Hi

I read in another thread that more success stories are welcome. I have found some limited success using herbs on myself after 2 years of trying supplements (b12, ALA), diets (Paleo), acupuncture, lyrica, a homeopath, amitriptyline, even energy healing from some one who I think was probably a bit of a wack job.... That's kind of a long story. Did not get any improvement other than sleep with the lyrica and amitriptyline which was useful because that is related to pain.

Anyway, so far it has not been a cure with the herbs, but I have used them with results. This is because I have seen the same pattern over time, if I stop certain ones and not others the pain gets worse. I have had my disease for quite some time now, about 3 years, so it I don't think what we would call, regression to the mean. I am still not cured: I have all over nerve pain/ neuropathy, unexplained and untreated by normal medicine. Other than that mostly fine and quite healthy! I am 31 now, 28 when it started. Possibly immune related as I was travelling in India and had some GI issues that have now been resolved with diet changes.

I went from being unable to walk far without pain, to walking 30 minutes without any real pain. I also have seem improvements in my arm nerve pain, where I could not do any yoga involving my wrists at all, but now, they have stably improved to the point where I can do certain asanas I could not do before. My knees get worse when I stop certain herbs, and do get better fairly slowly, but surely when I do start them again. However, my arms I regard as partially healed, as they got better, but now don't slide back like my knees do when I stop herbs.

Herbs I have used where I am pretty sure they have been helpful:

Fresh St. John's wort tincture: Apparently the gold standard for nerve pain in Western herbalism. Dried extracts are not as good. I took 20 drops twice daily with good results over several weeks. I like this herb. Relaxing and uplifting.

Ashwagandha: I am using a capsule extract of the root called KSM66. I think this is as important as St. John's wort. I have taken 2-4 capsules once a day over several weeks.

Fresh American skullcap tincture: A nice sedative that is gentle, I used 20 drops twice daily mixed with the ashwagandha and St. John's wort. Again, the fresh tincture appears much better than the pills. The dried tincture was pratically useless. I think this helped nerve pain combined with the other two.

Cautions

St. John's wort decreases the effectiveness of normal drugs because it increases the activity of liver enzymes that remove them from the body. Could potentially cause problems.

St. John's wort is an anti depressant so is contra indicated with SSRIs as you don't want too much serotonin.

American skullcap is a sedative, so should be taken with great caution if alongside sedative drugs.

I trained myself in herbalism over a number of months by reading books youtube and the net and I am optimistic of further improvements based on what I have seen. Will write another thread if anything dramatically good happens. None of the above has any well controlled scientific support in humans, only a few animal studies have been done with St. John's wort and ashwagandha with nerve pain. I recommend you see an experienced herbalist through the American herbalist guild if are not comfortable with self treatment.

I think even in the worst cases some pain relief is possible using herbs and they tend to be gentler and non addictive. When I stop them I don't get screwed up like the drugs with the sleepless nights and sweating.

Best wishes,

Chris