The vitamin D that you take in, through the sun or supplements, is d 25-OH. It is inert. It just floats around waiting to be converted to D 1,25 hydroxy. That happens by means of parathyroid hormone (PTH) or to a lesser extent calcitonin from you thyroid medullary cells. How much d 25-OH you have is really only mildly important, but it’s what is usually tested for and paid attention to. You can stockpile d 25-OH and then slowly use it up, like getting sun in the summer to hold you through the winter.
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Thanks didn’t know that.
25-OH, once in the liver is hydroxylated at C-25 by one or more cytochrome P450 vitamin D 25 hydroxylases (including CYP2R1, CYP2D11 and CYP2D25) and then taken to the kidney where magalin assists in endocytic internalization and then in the renal tubule it’s hydroxylated at carbon 1 on the a ring where it becomes hormonally active.
Patients having their 25-OH level is very important as means to detect deficiency. Also without adequate vitamin d we see parathyroid deficiencies.
Yes vitamin d is activated by PTH and that’s relevant for its effects on calcium for sure.
Good synopsis brother @hardartery
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Yah I eat chicken often and veggies.
Don’t worry I won’t eat you lolll
Boron makes me feel miserable… not sure why… I have texted it multiple times and it definitely has this effect. Like a “don’t talk to me” grumpy type feeling.
There are certain supplements or drugs that for one reason or another occasionally affect people like this. Just don’t take it. You could try a reduced dosage but it just might be a person who can’t tolerate it in supplement form. @mike12
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Ok I have a slight point of confusion / misunderstanding that maybe you guys could help clear up.
The title and topic of this thread suggest that everyone should be taking boron supplementation. It was also stated that boron could potentially lower SHGB, but on the other hand, low SHGB is associated with increased mortality.
Looking at this in a “big picture” perspective, if all of the above statements are valid, then why on earth would I, someone who already has lowish SHGB, want to supplement boron?
I’m trying to see the forest through the trees here, but we have to understand that a select few trees that really stand out can affect the state of the entire forest, so ignoring the trees altogether can’t be very wise either right?
Low shbg has a CORRELATION with higher rates of mortality. I believe this is because of the wide range of medical pathology associated with low levels of SHBG (insulin resistance, Cushing’s syndrome, acromegaly etc) I could be wrong, however genetically low SHBG in absence of medical pathology, although a risk factor, probably isn’t anything serious to worry about.
The benefits from supplementing with boron likely outweigh the risks. It’s all about a benefit risk assessment.
@bmbrady77 boron helps to modulate hormones to a healthy level. In a lot of ways it’s like an adapotgen - it works when your body needs it to.
Here’s a side note. In the last month Few years I’ve tested boron in every patient and almost every patient returns labs like this :
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Brother you have probably forgotten more about hormone theology than I will ever know, so I tend to lend that fact to any argument I would ever try to bring to yours or physio’s doorstep.
That being said, if the risk involved was just decreased libido or something like that, I would whole heartedly agree with this assessment. Beings that the risk that we are talking about is increased chance of dying very young…I’m not so sure that the benefit would outweigh that risk?
Fair enough and I see that benefit. To my earlier point though, would it be a wise option to have that confirmed for each individual before deciding to take boron, and potentially make a low SHGB situation worse, or in your experience is the “hormone balancing” effect of boron able to overcome or mitigate that factor to the benefit of each person?
Sorry for the run on sentence there, just couldn’t find a way to split that up! Lol.
I’ve never seen a lab result where someone had adequate boron levels without taking a supplement. Interestingly enough it also seems that unless someone takes 6000 iu vitamin d a day they also won’t have adequate levels of that.
Our soil is wrecked - we can’t get adequate magnesium or boron from our foods. Very few cultures can these days. Why don’t you try it out and see how you feel for a few weeks
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Everything’s wrecked. It’s jsut sad how we need supplements today because there are chains broken that used to provide us the minerals and nutrition needed.
That definitely my plan. I’m just trying to understand / reconcile a few seemingly conflicting concerns that were brought up during this thread.
You may have already answered this so forgive me if I missed it, but what dosing do you recommend?
I like 3mg a day. I’ve used as high as 12mg with patients who have very very high cortisol (it’s great for cortisol modulation as well). The only people I don’t use it in are addison’s patients for obvious reasons.
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Thank you sir for your time and expertise!
Well, if you prescribe 5-htp for anxiety to someone with a CBS upregulation like myself you will likely increase his cortisol, which is generally already elevated due to high ammonia, causing even more anxiety.
If you want to address the genes, you have to look for the whole picture, and in that regard the 23andMe test is just the first step. Second, would be a methylation panel like I did, but it’s quite expensive.
Genomic testing is expensive and treatment wise is still at dawn stage. Vast majority of doctors, including TRT renowned doctors, are completely clueless about it, as I can see from the comments on several TRT forum boards.
To make the whole picture more complicated, we have the interaction between different pathways, which will cause two people with the same mutation to react differently to the same supplement.
An example for someone with a CBS upregulation would be glycine, just to name one.
This is correct which is why it’s important to assess each persons specific responses to each supplement if they are unable to get genetic testing. Like all drugs and supplements - we script or suggest based on the average response to the average underlying condition. There are always outliers or people who respond paradoxically. When giving advice on message boards like this the best we can normally do is give advice based on the average patient.
Methylcysteine Synthase mutation is uncommon - at least as far as we can tell with the sample sizes available.
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Best thing to do, as I think you mentioned, is to introduce ONE drug/supplement at a time and see the reaction or (even better) get a blood test after few weeks.
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