natural mood inhancers

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alright, i wouldnt say im depressed i dont think i ever have been ive just been angry most my life and people, (especially doctors) want to call it depression. it isnt! i dont know what it is but i dont feel sad at all. anyways i was wondering if you guy&gals could give me some natural herbs or whatever to lift the mood and reduce anxiety.

i already know about passion flower and take it often, (it works well by the way) and i used to take something called 5HTP but i stopped taking it for some reason.

st johns wort does not work for me. omg waste of time!


thanks

Passion flower works great. Valerian root is helpful, too. Dramamine makes me so relaxed and blissful that I wonder why it's not illegal A doctor told me that a small population reactos to Dramamine like that.

Here's my thoughts on various things - it is a laundry list of things to consider (don't anyone try them all at once).

I like passionflower, and it works for me also. Skullcap is similar to passionflower, but my wife can't take passionflower (it makes her skin red) but she can take skullcap (aka scutellaria). Skullcap is more expensive.

Ginseng and Ashwagandha are thought of as stimulants in the west, but are considered calming in Asia. But it usually takes a few days or a week of ginseng to cut into the anxiety/tension/anger, and some people do react the opposite way.

One study of gingko on eldery people found a 'statistically significant reduction in anger' - but it wasn't clear how much - it could have been 10% or 70%, not sure. Also, gingko is not a quick acting herb.


>> ginkgo and anger <<

Coffee and caffeine often make things worse when it comes to anger - replacing that with a caffeine-free tea or water might help. Some people say chamomile is calming, but I have never noticed anything from it.

5-htp is good for some things, there are some hypothetical concerns that it may affect the heart like phen-fen did. They haven't observed it or proved it, but some people think it might. Tryptophan is back on the market, and that is not suspected of doing the same thing to the heart. The only problem is that tryptophan costs more, you need to take more, and you need to take it on an empty stomach.

Kava is very fast acting to mellow people out. There were some cases of liver damage - probably because the extract was made from roots and stems. The stems have a compound that is toxic to the liver, the roots dont. In Polynesia, the natives only eat the roots. But western chemical companies were using the whole plant. Some people are still afraid of Kava but I take it sometimes.

St. Johns wort takes a few weeks to kick in - it is not speedy, but it helps with some types of emotional issues. Good St. Johns wort should have a very unusual medicine-like smell when you open the bottle.

Hops are calming - I drink an O'douls in the evening to chill after work. Recent studies show that hops have a melatonin-like effect. Hops combined with valerian is good for insomnia.

A good multi-vitamin with plenty of B vitamins can help some people's mood. The B vitamins are needed for making various neurotransmitters, and some studies show it can help with mood.

Fish oil or flax oil helps the nervous system. A few capsules of this each day are cheap, and Consumer's Report recommends it for all middle aged people to prevent heart disease.

Sunshine in the morning and middle of day to tell your body it is daytime, and less light at night (as little as possible when sleeping).

Magnolia bark extract is good for anxiety. But too much is not good - look for a preparation and stick to the guidelines. It takes a week or two to kick in.

Exercise. Meditation. If you find traditional meditation too hard (mind wanders), try metta or compassion meditation. You start by feeling compassion or love or warmth for something nearby (your self, your meteorite, your card collection, whatever) and cultivate that positive emotion. The you spread it to people you know and like, then to more and more people, then the world. It is easier to do this than to try to not think, and it can harmonize and calm the mind. It strengthens the parts of the brain that work against anger and depression. Do this for 5 or 10 minutes a few times a day and you can change the way you think.

Any other ideas? I'm sure I left lots of things out.

Last edited by monty on 07 Nov 2007, 9:17 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Singing always calms me down and makes me feel euphoric.

Sunlight gives you seratonin, and that helps.

Wow I swear by st john though some brands do nothing for me. Fish oil is also very good for you though I don't know about mood. Play around with the brands. Also Ativan is not a herb but that stuff is awesome (small small dose though cause it's an opiate and you could get addicted or feel all drugged up with a larger dose).

Exercise works better than anything for me. That and sunlight, getting enough sleep, eating a healthy diet, writing, playing music, drawing, and listening to music. I recommend covering those essential things that support health before turning to herbs or other medicines.

Unesolved anger is one of the most common underlying triggers of depression. It's a common misconception to equate depression with feeling sad. Often times, especially with men, depression feels more like nothing. Depression, from a clinical stand point (and perhaps this has been explained to you - if not, it should have) means not sadness, but a lack of normal mental or emotional response, or hypo-response. People who are depressed respond less to not just good stimuli but also pain and negative stimuli. Hence why it's called depression - it depresses one's ability to response mentally and emotionally. It takes something extrteme or intense for a depressed person to feel something - this is why substancee abuse, self-injury and other risk-taking behavior is commonly linked to depression. It's basically depressed people trying to feel something, anything.

Think of it as your brain being exhausted by feeling anger that has no outlet, and so it slows down, responds less and withdraws - "turns itself off" - from the exterior world. If you find it harder to feel postive feelings, to espond to ordinary day-to-day stimuli, to find things that genuinely give you pleasure without goign to extreme lengths, or find yourself "stuck" in cyclic thinking where you just make yourself feel angier and or just plain worse, then you could be suffering from depression.

Depression is a genuine medical condition. Your brain chemistry literally changes as result. To counteract this, you need to take a broad approach. There's no quick fix. Regular, vigorous exercise (preferably outdoors) and a regular sleep schedule are the best possible starting point. Then watch what you eat. Eat a variety of highly nutrituous foods, especially fruits and vegetables. Fish oil is clinically proven to help with mood disorders, but you should take 1000mg of good quality fish oil regularly over an extended period and with regular physcal activity and low (bad) fat diet for maximum benefit. (Note: fish oil lowers triglycerides but raises bad cholesterol, so a healthy diet and exercise are very important. Also, taking it with garlic, vitamin E and a source of the fatty acid ALA, like flaxseed oil, may help keep your bad cholesterol levels down.)

What he said.


Depression=understimulation. Anger is also understimulation; you want a response but yiou're not getting it, and it makes you more high-strung looking for a response.

Petting my cats. I think it makes them feel happy, too. I love to hear them purring.

I'll second that. Try to get out into natural daylight every day, if possible around midday when the sun's overhead. It works even if there is some cloud around.