Any success with Inositol?

[pboy]

Just wondering if anyone had any success with Inositol during or after withdrawal? I'd read on another forum about using it along with the fish oil etc, and so started taking it over a week ago. The first thing I noticed was that my energy lifted somewhat. And, this is a hard one to describe, but it was as if my 'mental processing power' improved. That seems to have diminished a little now though, or maybe I just don't notice it anymore.

Would like to hear of others experiences of it and if it helped or not.

[palm]

Originally Posted by pboy

Just wondering if anyone had any success with Inositol during or after withdrawal? I'd read on another forum about using it along with the fish oil etc, and so started taking it over a week ago. The first thing I noticed was that my energy lifted somewhat. And, this is a hard one to describe, but it was as if my 'mental processing power' improved. That seems to have diminished a little now though, or maybe I just don't notice it anymore.

Would like to hear of others experiences of it and if it helped or not.

Hi PBoy,

I took it for insomnia last year.

The benefits were I noticed a sense of calm and mood elevation.

The downside was increased weakness and bruising. I was finally forced to give it up when it caused an ear blockage.

Sorry for not being more encouraging. Hope it continues to help you.

Palm

[pboy]

That's ok. Seems strange that it would cause an ear blockage but then again stranger things have happened!

My problems with weakness seem to have improved since taking magnesium, but if my ears start getting blocked I'll reconsider it.

[palm]

Originally Posted by pboy

That's ok. Seems strange that it would cause an ear blockage but then again stranger things have happened!

My problems with weakness seem to have improved since taking magnesium, but if my ears start getting blocked I'll reconsider it.

Yeah, it does seem strange as I found nothing about inositol doing that. But I seem to get all the strange side effects.

Palm

[TryingtoGetWell]

If you enter the word "inositol" in the search function here, you'll find a number of threads and posts about it.

I posted on some, including (at least two years ago, I believe) http://www.paxilprogress.org/forums/...30600=inositol

I've posted on other threads since that time; I discontinued it after a while because it may have been causing too much drowsiness, although I'm not sure because I've had severe fatigue/ muscle weakness/problems being groggy and dozing off during protracted w/d. Whether it aggravated those problems or was just coincidence, I'll probably never know. I also will never know for sure whether the relaxation of the akathisia-type symptoms I sometimes get (and which were quite bad earlier in my protracted w/d) were from the inositol or coincidence. Too much was going on with me at the time. I think it may have helped me to some degree.

[pboy]

Looked through the other threads, next time maybe I should just bring one back.

I guess that's the difficult thing in withdrawal TryingtoGetWell, you never know what supplements have what effect properly. Though with me, I could tell the difference when I took the Inositol. Now Ive stabilized on my current Lexapro dose and the withdrawal has calmed down a bit, I am noticing a return of the previous positive effects I got from Inositol. It just seems to give me a bit more energy and helps me focus a bit better.

[Songbird]

Originally Posted by altostrata

inositol's cousin niacinamide (nicotinamide).

Interesting - I was at the health store today (buying some more magnesium and aloe vera juice) and noticed a jar of inositol labelled as 'non-flush niacin'.

[TryingtoGetWell]

Originally Posted by Songbird

Interesting - I was at the health store today (buying some more magnesium and aloe vera juice) and noticed a jar of inositol labelled as 'non-flush niacin'.

There are many different forms of inositol, used for different purposes.

The powder I used was myoinositol, which is commonly known as inositol. Inositol is considered part of the B complex family, but technically is not a vitamin (it's an isomer of glucose), though it works in coordination with the B complex. The Israeli clinical study which led to its use for depression concluded that inositol helps depression, anxiety, and OCD, but there have apparently been other studies that didn't have the same results, so its benefits for those things remain inconclusive.

"No-flush niacin" is inositol hexaniacinate (or sometimes inositol nicotinate, I believe) and is usually used for circulatory disorders because it functions in some ways (not all, apparently) like niacin in the body. I don't know if it helps depression or not (it might - all B vitamins are considered helpful in depression, anxiety, etc., although they tend to cause bad reactions and unfortunately increase those symptoms in w/d). But it is chemically different from inositol, as the term is normally used.

I used to know more about the many forms of inositol, but I've forgotten most of it. Interestingly, the researchers in the Israeli study said:

http://www.springerlink.com/content/lb7dxbcxnxyx7ufq/

...Inositol has demonstrated antidepressant effects but in a controlled double blind augmentation trial did not improve depression in SSRI treatment failures.

No idea what to make of that.

One thing that appears accurate is that coffee apparently destroys inositol in the body.

[pboy]

Originally Posted by TryingtoGetWell

No idea what to make of that.

One thing that appears accurate is that coffee apparently destroys inositol in the body.

My take on that was that if an SSRI didn't reduce your depression, Inositol won't. I don't think it means that it's useless to anyone coming off an SSRI.

Also about the coffee, would decaf coffee destroy Inositol I wonder? I've switched myself to decaf to wean off caffeine. I was actually mixing some Inositol with it in place of sweetner, as that study said it can be mixed with drinks like tea and juice.

[LCrawford67]

Actually, you have to be a pretty heavy coffee drinker, to destroy inositol in your body. More than 3-4 cups a day, from what I read.

Also, you have to take up to 12 grams of inositol, according to these studies, for it to affect depression, which is a butt load of inositol.

If you read the older threads we have regarding inositol, most here never took that much. Also, considering the magnesium in it, that much would probably have you running to the bathroom quite a bit.

[pax80]

It's something I'm going to try for my anxiety...

[TryingtoGetWell]

Originally Posted by pboy

My take on that was that if an SSRI didn't reduce your depression, Inositol won't. I don't think it means that it's useless to anyone coming off an SSRI.

That was my thought, but I didn't have time to read the entire study. Think I did way back when, but not even sure I read every bit!

Originally Posted by pboy

Also about the coffee, would decaf coffee destroy Inositol I wonder?

If taking large enough doses, coffee would destroy some but not all of the inositol, I would think, and the thereapeutic doses for depression are huge, so I don't think a bit would hurt. Whether it matters if it's decaf or not, I don't know - that never came up in anything I read.

Glad LaurieC read something about actual amounts of coffee, and more than 3-4 cups of coffee in w/d sounds like a horror story!

Originally Posted by LCrawford67

Also, you have to take up to 12 grams of inositol, according to these studies, for it to affect depression, which is a butt load of inositol.

If you read the older threads we have regarding inositol, most here never took that much. Also, considering the magnesium in it, that much would probably have you running to the bathroom quite a bit.

I'd have to look it up since it's been a while, but I think it's 12-18 grams for depression/anxiety/OCD. At least I think that's what was used in the Israeli study. I worked up to 18! Hardly touched me. Don't even know if it did anything at all, but didn't cause any problems (which with me is amazing!).

I used pure crystalline inositol, which as far as I know doesn't contain any magnesium. (I can't tolerate magnesium, never could even before w/d.)

I think IP-6, which is used primarily for cancer prevention and adjunctive treatment, sometimes comes in combination with magnesium, called magnesium inositol hexaphosphate, but I don't know much about that. I just don't know that even IP-6 always contains magnesium, and the crystalline myoinositol doesn't say anything about magnesium on the label; as far as I know it's pure inositol, which is a form of glucose.

(By the way, it's an isomer that doesn't cause problems with blood sugar levels like ordinary glucose; it tastes like powdered sugar but has very different properties than ordinary glucose.)

If people had problems from magnesium with inositol, they may have taken a different form than is normally used for depression, etc.

(Hope this post makes sense and isn't repetitive - I don't know why my phone only seems to ring when I'm posting here, but then I get on numerous long conversations and lose my train of thought. But I have too much to do to proofread it, so shouldn't risk more bloopers but sending it off as is!)

[Songbird]

Thanks for the clarification, TTGW, I didn't realise that there were many forms of inositol. If it is an isomer of glucose, then it would not contain magnesium. Fructose and galactose are also isomers of glucose, however our bodies convert those to glucose, so presumably we don't have the metabolic pathways to convert isositol to glucose?

Interesting about the coffee, I have read that caffeine destroys B vitamins, so if it is closely related to B vitamins, I think it is likely to be the caffeine in the coffee. I'm also very interested in the niacinamde Alto mentioned.