Hi everyone, here is what I took re: supp wise:
a) Once I read Yasko's info re: ammonia buildup I immediately planned on doing charcoal detox. I happened to have some bulk activated charcoal on hand, so I just put about 1/8 teaspoon in a gelatin capsule and took it. Within a few hours it was amazing. My cognition started to clear, and I had emotions (increased creativity, happiness, peacefulness) start to arise that I haven't experienced since I got sick 7 years ago! It sounds fairy-tale-ish, I know, but it was rather remarkable. I repeated this once per day for several days, and my cognition continued to get more clear, and I had more and more of these balanced emotional experiences. I did do for say 3 days in a row, and have done this I would say a total of 3 times.
b) I started taking magnesium citrate 300 mg, on the evenings of the days that I was taking the charcoal before bed. This helped me have a good movement the next am to help keep the charcoal moving through, as charcoal from what I experienced, and researched can be constipating.
c) Within a few days of starting the charcoal procedure I started Molybdenum 150 mcg (I used the Rice Chelated product from New Roots). I started with one tablet, felt even better that day, and then went up to 3 tablets/day for about a week, and concentrated my doses when I ate protein foods. I now am taking one tablet (150mcg) per day, and have seemed to stabilize at that dose.
d) With respect to diet, I was very strict for the first week & avoided all sulphur foods. I basically followed the list on this website with a few additions:
http://www.livingnetwork.co.za/chelationnetwork/food/high-sulfur-sulphur-food-list/
It became very easy to see what foods needed to be added to list for me, because I would feel AMAZING, and then AWFUL, ha, ha after eating the foods. The only addition I can think of right now would be mustard, which I don't see on this list.
e) With respect to meat, I *did restrict* it for about 2 weeks, but *did not eliminate* it. I ate what I could to tolerance. With my adrenal fatigue/reactive hypglycemia, no-protein is simply just not an option. I felt that I compensated by taking the Molybdenum in conjuction with the meat when I did eat it.
f) These diet changes were not that hard for me, because I basically have been living with dietary restrictions forever, and have been eating Paleo for years.
g) After about one week of doing this, I added in Manganese, and felt that the positive changes were solidified even more (decreased fatigue, less post-extertional fatigue). I used 5 mg Manganese Bisglycinate (Trophic). I'm taking one per day.
h) During this round of food elimination I noticed that I was still having some odd reactions to food. Sometimes fatigue related, sometimes agitation/racing thoughts. I connected it to high copper foods. Once I eliminated these as well, the results were astonishing.
What is happening now:
a) Amazingly I have been able to total eliminate all my Tyrosine and Phenylalanine supplements, which I have been taking for about 2 years, without any relapse. In fact, I have considerably more energy then I ever had when I was on them.
b) I don't need to avoid meat entirely. During the strict period I noticed that the high thiol foods were the worst anyhow. I seem to have less problems with lentils as well. I'm sure if I ate them everyday then they would be problematic again.
c) What I am eating: unfortunately as a lot of vegetables that were part of my normal diet are on high sulphur list, I have found myself relying more on fruit, which concerns me a bit because I have had candida problems in the past. So for now, I'm just going to watch it. I have noticed that my reactions to some high sulphur foods have decreased considerably like to onions (++agitation, emotionality, and foggy-head), because there was a little onion in something I ate yesterday and the reaction was far more muted than before. I am having smaller portions of meat, but will have some days when I'm eating quite a bit. I have found that the best meat has been beef, and I just tried Bison, and that went over well too. Chicken is more tricky I find. I don't have this all worked out but I believe in terms of copper balancing red meat is best, because it contains the highest amount of zinc to oppose the copper that is naturally present in all meats (from my rather rudimentary understanding). I have been eating squashes; they seem to work fine. I have also been strictly avoiding all non-organic fruit that I cannot peel. I had a real bad reaction to sulphites recently, and noticed that when I eat non-organic berries that they heavy fatigued feeling comes back with the brain fog.
d)**I do notice that if I take the manganese and the molybdenum together that it does push me into overmethylation. I take the manganese in the morning, and I take the molybdenum when I have a larger portion of protein later in day at lunch or early afternoon. I have experimented with taking a 3rd dose of molybdenum if I have a larger protein supper as well with mixed results. I don't think I need it.
e) Well I am still experiencing some energy blocks, and have now decided to go ahead with getting test through 23andme as I am quite sure that I have MTHFR mutations as well because I'm getting mixed results with Mb12, and other forms, as well as various forms of folate. I think the 23andme will allow me to just see the facts, and then work from there, instead of engaging in informed guesswork, which is what I have been doing up until this point. It worked for the CBS issue, and I will share my actual mutations once I get my results for everyone's learning, but now it is getting too complicated trying to figure out what MTHFR or other mutations I "may" have, and how to work with them.
f) While I have had much success with re-activating my own dopamine pathways and no longer need supplementation, I haven't had as much success with the serotonin pathway. I tried to decrease it just a tad, and had quite an increase in fatigue. My hunch that some other mutation is playing a role here, or it might still be related to compromised gut function. In Yasko's book she talks about how deteriorated gut function can lead to Tryptophan being used up too quickly.
I definitely feel encouraged! With these recent results I would say I'm back to 75% of my pre-sick best on a good day. Now to work on those days when my energy is still off...
All the best,
Star