#387
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#388

Why take Lithium at bedtime?

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#389

I take all my supplements with a glass of milk and crash… letting them slowly abdorb while I sleep.

They don’t cause any issues in sleep quality. Last thing I do at night.

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#390

Nothing really actionable in this video. Largely an ad to hype paying $19.99 / mo. to join his ‘Psysionic Insiders’ channel to even find out what type of lithium to use. He also points out that studies used 300-400ug of lithium. Nick Norwitz piece is better; he says he’s taking 5mg or lithium orotate daily (but doesn’t address the 5mg elemental lithium v. ~130mg lithium orotate discussion which has been addressed here).

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#391

I thought the images of brain plaques in the mice were interesting. You always need to ignore the request to become a physionic insider in his videos.

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#392

I also take it at bedtime as I’m taking dapagliflozin in the morning (SGLT2is lower lithium levels) and telmisartan in the evening (increases lithium levels). If lithium acts by clearing amyloid then it might be better to do that at night which is when a lot of clearing is done? In Defense Of The Amyloid Hypothesis

However, lithium orotate has a long half-life so it shouldn’t matter that much.

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#393

Lithium itself does not get metabolised. Hence it is entirely an excretion issue.

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#394

Yes, SGLT2 inhibitors enhance the renal excretion of lithium: “Fractional lithium excretion increased by 19.6% (from 6.7 to 34.2; p < 0.01), suggesting inhibition of sodium reabsorption in the proximal tubule.” (Effects of Dapagliflozin on Volume Status When Added to Renin-Angiotensin System Inhibitors 2019)

Telmisartan lowers lithium renal excretion, but it’s unclear by how much (about -26% for ACEIs: Lithium and angiotensin-converting enzyme inhibitors: evaluation of a potential interaction - PubMed )

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#395

I don’t think the body has a target for lithium levels unlike sodium. Hence the excretion will be heavily linked to the serum levels.

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#396

How much Lithium did you say you were taking personally in case I missed it?

#397

Lithium orotate 1 mg: Lithium, 1000 mcg, 100 capsules - - Life Extension

I might try 5 mg. For now, 1 mg does the job for me (I notice it when I don’t take it).

Before that, I tried lithium gluconate and lithium citrate, the only forms available OTC in France (also 1 mg). Orotate felt more potent, and I kept using it. The recent paper confirms my subjective feeling.

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#398

Please elaborate “you notice when you don’t take it”.
Seems like a wide range of dosing from 1 mg to 10 mg.

#399

I already mentioned it here: when I don’t take lithium I’m more sensitive to day-to-day stress. Let’s say you have an appointment for something and you’re stuck in traffic and you know you’ll arrive late, maybe by a few minutes, maybe so much that you’ll miss the appointment. Without lithium I would be worried, try to look at alternatives, with lithium I’m a bit in a “that’s life and I can’t do anything” mode. That’s the best analogy I can find. It makes my life smoother. On days with actual stress I tried 2 mg and it seems that the effect are dose dependent. Others here mentioned a similar feeling.

In terms of cognition I haven’t seen benefits but it’s hard to measure and in any case I’m sure that stress negatively affects cognition in the long run.

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#400

Puts up glucose. Increases ROS.

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#401

Are you saying stress increases glucose and ROS, or lithium does? Just to clarify.

#402

Stress which tends to involve cortisol increases glucose.

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#403

Where do Ergothionienes (e.g., Maitake and other mushrooms) fit with Lithium in the cognition paradigm.
Any synergies or antagonism? Or, ergo alone is sufficient?

#404

New Commentary by Peter Attia’s group on the paper discussed above in this thread.

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#405

100%. Started wearing a CGM, and when stressed, glucose went up even though it was still in a fasted state. Also, when exercising, glucose went up. I recommend that everyone test Fasting Insulin as well to gain a fuller picture of their metabolic health.

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#406

People might find this amusing: while at the hospital recently, they asked what drugs and supplements I take, during a phone conversation, where the person of the other end of the line had never heard most of things I mentioned (and had trouble pronouncing them). One that I mentioned was “lithium”, and I explained that I took it for its potential health-promoting uses, and I said that what I take was “thousands of times lower dose than psychiatric patients take”. She had trouble finding it in the system she was entering it into, and said something like, “lithium carbonate?” I said, “lithium orotate, like less than a milligram of elemental lithium. Maybe it’s 500 micrograms.” And what ended up on my chart was, “450 mg of lithium”. I kept getting people ask about my psychiatric state, and maybe that’s why.

A similar problem was with inulin. Some people thought I was diabetic, and read it as “insulin”. I had to keep correcting them, “no, it’s fiber… it’s IN-U-LIN”.

And then there was another lab that thought I had kidney problems, because I take creatine. I explained to the lady technician today that it raises creatinine, and that those numbers they think are telling them something are wrong. She left the room, talked to the head of the group, then came back and said, we think you should stop taking that and taking the lithium (which is about the same amount you get in food!) for a few weeks so we can run the panels and get a clean signal.

Interestingly, the more educated people I had interacted with knew immediately what I was talking about, and even said, “Oh, yeah, I take the gummies. Yeah, they mess up the blood panel interpretations. You should probably tell them.” Well, I tried… but just kept getting moved away from people I could tell these things to.

Another small issue is that one of the nurses wanted to inject me with anti-coagulants. Alas, I have very low body fat. I’m like solid muscle. She tried… but ended up bruising my belly. I should have told her to inject me in my butt.

The problems with being a little… different from what people expect…

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