Posted by Ron Hill on February 24, 2003, at 12:10:56
In reply to Re: Is NADH really safe??? » Lawrence S., posted by colin wallace on February 23, 2003, at 8:22:44
Colin,
I ran into a small problem with Enada NADH so I want to let you know about it and I want to document it on this board. After four weeks of excellent results using 5 mg/day of Enada NADH (one dose in the morning), it began to make me VERY sleepy about four hours after taking the dose. Two days ago (i.e.; Saturday), it made me so sleepy that I could not stay awake, so I gave in and took a three hour nap. When I woke up I felt somewhat like I do on an SSRI; content (kind of an artificial happy feeling) and no irritability, but blunted emotions and "do nothing boy" ambitions.
Initially when this stuff started to make me sleepy, I thought that I was building a tolerance to the supplement and that I would need to take more to regain the effectiveness. However, on Saturday night I decided to skip the following day's dose to see what would happen. Your post yesterday (Sunday) reaffirmed my decision to skip a day or two. Thanks for the link!
As it turns out, the sleepiness side effect was apparently due to taking too much Enada NADH because when I skipped my dose yesterday (Sunday) I felt excellent again and no sleepiness. I could still feel the positive effects of the supplement working in my brain and body even though I did not take the day's dose.
Bottom line: I'm apparently still in the process of figuring out the appropriate dose. I'm going to order some 2.5 mg enteric coated tablets and, in the meantime, I'm going to try taking a 5 mg tablet only two or three times per week. Ray Sahelian, M.D., in his book titled "Mind Boosters: A Guide to Natural Supplements that Enhance Your Mind, Memory, and Mood", recommends taking no more than 2.5 mg two or three times per week. His main concerns are the potential for building a tolerance to NADH and that the medical community doesn't know a lot about this stuff yet. It's my opinion that his dose guidelines may be a little overly conservative for the therapeutic treatment of depression. Be well, Colin, and stay in touch.
This is for benefit of the readers of this post who may not have read my prior posts on this topic: A little more than four weeks ago I added Enada NADH to my 600 mg/day of Lithobid and it has provided remarkable effectiveness for my BP II atypical depression (low motivation, anergy, anhedonia, hypersomnia) and extreme irritability (dysphoric mood states). I stared out taking 10 mg/day but cut back to 5 mg/day ten days into the trial when it began to CAUSE irritability. I continued taking 5 mg/day with great success until a few days ago when this sleepiness side effect presented.
-- Ron
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> Lawrence,
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> This is the only hint of caution I've been able to dig up so far on NADH...
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> http://www.wholehealthmd.com/refshelf/substances_view/1,1525,10047,00.html
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> >> Possible Side Effects
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> High doses of NADH (10 mg a day or more) may cause jitteriness, anxiety, and insomnia.
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> Cautions
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> The safety of long-term treatment with oral NADH remains unclear. Most sources recommend using it for periods of no more than four months, then taking a month off before starting again. An alternative is to take it only two or three times a week, rather than daily.
>
>
poster:Ron Hill
thread:202372
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20030224/msgs/203343.html