(Updated May 2022.) Since 1999 I have experimented with mostly non-prescription, over-the-counter (OTC) supplements and treatments to address hypoglycemia, brain fog, hypothyroidism, stigmata*, and a bunch of other annoyances.
After finding success in treating my depression with a gluten-free diet, I had followed the logic that since celiac disease (for which a gluten-free diet is the solution) results in malabsorption and thus nutritional deficiencies, my health problems were most likely caused by nutritional deficiencies. (BTW, you don’t have to be a celiac to have nutritional deficiencies.) That was the approach I took, with a few detours into acupuncture and Armour thyroid, until mid-2015, when I discovered that mold avoidance and detox significantly improved many of my health issues.
I wasted far too much time on this approach, so learn from me. But then again, it helped me when nothing did and my successes kept me going. Without it I’d be dead or on eight prescription drugs and under the sway of some Svengali shrink.
What do I mean by “nutritional therapy”?
By “nutritional therapy” I mean using additional, man-made, supplemental sources of vitamins, minerals, and other substances essential to bodily functioning to fix health problems. A more accurate term is orthomolecular therapy or medicine.
I have altered my diet radically and frequently over the years — to avoid gluten, dairy, goitrogens, and histamine, among other things — and although it helped a great deal, it did not completely resolve my problems.
In my experience, and from what I have learned in my research, an illness that is due to a nutritional deficiency cannot be fixed with the amounts of nutrients found in food alone. Or not any time soon, anyway.
Thoughts on the subject in general
- My approach to figuring out dosages in nutritional therapy self-experiments.
- A few pointers on how to decide what to try, how much to worry, when to resort to hoodoo, etc.
- On “developing a tolerance” to a supplement
- A list of supplements that don’t work very well in the versions sold in the US
- Supplements can differ in effectiveness by brand
- Can’t tolerate a supplement? Try an alternate formulation
- Discussion forum misinformation
- Disturbing theories about the 1989 L-tryptophan poisonings
Examples of my nutritional therapy self-experiments
Nutritional therapy was my approach for the vast majority of my n=1 evil lab shenanigans. Here’s a selection:
- The iodine experiments
- The melatonin experiments
- And then there was the time B-complex drove me insane . . .
- Don’t take folic acid and methylfolate at the same time
- As a matter of fact, yes I have poisoned myself with supplements
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This content was first published in July 2011 and updated in May 2022.
