I just struck the supplement goldmine... i think.
I have been only partially or not medicated for ADHD my entire life because ritalin, adderal, etc had too many side effects.
I also did not like how they altered my personality so much.
So i took to my own path there. As i did with my depression, and for the same reasons.
Also, these drugs don't work well on me. Ritalin does 33% of the job. Adderall works fantastic but is horribly addictive and has 'what comes up, must go down' effects. Adderall is a Schedule 2 substance for good reasons. I won't touch it ever again.
I recently tried out
Chinese skullcap out of my own curiosity.
Skullcap has been used in traditional medicine for eons for mental health and other issues.
When i took it, i got a boost in focus that i've never felt from anything non pharmaceutical, but this was later tinged by the GABA activity, and i had the focus, but not the sharpness to use it. My nerves were just too calm.
This lead me to read more about skullcap.. and i found out that in recent years, identification of the focus-boosting chemical, and also.. human and animal trials had been done, and all of them agree that this extract (
Oroxylin A ) butts heads with ritalin.
Like ritalin, it is a dopamine reuptake inhibitor. But it also reduces GABA activity. It isn't known to touch epinephrine like ritalin does - which is where many of the negative effects of Ritalin comes from. So this seemed promising.
I decided to give it a spin to see if there was some hope for my ADHD 3 days ago.
I took 1/5th of the human clinical trial dosage to be cautious and had my mind blown anyway.
Compared to Ritalin:
Focus boosting effect 3x better; basically perfect.
Unlike ritalin, area of focus can be controlled.
75% less off-target motor effects ( shakes, twitches, etc. ).
No 'robotic personality' effect.
No 'overconfidence' and then subsequent agitation effect.
No comedown, and focus effects last longer than a day despite a half life of 5h. Very abnormal for a stimulant.
Sweatiness a bit worse.
Heart racing nowhere near as bad.
Appetite suppressing qualities are 1/2 of Ritalin's.
No suppression of libido. Ritalin would destroy mine.
My arthritis pain, which is almost always noticeable, has faded into almost background noise. Ritalin: no change.
Long term safety is an unknown in scientific literature, so for this one, i have decided to play it safe.
There's enough efficacy here that I can cut the dose in half and still notably move the needle on my ADHD.
So i will be taking 1/2 this dose starting next week and will take that 5 days a week, then withdraw for a week to see if 'what goes up must come down'.
What is really encouraging is that the stuff appears to be reparative to the body:
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/29414645/
Interestingly, the use of natural products as a realistic option for the treatment of liver fibrosis has broadly been accepted. Oroxylin A, a safe and natural product, shows a wide range of pharmacological activities such as anti-inflammatory, anti-oxidant, and anti-tumor properties. However, the effects of Oroxylin A on liver fibrosis remain poorly understood. In the present study, we sought to determine the effect of Oroxylin A on carbon tetrachloride (CCl4)-induced liver fibrosis, and to further examine the molecular mechanisms. We found that treatment with Oroxylin A markedly decreased the level of liver injury markers, alkaline phosphatase (ALP), aspartate aminotransferase (AST), and alanine aminotransferase (ALT), in a dose dependent manner.
Given that it reduces liver injury markers, this is a good sign that it's very unlikely to harm the liver.
Moreover, Oroxylin A treatment remarkably inhibited extracellular matrix (ECM) deposition, and significantly down-regulated the mRNA and protein expression of liver fibrosis markers including α1(I)collagen, fibronectin, alpha-smooth muscle actin (α-SMA), PDGF-βR, and TGF-βR1 in CCl4-induced murine model of liver fibrosis. Furthermore, experimental results in vitro showed that Oroxylin A treatment reduced the mRNA and protein expression of HSC activation markers, α-SMA, desmin, α1 (I) collagen, fibronectin, TGF-β, and TNF-α, in a dose dependent manner.
This explains the arthritis relieving effect! some of these things it touches are target receptors of some very expensive and new drugs.
https://pubs.rsc.org/en/content/articlelanding/2021/fo/d0fo02159h
In the present study, we found that Oroxylin A (ORA), a flavonoid compound derived from Oroxylum indicum, maintained ECM hemostasis of chondrocytes by Interleukin-1β (IL-1β) stimulation. Besides, it was demonstrated that IL-1β induced over-production of inflammatory mediators was attenuated by ORA treatment. Moreover, ORA could rescue IL-1β mediated hypertrophic alterations of chondrocytes. Mechanistically, ORA's protective effects were found to be associated with both NF-κB and Wnt/β-catenin signaling inhibition.
In addition, ORA driven chondroprotective effects were also affirmed in a surgically induced OA mouse model. Taken together, the current study suggested that ORA might be a promising therapeutic option for the treatment of OA.
This sounds like a regenerative drug for arthritis!
wait a minute, they're thinking of turning it into a patented medicine?
This goes on the 'things i'm surprised i can buy on the internet - for now' list.. :lol:
