[HN Gopher] Omega-3 intake counteracts symptoms of anxiety and d...
___________________________________________________________________
Omega-3 intake counteracts symptoms of anxiety and depression in
mice
Author : geox
Score : 272 points
Date : 2024-09-21 15:31 UTC (1 days ago)
(HTM) web link (www.psypost.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.psypost.org)
| elromulous wrote:
| This is exciting, and should be fairly easy to confirm/deny with
| a double blind trial in humans. There's no money to be had in it
| for big pharma, so funding it would have to come from some other
| means, but it should be possible.
| setting1855 wrote:
| as opposed to supplement studies in mice, which are notoriously
| lucrative
| brokensegue wrote:
| they are cheaper
| elromulous wrote:
| As the other comment mentions, mouse studies are hilariously
| cheap compared to human trials. We're talking many orders of
| magnitude. A couple grad students can do a mouse study at
| costs very much approaching zero.
| nosefurhairdo wrote:
| There's already research on Omega 3 supplementation's impact on
| depression + anxiety symptoms in humans. The results generally
| show that Omega 3 is roughly as effective as antidepressants,
| and can be safely taken in addition to antidepressants for an
| even greater effect.
| petesergeant wrote:
| Examine.com summary:
|
| > Fish oil supplementation has been noted to be comparable to
| pharmaceutical drugs (fluoxetine) in majorly depressed
| persons, but this may be the only cohort that experiences a
| reduction of depression. There is insufficient evidence to
| support a reduction of depressive symptoms in persons with
| minor depression (ie. not diagnosed major depressive
| disorder)
|
| They give it a B for the research and an effect size of
| moderate improvement. Also a B with a small effect size for
| anxiety.
|
| https://examine.com/supplements/fish-oil
|
| I'd note it also says:
|
| > A meta-analysis of 35 small, randomized trials found that
| fish oil can slightly improve depression when compared to
| control. However, this improvement may be too small to be
| noticeable. Also, adding fish oil to antidepressant
| medication seems to be more beneficial than antidepressant
| treatment alone
|
| In short, sounds like it's worth throwing in as an adjunct
| treatment for people wanting to take a kitchen sink approach
| jaggederest wrote:
| > They give it a B for the research and an effect size of
| moderate improvement. Also a B with a small effect size for
| anxiety
|
| To be fair, this is among the most highly rated things on
| the entire site - let not the "B" scare you off. A moderate
| effect size is pretty substantial, all things considered.
| RobotToaster wrote:
| > There's no money to be had in it for big pharma
|
| IIRC there's several patent medicine versions of omega 3 such
| as icosapent ethyl
| FollowingTheDao wrote:
| High long chain omega 3 and low omega 6 not only revered my
| hyperlipidemia (through stimulating reverse cholesterol
| transport) but notably reduces my symptoms of schizoaffective
| disorder bipolar type (I am assuming this is through assisting
| with carecholamine receptor function).
|
| I came to the conclusion this diet would help me by noting the
| polymorphisms in my FADS1 and FADS2 genes linked to needing more
| long chain PUFAs.
|
| You might also be interested that omega 3 is responsible for
| making natural Cannabinoid (endocannabinoids) in humans which
| could be linked to the lower anxiety.
| wtetzner wrote:
| Yeah, I've noticed too much Omega 6 is at least one big cause
| of my anxiety.
|
| Avoiding vegetable oils (and foods that are cooked with it) and
| just using coconut oil, tallow, butter etc. reduces my anxiety
| to the point that it's barely noticeable.
| FollowingTheDao wrote:
| IMHO, Omega 3 increases GABA and Omega 6 increases Glutamate.
| I am going to guess that if you ever smoked pot that high THC
| weed makes you severely anxious?
| s__s wrote:
| Can you elaborate on the connection you're drawing here?
| FollowingTheDao wrote:
| Omega 6 creates an endocannibinoid that is more like
| Delta 9 THC and Delta 9 THC increases glutamate release.
| This will cause psychosis in people who have high
| glutamate levels or low GABA levels.
|
| https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7714685/
|
| Omega 3 creates an endocannibinoid that is more like CBD
| and CBD increases GABA release.
|
| https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S10
| 436...
| snvzz wrote:
| Donuts are evil.
| hndude wrote:
| Whenever I get my cholesterol tested I have low good
| cholesterol and high bad cholesterol, is that hyperlipidemia?
| Any recommendations on how to get high long chain omega 3 and
| low omega 6 in my diet? Any supplements or brands I should
| take? Any books that you recommend I read?
| Trasmatta wrote:
| Omega 3 supplements are such a wild world. So many low quality
| ones, so many different types, and so many claims about them
| being miracle cures (that then don't hold out for later studies).
|
| I have severe chronic dry eye, and omega 3 is one of the first
| things they recommend. But then in the past 5 or 6 years there
| have been a bunch of studies that have shown there is no actual
| measurable effect.
|
| Some people still claim that it helps, but that you have to get
| it by actually eating Omega 3 rich fish, and not just taking the
| supplements. Either way, I've never seen any difference with my
| dry eye symptoms.
| oidar wrote:
| I have dry eye as well. What have you done that helps? Omega 3
| didn't do anything for me either.
| FollowingTheDao wrote:
| I have uveitis and it certainly helped for me. I think what
| happens is a lot of people don't lower the amount omega 6 and
| just increase omega-3 by a small amount. It took a drastic
| reduction in omega 6 for it to help.
| Trasmatta wrote:
| I'm about 10 years into this, and I've tried many many
| things. It's all about management now. It really depends on
| the type of dry eye you have, so I'd recommend seeing a dry
| eye specialist if you haven't. Getting a meibography done is
| really important for seeing the state of your glands.
|
| The things that work the best for me currently are Systane
| Hydration PF eye drops, NuLids, Manuka Honey gel, OcuSoft lid
| scrubs, moving out of a dry climate, and limiting screen
| time. Inflammation in general causes it to flare up -- diet,
| lack of sleep, alcohol, stress, staying up late coding or
| gaming, all seem to cause inflammation and make it worse for
| me.
|
| I've also done Restasis, Xiidra, Cequa, IPL, Radio Frequency,
| warm compresses, and punctal plugs, without much success.
|
| I'd like to try autologous tear serum next.
| calf wrote:
| I'm doing IPL/RF now which is theorized to help with
| inflammation, but now I know to be more careful with
| healthy lifestyle. Too bad this understanding of computer
| lifestyle and dry eye syndrome was that well explained and
| emphasizsd 15 years ago.
| Trasmatta wrote:
| Have you noticed any improvement with IPL/RF? I've done 5
| sessions - I saw improvement after the first and fourth,
| but regressed pretty quicky back after a few days. I've
| heard some people saying they had to do like 10 to start
| to notice a bigger difference. The problem is it's so
| expensive (I have to pay $750 for the combo session).
| youniverse wrote:
| Wow you've tried the whole industry. The only thing I can
| recommend to you would be to try a brand of drops called
| Optase, they are more quality and thicker than everything
| else on the market.
|
| Here's a HN post with a really good top comment that talks
| about psychological eye strain that really resonated with
| me, plenty of other advice in there too you might like:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34518343
|
| Good luck!
| Trasmatta wrote:
| I haven't tried Optase, but it's worth a shot. Systane
| Hydration PF has been the best for me, and it is also a
| lot thicker.
|
| Thank you for the link! It resonates with my experience.
| I do think there's a psychological aspect of it for me.
| When I'm depressed or disassociating (which is frequent)
| it's easy to just stare at a screen and not blink at all.
| ckcheng wrote:
| That's a lot of different things to consider and try,
| thanks!
|
| What worked for me was drinking massive amounts of water
| throughout the day.
|
| Not so much to cause hyponatremia, of course, but it was a
| cheap easy way to establish a baseline for me (i.e. helps
| with dry climates, salty foods, dehydration, etc). And
| yeah, I tried some of those other things too.
| manmal wrote:
| If Manuka honey has helped, have you considered using other
| antiseptics or even probiotic eye baths and bacteriophages?
| theropost wrote:
| I used to have this problem too. Tried prescriptions,
| systane, hydration eye drops etc etc, but in the end but
| actually worked was baby shampoo rinsing my eyes twice a
| day and washing them it took some time but now it's
| completely gone. But for me I believe it was some sort of
| blepharitis that was blocking the glands that produced the
| lubrication my eyes needed, and now that I have a good
| routine, it appears to have solve the problem.
| theendisney4 wrote:
| How much water do you drink and do you take extra salt?
| throwaway2037 wrote:
| > Manuka Honey gel
|
| What is special about this honey? Is there any science
| behind the extravagant health claims?
| rozman50 wrote:
| I have had dry eyes, still occur in the summer when AC is
| blasting and right before winter. My solution was seeing an
| eye doctor, which recommended cyclosporine drops (I took
| them for 2 years every night), mediteranian diet, Omega3.
| Also cleaning my eyes with soft tooth brush and child
| shampoo (tearless) every night.
|
| Naturally you have some little bacteria called Demodex on
| your eyelashes, but they might cause problems. The only way
| to get rid of them is clean your eyelashes with Teatree
| extract. I was recommended Blephademodex wipes, which I had
| to warm up in microwave and then clean my eyes.
|
| All this solutions together made my dry eyes more
| manageable.
| sebmellen wrote:
| For me, Xiidra combined with once a day Pataday (which
| actually dries the eye, but for me helped stem inflammation
| that was harming my ability to form a tear film), plus this
| iTEAR device (https://olympicophthalmics.com/itear-100/), was
| incredibly helpful.
|
| I'd also recommend getting a humidifier for each of your main
| rooms and using distilled water with it.
| cyberax wrote:
| Perfluorohexyloctane helped me quite a bit. You can ship it
| from Europe for something like $20 per vial (EvoTears), or
| get in the US for $700 (Miebo). The vials are literally
| identical.
| amluto wrote:
| Nifty but perhaps distressing. A brief search found nothing
| about what happens to it after you put it in your eyes. I
| assume a bunch of it ends up in your tear ducts, to your
| nose, and into your stomach. And then?
| cyberax wrote:
| It'll diffuse out eventually. It's metabolically inert,
| and it's been used as a vitreous humor substitute for
| quite a while.
| 93po wrote:
| I cured mine bc I figured out it was related to LPR/reflux
| which was causing dry eyes along with some other crappy
| stuff.
| cbruns wrote:
| What was the cure?
| 93po wrote:
| LPR is really tricky because weeks of "good behavior" can
| be undone very easily with one wrong move. It also took
| me years to figure out it was LPR because it doesn't have
| traditional acid reflux symptoms and can also look a lot
| like allergies or other things my doctors labeled it with
| instead. For me it was especially debilitating because it
| inflamed my Eustachian tubes, which meant my middle ears
| filled with way too much fluid, and i'd have 5+ hour long
| vertigo attacks where i literally could not move a single
| inch and was vomiting the entire time and sometimes only
| had a few minutes of warning before this started. if this
| happened in public, which it thankfully never did in a
| way i couldn't get home or to my car quickly (to pass out
| in the back seat and barf out the window), it would have
| been absolutely awful. the other shitty symptom as i said
| was extremely dry eyes, like painfully dry, which i think
| was actually more just them stinging which feels
| identical to dry. no amount of eye drops helped, and i
| tried like 6 different types.
|
| anyway lots of tips online for LPR that are true for me:
|
| * nothing carbonated. this is one of the worst things i
| can do
|
| * nothing acidic. some fruit juices like pineapple in
| particular are really, really bad for me. coffee, even
| with milk and ice and sugar, is also really bad for me.
| overly acidic foods (vinegar, tomato based stuff, etc)
| are also bad.
|
| * anything spicy is really bad too
|
| * no caffeine
|
| * stopping eating before i feel full. this is hard for me
| because i've been a "eat until i'm stuffed" person my
| entire life and it's really satisfying for me to do so.
|
| * stopping drinking helps but i got symptoms to go away
| pretty well even with moderate+ levels of drinking. but
| mostly just sticking to liquor and no cocktails or beer
| or seltzers. wine seems okay.
|
| * sitting upright after eating for at least an hour or
| two
|
| * not eating for at least a few hours before bed
|
| * exercise helps a bit but isn't critical for me
|
| * daily allergy pill and nasal spray, even missing one
| day sucks
|
| dry eyes are my first symptom that i did something
| "wrong". once i learned to listen to that it helped a
| ton. if i do "wrong" things for like a week straight, the
| constant dizziness starts, and if i go on much further
| than that then the vertigo attacks start.
| faustlast wrote:
| Do you get headaches because of your dry eyes? (specifically,
| after staring at screens for a long time)
| Trasmatta wrote:
| I generally don't get headaches luckily. When my dry eye was
| a lot more severe I had to strain to see the screen, and
| would sometimes get them then. It's better managed now (but
| still severe).
| theropost wrote:
| Blepharitis perhaps?
| AlisdairO wrote:
| I used to (and I didn't find much relief from eye drops). For
| the headaches, turned out they were migraines, which I was
| getting from screwing up my face because my eyes were
| uncomfortable.
| someothherguyy wrote:
| It is suspect to me that a lot of waste products end up being
| pushed as supplements. Also, there is a swath of junk science
| associated with nutrition publishing.
| lambdaba wrote:
| It's used in TBI, see Dr. Barry Sears for some accounts.
|
| "Fish oil helped save our son"
| https://edition.cnn.com/2012/10/19/health/fish-oil-brain-
| inj...
|
| > Most of the studies about omega-3 for traumatic brain
| injury are in animals, but they indicate potential for
| healing the human brain.
|
| > After a trauma, the brain tends to swell, and the
| connections between some nerve cells can become damaged,
| while other cells simply die.
|
| > National Institutes of Health research suggests that
| omega-3 fatty acids may inhibit cell death and could be
| instrumental for reconnecting damaged neurons.
|
| > Another recent study revealed genes that are activated to
| contain massive damage - especially inflammation - when the
| brain is injured. What activates those genes: omega-3.
|
| > "We have strong data that suggest omega-3 will activate
| good proteins to cope with brain damage and turn off proteins
| that cause neuroinflammation," said Dr. Nicolas Bazan,
| director of the Neuroscience Center of Excellence at LSU
| Health in New Orleans and author of the study.
|
| > Bailes consulted with a fish oil expert and eventually
| decided that administering 20 grams a day of omega-3 fish oil
| through a feeding tube might repair the myelin sheath. (For
| comparison: A typical supplemental dose for someone with an
| uninjured brain is about 2 grams a day.)
| hirvi74 wrote:
| TBI is a wide spectrum of conditions akin to "trauma" in
| psychological terms.
|
| I skimmed the article, but I didn't see any specific
| medical terms used. The reason I am curious is because I do
| not think that mTBI like concussions cause brain swelling
| since the injury is more of a functional injury than a
| structural injury.
|
| I like to play ice hockey as an adult, and I try to do
| everything reasonably possible to protect my brain from
| vulcanized rubber disks flying at my head at 0 < x 100 mph.
| Perhaps I will add some fish oil back into my diet. I
| already uses Lion's Mane, but I am not sure if it truly
| does anything, but I love the taste of the product I use,
| so I will continue to use it regardless. Not sure if I have
| ever had a "real" concussion, but definitely some ringers.
| lambdaba wrote:
| Sorry, this was just a quick search, I first heard about
| this from Dr. Barry Sears, and he had several accounts of
| miraculous recovery with massive doses of fish oil (20g+)
| AStonesThrow wrote:
| > TBI is a wide spectrum of conditions akin to "trauma"
| in psychological terms.
|
| I don't understand. "Trauma" was fairly well defined in
| physical terms: see Trauma Centers specializing in
| accident/crime victims.
|
| Psychological "trauma" is only by analogy, and not
| classical "trauma", and the term is rapidly undergoing
| its own expansion, to a point where high prices at the
| grocery store can "traumatize" a sane adult with a social
| media account.
| someothherguyy wrote:
| > Dr. Barry Sears
|
| Why would I refer to anecdotes from a medical doctor? If
| this is a real thing, we should be seeing it by now. The
| article you linked is nearly 15 years old.
|
| People have been eating fish oil capsules in droves over
| the last two decades. They are readily accessible to people
| with TBIs. Where are all the miracles?
| Etheryte wrote:
| This is incredibly common with things such as fungi, which
| are known to have numerous benefits across a wide body of
| studies. The catch is that most of the supplements are just
| filler, leftover parts you can't use for much else e.g.
| ground up stem or even growth medium that has little to
| nothing in it.
| AStonesThrow wrote:
| Table salt is refined after harvest, removing all other
| minerals and nutrients that aren't NaCl. And then those
| "waste products" are sold very lucratively to specialized
| supplement companies -- magnesium, selenium, calcium: you
| know, highly valued trace minerals.
|
| Your table salt is a pure and translucent white because it's
| nutritionally worthless. You can season food, but you're not
| adding any micronutrients. And this is why low-sodium diets
| became very important: not because the salt itself was
| harmful, but because its essence has changed!
|
| Salt's name will not inform you whether it's been refined.
| Sea salt, Himalayan salt, Kosher salt. The key is inspecting
| it for dark particles and natural impurities. Beware opaque
| boxes.
|
| Unrefined salt may carry an FDA-mandated warning that claims
| it doesn't contain iodide, but welcome to Bizarro World,
| because they don't remove naturally-occurring iodide, but
| since it hasn't been added back in, they're obligated to deny
| it.
| throwaway2037 wrote:
| In most industrialised countries, table salt has iodine as
| an additive. I would not call that "nutritionally
| worthless".
| AStonesThrow wrote:
| I would consider it potentially harmful.
|
| Ingesting iodine, much less deliberately fortifying salt
| for everyone to ingest, is the worst possible way to use
| it. Ingested iodine can lead to serious trouble, and does
| not produce the desired effect on the thyroid.
|
| I ordered some potassium iodide from an organic
| supplement vendor. Indeed, the product directions said to
| take by mouth. I was directed in no uncertain terms to
| ignore that. I applied it transdermally.
|
| Transdermal application has great advantage. You can't
| overdose. The skin will absorb a necessary amount, and no
| more. Wipe off the excess.
|
| About 20 years ago, an inexperienced but eager PA started
| me on Levothyroxine for no good reason. It appears that
| no lasting damage was sustained by my thyroid.
|
| Today, my TSH/T4/T3 levels are completely normal. I've
| been drug-free for over 12 months. Last week, my PCP
| agreed that there is no evidence of thyroid dysfunction.
| ywvcbk wrote:
| Wouldn't you have to consume extreme amounts of iodized
| salt for it to become an issue? At that point excess
| sodium would probably be causing significantly bigger
| problems..
| AStonesThrow wrote:
| Exactly, exactly, and that may indeed be the intent: make
| this heretofore innocuous and beneficial staple into
| something really undesirable, while you plead with us to
| moderate consumption. Then the "I-told-you-so's" come
| naturally!
| estarkio wrote:
| I'm curious about your statement that transdermal
| overdose is impossible. If I applied this to the entirety
| of my body simultaneously, how would my foot know to stop
| dragging in the potassium iodide after my neck got its
| fill?
| hombre_fatal wrote:
| Unrefined salt isn't a good source of any of the minerals
| that it incidentally might have. Kinda sounds like you're
| about to link us to a blog post about how it cures diseases
| (that also sells unrefined salt).
| AStonesThrow wrote:
| I am not, but consider that unrefined salt is less worse
| than the refined stuff, which as I pointed out, does
| nothing but season food.
|
| You should also consider the inestimable value of salt to
| the ancient world, and perhaps not merely for its
| preservative uses. Perhaps salt today is uniformly worse
| than it was thousands of years ago, because all the
| really good deposits are tapped out?
|
| Salt is one of the many things that is still trading on
| its "brand name" and reputation, yet it's been replaced
| by an impostor.
| hombre_fatal wrote:
| Table salt does more than season food. It can increase
| your blood pressure and CVD outcomes, especially in the
| doses you get from packaged foods and some cuisines.
| That's something to consider when most of us are dying of
| heart disease.
|
| I don't buy the claim that unrefined salt is less worse
| than refined salt because we're talking about minute
| amounts of nutrients. You get the nutrients from the food
| you eat, not the salt you put on it. Do the math and show
| me otherwise.
| FollowingTheDao wrote:
| > Omega 3 supplements are such a wild world.
|
| That's why you should get it from seafood and grass fed mammals
| (if you need long chain PUFAs) or flaxseed (if you need short
| chain PUFAs).
|
| There are probably many other things in seafood that co-exist
| with Omega 3 for a reason.
| lambdaba wrote:
| I've researched trustworthy brands a lot, the ones I settled on
| are Nootropics Depot, Viva Naturals and Nordic Naturals. I
| prefer those with only Vit E as preservative.
| AbstractH24 wrote:
| What led you to settle on these?
| lambdaba wrote:
| - Nootropics Depot because I know the owner (online) and
| they do rigorous testing
|
| - Viva Naturals from recommendations and testing (Labdoor)
|
| - Nordic Naturals is a well-known premium brand
|
| frankly I haven't documented, these are just some things
| out of the top my head
| tharmas wrote:
| Have you tried Lutein?
| l5870uoo9y wrote:
| Another important aspect regarding supplements; so few are
| tested for how well they are absorbed by human digestion.
| 2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote:
| It's amazing the lengths some people will go to avoid eating
| fish.
| naitgacem wrote:
| Fish can be prohibitively expensive even in parts of the
| world with access to large amounts of seashorres. Think:
| North Africa.
| 2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote:
| I'm not talking to them I'm on HN with a buncha rich nerds
| looking for supplements.
| wezdog1 wrote:
| Why is that amazing. Why not get it from the source. Algae
| Beijinger wrote:
| I think there is a Russian medicine for dry eye: Visomitin
|
| But I remember a study that claimed it does not work. Also, may
| be currently hard to get.
| ahallock wrote:
| There are conflicting studies, but recently, it was determined
| you need adequate vitamin B levels to support omega-3.
|
| As an aside, you can definitely over-dose on omega-3 which can
| cause afib, and increase your chance of stroke. I was taking 2
| grams per day and definitely had arrhythmia issues. Decreasing
| the dosage to 500mg per day eliminated the arrhythmia.
| dmix wrote:
| Didn't know that was possible with Omega 3. The pills I have
| are 660mg and recommends 1 per day, seems you took about 3.5x
| that dose
|
| By the way, how can you detect arrhythmia? Blood pressure
| monitor or Apple Watch? General feeling?
| naasking wrote:
| People can often feel arrhythmia. It can feel like heart
| fluttering, or skipping a beat, like when you get startled.
| Depends on the type of arrhythmia too.
| AStonesThrow wrote:
| That's exactly how "palpitations" were so named, because
| they can be unmistakably felt by the patient.
| zmmmmm wrote:
| The elephant in the room is that true randomised controlled
| trials take decades to do and even then are almost impossible
| to build in a way that teases out nuances such as the specific
| effects of individual compounds within a supplement.
|
| So we are effectively left with pseudoscience as the only other
| option, but what would you rather do - sacrifice all of the
| insight and knowledge we are learning at such a rapid pace in
| medicine today, just because there's no feasible way to prove
| it within your lifetime (like, if you wait 20 years for
| observational studies to show that humans benefit from Omega 3
| you will have missed the entire window when it would have been
| beneficial).
|
| We have to find a balance, but it can't sit at the extreme of
| requiring everything to meet an impossible bar of scientific
| proof before we start to benefit from it. But the price to pay
| is that some of them are not going to pan out.
| wafflemaker wrote:
| Your dry eye condition is probably way too severe for this to
| help, but here is a method that helps my eyes stay more healthy
| the more I stare into the PC screen:
|
| Eye exercises!
|
| Eye tissue is very suspectable to drying and eyes are fed with
| only one small artery.
|
| This makes simple exercises super effective!
|
| To enforce a routine I use 'safeeyes' on Linux. A mac
| alternative is EyeLeo (haven't tested). If you have a windows
| one, please share!
|
| I change settings to have a break every 10 minutes for 15
| seconds. Today I'll add a new exercise to do the focus shifting
| exercise1, because your dry eye scared me.
|
| It's funny, but in the weeks when I'm not using PC and don't
| remember to exercise eyes without prompting, I can feel my
| eyesight degrading and my eyes hurt.
|
| P.S. if you've never trained your eyes, it will hurt the first
| few time, but it's the good pain, like from stretching. Don't
| overdo anyway!
|
| 1 focus shifting exercise - taken from Huberman Lab episode on
| eyesight and preventing myopia: you put a thumb in front of
| your eyes and focus on it. Then you slowly extend your arm
| forward, keeping the focus on it. After your arm is stretched,
| you switch focus to something as close to you as your extended
| arm and slowly move to different objects (or trace a wall or
| ground), changing objects when required, until you reach
| horizon (or furthest possible point). Then you trace back and
| end up moving your thumb towards your face again. One very good
| exercise that is missing from safeeyes.
| maxresdefault wrote:
| This is great, but why does Omega 3 paradoxically reduce
| expression of dopamine receptors and dopamine release
| FollowingTheDao wrote:
| Because it makes the dopamine more effective.
| daniel_reetz wrote:
| The dopamine hypothesis is being heavily debated and revisited
| these days. Might be worth checking any assumptions against
| current research.
| nightmonkey wrote:
| Does caffeine intake nullify this effect?
| cultofmetatron wrote:
| This definitely tracks with my experience. I take a tablespoon of
| cod liver oil daily and I've definitely noticed a complete
| flatlining of my emotional states. My baseline is just basic
| calmness and a general lack of "monkeymind"/intrusive thoughts.
| Really amazed its not a more prescribed treatment.
| alberth wrote:
| Cod is super high in Vitamin D, and considered by many
| historians the secret food that contributed to Vikings success.
|
| https://goodness-exchange.com/cod-vikings-vitamin-d/
| Beijinger wrote:
| Cod is super high in Vitamin A too and I would be worried
| about your liver.
| throwaway2037 wrote:
| According to USDA, Atlantic Cod has no vitamin A. What is
| your source?
| Beijinger wrote:
| Sorry, maybe it was a misunderstanding, especially since
| the Vikings were mentioned on the thread.
|
| I was thinking about this:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cod_liver_oil
| Trasmatta wrote:
| Does it also flatline your positive emotions? Ashwaganda does a
| similar thing for a lot of people, it tamps down their anxiety
| and depression but suppresses most other emotions as well (it's
| called anhedonia).
| cultofmetatron wrote:
| I would definitely say so. I can still feel happy if I choose
| to but I don't feel upward swings. Overall I'd say its a net
| positive as I generally feel content.
| AbstractH24 wrote:
| Many people complain of a similar flatlining with NAC as
| well, I've had a positive mood change because of it and
| drastic memory improvement.
| carabiner wrote:
| It didn't affect me at all when I took it for a few years. No
| noticeable positive or negative effect.
| aucisson_masque wrote:
| used to drink cod liver oil daily, then i learned how it's
| processed... I would advise just taking vitamin d pill and
| eating 2 to 3 times a week fat fish.
|
| About cod liver oil manufacturing :
| https://www.rositausa.com/cdn/shop/articles/Rosita-Postcard-...
|
| Everything is so polluted that either you're drinking oil that
| contains plastics and chemicals, or you're drinking an oil that
| has been completely destroyed and rebuilt using vitamin D, A
| and omega 3 from third party manufacturer.
| dmix wrote:
| Any particular types of fish or sources of that fish fat?
| zug_zug wrote:
| So for what it's worth here's my experience -- generally
| not super impressed with supplements, tried cod-liver oil,
| didn't notice much effect, but after starting to make
| homemade salmon sashimi from costco salmon (Yes it's a
| thing, youtube it), I started noticing reduced anxiety and
| better concentration on days when I did so.
|
| I would eat about 2/3rds of a pound of raw salmon and
| notice this effect (which would be like $60 or more at a
| sushi restaurant). I've done this at least 20 times now and
| never had any issues.
|
| Generally I don't mention the mental effects of the salmon
| to people because I feel like they wouldn't take it very
| seriously, but since you're asking and it's on-topic, I
| thought I'd share.
| aucisson_masque wrote:
| Mackerel, sardine.
|
| I believe they are amongst the best source of Omega 3.
| Technically you could still eat cod liver but you would
| still eat big amount of pollutants because it's the liver.
| strken wrote:
| What am I meant to be getting out of that link? I don't care
| about vitamin A/D and I don't see any point where they're
| adding third-party omega 3s back in.
|
| It also seems pretty low-quality. "Our oil uses some
| mysterious process labelled 'oil released in 15 minutes' so
| it's good! Their process uses a grinder and a centrifuge, and
| look, we added bloodstains and made the centrifuge brown to
| show how bad that is!"
| aucisson_masque wrote:
| I believe when you heat the oil to 374deg, it kills
| vitamins but also Omega 3. It's the oxidation, that's why
| Omega 3 is sold in pill or you get something like 3 month
| to end your bottle of cod liver oil.
|
| I didn't notice the color as distracting, the oil actually
| change color when heated up.
|
| Look if you are interested in your health, there are plenty
| reputable source of information on cod liver oil.
|
| For instance https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/
| abs/pii/S00456...
|
| > The results indicate that although currently produced
| fish oils may undergo rigorous purification procedures and
| show low contaminant levels, cod livers sourced from the
| Baltic and consumed locally, continue to contribute
| substantially to the dietary intake of these contaminants.
| mmanfrin wrote:
| Well this is a great thing to see an hour after buying some O3s.
|
| I have read though that omega-3 _supplements_ seem to not do
| much, it 's the intake of them dietarily that show results, I'm
| not sure how current that research is. I've also read that algae
| as a source might be better? There's a tremendous amount of
| conflicting information.
| oarfish wrote:
| > I have read though that omega-3 supplements seem to not do
| much
|
| afaik that holds for a lot (if not most) commonly used
| supplements (vitamins are another popular offender). Sometimes
| the reason is the food matrix effect, where just isolated
| nutrients are not as beneficial as when they are consumed along
| with other nutrients. Sometimes (like vitamin D or
| testosterone), the biomarker is reflective of health status,
| not predictive.
|
| From this [1] podcast (2y old at this point) I too seem to
| remember that it doesn't do much most of the time, that
| supplements are generally untrustworthy w.r.t. dosing and
| purity and there's also a slight chance of giving yourself
| afib.
|
| 1. https://soundcloud.com/user-344313169/episode-193-fish-oil
| reubensutton wrote:
| There's never been a better time to be a mouse
| CatWChainsaw wrote:
| Right up until any given study with mice concludes...
| atombender wrote:
| Or a worse one. I know you're making a joke, but it doesn't
| seem that funny to me -- U.S. biomedical industry goes through
| about 111 million lab mice and rats each year [1]. Most mice
| lives are short and cruel, living their entire lives in tiny
| plastic boxes and often subjected to horrific experiences. We
| should be more thankful.
|
| [1] https://www.science.org/content/article/how-many-mice-and-
| ra...
| hirvi74 wrote:
| I really appreciate that someone else shares my opinions on
| this matter. It pains me what we do to animals for our
| benefit. I suppose there is no other alternative, but that
| does not diminish the cruelty.
|
| I feel the same way about the "Boar's Head" meat recall in
| the US due to Listeria. 7 million pounds of meat must be
| disposed of. That means every single one of the pigs died for
| that meat died for absolutely nothing at all. It just doesn't
| sit right with me.
| PlattypusRex wrote:
| This isn't funny. Mice and rats are among the most intelligent
| animals used in research, and despite ethical regulations on
| their treatment, they are often ignored. Many of these animals
| endure severe procedures without adequate pain relief, or none
| at all. This widespread suffering also causes mental health
| problems for many of the researchers who have to regularly
| euthanize them. These animals sacrifice their lives to improve
| human health and well-being. At the very least, we should show
| respect for their pain and suffering, which is undertaken for
| our benefit.
| ahallock wrote:
| Have they made any mice immortal yet (with continuous
| treatments of stem cells and other therapies)?
| voytec wrote:
| "Omega-3" is as vague and underdescriptive term as "marihuana".
| We're better educated now and we can focus on the
| eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA) and docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) where
| it comes to Omega 3. And we can point at THC, CBN, CBD or any of
| the 100+ other cannabinoids present in cannabis flowers when we
| describe "marihuana", "weed" or "pot".
|
| And there's a reason behind my local pharmacy offering THC-
| focused or CBD-focused pot, and my local supplements store
| offering DHA-focused and EPA-focused softgels, produced by the
| same company and under the same brand. How these these products
| act varies by active substances content and the person. Both
| "Omega 3" and "marihuana" are dumbed-down terms, meaningless when
| it comes to studies or papers.
|
| There's a ton of studies on nih.gov about EPA's potential as an
| antidepressant, misaligned with DHA-related articles on the
| subject, that I could link. But I can say - purely anecdotally -
| that I removed psypost.org feed from my RSS reader a few months
| after ChatGPT became public.
| orblivion wrote:
| I had been under the mistaken impression that DHA was only
| interesting inasmuch as your body inefficiently turns it into
| EPA.
| adrian_b wrote:
| DHA and EPA have distinct roles in the body.
|
| Both are necessary for most people, especially for males and
| for older people, because the inter-conversions between the
| various omega-3 fatty acids are done inefficiently by humans.
|
| The other omega-3 fatty acids do not have known functions,
| except as sources of DHA and EPA, after an enzymatic
| conversion.
| derefr wrote:
| I think there's a practical distinction between the kind of
| term "omega-3" is vs the kind of term "marijuana" is.
|
| You mostly only find THC/CBD/etc _in_ marijuana; and we mostly
| only consume marijuana to get those particular active
| ingredients into our bodies. So you can forget about
| "marijuana" as a category for describing those compounds, and
| just speak of the compounds themselves -- measure marijuana
| strains by the presence of those active ingredients; extract
| and purify one particular active ingredient and sell it; etc.
| Doing this doesn't lose you anything; in fact, it's a pure win,
| as the use of precise language gives people a tool to leverage
| to more precisely ask for the effect they're looking for, and
| gives suppliers a tool to more precisely describe what they're
| selling.
|
| While the omega-3 constituent compounds _can_ be treated this
| way, they are not _solely_ a thing we extract or synthesize to
| put in precise-molarity-per-dose pills; they 're _also_ a thing
| found _in food_. Many different foods; with most of them being
| foods people eat for reasons _beyond_ just getting omega-3s in
| their bodies. In other words, the "omega-3" constituent
| compounds are _nutrients_.
|
| And many of these omega-3-containing foods -- fish, for example
| -- aren't carefully cultivated species that have known ratios
| of the omega-3 constituent compounds that could be put on the
| label of the food-product. Rather, the ratio of those
| constituent compounds is pretty much random per individual food
| item. One salmon at the grocery store has omega-3 fats which
| happen to be high in DHA, while the next salmon beside it in
| the same cooler display is higher in EPA. All you can _in
| general_ about a food product -- all a supplier can say, and
| all a _food_ shopper can generally expect to look for -- is a
| food that is "high in omega-3s."
|
| As long as people are interested in optimizing their health in
| a loose manner by eating "healthful foods" -- rather than
| taking specifically-formulated supplements -- I don't expect
| they'll let go of the generic categorical term "omega-3." When
| it comes to _food_ , "it contains omega-3s" is almost always
| the tightest bound you can put on the "nutritional value" of a
| given food.
| sheepdestroyer wrote:
| I'm not so sure about the incertitude you speak of about
| omega-3s content and ratios in food.
|
| In fact while in Japan I used to specifically select my bags
| of dried sardine (niboshi) and mackerel cans by the content
| of EPA and DHA, clearly indicated in mg per 100g. Every such
| products had these indications with content varying by
| brands.
|
| I guess that if you master your process you can ensure and
| advertise a consistent quality.
| derefr wrote:
| Processed fish products are a bit different from a large
| chunk of a single fish, in terms of the promises that can
| be made.
|
| The problem with large, wild-caught fish, is that different
| fish are going to be living in slightly-different regions,
| or migrating through given regions at slightly-different
| times, and so eating different things; and so will have
| more or less of any given nutrient coming from those things
| in their bodies.
|
| If you're catching large swarms/schools of fish, all the
| fish _in_ a given school will be mostly identical in their
| nutritional content. And so, if you 're doing some bulk
| operation like canning or drying, and you're doing it on
| fish that swarm/school and get caught as whole
| swarms/schools (such as sardine or mackerel) -- then, for
| each catch delivered to your plant by a fishing vessel, you
| can take a few samples from that catch to get a sense of
| the average micronutrient values of that catch; and then
| you can store these catches separately, _titrating
| together_ the different catches into each processed
| mixture, to achieve the a steady nutritional value in the
| result. (This is roughly the same thing that e.g. orange
| juice companies do with the truckloads of oranges they buy
| to achieve a consistent output juice product.)
|
| But if you're just buying e.g. one salmon, then it came
| through an entirely different logistics pipeline to get to
| you -- either an "independent" one where a small-time
| fisherman sold some fish directly to a local fishmonger,
| who then sold it directly to a local grocer, a few fish at
| a time; or a "big chain" one where a stream of flash-frozen
| fish from fishing vessels is being just-in-time streamed
| out to various grocery stores. (This lack of a fan-in
| processing step for raw large fish is also why grocers end
| up with so much mislabelled fish; the guy who works at a
| fish processing plant near the fishery will recognize all
| the fish that fishery tends to pull out of the water; but
| there's no similar expert in the meat department of a
| random grocery store in Idaho -- in fact, that person might
| not even know which fishery the fish they're receiving came
| from!)
| dragonwriter wrote:
| The specific supplement used in this research [0] was equal
| parts DHA and EPA (no ALA, which is the third main Omega-3.)
| Determining whether the effect is specific to one of the
| Omega-3's or general to the class would be an expected subject
| of further research, as would seeing if the effect holds
| outside of the lab mice model.
|
| There's a whole lot of work between this study and anything
| actionable other than for planning further research to confirm
| and better understand the effect, and whatever more general
| problems psypost.com may have, reporting the source of the
| effect as "Omega-3" is both consistent with the paper and not
| overly general given the actual facts.
|
| [0] Linked from the story, but:
| https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S235228952...
| QuantumGood wrote:
| High quality EPA was the only thing that universally worked for
| a family member with depression. Tried changing sources one
| time and felt the difference in about 2 days. Got back on the
| previous source and back out of depression.
| dukeofdoom wrote:
| Anxiety and depressions are feelings. Eating feels good for a
| little bit. But I could easily make the claim that getting a dog
| and taking it for regular walks in nature counteracts symptoms of
| anxiety and depression. Doing Yoga with synchronized
| breathing...same Taking a hot bath, a sauna session, a massage,
| sex, a long list. Why do so many people think eating something is
| the path to good health.
|
| Also knowing how things are encoded in neural networks, where
| it's a combination of variables that sets off some behaviour. Why
| do Scientists still persist on trying to isolate a single
| variable.
| FollowingTheDao wrote:
| I take it you were never in a psychiatric hospital with people
| urging you to get ECT?
|
| I was. Hot baths don't work, but that's just me. Blanket
| recommendations are useless and harmful. It turns out I have a
| genetic issue causing my mood issues and diet is my treatment.
| dukeofdoom wrote:
| By all means, eat as much healthy food as you can afford. But
| whatever caused your psychiatric problems, it couldn't have
| been food. Unless you're so poor that you severely
| malnourished, or you're eating something severely toxic. And
| even then, lots of places in this world with malnourished
| populations that are not depressed.
|
| Improving the quality of your life is not just food. It's all
| the other things that go into it. Like autonomy, sense of
| security, friends, social status, finances, physical activity
| levels, etc.
|
| So be sure to look after improving those things too.
|
| And my suggestion for walking a dog, is a simple and
| practical suggestion for something that will get you both
| companionship and exercise.
|
| From personal experience, quitting smoking helped with
| anxiety. That longing feeling for a cigarette was making me
| anxious, and that feeling would persist even after having
| one. So quitting was helpful. But again, smoking is not
| eating.
| FollowingTheDao wrote:
| > By all means, eat as much healthy food as you can afford.
| But whatever caused your psychiatric problems, it couldn't
| have been food
|
| Are there purines, like Inosine and Guanosine, in food?
|
| Did you even ask what my genetic disorder is?
| dukeofdoom wrote:
| I'm always open to learning things I don't know about ...
| go on
| FollowingTheDao wrote:
| Cool.
|
| I have a Partial PNP Deficiency that makes it harder for
| me to break down Inosine and Guanosine (and xanthine). My
| PNP enzyme only functions at about 12% of most "normal"
| people.
|
| Image: https://www.frontiersin.org/files/Articles/538247/
| fimmu-11-0...
|
| Paper on the topic: https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/
| immunology/articles/10....
|
| So how does food affect me?
|
| They use Inosine (Inosinic acid) and Guanosine (Guanylic
| acid) in foods as a food additives to increase the umami.
|
| https://www.eurofins.com/media-centre/newsletters/food-
| newsl...
|
| These are also found naturally in many foods:
| https://www.umamiinfo.com/richfood/
|
| When I eat these foods I cannot break these purines down
| and they not only cause mood issues but also an immune
| deficiency.
|
| Purinergic System Dysfunction is linked to mood
| disorders:
| https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4262688/
|
| After going on a low specific purine diet I no longer
| need any of the three psychiatric medications I was on
| but for klonopin since there are some triggers I cannot
| avoid.
|
| Food did this. Food and having a good doctor who did not
| give up on me. Food and knowing what my genetics are. I
| get that some people might benefit from Yoga, etc, but to
| serve a blanket statement like that is just ignorant of
| the genetic and environmental diversity of humanity. I
| have these genetics because I have Sami heritage and I am
| adapted to live in a cold climate and eating low purine,
| high zinc foods. Zinc also helps me break down the
| purines by stimulating LACC1, which is a sort of PNP
| backup. A zinc deficiency when I was young left me with
| an undecended testicle because of my LACC1 genetics.
|
| https://www.uniprot.org/uniprotkb/Q8IV20/entry
| seper8 wrote:
| Super interesting, thanks for sharing
| jaggederest wrote:
| Thank you for posting the genetic polymorphism, makes it
| much easier to cross reference. Glad you've found an
| answer!
| dukeofdoom wrote:
| Thank you, interesting read. My friend that has an
| autistic son, wants to cure him through diet changes. Do
| you know anything food related to autism?
| FollowingTheDao wrote:
| Not really, but this may be a good start:
|
| Purine signaling pathway dysfunction in autism spectrum
| disorders: Evidence from multiple omics data
| https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9935591/
|
| and
|
| https://www.mdpi.com/2218-1989/10/5/184
|
| I do not think the spectrum of autism are caused by a
| single gene or environmental factor. I was diagnosed with
| Asperger's as well, much too late in life.
| ec109685 wrote:
| Allergies are a thing. Why is it hard to believe that certain
| types of food affect people in specific ways?
| readyplayernull wrote:
| On a related topic, I started taking bacopa monnieri and it
| improved my memory and mental endurance, anxiety and depression.
| I gave it to my wife and had the totally opposite effect:
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bacopa_monnieri
|
| Also I can drink coffee and won't make any effect on my sleep,
| while my wife gets the boost. I wouldn't be surprised the effects
| of all those supplements depend on your body chemistry.
|
| They can't differentiate the population, so all these studies
| will average zero.
| huuhee3 wrote:
| Yep, what works for one may not work for others. Some people
| find L-theanine supplement helpful for reducing anxiety. For me
| it kind of worked, but then gave bad anxiety as a withdrawal
| symptom.
| crucialfelix wrote:
| Bacopa Monnieri aka Brahmi has been very effective to eliminate
| mental turbulence for me. It has a calming, sharp, bitter
| effect. It's like it's cleaning something up. If my mind is
| overactive in bed at night I take Brahmi and I quickly feel
| settled.
| DrBenCarson wrote:
| Are you measuring your vitals during sleep with a watch or a
| ring? Might not be affecting your ability to fall asleep but
| hard to imagine it does nothing to your brain or heart while
| you're unconscious
| meindnoch wrote:
| When I took omega-3 in addition to duloxetine, I got terrible
| brain zaps the whole day.
| scellus wrote:
| That's interesting, zaps are a withdrawal syndrome of SSRIs
| (and duloxetine).
| meindnoch wrote:
| Yep. That's where I knew brain zaps from, because I
| previously experienced them when coming off SSRIs.
| seper8 wrote:
| I had them after an accidental too big MDMA dose, after
| which I felt depressed for a few weeks.
| olyjohn wrote:
| Buspirone (an anti-anxiety) gave me brain zaps within an hour
| of taking it. Didn't seem to help with the anxiety at all
| though...
| fredgrott wrote:
| It should not be title Omega-3!
|
| The article clearly States Omega-3, 8, and Omega-9!
| hereme888 wrote:
| Why are we still looking at mice studies for such a human-used
| substance?
|
| This study used EPA: 0.55 mg/kg/day, and DHA: 0.55 mg/kg/day.
|
| Among the largest I've heard in human studies are things like
| 4,400mg EPA and 2,200mg DHA.
|
| Examine.com is one of the best resources to understand what
| evidence shows about supplements.
|
| EPA appears to be the component that works for depression.
|
| Also, important these days, is the quality: it should be filtered
| from heavy metals, and processed and stored in a way that avoids
| it going rancid by the time you consume it.
|
| I strongly believe in the benefits of having a higher
| omega-3:omega-6 ratio than is common nowadays.
| mattnewton wrote:
| > Once the behavioral tests were completed, the mice were
| killed, and their blood and tissues were analyzed to assess the
| biological effects of stress and omega-3 supplementation.
|
| I think they are trying to show biological causes by carefully
| controlling the mice's entire life and then cracking them open
| at the end of the study. Can't really do that with humans.
| ahallock wrote:
| You have to be careful with such high doses over a long period
| of time. It can cause heart arrhythmia.
| genewitch wrote:
| There's a study about omega3 supplementation that says that if
| children in a family supplement it, that the parents have a
| better relationship, even if they don't supplement. I can
| probably dig it out, given enough time with a search engine.
|
| Another one is D. over the course of three years i managed to
| help my wife get above 100ng/ml 25-hydroxy-D on a blood test. Of
| course every doctor called and said "too high" and her Calcium is
| too high too, but not from the D3, folks, because she takes K2
| Mk7. Her calcium is high because she mostly drinks fortified
| orange juice _and_ was taking 1200mg calcium per day at the
| direction of her oncologist. She has a lot of chronic issues and
| we 're slowly trying to mitigate everything possible with diet
| and supplements. The specialist said "stop calcium immediately"
| and "reduce D for 1 month" only. for those aware her Ca was 10.9
| ("good" range is ~9.0 - 10.2). I guarantee that her calcium will
| go back to normal because of the K2 between now and her next
| blood panel. _note_ : they don't actually test D levels unless
| you ask, in general. One might wonder why that is - i know i
| certainly do.
|
| In fact, i was just about to go to the pharmacy to get Omega-3
| supplements when i saw this post. Her chart shows that she _must_
| supplement omega 3, since she won 't eat baked salmon. My kid
| already has vitamins with omegas in them.
|
| What i recommend is actually reading studies - completely - and
| if you have any questions or doubts, befriend researchers in
| biology or other life sciences that can skim the paper and tell
| you "meh" or "hey that's cool". Studies contradict, studies may
| have bad inputs or methodology, the only way to know for sure is
| to read as many as you can as thoroughly as you can, and if
| possible, consult experts. Medical doctors of the "PCP"
| persuasion are _not_ experts, generally.
| eightysixfour wrote:
| You could just pay for an examine.com subscription. That's
| pretty much what they offer as a service - third party
| evaluation of studies to provide unbiased advice for different
| supplements.
| ilius2 wrote:
| All omega-3 supplements are probably somewhat rancid and possibly
| harmful, specially in solid / pill form! I personally take cod
| liver oil (liquid) from a reputable brand, but I still don't %100
| trust it to be healthy. It's much better to eat fatty fish or
| actual cod liver.
| alihm wrote:
| Can you say which brand? And what research have you found on
| them? I also do the same and just wonder if they actually work
| or not
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