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Social anxiety disorder-associated gut microbiota increases social fear

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Re: Social anxiety disorder-associated gut microbiota increases social fear

#51

Post by pogue »

AaronAPU wrote: post #41
kilroy123 wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've had a LOT of gut problems in my life. I have a physically broken stomach, have had to have stomach surgery in the past, and probably will have to do it again soon. Most probiotics I've taken did nothing. The only ones that seem to actually work for me are these: https://drohhiraprobiotics.com/ Not sure why it works, but anecdotally, they do. Other things that have helped significantly – cutting out alcohol.

yeah I had serious gut problems for years and no probiotic ever did the slightest thing. Anecdotally I can’t differentiate them from snake oil. But Metamucil changed my life dramatically over a span of a few weeks. Never had the type of symptoms it’s indicated for, which everyone I mention it to just assumes. But it fixed me somehow.

I was recently talking about fiber & fiber supplements on here in a thread about a new type of fiber that was shown in a study to help with weight loss.

Acetylated cellulose suppresses mass through commensals consuming carbohydrates https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44219171

Re: Social anxiety disorder-associated gut microbiota increases social fear

#52

Post by kelipso »

frankish wrote: post #48
Tarsul wrote: post #40

I know from personal experience that eating sugar does induce more anxiety in me. This might sound weird but I can "physically feel" in my head a certain anxiety when e.g. I think about something awkward. This "physical feel" stopped being there when I stopped eating sweets for a few weeks. One reason why I try to keep my sugar intake down (the other being in danger of getting diabetes...). Thus, I wholly believe thi…

Can you explain your jump from gut microbiota to sugar? Aside from sugar being one food that passes through our digestion, I'm not certain why you have singled it out.

Just from basic principles, what you eat affects your gut microbiome because different bacteria reproduce more or less from you eating different foods.

Re: Social anxiety disorder-associated gut microbiota increases social fear

#53

Post by cjbgkagh »

Tarsul wrote: post #40

I know from personal experience that eating sugar does induce more anxiety in me. This might sound weird but I can "physically feel" in my head a certain anxiety when e.g. I think about something awkward. This "physical feel" stopped being there when I stopped eating sweets for a few weeks. One reason why I try to keep my sugar intake down (the other being in danger of getting diabetes...). Thus, I wholly believe thi…

I believe most people are not notability adversely affected by sugar and a small subset of the population, like myself, are acutely affected. The former does not invalidate the latter. Sarah Wilson of “I quit sugar” fame started off with a zero sugar crusade then later ameliorated her advice in an apparent effort to generalize her advice for a wider audience. I think advice should be tailored by conditioning on what category a person fits into. I would go further and suggest that a zero sugar diet should also have zero fruit. As a ADHD sugar addict I would generally substitute sugar with fruit and that prevented me from finding out that even my ostensibly healthy diet had too much sugar in it.

Re: Social anxiety disorder-associated gut microbiota increases social fear

#54

Post by Tarsul »

cjbgkagh wrote: post #53
Tarsul wrote: post #40

I know from personal experience that eating sugar does induce more anxiety in me. This might sound weird but I can "physically feel" in my head a certain anxiety when e.g. I think about something awkward. This "physical feel" stopped being there when I stopped eating sweets for a few weeks. One reason why I try to keep my sugar intake down (the other being in danger of getting diabetes...). Thus, I wholly believe thi…

I believe most people are not notability adversely affected by sugar and a small subset of the population, like myself, are acutely affected. The former does not invalidate the latter. Sarah Wilson of “I quit sugar” fame started off with a zero sugar crusade then later ameliorated her advice in an apparent effort to generalize her advice for a wider audience. I think advice should be tailored by conditioning on what…

do you substitute your fruits with vegetables? Maybe I should try it as well but then again my daily apple is one of my highlights.

Re: Social anxiety disorder-associated gut microbiota increases social fear

#55

Post by kayamon »

pogue wrote: post #19

I've seen probiotic supplements that have strains that claim to help with anxiety and depression, but I've never really looked into them because I'm quite skeptical they do anything. But if anyone is familiar with them and has any feedback I'd be interested to hear it.

After trying a lot of things what worked for me was cutting out negative food; usually gluten, lactose, fructose. Probiotics never did anything for me.

Re: Social anxiety disorder-associated gut microbiota increases social fear

#56

Post by softsound »

h2zizzle wrote: post #42
theptip wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem with Evolutionary Psychology is that it’s easy to construct this sort of “just so” story for pretty much any causal link, and they are not falsifiable. IMO the simpler hypothesis here is that this isn’t anything adaptive, it’s just another example of how biology is like spaghetti code; changing one chemical signal will affect an essentially random set of downstream systems, some of which can be causally c…

Could also be like climate change, where it correctly describes a broad phenomenon, but cannot be used to identify or classify any individual event. E.g., Wildfires are probably getting worse because of climate change, but it's difficult to say if the Pacific Palisades fire would not have happened in a cooler global climate. So, is microbiome-mediated social anxiety selected for as an advantageous trait for societies…

Wildfires are worse in areas where the wrong type of trees were planted as well which is common in logging areas or places cheaply "reforested" that don't do much research on what should be growing there. Wildfires themselves aren't bad per say either as certain trees only grow from fires. Not to say that climate change isn't a factor though, but there are a lot of varibles too.

Re: Social anxiety disorder-associated gut microbiota increases social fear

#57

Post by reliablereason »

Tarsul wrote: post #40

I know from personal experience that eating sugar does induce more anxiety in me. This might sound weird but I can "physically feel" in my head a certain anxiety when e.g. I think about something awkward. This "physical feel" stopped being there when I stopped eating sweets for a few weeks. One reason why I try to keep my sugar intake down (the other being in danger of getting diabetes...). Thus, I wholly believe thi…

You say sugar, but are you referring to glucose or fructose?

There is a meaningful amount of scientific literature connecting fructose and inflammation.

The AVERAGE human can only digest about 30g of fructose a day. Some substantially more, some substantially less.

A can of soda or three apples is about 30g of fructose.

Inflammation (high- and low grade)then being a second step linking to anxiety.

Re: Social anxiety disorder-associated gut microbiota increases social fear

#58

Post by iknowstuff »

Tarsul wrote: post #40

I know from personal experience that eating sugar does induce more anxiety in me. This might sound weird but I can "physically feel" in my head a certain anxiety when e.g. I think about something awkward. This "physical feel" stopped being there when I stopped eating sweets for a few weeks. One reason why I try to keep my sugar intake down (the other being in danger of getting diabetes...). Thus, I wholly believe thi…

Heads up, I don’t think there’s a link between eating sugar and risk of developing diabetes. Obesity is a risk factor but not sugar itself.

Re: Social anxiety disorder-associated gut microbiota increases social fear

#59

Post by keernan »

I've suffered with social anxiety for a very long time. Thirty years ago a doctor prescribed a MAOI which immediately transformed me into a social butterfly (which in hindsight was a very difficult transition). This forever proved to me what the doctor had told me: it is all about chemical balance in the brain.

The problem, of course, was the danger. I could die within minutes if I ate fermented food without taking the antidote I always carried. Problem with that was the risk was almost the same if I took the antidote if it wasn't needed.

I therefore only stayed on the meds for maybe 6 months (during which time I went from 150lbs to 225lbs).

I've never found an alternative substitute. I've taken meds that help lessen the anxiety, but never found anything else that literally changed who I was (making me an incredibly social person).

PS: I think it was Nardil. I wasn't having any issues with depression. The doctor was specializing social anxiety and in particular in the use of Nardil to help. He also told me that the chemical balance in my brain indicated that, without Nardil, I would almost certainly become a hermit in my 70s. I'm 72 and his prognosis was spot on.

Re: Social anxiety disorder-associated gut microbiota increases social fear

#60

Post by cjbgkagh »

Tarsul wrote: post #54
cjbgkagh wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I believe most people are not notability adversely affected by sugar and a small subset of the population, like myself, are acutely affected. The former does not invalidate the latter. Sarah Wilson of “I quit sugar” fame started off with a zero sugar crusade then later ameliorated her advice in an apparent effort to generalize her advice for a wider audience. I think advice should be tailored by conditioning on what…

do you substitute your fruits with vegetables? Maybe I should try it as well but then again my daily apple is one of my highlights.

The most direct substitution was cheese, lactose does not appear to have the same effect on me as fructose or sucrose.

I mostly eat kale for vegetables, this also helps with subclinical insulin resistance and inflammation. I think roasting vegetables may end up being too sweet.

I did an extended 5 day water fast to kick start the microbiome changes I undertook it as an experiment and the effectiveness in lifting brain fog suggested that it likely had a microbiome component.

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