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Melatonin as a treatment for food waste

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Re: Melatonin as a treatment for food waste

#121

Post by kelnos »

Void_ wrote: post #37
maltyr wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And those studies suggest that melatonin plays a critical part in your circadian rhythm, which kind of implies that adding it to your food would also screw with your circadian rhythm. That alone seems like a good enough reason to caution against adding it into the food supply. Additionally, there are receptors for melatonin in a number of systems in the body, and we don't have much knowledge on what those receptors d…

Once I took melatonin to get a better afternoon nap. I never felt so groggy in my life. Completely screwed up my internal clock. I’m very careful with it since then. Taking it at night time doesn’t quite show how powerful it is - since you’re sleepy anyway.

Melatonin supplements are not good for napping. If it's having the proper effect, it should get your body into full sleep mode, and you'll want to get a full 8 hours or whatever. Forcing yourself up early will have the exact effect you describe.

> Taking it at night time doesn’t quite show how powerful it is - since you’re sleepy anyway.

If you're already sleepy enough to fall asleep at what you deem to be a reasonable time, and you're able to sleep deeply enough for the length of time you want, then you probably don't need melatonin supplements.

Re: Melatonin as a treatment for food waste

#122

Post by RheingoldRiver »

kelnos wrote: post #103
ChrisMarshallNY wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it was here, where I read that the optimal dosage for melatonin was 0.3 mg (300 micrograms). The smallest OTC dosage you can get, is 1mg, and they sell 10mg pills. When I switched from 10mg to 0.3mg, my sleep improved drastically . Also, I stopped getting those really weird dreams. But I don't like taking stuff, and ended up stopping completely, a long time ago.

I still use melatonin on occasion. When I first learned about it, I tried the 10mg version, and it never did anything for me. Years ago I read about 0.3mg being the correct dose, and gave that a try. I don't take it every night, but when I do, I sleep much better, and for longer without waking up. The main annoying thing about it is that you really need to take it a few hours before you go to sleep. So it's not somet…

This is 0.3 and not 3 right? I just checked and my pills are 3mg. If it's supposed to be 0.3 I will buy a new bottle immediately and see if it improves my sleep.

100% agree about taking it early, I get a bit of an "omg I'm sleepy" effect immediately, but I'm pretty sure it's placebo, I have to take it about 1-2 hours before I want to sleep. But it's still not super effective on its own.

Re: Melatonin as a treatment for food waste

#123

Post by esperent »

kelnos wrote: post #103
ChrisMarshallNY wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it was here, where I read that the optimal dosage for melatonin was 0.3 mg (300 micrograms). The smallest OTC dosage you can get, is 1mg, and they sell 10mg pills. When I switched from 10mg to 0.3mg, my sleep improved drastically . Also, I stopped getting those really weird dreams. But I don't like taking stuff, and ended up stopping completely, a long time ago.

I still use melatonin on occasion. When I first learned about it, I tried the 10mg version, and it never did anything for me. Years ago I read about 0.3mg being the correct dose, and gave that a try. I don't take it every night, but when I do, I sleep much better, and for longer without waking up. The main annoying thing about it is that you really need to take it a few hours before you go to sleep. So it's not somet…

I take 3mg most nights and find it's an very effective asleep aid. I've tried breaking up the tablets to take around 1 to 0.5g but I don't feel like it does anything. Of course, this is purely anecdotal and it may well be placebo. But it works and as someone who often struggles with sleep I'm not gonna complain when I find something that helps, placebo or not.

At worst, it's far less harmful than drugs, and at best, it may have a bunch of other benefits from reducing cancer risk to reducing depression, to helping with acid reflux and GERD - none yet proven though.

Re: Melatonin as a treatment for food waste

#124

Post by [deleted] »

maltyr wrote: post #5

I'm not sure we should cover our food in melatonin. People would recoil at the thought of pretty much any other hormone being added to our food supply. It's strange to me how Melatonin is so uncontrolled in usage, dosage, etc., despite being a hormone. The article suggests it's safer than current food additives, but I find that statement questionable. We don't understand the full effect of Melatonin on the human body…

[deleted]

Re: Melatonin as a treatment for food waste

#125

Post by wincy »

RheingoldRiver wrote: post #122
kelnos wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I still use melatonin on occasion. When I first learned about it, I tried the 10mg version, and it never did anything for me. Years ago I read about 0.3mg being the correct dose, and gave that a try. I don't take it every night, but when I do, I sleep much better, and for longer without waking up. The main annoying thing about it is that you really need to take it a few hours before you go to sleep. So it's not somet…

This is 0.3 and not 3 right? I just checked and my pills are 3mg. If it's supposed to be 0.3 I will buy a new bottle immediately and see if it improves my sleep. 100% agree about taking it early, I get a bit of an "omg I'm sleepy" effect immediately, but I'm pretty sure it's placebo, I have to take it about 1-2 hours before I want to sleep. But it's still not super effective on its own.

I use 0.3mg and it has also improved my sleep drastically. It’s not a typo. I also give it to my kids who had terrible problems with sleep (staying up until 1am and bad stuff) and it’s made bedtime happen promptly.

Re: Melatonin as a treatment for food waste

#126

Post by jansan »

orev wrote: post #87
RyJones wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I asked a pharmacy in Reykjavik if they sold it, or Tylenol PM, and the pharmacist reacted like I'd asked to buy a brick of cocaine.

Never take Tylenol PM to sleep, unless you also have a reason to need a painkiller (acetaminophen). Acetaminophen is toxic to the liver and can cause liver failure if overdosed. A regular diphenhydramine (Benadryl) is the just the PM part without the extra risk (except that has its own risks).

It has a therapeutic index of 10, which is quite low (easy to overdose). I stopped taking Paracetamol almost completely after learning what it can to your body.

Also, there was a story about the developer of DirectX who alledgedly overdoesed on Paracetamol/Tylenol:

https://web.archive.org/web/20201223122742/https://www.wsj.c...

Re: Melatonin as a treatment for food waste

#127

Post by swozey »

kelnos wrote: post #110
swozey wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> chronic sleep disorders Wow. It's been a long time but I've definitely taken melatonin and if I felt any effects at all they definitely weren't strong if even noticable. Here (USA) Ambien is prescribed often for chronic sleep issues and that drug absolutely terrifies me. I've had friends addicted to it who wound up in a lot of criminal trouble for trespassing and wandering around beaches naked and things like that…

Interesting; I didn't realize Ambien was addictive. It was prescribed to me years ago after laser eye surgery (but only a week or so of pills). It was great for the first two or three days (I generally do have trouble sleeping and staying asleep, and Ambien knocked me right out and kept me that way for a solid 8 hours), but then I guess I developed a tolerance and it stopped being effective. I wonder if that's why pe…

I'm not sure about its actual addictive power but I do know that a sad amount of people like to get ambien drunk.

> According to a report by the Drug Abuse Warning Network (DAWN), in 2010, about 57% of ER visits and hospitalizations caused by taking too much Ambien also involved other drugs. Ambien combined with alcohol accounted for 14% of those visits, or 2,851 people total. Combining alcohol and Ambien increased the person’s likelihood of requiring transfer to an intensive care unit (ICU) due to overdose.6

That could be because insomnia and alcohol dependence often go hand in hand. Additionally, alcohol works on the same GABA receptors in the brain as Ambien, increasing the effects of both Ambien and alcohol. Reported rates of sleep problems among people with alcohol use disorders (AUDs) in

https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2018/05/30/615421269...

https://americanaddictioncenters.org/alcoholism-treatment/mi...

Re: Melatonin as a treatment for food waste

#129

Post by wheels »

ChrisMarshallNY wrote: post #86
maltyr wrote: post #5

I'm not sure we should cover our food in melatonin. People would recoil at the thought of pretty much any other hormone being added to our food supply. It's strange to me how Melatonin is so uncontrolled in usage, dosage, etc., despite being a hormone. The article suggests it's safer than current food additives, but I find that statement questionable. We don't understand the full effect of Melatonin on the human body…

I think it was here, where I read that the optimal dosage for melatonin was 0.3 mg (300 micrograms). The smallest OTC dosage you can get, is 1mg, and they sell 10mg pills. When I switched from 10mg to 0.3mg, my sleep improved drastically . Also, I stopped getting those really weird dreams. But I don't like taking stuff, and ended up stopping completely, a long time ago.

Some random anecdata:

I have a chronic sleep disorder, "Non-24 Sleep / Wake Disorder", which means my sleep floats pretty freely and doesn't naturally sync up with the sun. For the most part, I've structured my life for that to be ok, but sometimes it's not. I basically use melanin to bludgeon myself into a more normal sleep pattern when I have to. I usually start with 2 mg, 30-60 minutes before I want to sleep, but often when that doesn't work, take another 3 mg, which usually gets the job done. Often I don't even notice 1-2 mg, but 5 mg does register reasonably strongly.

Re: Melatonin as a treatment for food waste

#130

Post by zemvpferreira »

vvpan wrote: post #41
mallomarmeasle wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder about the dosage you might’ve been taking. Many, many people take much more than needed, and higher doses are more likely to have adverse effects. 250-300 µg is an appropriate dosage for most adults. Note that common over-the-counter dosages are 10 to 25 mg. There is a Cochran collaboration meta-analysis supporting this. I work in a pharmacy school in the US. One of my colleagues told me a funny anecdote abo…

I think that's super reasonable and I have no record or memory of dosage, sadly. Although nowadays I approach such things from a very different angle: why do I think I need to medicate at all? Why am I, a relatively young and healthy person, not sleeping well? Jet lag in my book is not a strong enough reason to self-medicate, just suck it up and learn to enjoy early mornings =) I have been reading a book about biolog…

My own two cents on melatonin at low (.5mg) dosages: it helps me go to bed and keep a reasonable circadian rythm 100x better than any sleep hygiene trick. Without it I have racing thoughts for hours and no sleep pressure on a 24 hour cycle. It's a great boon for me, a healthy normal person.
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