[Meowser01]

Thank you Mrs D! I refused to take the Welchol but take digestive enzymes instead. I knew that BC depletes a lot and I've been on BC for over 20 years. Wonderful information. Will pick up Taurine next time I am out. Will also check out the cream - that excites me!

I wanted to ask, is there a supplement you can recommend I take that has calcium, magnesium, D3, iron, etc? versus me taking 20 pills a day?

I do consume some healthy fats and on rare occasions not so healthy, and pay the price for it later by having horrible stomach pain.

Also, in reference to your signature, I am addicted to my backyard birds & buy 25lb bags of black oil seeds 2x a month ha.

Originally Posted by mrsD

Hormones can affect many nutrients:


With no gall bladder your fat intake has to be spaced out and not in huge meals. But you should be able to tolerate some fats. You should still be making bile, only not storing it. If your bile seems sluggish or you still get "symptoms" with many foods...try using a gram a day of Taurine. This amino acid grabs onto the cholesterol in the bile, and helps it move out better.

Your Welchol only grabs the bile AFTER the bile exits the duct.
The taurine helps at the liver level.

I'd take the nutrients in between the Welchol and not with it.

Also check your magnesium...if it is oxide it is not being absorbed (it remains in the bowel which with the constipating Welcol may be necessary for you at times). Get another type, either SlowMag or a chelated form for systemic absorption.
You can also get rub on lotion now, the new Morton Epsom Lotion, this bypasses the GI tract entirely and is absorbed thru the skin. Many of us find it very helpful for neuropathy pain.

WalMart, Walgreen's and online at Amazon are the most common places to find it. Not all stores carry it locally.

[mrsD]

No, I am sorry... therapeutically, you need high doses to fix things, and that would make the pills very large...imposssible to swallow.

Eventually you will fix your issues and a high potency product may work. For the B's you could use B-Right by Jarrow. They are a good product. But even with this, you still need the separate B12 because mixes usually don't have a high enough dosage.

The Cal/mag/zn tend to use the oxide form for the mag, and that is useless. Most mixtures use Oxide in fact still.

Taking high D3 daily has a new warning for calcium... no more than 600mg a day...because the D increases absorption and can lead to hypercalcemia.

The taurine tends to be big ...comes in caps and tabs. I get the caps because my cats get some now and then. The tablets I have to break in half. This might really help your bile flow issues. Let's hope it does. I get ours at Puritan's pride and use it myself for sluggish gall bladder. Some of your pain may be the duct spasming. I know alot of people who have had it removed...complain about garlic. So watch the garlic too.

If you go to my profile albums, by clicking on my name, you can see some interesting bird photos, including hummingbirds and hawks too.

B-Right:
http://www.chiro.org/nutrition/ABSTR...ceptives.shtml
Also on Amazon, and iherb.com
You could start on this now for some of the lost B's.

Good for you, feeding the poor birds...this winter it is really cold!
I watch them out the window behind my monitor while online too. Some very interesting situations going on there this season.
I use the photos I take as reference for my art work.

[Meowser01]

Thank you again for all of the information. I found B Right on Amazon.

Thanks for addressing my non PN issues as well

Just wondering if any of you experience the "red face" after showering? I was told it's a side effect of the B12. Literally look sunburnt for about an hour.

Re: birds - I have tons of mourning doves, cardinals, chickpeas, one red-bellied woodpecker, other birds I haven't identified yet and many squirrels and I live about 7 miles from a major city. Helps to have a privacy fenced backyard with many mature trees. I also have the occasional Coopers Hawk, which I shoo away as they eat my birds/squirrels/chipmunks!



[QUOTE=mrsD;1118386]No, I am sorry... therapeutically, you need high doses to fix things, and that would make the pills very large...imposssible to swallow.

Eventually you will fix your issues and a high potency product may work. For the B's you could use B-Right by Jarrow. They are a good product. But even with this, you still need the separate B12 because mixes usually don't have a high enough dosage.

The Cal/mag/zn tend to use the oxide form for the mag, and that is useless. Most mixtures use Oxide in fact still.

Taking high D3 daily has a new warning for calcium... no more than 600mg a day...because the D increases absorption and can lead to hypercalcemia.

The taurine tends to be big ...comes in caps and tabs. I get the caps because my cats get some now and then. The tablets I have to break in half. This might really help your bile flow issues. Let's hope it does. I get ours at Puritan's pride and use it myself for sluggish gall bladder. Some of your pain may be the duct spasming. I know alot of people who have had it removed...complain about garlic. So watch the garlic too.

If you go to my profile albums, by clicking on my name, you can see some interesting bird photos, including hummingbirds and hawks too.


Also on Amazon, and iherb.com
You could start on this now for some of the lost B's.

Good for you, feeding the poor birds...this winter it is really cold!
I watch them out the window behind my monitor while online too. Some very interesting situations going on there this season.
I use the photos I take as reference for my art work.

[MAT52]

Originally Posted by mrsD

Well, if you are reading here and have a need great enough to
end up here looking for answers, logically you probably need
B12.

More and more people are turning up low in this nutrient.
Vegans, who eat a diet devoid of animal protein, need to supplement this. They like to claim that their own bacteria that live in their GI tract will make enough for them, but that often does not turn out to be true. These bacteria may be killed off with antibiotics.

Our liver stores up to 5 years of excess B12 that has been eaten.
And it follows that if you have liver damage, less of this can be relied upon.

Lifestyle today is critical when it comes to B12. The over the counter availability of acid blocking drugs, impairs the utilization of B12. Acid normally breaks up proteins, and makes the B12 available to intrinsic factor which grabs it and facilitates its absorption in the intestine. (nature has developed this strategy because B12 is normally only in foods in tiny microgram amounts.) Previously to the appearance of these drugs, B12 deficiencies were found in people with hereditary errors who cannot make intrinsic factor, or who had their stomach removed completely or partially, or who have autoimmune disease which damaged the cells making intrinsic factor, OR who are getting older and no longer making adequate stomach acid-- called achlorhydria.

Now babies are born deficient (if Mom was on a vegan diet and did not take vitamins) and many in the general population are deficient because they take Zantac or Prilosec daily for years.

Some other drugs also upset B12 levels. One common drug which is no longer available orally here in US is Vioform (clioquinol). This drug was taken off the market in Japan and US for causing blindness and neurological damage. It is still found in creams for treating fungal infections however. But its tragedy in Japan led to aggressive use of B12 in that country, and its more aggressive interpretation of adequate blood levels. So we see Japanese papers using B12 for MS in enormous doses, and we see a higher cut off for "normal" in blood testing there as well.

Other drugs that reduce B12 are:
colchicine
most antibiotics (long term use)
some retroviral drugs for HIV
metformin
birth control pills
acid reducing drugs

One misconception doctors still have is that anemia must be present to have a real deficiency. This has been shown in papers to not be the case. Sometimes one blood test will hint at low B12 before anemia becomes severe, and that is MCV.
But many people can be low and not anemic.

The link I gave in the first post here, suggests various testing
http://www.aafp.org/afp/20030301/979.html
It has a chart suggesting testing and treatment for those at 400 and below.

Testing for MMA, and homocysteine are still considered better indicators than serum B12 levels. Rose's website has far more detail on this subject.

Since B12 has no upper toxic limit set by researchers, one can be flexible in using oral supplements safely.
I think that people very low in testing, need to bring that level up as quickly as possible.
There are 5mg (5000mcg) tablets available orally for about 30 cents a day. Take one of these daily on an empty stomach for 2 to 3 months and get retested. If you show levels above 1000, that is a good start. You can continue with this if you want, and feel you need it. Or you can reduce to 1 or 2 mg a day, thereafter. Most test ranges are not kept up to date, and most labs have a ceiling test of 2000. They will report this as HIGH and some doctors --who are trained to fear anything HIGH-- think this is "bad". There is no evidence anywhere in the research that high serum levels of B12 are harmful in any way.
Should you become ill however, or develop some new symptom, it is best to contact your doctor for evaluation.

I personally think 1mg of B12 daily is enough for most people once they bring up their blood work to normal.

People with MS and Fibro may have to take larger doses for a longer period of time. Research has shown that the fluid called the CSF is low in B12 for these patients. Spinal taps are not routinely given, but for MS patients who have them as diagnostic tools, ask for the B12 measurement when the test is done. Others may be offered a spinal tap, especially in rapidly progressing or long lasting PNs. Ask for the B12 measurement if you have one.

The next post is going to discuss the differences in cyanocobalamin and methylcobalamin, as well as some others.

Mrs D - I am very grateful to you for this thread.

However I'm too distracted and unfocused just now to take too much of it in. I did learn, when my small fiber neuropathy first became dominant, that the folic acid I took when on Methotrexate for my RA for two years might have skewed my serum B12 results - last taken a year ago. So about 18 months ago I got myself privately tested to try and work out whether B12 deficiency could be causing this symptom for me. I hope you might advise me if taking one Methyl B12 (Jarrow) 5000mcg is enough if I tell you my levels from these tests - although they are quite old now. They were all within normal lab range when done;

10/10/13. MMA was 0.16 (lab range <0.29). Homocysteine 9.25 (lab range less than 15).

29/01/14 Serum B12 382 (lab range 200-700)

I took the above sublingual Methyl B12 5000mcg for six months last year and it made no difference to my neuropathic symptoms. However these were the last tests I had taken as my GP refuses to check this now and going private is very expensive for me as there's no clinic in the area where I live so I have to travel a long way to get it done. I am also Hypothyroid and I take Levothyroxine 100mcg and AdCal D3 one chewable daily on NHS prescription.

I would be so grateful if you could let me know how much I should take to get the benefit and hopefully address my SFN. Best wishes, Mat

[mrsD]

Mat, just take 5mg of the methylcobalamin once a day on an empty stomach. That is enough for most people.

You did test below 400 which is concerning. 400 is the new low now. (not 200) It will take a few months to see much improvement, especially if you have been low for a long time.

[MAT52]

Originally Posted by mrsD

Mat, just take 5mg of the methylcobalamin once a day on an empty stomach. That is enough for most people.

You did test below 400 which is concerning. 400 is the new low now. (not 200) It will take a few months to see much improvement, especially if you have been low for a long time.

Many thanks Mrs D - I will do this and let you know how I get on. Mat

[Malia]

Thank you so much Mrs. D for all the wonderful information... my discovery of this site has been such a blessing. I have already learned so much and don't feel so alone. I ordered the B-Right and Gaba
I too feed the wild birds... lots of wild turkeys and pigeons and others lovelies. I get the chicken scratch and of course lots of table scraps too...boy they sure do eat the bugs ... my friends... My Aloha to all.

[flback]

Hi all. I first posted here back in the summer. Wanted to follow up and find out if I should rule out B12 now

Long story short during the summer I started getting weird tingling feelings in my legs coupled with some lightheadedness. Wasnt dizzy but was just feeling out of it as though I was sick. Went to Doc, they did a blood test and my B12 was in the low 300's. Never had a blood test before so no idea how long it has been low(Im in my early 30s)

Anyways, back in August I started doing weekly shots of b12 for a month followed by one more in September. I coupled that with taking jarrow vitamin tablets first thing in the morning a half hour before eating. I started feeling better although not completely back to normal. The tingling disappeared as did the lightheadedness but was replaced with weird muscle twitching that would happen a few times a day but in random places... sometimes legs, back, face, anywhere I use a muscle. which I assumed was my nerves regrowing.

Fast forward to Thanksgiving and I started noticing the muscle twitching more often and the tingling returned even though I had continued the morning b12 vitamins. Decided to start the shots again. Had one in early Dec, then early Jan, then early Feb. This time the sensations no longer got better. In fact they've gotten worse. Muscle twitching happens frequently throughout the day. Will get the tingling feeling in legs, feet, and hand somewhat often. And the lightheadedness has returned. Went back to my Doc who ran another blood test. B12 was through the roof. I think she thinks Im overblowing all of this. Went to a neurologist, who I think read the notes from my Doc, so he kind of gave me the "you're crazy look" as well. He signed me up for an MRI on my neck and back to be on the safe side although he doesnt think I have MS or b12 problems.

At this point though, can I rule out low B12 as the issue? I've been taking one vitamin a day since beginning of August so 7 months now. Plus I had a bunch of shots in Aug, Sept, and then one in Dec, Jan, and Feb. Symptoms went away but then have come back and are worse. I've read on here how long it can take for some people to recover but I was only experiencing symptoms for 2-3 months before I started taking vitamins. I guess in theory I could have been low for a very long time and didnt realize it but again I would have thought I would be feeling better now if it really was B12.

Thanks for any answers, I appreciate it!

[mrsD]

So please refresh my memory...

Are you taking the methylB12? Do you take methylfolate with it?

Some people here have found that they have the DNA mutation that interferes with proper methylation of B12 and folate.

There is a test for this that is not expensive... 23andme has it online. You might find having this test helpful in explaining things.

If you did not stop your vitamins at least 3 days before your testing, you naturally will show high levels. B12 is not toxic in any way so a high level is not a worry. It is only a consideration if really high with NO intake at all...that points to other disease entities that cause high B12. But doctors really don't understand this at all.

There can be tingling and other feelings as nerves heal. I had that with my feet when I started thyroid treatment. I had buzzing and burning feet for a year back then, before it all improved significantly. Sometimes healing is not a straight line at all. The body has priorities...and will take the B12 for the spinal cord, brain, bone marrow, muscles, etc in the order it needs. Alot is also stored in the liver.

[flback]

Hi Mrs D. As always thanks for your answers! I've been taking the methyl B12. Jarrows brand. I've got the 1000 and 5000 versions although I usually only take the 5000. I was really hoping this would work but it's difficult to stay patient. Especially when you get better and then get worse again... plus googling your symptoms wondering what else it could be is never helpful. Hopefully this MRI will provide some answers... or at least just rule certain things out.

Also, I will say I've changed my diet starting in January. I've always thought I had IBS as almost every meal had me running for the bathroom... which made the low b12 make sense to me. Ive been slowly changing my diet over the years but never saw a ton of success. In January though, I started a gluten free diet just to see what would happen and the returns have been extremely positive. Admittedly I may cheat once or twice a week as it's difficult to stay rigid but where I used to eat gluten almost every meal, now I rarely have it. I've wondered if maybe now that my stomach is functioning a little more normally if I'm absorbing more of the b12 these last couple months and I'm seeing an uptick in reaction as a result.