LONGECITY

Hey Everyone, I see that this thread has been a little slow as of late. I wanted to post and discuss my experiences with Astragalus only relying on what I have seen while experiment with astragalus root powder.

 

I began taking astragalus root powder 3 months ago for anti aging and general health benefits. over the course of 3 months I have titrated up to over 75 grams of astragalus powder each day in hot or cold water depending on my mood. I usually split the 75 grams in 3 or 4 doses through the day and attempt not eating within 1 hour of ingesting the astragalus mxture.

 

The first week I started taking astragalus powder I ingested 33 grams a day because I have heard that this was the maximum doses used in traditional chinese herbal therapies. every few weeks I have increased the dose several grams until I hit 75 grams/day about 1 month ago. There was a point sometime during upping my dosage in the first few weeks where I felt extremely tired and at sometimes even had nausea and blurred vision in the evening. I contemplated stopping or reducing the dosage, but the carless person I am at times decided to push through and keep upping the dosage each week. After a little time those feelings passed.

 

So far what I have noticed by taking this dose over the course of time has been somewhat significant, I noticed the pimples and acne on my back that I have had since my teenage years have completely disappeared. That is not to say that they were overly severe but they were noticeable. Also, I have had mild to moderate dandruff  since my teens and that has almost completely gone as well. All of the skin on my body has become completely smooth. I am still young (26) but my skin has become smoother than I every remember feeling it. Almost unnaturally supple. I believe slightly thicker around my eyes and other areas. I have had minor dark circles since my childhood. They are still present but reduced.

 

As for energy, I have more focused energy and besides those few weeks where I was extremely fatigued,(maybe a result of low blood sugar from the high doses of astragalus), the energy is calm and lasting.

 

I have noticed that through out taking astragalus I have a lot of mucus being churned up in my body. I have coughed up alot the first few months. that was followed by coughing a little up each day even until this day. Keep in mind that I have never been a smoker. I never felt sick while caoughing up the mucus, it just felt like there was always something in my respiratory tract. Now that is almost gone, but still present to a degree.

 

One other interesting thing that has happened is that some of the hairs on my arms have been growing longer and have gained some very thin fuzz like hairs on my arms as well. Before I started taking astrgalus my head of hair was good but, I think it could have been healthier, not to say i was getting bald but my doet although not horrible had not been the greatest for the past year or so. It seems like after taking astragalus my hair on my head especially has been becoming slightly thicker and fuller and more coarse.

 

One mistake I did make was this. I did not drink enough water and I suffered a great deal for a few weeks. Astragalus is a diuretic and for a while I think i was dehydrated, but that all came to a head when I helped a friend do landscaping in severe heat. My arms and feet had severe rashes as well as a part of my nether region. after a week the sking turned from red to dry and cracking on those parts of my body. it took a while for the rash to go away but once it did the dry skin stayed for several weeks. My feet cracked and i was barely able to walk for 2 weeks and it is still healing now. I realized that Iw ant not hydrating enough and this was the cause. Now I am almost all better and still talking the same dose as before.

 

For now this is all that I can say about my experience with astragalus. I would like to hear some responses from people on this forum and see their opinions on my self experiement.

is anyone interested in this thread?

hi markmsb,

i've been eating a few tablespoons a day of crushed up root - probably for about 7 days in all.  I found it absolutely revolting and haven't figured out a tolerable way of taking it yet.  If you have some suggestions I would be keen to know.  I experienced a feeling of vitality and energy with the smooth skin you mentioned.  I'm planning to do a proper extraction of the active ingredients as I have most of my lab together now  Will report back soon.

Hey, thanks for your experience with astragalus. A few questions. Did you crush the root yourself? Was it dried or not dried? Was the root that you ingested a fine powder or a courser type consistency? Did you try to ingest it dry or mix it with something( food or drink).

What I have done is bought finely powdered astragalus root in bulk. I have experimented with mixing it with hot or cold water at times or even with milk. Sometimes I let it sit in the water for a while and sometimes I just mix it up in the water and drink it in a few minutes. Although not the greatest tasting thing, in powdered form it is bareable for me and I have been taking massive amounts each day. I wonder if letting it sit would be better for absorption?

I beli e just taking the active ingredients and not ingesting the root itself might be leaving out a lot of important things. That's why I ingest the powder.

One thing I forgot to mention is that after taking this for 3 months I have almost no body or foot odor even when I sweat a lot.

I've got kilo bags of chucky root about 5 mm x 3mm :- I put it in a milling machine and mill it to a fine sand consistency.  The taste is extremely pungent - tastes like a combination of 17 trees with some volatiles thrown in.  I take a giant tablespoon dry and chase it with something like orange juice.  I get the shivers and gag a bit and do it again until I just can take it anymore. I really need someone like a chef to figure out how to make this stuff edible. 

 

cheers

 

Simon

Why not just mix it in a liquid and drink it little by little?

tastes bad to me even in a drink :(

 

Does anyone have an theories as to why hair on my body has grown more than usual and to a longer length and why I have almost no body odor after a workout taking high doses of astragalus?

Hey Everyone, I see that this thread has been a little slow as of late. I wanted to post and discuss my experiences with Astragalus only relying on what I have seen while experiment with astragalus root powder.
 
I began taking astragalus root powder 3 months ago for anti aging and general health benefits. over the course of 3 months I have titrated up to over 75 grams of astragalus powder each day in hot or cold water depending on my mood. I usually split the 75 grams in 3 or 4 doses through the day and attempt not eating within 1 hour of ingesting the astragalus mxture.
 
The first week I started taking astragalus powder I ingested 33 grams a day because I have heard that this was the maximum doses used in traditional chinese herbal therapies. every few weeks I have increased the dose several grams until I hit 75 grams/day about 1 month ago. There was a point sometime during upping my dosage in the first few weeks where I felt extremely tired and at sometimes even had nausea and blurred vision in the evening. I contemplated stopping or reducing the dosage, but the carless person I am at times decided to push through and keep upping the dosage each week. After a little time those feelings passed.
 
So far what I have noticed by taking this dose over the course of time has been somewhat significant, I noticed the pimples and acne on my back that I have had since my teenage years have completely disappeared. That is not to say that they were overly severe but they were noticeable. Also, I have had mild to moderate dandruff  since my teens and that has almost completely gone as well. All of the skin on my body has become completely smooth. I am still young (26) but my skin has become smoother than I every remember feeling it. Almost unnaturally supple. I believe slightly thicker around my eyes and other areas. I have had minor dark circles since my childhood. They are still present but reduced.
 
As for energy, I have more focused energy and besides tho

Wait.

You took 33 grams each day? That's way more than what's in a single dose. Did you mean milligrams? Put which one you actually meant. That seems like a lot.

Wait.

You took 33 grams each day? That's way more than what's in a single dose. Did you mean milligrams? Put which one you actually meant. That seems like a lot.

 

It's about 3g/teaspoon and maybe 9g/heaping teaspoon, so I'd say grams.

I'm still alive and well and couldn't feel better. I took grams not milligrams.

I have noticed that through out taking astragalus I have a lot of mucus being churned up in my body. I have coughed up alot the first few months. that was followed by coughing a little up each day even until this day. Keep in mind that I have never been a smoker. I never felt sick while caoughing up the mucus, it just felt like there was always something in my respiratory tract.

 

Since astragalus is a strong immunostimulant, it sounds like your immune system went into Th2 dominance which is frequently manifested with increased mucous production throughout the body.

 

Also, getting skin conditions (dandruff, pimples) resolved seem like you have been Th1 dominant before and now that you tipped into Th2, these issues started to disappear.

You may try to ease on the astragalus dosage to see if you can reach somewhat balanced Th1/Th2 state.

 

I am also Th1 dominant and will try your experiment to see if my scalp psoriasis/dandruff (also since my teens) will be fixed.

 

Great report, btw!

 

Keep us posted on your progress. 

Yes, I absolutely will keep you posted. I haven't noticed any increasing or changing effects as of late. What I have noticed is that even with the same dosage my mucus production has gone down to a regular level over the past week. Maybe back into stasis after it was ramped up. Keep in mind I still take the same 75 gram dosage a day I have taken for almost the full 3.5 months.

I don't remember if I said this in one of my previous posts but some of the hairs on my back (I never had a lot) have gotten finer and slowed in growing speed.As you know hair on other parts of my body have increased in length such as arms and head hair thickness to a slight degree. My chest hair and beard seem the same as before although now that I think of it I see straggling random hairs of a light brown color growing faster than other parts of my beard. It's a weird effect. My hair is naturally very dark brown to black shade.

Yes, I absolutely will keep you posted. I haven't noticed any increasing or changing effects as of late. What I have noticed is that even with the same dosage my mucus production has gone down to a regular level over the past week. Maybe back into stasis after it was ramped up. Keep in mind I still take the same 75 gram dosage a day I have taken for almost the full 3.5 months.

I don't remember if I said this in one of my previous posts but some of the hairs on my back (I never had a lot) have gotten finer and slowed in growing speed.As you know hair on other parts of my body have increased in length such as arms and head hair thickness to a slight degree. My chest hair and beard seem the same as before although now that I think of it I see straggling random hairs of a light brown color growing faster than other parts of my beard. It's a weird effect. My hair is naturally very dark brown to black shade.

 

Thanks for your posts about your Astragalus intake - I think the constitutional shift you have experienced is very interested and well described in your posts. I'm quite interested in what brand you have been buying (or specific source if non-brand)? I've noticed random long hairs a couple of times (eyebrow/facial mainly), always when taking exotic supplements of various kinds but I've never been able to narrow down exactly what was causing it - at least it wasn't Astragalus since I haven't tried that as of yet.

Since astragalus is a strong immunostimulant, it sounds like your immune system went into Th2 dominance which is frequently manifested with increased mucous production throughout the body.

 

Also, getting skin conditions (dandruff, pimples) resolved seem like you have been Th1 dominant before and now that you tipped into Th2, these issues started to disappear.

You may try to ease on the astragalus dosage to see if you can reach somewhat balanced Th1/Th2 state.

 

I am also Th1 dominant and will try your experiment to see if my scalp psoriasis/dandruff (also since my teens) will be fixed.

 

Great report, btw!

 

Keep us posted on your progress. 

 

I don't know, does the Th1 vs Th2 hypothesis even hold out? This abstract ( http://www.ncbi.nlm....pubmed/12946237 ) seem to indicate that while it may well hold true on micro-level it is unlikely to true on a constitutional/macro level:

 

"[...] the hypothesis [i.e. Th1 vs Th2 dominance] has major inconsistencies; human cytokine activities rarely fall into exclusive pro-Th1 or -Th2 patterns. The non-helper regulatory T cells, or the antigen-presenting cells (APC), likely influence immunity in a manner comparable to Th1 and Th2 cells. Many diseases previously classified as Th1 or Th2 dominant fail to meet the set criteria."

 

@8bitmore. I'm not sure if we are able to plug the source company we are buying from. But I buy the powdered bulk herb. It's organically grown without pesticides and is certified kosher if that makes a difference to you. If you want to know the source let me know if you want me to PM you.

Anyway, I'm curious to know further about the experiences of others. I be heard it takes about 6 months to see any change in gray hair growth.

One word of caution while taking astragalus. After taking a large dose of powder mixed with water make sure to rinse your mouth clean so there is no residual powder sitting on your gums,lips or tongue. I made the mistake of taking powder in water and lying down on the couch a minute later without taking another glass of water or rinsing my mouth. I woke up with my mouth dried out and sore with redness on my lips and tongue. Seems like letting the powder sit has some properties that are drying. It was moderately painful. I had no problems up to this point.

I'm curious to know how every is doing with their astragalus regimens.

finally found a way to ingest this stuff without puking.

 

ground up 10g of root, added 250mls ethanol and 25mls water, heated and agitated it for 4 hours at 75 degrees and then filtered it and reclaimed the ethanol via condensing still to get around 40 mls of straw-colored target liquid. 

 

Use a dropper and have a couple of mls at a time, 

 

tastes far better than the root

 

now to figure out how to enhance the flavour a bit, maybe 

How were your results ingesting the astragalus on a daily basis?

I've taken Astragalus root for many years. In China we boil Astragalus with water for 20-30 minutes and then drink the water. Usually 30 g is enough for healthy adults. I think Astragalus is helpful for CFS, better than MitoQ (20 mg per day). Chinese takes Astragalus to expand life since 1000 years ago. Also, Astragalus is cheaper.

Do you boil the whole root or root powder? And do you ingest the actual root afterwards?

Did anyone gain weight on astragalus?  Everytime I take TA-65 I feel very,very sleepy for weeks and gain about 5 LBS.  My friend who has cancer also took TA-65 and he gained weight on it too, but he needed the weight I dont.

Do you boil the whole root or root powder? And do you ingest the actual root afterwards?

Do you boil the whole root or root powder? And do you ingest the actual root afterwards?

Do you boil the whole root or root powder? And do you ingest the actual root afterwards?

I think powder is better, but most of times there are only root in pieces in the market. We boil the root for two times, in order to extract the effective medicine from the root.

Then we drink the water, and abandon the boiled root, which is useless.

Did anyone gain weight on astragalus? Everytime I take TA-65 I feel very,very sleepy for weeks and gain about 5 LBS. My friend who has cancer also took TA-65 and he gained weight on it too, but he needed the weight I dont.

Yes, astragalus will make you more hungry. You may take it for 4 day and than stop for 3 days. Then repeat this procedure.

Actually many foods can make people more hungry,such as apple, peach, etc. You may pay a little attention on these fruits ^_^

So, If i'm understanding this correctly. We should take no more than 30 grams of the root a day and only take it 4 days per week and rest for 3 days. also, we boil the root and omit the powder or solids and do not ingest them?

30g/day is a recomanded dose according to ancient chinese medicine books and my own experience, however, since it is safe (in most cases), 200g per day is also ok, but you may find yourself too energetic to get into sleep, and your blood presure might be higher.
The solids left are useless and I recommend you not taking them.
Edited by rudeway, 09 December 2014 - 06:09 AM.

In my experience it caused me too urinate a great deal even at 30 grams. I think we all have to be sure to drink enough fluids and also replace minerals and electrolytes in our bodies.

Hi there, I like to ask a short question. Is it possible to assorb astragalus powder via snorting? what effect will it have?

 

Thank you.