OrthoMolecular

I admit, I've gone off my meds, after being diagnosed with bipolar with psychotic features for a few months now, and have been supplementing with health foods mentioned in this article. I seem to be making progress. I mean I think if I went for a re-diagnosis, I might no longer be BiPolar. I guess a psychotic episode might pop up down the road however I am optimistic. Anyone else tried something like this?

http://www.orthomolecular.org/library/j ... 1-p048.pdf

I do use other health powders as well, but generally I feel the nutritional enhancement in my life has worked substantially.

If it works for you, go for it. But I am a sceptic.
What I want to see is the results of clinical trials including placebos. The research should be peer reviewed by a spectrum of experts including those from modern medicine.

The huge number of drugs tried on the girl in the story in a short period is worrysome.
My psychiatrist starts with the minimum dosage and gives it time to begin to show results.
This can be 4 to six weeks. Only then does he raise the dose or change the medication.

Once I was stablized on medication, I followed up with seeing a psychologist for several years. I believe this is where the real healing took place. Some may consider the work of psychologists to be voodoo science, but it worked for me.

Final word: OrthoMolecular medicine has not been proven to be the panacea of mental illness.

I did a quick search in the anti-psych forum as I know it has been talked about in there a little bit and there was one user who was really into it. It won't let me copy the search in here but you can search for yourself using this link:
search.php

Sorry I couldn't be more helpful

[quote="MrGamma"] I mean I think if I went for a re-diagnosis, I might no longer be BiPolar. I guess a psychotic episode might pop up down the road however I am optimistic.

Sorry MrGamma - that's not how the diagnosis works. You only need one manic or hypomanic episode in a lifetime to be diagnosed bipolar. Once you've had that episode, the diagnosis sticks. However it is possible not to have any more episodes. Best of luck.

I follow the psychiatric medicine path and I don't believe in nutritional supplements, having worked in the industry I consider it to be one big rip off. Best to try to optimize your nutrition through diet. But, if it's working for you, then again, best of luck to you.

skilsaw wrote:If it works for you, go for it. But I am a sceptic.

Yes, well I am very reluctant to mention a particular medicine I have experimented with alongside OrthoMolecular. Which I will do.

The important thing to remember is vitamin and mineral deficiencies are known to cause desease and illness.

Now for an experimental treatment explanation I am currently on. Please regard with caution as long term effects and the use of the drugs are highly controversial. Racetams. They are all slightly different, and I have experimented with a few. I am currently taking something called Piracetam, which is known to increase the circulation of blood/oxygen supply to the brain while acting as a neuro-protective agent. Some proven claims are that it is effective at reversing alcohol memory damage, and assists stroke patients from suffering additional damage during ischemic stroke, and so on. It is in clinical use in Japan and Britain (for myclonic tics/anti-convulsant), however it is not recognized elsewhere, although it has been around since the 60s or 70s.

Without explaining the last few years of experimentation (maybe I will start another thread)... I will mention this...

One time I drank a drink with a few tablespoons of vanilla extract, cocoa, and marshmellows alongside the racetam. I felt like I was drunk for the first time. This clued me in that Piracetam does increase blood/oxygen supply to the brain, along with the other foods I was eating.

So now...

Warning though, about 4 years ago while trying to beat a self diagnosed depression, I experimented with this stuff and did an "attack dose" (about 10 times the recommended suggestion) and it basically put me into a psychosis, and burnt me out a little more. Surprisingly though, my memory improved substantially. I mean whole parts of my life felt like they came back to me. I truly believe it reduced alcohol damage to my brain after a few short weeks of use. So I gave up that route, as I felt I could not use the substance responsibly at the time.

Anyways, this is now... many years later after that depression period and further experimentation with the racetam drugs. In the summer, I was diagnosed bipolar with psychotic episodes, probably due to further experimentation with several different "racetams". First time ever in a hospital for mental issues, I simply could not handle the week long stints of psychosis.

So now...

I went off the bipolar drugs after about one or two weeks, maybe a month on the lithium, which I felt made me more depressed but perhaps a little stable. The anti-psychotics kicked my butt. I have never felt poison or weight like that, only my opinion.

Now I'm taking Piracetam, low medium doses, maybe 0.5 to 1.5 grams, three times daily, and limiting my diet to high nutritional content food, avoiding alcohol, and artificial foods. For example, I'll eat a spoonful of Bee Pollen which is packed with nutrition, in fact 5% of the stuff in Bee Pollen is so complex it is unknown to man, as well as fish oils with DHEA in them, and I feel along with the piracetam, more nutrition is reaching more areas of my brain, more deeply and I feel great.

Sorry MrGamma - that's not how the diagnosis works. You only need one manic or hypomanic episode in a lifetime to be diagnosed bipolar. Once you've had that episode, the diagnosis sticks. However it is possible not to have any more episodes. Best of luck.

Interesting, I had no idea...

Anyways, yeah racetams take alot of fire because I believe they are used incorrectly, and with OrthoMolecular, it seems like night to day. I have to be careful though, who knows, maybe long term I will simply burn out, but it seems like it is working, and has been for a couple months now.

Right now, it feels like I've opened up every pore in my brain, and am injecting high nutritional contents directly into it. That's my theory anyways.


In that article I posted, that young lady recovered after several years of lifestyle changes, I am simply explaining how I feel I have accelerated that process. Important to remember and this is something I read before experimenting with racetams, is that if yu take it alongside other drugs like neuroleptics/anti-psychotics, it will in fact accelerate or intensify the effects of those drugs, so a stable balance in healthy lifestyle is critical with racetams. In other words don't mix racetams with anti-psychotics. In fact, don't mix it with things like bleached flour, tap water, artificial sweeteners, foods high in sugar, and so on, if you can help it.

I follow the psychiatric medicine path and I don't believe in nutritional supplements

Yeah stuff vitamin Cs or Ds, are of no interest to me, only stuff that crosses the blood brain barrier.

Final word: OrthoMolecular medicine has not been proven to be the panacea of mental illness.

In a sense true, it's like trying to wash sand off the floor with a slow drip water bottle. It works, is probably the best possible thing for the human body but is a slow an arduous process.

I follow the psychiatric medicine path and I don't believe in nutritional supplements, having worked in the industry I consider it to be one big rip off. Best to try to optimize your nutrition through diet. But, if it's working for you, then again, best of luck to you.

Yeah, it can be expensive, I've learned to buy in bulk. Instead of pills, I buy powders or bottles of liquid.

The prescription med path is the safe vetted path. Most certainly, I couldn't handle the anti-psychotics. They beat the crap out of me. The lithium, even though I went off it, and didn't like it a whole lot, I may go back on it, as recently it has been proven to grown grey matter in the brain.

There wad a guy in the schizophrenia snd children forum who fid thix orthomoleculsr with his son has done this for three years and he has improved vastly. It was discovered he hsd yesdt and another more agressive yeast in his tract. The connection with bad gut flors and no good gut flora hss been linked to mental illness as well as celiacs and gluten sensitivity is linked w bipolar. Sorty i don't know the thread but he did alot of research which eould be beneficial to you.

Also st jhons wort, 5htp, snd fish oil sre helpful fot bipolar disorder

jumpingjellybean wrote:Also st jhons wort, 5htp, snd fish oil sre helpful fot bipolar disorder

Just chiming in to point out that those things, especially the first two, have been demonstrated to have the potential to shove bipolar patients into mania. St. John's Wort functions somewhat like an SSRI, if that tells you anything. This WebMD article goes over those supplements and some general advice for supplementary approaches:

http://www.webmd.com/bipolar-disorder/g ... upplements

In short, psych meds are prescribed because they've been demonstrated to work, and "natural" remedies can be not only ineffective, but dangerous. Do your research first, and be 100% honest with yourself about whether you're genuinely doing better, or just want to believe you're doing better, when trying alternative approaches.

As for differential diagnosis, there is a short list of health conditions that can mimic bipolar disorder, and if you have one of those issues, you can find out via medical tests. If those tests come back clear, you probably should accept that you have a psychiatric condition, for which lifestyle and diet can only go so far.