I wanted to hear from long-term users of P...
Legolas 29 Jul 2011
From my 10+ years of personal experience, I have found that many times Piracetam made me sleepy, and/or I got a severe brain fog. I have tried it at dosages from 800mg up to 4,800mg "attack" dosage per day, both with and without choline (either Alpha-GPC, Citicoline, or Phosphdylcholine in dosages from 300mg - 1000mg per day). I have also taken it with Hydregine (up to 4.5mg per day), and I have also tried Aniracetam, Oxiracetam, and Pramiricetam with similar results. I have also tried different brands of Piracetam from Nootropil to Primaforce. I also don't use any recreational drugs, other than a glass of beer or wine a few nights a week, I get 6-8 hours of sleep a night, and I have no psychological conditions(i.e. bi-polar, depression, etc). I have a job where I need to maintain alertness and clear thinking 8-10 hours a day, so I can't afford self induced brain fog.
I have always taken nootropics on faith, thinking that they were somehow helping me, even if I didn't notice any effects. I'm now starting to think that in order for a nootropic to be called effective, you should be able to notice a positive result within a reasonably short period of time (none of this "you need to try it for 6 months before you notice a result"). I am also starting to believe that in order to be called an effective, a nootropic like Piracetam should never make you feel worse. I was sitting there one day in a Piracetam induced fog, thinking to myself that I paid money for this result.
I'm now at a point in my middle age where I want to limit myself to effective (the best cost/benefit ratio) and sustainable (i.e. you can take over a long period of time with no adverse effects or withdrawl) supplements and/or nootropics. I was thinking of a 6xday multivitamin, Acetyl-L-Carnithine, Alpha Lipoic Acid, Phosphedylserine, Essential Fatty Acids, and 50mg of caffenine spaced 6x throughout the day.
I wanted to hear from other long term Piracetam/nootropic users. Are you still using it after several years? Have you increased or scaled down the number nootropics/supplements and/or the dosages? What are your thoughts on your future supplementation?
Edited by Legolas, 29 July 2011 - 02:51 AM.
nezxon 29 Jul 2011
Edited by nezxon, 29 July 2011 - 06:53 AM.
Legolas 29 Jul 2011
Edit: I just don't believe that you committed to a 10+ year regimen of something that you have not only deemed ineffective, but actually noticed it hinders you. On second thought, I'll just leave this conversation alone.
I can't say it always hindered me. At first I thought I noticed benefits, however after a while I began to question it's effectiveness. I also didn't use it continuously during the 10 years, it's been off and on.
My question is: How to other long term users feel? Is it still effective for them? Have they changed or modified their supplements over the years? Has anyone else dropped Piracetam from ther stack? Why isn't Piracetam more mainstream if it's so effective?
Luca_Toni 29 Jul 2011
I'd like to say that after reading user stories from this and other forums there's no doubt (for me) that piracetam doesn't have chances succesfully pass through double-blind placebo-controlled trial as cognitive enhancer. Especially if we take into consideration the fact that even blockbuster drugs - SSRI - are barely distinguishable from placebo(placebo helps 4 out of 10 when SSRI helps 5 out of 10 users) in such trials.
So I agree with you that piracetam seems to be useless drug.
mwestbro 29 Jul 2011
Mike
Ben 30 Jul 2011
Pros:
Enhancement of intelligence: Thoughts are clearer, more liquid, but you need to be doing something mentally challenging before you notice the difference. After all, you're using the tool you're trying to enhance to measure the enhancement.
Cons:
Hard to estimate best dose; and, efficacy decreases after a while and you need an abstinence period (i.e. cycling.)
As an aside, pramiracetam gives me a real boost; the comedown though is shocking.
abelard lindsay 30 Jul 2011
The first time I took it, the effects were miraculous. At the time, I had some health problems that affected my mental capacity. That could have been the reason I had such a strong positive response to it during my first few years of taking it.
Edited by abelard lindsay, 30 July 2011 - 06:30 AM.
aston_geek 31 Jul 2011
In my opinion Ben is right about the "challenging" part. NZT isn't real Piracetam might help if you want to do something really big. by "big" I mean a lot of passion and dedication.
adamh 31 Jul 2011
You should take it with a choline source. It seems to work better for older people than younger. Perhaps they don't need it as much?
thedevinroy 01 Aug 2011
Simply put...
Fog Could Be From Low Brain Levels Of...
- Glucose
- Oxygen
- Choline
- Glutamate
- Acetic Acid
- Betaine (TMG)
- Phosphatidylcholine
TMG is the weird one, it is a potent methyl doner primarily made from choline and why I included it in the list. More choline would also prevent this deficiency, as would an increase in methyl doners either through taking extra TMG or SAMe or whatever. In addition to being a primary fuel, glucose is used to make pyruvic acid, which is an acetyl group doner for Coenzyme A. Pyruvic acid supplementation may also be beneficial, as would ALCAR - the more popular acetyl doner. Acetic acid is found in vinegar, so it's a good test to see if the fog is from lack of acetyl groups. An uptake in choline for acetylation into acetylcholine means that less choline is being used to make phosphatidylcholine. Hence, supplementation with eggs, peanuts, oats, or even soy lecithin may help maintain healthy phospholipid levels, essential for brain cell membranes. The latter I doubt is causing brain fog, but I deem it an essential brain supplement regardless.
Oxygen, Choline, and Glutamate are well explained elsewhere. Off the top of my head, there's... Methylene Blue and L-Arginine for oxygen levels, Alpha GPC and CDP Choline for choline levels, and Pyroglutamate and L-Glutamine for glutamate levels.
So please don't think that the only thing causing brain fog is simply choline. Piracetam is much too broad a drug to be confined to a simple one-fits-all solution.
Edited by devinthayer, 01 August 2011 - 03:57 PM.
2tender 01 Aug 2011
Isochroma 02 Aug 2011
The Racetams don't cause long-term tolerance issues like so many other drugs - at least not Piracetam. Incidentally, they also don't cause the damages that other drugs cause long-term.
SuperjackDid_ 02 Aug 2011
Piracetam is neuro toxic to me ,feel more stupid than previous year .
Edited by Nootropix, 02 August 2011 - 06:18 AM.
kassem23 02 Aug 2011
I'm a long-term Piracetam user (3g every 3 hours) and the stuff is working even better than the first day I tried it
The Racetams don't cause long-term tolerance issues like so many other drugs - at least not Piracetam. Incidentally, they also don't cause the damages that other drugs cause long-term.
Wow dude. Are you back for good? What happened to you? As far as I understand, people said that you deleted all your posts from ImmInst, and wanted the staff to delete your profile as well. To me, your increased ability to write in verse and be overly creative, and filled with energy (sleeping less than 6 hours รก day and still refreshed) made me believe that you had hypomania, and that that developed into mania, and things felt apart after that. You care to update us with the details?
Thanks in advance. I hope you are doing good.
gamesguru 04 Aug 2011
It is therefore that I recommend to my friends they either use piracetam only when already in a productive mood, or learn to battle the infectious cycle of depression so typical of man to reduce the time (and incidence) of depressive episodes. Believe it or not, we all have them...our neurochemistry is in a constant state of flux and mild depression is not as abnormal as the television ads lead one to think.
Don't use piracetam as a crutch when you're clearly not in an emotional state appropriate for intellectual function; instead correct the emotional state to restore ideal neurochemistry...then use piracetam and choline to gain that cholinergic edge commonly associated with clearer thought.
thedevinroy 04 Aug 2011
Piracetam is not for the depressed. That I agree with. However, many people miss the bigger picture with why that is. Increasing choline uptake or inhibiting reuptake means decreasing its degradation. What people often miss is that choline does not become a metabolite to be excreted. When broken down, it becomes TMG (a betaine), a very important nutrient for monoamine construction. It is a potent methyl donor.My own view would be, piracetam makes depressed days worse but upbeat days better. If you increase the glucose metabolism of cholinergic neurons, clearly your brain will become hypercholergic so long as you have sufficient precursors and acetyl- supplies on spare for enzymes to produce acetylcholine for the power hunger cholenergic neurons. I now reference the mutual antagonism between acetylcholine and dopamine; they antagonize each other's receptors to the extent that many farmers who use acetylechonlinease inhibitors for pest control have suspiciously high rates of depression incidence. Thus, in a depressed state, piracetam will not get one's thoughts running in a upbeat manner, but will only agitate the situation further by providing a higher cognitive but lower emotional state.
It is therefore that I recommend to my friends they either use piracetam only when already in a productive mood, or learn to battle the infectious cycle of depression so typical of man to reduce the time (and incidence) of depressive episodes. Believe it or not, we all have them...our neurochemistry is in a constant state of flux and mild depression is not as abnormal as the television ads lead one to think.
Don't use piracetam as a crutch when you're clearly not in an emotional state appropriate for intellectual function; instead correct the emotional state to restore ideal neurochemistry...then use piracetam and choline to gain that cholinergic edge commonly associated with clearer thought.
Never heard the thing about antagonism between acetylcholine and dopamine receptors... but I can tell you for sure that Pramiracetam + Huperzine A alone definitely lowered my mood, but I would attribute that more to serotonin than dopamine. The reason for that having more to do with lowered levels of betaine. DMAE raises betaine levels, and looking back, I can see why when I was taking Pram with DMAE, I had such a lift. (PS: DMAE and Centrophenoxine should be used sparingly and only along with phosphatidylcholine, since DMAE inhibits/competes for its biosynthesis.)
gamesguru 05 Aug 2011
Also don't mistake mood for emotional swings. One is rooted in dopamine, the other in serotonin. One takes minutes to hours to change, one takes mere hundreds of milliseconds. Think of this way; all emotional fluctuation occurs within the superset of the mood. I have strong evidence for believing the antagonism between acetylcholine and dopamine and it explains a lot.
Go smoke marijuana and you will experience mania as it floods your nucleus accumbnus with dopamine; go take galatamine and alpha gpc and you will experience depression as your dopamine wages war with your acetylcholine. Go take MDMA and you will roll every 12 seconds upon a new feeling, but come off an SSRI (not dopamine/noradrenaline related) and you won't have depression, just emotional stupor. I think SSRI's are basically the wrong tool for the job they are commonly assumed to be right for. They are more appropriate for the emotionally unpredictable than for the chronically depressed, I believe.
The books are laiden with over simplified theories. Serotonin alone does not cause mood's average to sway; many interacting pathways, starting primarily with dopamine, do.
thedevinroy 05 Aug 2011
Depression has more to do with stable monoamine levels. Methylation, and TMG being a powerful methyl donor, is required in a chain of events that lead to monoamine production. TMG charges up SAMe, so to speak, and can do so three times before becoming glycine. Please see this text for a more complete description of how methylation is related with depression: http://www.altmedrev...ns/13/3/216.pdf There are some cool diagrams and stuff. Particularly, folate needs to be methylated into its active form in order to assist a cofactor involved in turning tyrosine into dopa and tryptophan into 5-HTP.Only most of acetylcholine is swallowed by choline dehydrogenase into TMG, some is recycled. Acetic acid is needed as a second component to form acetylcholine, but I don't see reason for supposing the pathway is strongly dependent on methyl groups. They are there in normal concentrations and already in the molecules which will be recycled. Please enlighten me. Also tell me why you believe dmae should work but choline should not.
Hey wait a second... don't put words in my mouth. I never said choline wasn't good. I had just mentioned DMAE as a way to cure racetam depression. Choline is good, too, but lack of betaine is what is causing the depression, and from personal experience, DMAE, per milligram, has a stronger effect on betaine than choline supplementation - probably due to its inhibition on choline uptake. Certainly a large dose of choline will be converted into a healthy amount of betaine. I believe it to be the healthier route, and I'm glad you mentioned that.
Perhaps it was wrong of me to say that serotonin was the cause of racetam depression. However, I'm not convinced that lowered TMG levels is not the root cause of racetam depression. It's the only link that I have found between monoamine levels and choline uptake. Your receptor ligand antagonism theory needs sources.Also don't mistake mood for emotional swings. One is rooted in dopamine, the other in serotonin. One takes minutes to hours to change, one takes mere hundreds of milliseconds. Think of this way; all emotional fluctuation occurs within the superset of the mood. I have strong evidence for believing the antagonism between acetylcholine and dopamine and it explains a lot.
Go smoke marijuana and you will experience mania as it floods your nucleus accumbnus with dopamine; go take galatamine and alpha gpc and you will experience depression as your dopamine wages war with your acetylcholine. Go take MDMA and you will roll every 12 seconds upon a new feeling, but come off an SSRI (not dopamine/noradrenaline related) and you won't have depression, just emotional stupor. I think SSRI's are basically the wrong tool for the job they are commonly assumed to be right for. They are more appropriate for the emotionally unpredictable than for the chronically depressed, I believe.
The books are laiden with over simplified theories. Serotonin alone does not cause mood's average to sway; many interacting pathways, starting primarily with dopamine, do.
caruga 05 Aug 2011
Justchill 08 Aug 2011
Isochroma 08 Aug 2011
Solthar 12 Aug 2011
Piracetam initially had no visible effect besides giving me one hell of a headache if I forgot my choline source. The really nasty kind that you can't sleep through (my #1 solution for most headaches ). Eventually, I noticed a gradual lifting of the 'fog' in my mind - and I didn't even know I had brainfog until then, along with a slow increase in focus. If I stop taking piracetam for about a week, I've noticed that the brainfog will slowly creep back.
Quick reference:
- Am I smarter? Probably not.
- Better memory? A difficult question, I seem to find my memory being more visual/spatial than it usually is when using piracetam.
- Piracetam seems to accentuate perception of contrast after a long time on it, with an emphasis on visual/auditory stimuli.
- Piracetam and too little Choline seems to make me easy to anger/rage.
- Too much choline makes me depressed.
- Seems to act as a psuedo-social lubricant. I find easier to talk to people while under its influence.
- I have to agree with a really old post of IsoChroma's - eventually you actually start to enjoy (or at least easily tolerate) the taste of piracetam. Not that I'll eat megadoses of it in public with no water .
- I have no need to megadose piracetam, just a low dose three times a day, four hours apart, seems to be my sweet spot.
All in all, I find Piracetam to be worth my investment.
P.S. If you hate fish (like I do) Don't take choline in powder form. Everyone comments on how bad piracetam tastes, but choline is around 200x worse! Bleh!
Edited by Solthar, 12 August 2011 - 07:57 AM.
Legolas 18 Aug 2011
Upon waking at 6:00 a.m.:
Provigil 200mg
Piracetam 800mg
Hydregine 2.5mg
Alpha-GPC 300mg
Acetyl-L-Carnithine 500mg
Alpha Lipoic Acid 200mg
Sam-e 200mg
B-Complex vitamin
Korean Red Ginseng Capsule
I took the same at around 1:00 p.m., except for 300mg of CDP-Choline rather than Alpha-GPC (switch the Choline source). I also took around 400mg of caffeine in 100mg doses spaced about 3 hours apart. In addition to the listed nootropics, I also took a 6-day multi and 1G fish oil per day.
I used to take the weekends off, except for caffeine.
On some days I used to feel fine, and I felt as if I could think more clearly. On other days I felt almost paralyzed mentally, to the point where people asked if something was wrong with me because I seemed out of it.
I also tried Aniracetam and Pramiracetam with similar results. I have tried higher doses of Piracetam with some benefit (up to 4800mg per day), but generally I have stayed within the 1600-2400mg range because of cost and the "bell curve".
In the weeks I haven't taken any nootropics, I have sometimes felt tired because of lack of sleep, but I haven't had the dreaded brain fog that causes near paralysis. However, when I don't take any nootropics, I also feel I'm missing something in terms of creativity/memory.
I think my brain fog may have been a choline/piracetam imbalance of some sort. From reading other posts on this forum, the ratio seems to be subjective, so I'll probably have to experiment with it again to see if I can achieve any benefits without the fog.
anomalous3 27 Oct 2011
abelard lindsay 27 Oct 2011
Edited by abelard lindsay, 27 October 2011 - 04:45 AM.
JChief 28 Oct 2011
So I agree with you that piracetam seems to be useless drug.
I totally disagree. It definitely works and continues to work. Sleepiness can occur at larger doses for me when combined with Alpha GPC but other than that it has noticeable effects. Colors more vivid, increased appreciation for music, verbal fluency, and quirky things... like my ability to type on my keyboard is much more fluid and I don't backspace as much.. it's silly I know but I swear it has an effect on my eye/hand coordination. It also has a definite antidepressant effect for me as well as an anxiolytic. If anyone wants to prove that all they'd have to do is smoke cannabis. Then those paranoia/anxiety tendencies, when combined with piracetam, will cease. That's proof enough for me. I have dealt with anxiety in the past and cannabis never helped that very much (I dealt with it since it provided other benefits for me at the time) but that's just an example that I KNOW piracetam does something. Anyone who says it's useless I question if they even have a pulse because they assume everybody ELSE is just imagining that it's doing something I guess... lol
Edited by JChief, 28 October 2011 - 11:00 AM.
JChief 28 Oct 2011
Thank Isochroma,you still alive.
Piracetam is neuro toxic to me ,feel more stupid than previous year .
lol ... something tells me it's NOT the piracetam haha
JChief 28 Oct 2011
I have been taking Piracetam for 6 years. It radically affected my life at first because my brain was in quite a fucked up state due to illness and Piracetam alleviated the symptoms. The anxiolitic effects were profound at first and I found I could think much more clearly about things while taking it. Now I'm over my illness and I still take a small amount, about 400mg once a day. Largely, it just makes my mornings clearer and makes work and studying material more enjoyable. I don't think it causes a lasting increase in intelligence, but it certainly has temporary effects while it's working. Some people are piracetam non-responders. I don't have any idea why. People's brains are different.
Agreed. Lots of people experience benefits that are too significant to be just placebo. People who think it doesn't work for them and must be bunk are themselves ignorant as can be.
anomalous3 01 Dec 2011
In other words, I can't really "feel it working", but I notice that my behaviors are different, and for the better, and I notice a reduction in unpleasant symptoms.
While I can't give Piracetam all the credit for this, it is an inexpensive tool with minimal side-effects, and I think anyone who suffers from depression might want to give it ago, at the very least in combination with other treatments.
SuperjackDid_ 31 Dec 2011
Thank Isochroma,you still alive.
Piracetam is neuro toxic to me ,feel more stupid than previous year .
lol ... something tells me it's NOT the piracetam haha
I have attach picture what i'm taking most daily
IMG_5479.JPG 117.86KB 138 downloads
2nd of that pic that i currently take,
(get from http://antiagingcentral.com )
How should i know i get real one,Piracetam ?
Today i'm off piracetam ,my mind have less fog and less depress ,
but Piracetam effect still not vanish away such as more vivid environment,better eyesight,better hearing ,more 3D environment
but overall i'm still less focus ,hard to find word ,easy to wrong typo,lethargy,very depress mood ,very low enery
I found some research about Piracetam toxicity
Piacetam is only toxic at concentrations greater than 70 mM;
Piracetam effect might built up overtime and then it can built to greater than 70mM so toxicity occur.
tomorrow i will take half a half a half of 800mg pill (~100mg ) and see any effect better than ~200mg that i take daily.
Sorry for bad grammar.
Edited by Nootropix, 31 December 2011 - 04:18 PM.