach.) Doses of standard folic acid supplements above 200 mcg cannot be fully metabolized and are probably harmful.

[Dorian Grey]

I take substantial amounts of B-Complex to ward off age related brain shrinkage

 

http://www.ncbi.nlm....pubmed/23690582

 

As most B-Complex has at least 400mcg of folic acid, and the FDA upped folic acid in fortified foods in 1996 to reduce neural tube birth defects, I had to seek out a B-Complex without folic acid.  Finally found a drug store brand (Rite-Aid) that was FA free.  

 

I 'recon I get all the folic acid I need now from the increased FA in fortified foods combined with plant based folate in my diet.  Hope the high dose FA isn't the component of B-Complex that effectively prevented brain shrinkage with age.  Hard to determine exactly what part of the B-Complex resulted in the protection.  

Edited by synesthesia, 23 October 2014 - 03:42 AM.

[Transcender]

Is 5-MTHF an adequate substitute for folic acid without any safety concerns?

[krillin]

I take substantial amounts of B-Complex to ward off age related brain shrinkage

 

http://www.ncbi.nlm....pubmed/23690582

 

As most B-Complex has at least 400mcg of folic acid, and the FDA upped folic acid in fortified foods in 1996 to reduce neural tube birth defects, I had to seek out a B-Complex without folic acid.  Finally found a drug store brand (Rite-Aid) that was FA free.  

 

I 'recon I get all the folic acid I need now from the increased FA in fortified foods combined with plant based folate in my diet.  Hope the high dose FA isn't the component of B-Complex that effectively prevented brain shrinkage with age.  Hard to determine exactly what part of the B-Complex resulted in the protection.  

 

The paper says that it was B12 lowering homocysteine that provided the protection. It did not help people with homocysteine below 11 microM, so you can use that as a target. It says that the folic acid did not help because the people already had enough: 29 nM at baseline, which would be about 550 mcg/day.

 

Is 5-MTHF an adequate substitute for folic acid without any safety concerns?

It just has fewer safety concerns.

[Transcender]

What I am taking now is this:

 

 

Morning:

 

- warm water with squeezed lemon juice (first thing in the morning)

 

- Life Extension Rhodiola Extract 250 mg (I am taking 2 capsules half an hour after lemon-water because I didn't feel anything from one capsule - when I finish this bottle I will change to another rhodiola product, probably Gaia Herbs)

 

Lunch time:

 

- Himalaya LiverCare one capsule just before lunch

 

- Fairhaven Health FertilAid for men (fertility formula) one capsule with food

 

- NOW Foods Ubiquinol CoQH-CF 50 mg one softgel with food during lunch

 

- NOW Foods Vitamin D-3 2000 IU one softgel with lunch 

 

- Solgar Advanced Calcium Complex with vitamins D3, K2, zinc, boron one tablet with food

 

- KAL Hair Force one capsule with food

 

Dinner time:

 

- Himalaya LiverCare one capsule before dinner

 

- Fairhaven Health FertilAid for men (fertility formula) one capsule with food

 

- Solgar Advanced Calcium Complex with vitamins D3, K2, zinc, boron one tablet with food

 

- KAL Hair Force one capsule with food

 

 

Every 3-4 days I take one Life Extension Super Bio-Curcumin 400 mg capsule with two tablespoons of extra-virgin olive oil.

 

When I finish these open bottles, I will leave FertilAid and Hair Force out because they contain folic acid and magnesium stearate. I'll discontinue Solgar Advanced Calcium Complex too (I wanted a comprehensive calcium/magnesium formula with 2:1 ratio and with co-factors so much that I didn't even notice it is tablets and not capsules). Instead of it I plan to take Pure Encapsulations Magnesium Glycinate and Thorne Research Zinc Piccolinate. I have already ordered it together with Thorne Research Copper Bisglycinate. I did so because I read somewhere that if you use zinc supplements long time it can completely deplete copper and it is necessary to supplement it as well. Now I see that almost everybody says copper shouldn't be supplemented at all. I guess if I take one 15 mg zinc capsule every day and one 2 mg copper capsule once a week it shouldn't do any damage, or...? I have also ordered Thorne Research Stress B-Complex capsules.

 

I'll replace FertilAid with an ad hoc combination of its ingredients: as I said I have already ordered zinc piccolinate, B-complex and Doctor's Best Acetyl-L-Carnitine HCl. I need to find a good vitamin C and vitamin E products, and maybe maca and grape seed extract.

 

I have ordered Jarrow Formulas L-Glutamine powder, Jarrow Formulas Ideal Bowel Support 299v probiotic and Organic India Triphala digestion and colon cleanse formula to help digestion.

 

I want to find a good resveratrol product to combine it with curcumin and vitamins C and E to replace KAL Hair Force.

 

Any suggestions?

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Transcender]

I've just realized that Pure Encapsulations Magnesium Glycinate can't be shipped to my country neither from iHerb nor from Vitacost or Amazon. What's the reason for this? So, my chosen magnesium supplement is permanently unavailable to me. What would be an alternative?

 

I see that Jigsaw Magnesium w/SRT is highly recommended but it's tablets with all those fillers inside I would rather skip if possible.

 

Is there any other pure magnesium glycinate product out there?