Most depressive episodes are triggered by stressful personal event such as loss of a loved one or change of circumstances, and depression over a short period is a normal coping mechanism. Long-term stress-induced depression often, if not always, results when magnesium levels fall to dangerously low levels in the body by biochemical stress reactions discussed below. Magnesium deficiency related depression is a fixable biochemical problem and not necessarily a physiological problem.
Depression can also be due to many other factors such as underlying disease (particularly hepatitis C), brain chemical imbalances requiring antidepressant drugs of one type or another, hormonal imbalance (particularly hypothyroidism and low testosterone), low cholesterol, Wilson's Disease, food allergy (particularly gluten intolerance), heavy metal posioning, adverse reaction to medications and a list of other specific causes listed here, each of which requires professional care. Magnesium deficiency is not necessarily the only cause of depression, but it can be very useful in recovering from depression because the blood, body and especially the brain often become depleted of magnesium in depression, particularly stress-induced or diet-induced depression. Often, depression that does not respond to SSRI's (classical antidepressants - as in treatment-resistant depression) will respond best to magnesium treatment.
Symptoms listed for paying for magnesium serum level tests to detect hypomagnesemia (low blood levels of magnesium) by a major United States insurance carrier include depression. However, magnesium is an intracellular cation, and its only valid measurement is through red blood cell (not whole blood or serum) testing. This is because only one percent of all body magnesium is found in the serum, while the remainder is found inside cells. Consequently, serum testing, the routine clinical measure, makes as much sense as checking the carburetor bowl of a car to see if gasoline is needed. A huge list of diseases and health conditions meriting magnesium status testing is here.
Not too certain what your problem is? If you are interested in knowing generally about mental health issues generally, look through the Mental health Net site. If you are interested in what life as a manic depressive (bi-polar) is like, click here. You can test your own level of mania on the Goldberg Depression Inventory here, and depression here.
From early 2000 to summer of 2003, this essay focused upon magnesium glycinate as the preferred source of magnesium. In late summer of 2003, I shifted emphasis from magnesium glycinate to magnesium taurate (same as magnesium taurinate), which appeared to me at that time to be superior to all other forms of magnesium in treating treatment resistant depression due to its content of taurine (more on taurine here). However, I have had some complaints from various people about magnesium taruate as not being effective while they found magnesium glycinate and citrate were effective, as have I. I now emphasis magnesium glycinate plus taurine, and not magneisum taurate, since it appears too tightly bound chemically for some people to digest and utilize. After years of study, I remain truly amazed at the tremendous benefits of biologically available magnesium compounds and other nutrients in treating and preventing depression. In particular, I see magnesium as an important research topic for survival considering its limited (purposefully lowered) availability from our Western diets and due to its ability to inexpensively cure and prevent many expensive diseases, life threatening or not. As you will see from this essay, our dietary choices and our over consumption of certain foods are contributing to much illness, including depression.
I have major PRECAUTIONS at this internal link concerning potentially harmful magnesium compounds and at this internal link concerning ineffective compounds of magnesium for treating depression. For brevity and simplicity: (a) magnesium oxide and magnesium hydroxide are ineffective and (b) magnesium glutamate and magnesium aspartate are always harmful to depressives.
I know how bad depression can be, because I spent September of 1999 through April of 2000, in a clinical depression that worsened from the beginning. First, I must mention that my life was at that time other-wise perfect. I had absolutely no financial, personal, physiological or other reason to be depressed. By Christmas the depression suddenly became much worse, nearly suicidal in intensity, and remained that way for four more months. I had always thought that I was a mild hypo manic-depressive, not a suicidal idiot. In my highs, I was capable of deep, insightful thought and amplified abilities in general which I considered to be a great advantage. Never did I think that things could go so wrong with my biochemistry that it would cause me to have suicidal thoughts and tendencies. How wrong I was. I had been taking Zoloft (an antidepressant) since 1987 which seemed to take care of my depression. I lived on Zoloft, but by September of 1999, Zoloft stopped working - and I knew that something was really wrong.
My depression was preceded by many years and accompanied by major stress from over-work (which I thought I loved), treatment responsive depression, anxiety, hypomania, infrequent panic attacks, anger, stress, poor diet, overwhelming emotional feelings, night time muscle spasms, paranoia, asthma, prickly sensations in hands, arms, chest and lips. I wanted to sleep all day and had trouble getting up in mornings. My wife said I was also uncooperative, withdrawn, apathetic, nervous. I had become a real pain to deal with according to those around me. Occasionally my lips felt that they were going to vibrate or tingle off my face. I even saw a spider disappear into my arm once. About 10 years earlier, I had a very painful bout with calcium oxalate kidney stones, a recognized sign of magnesium deficiency. A few weeks before I was hospitalized in January of 2000, I had very low energy, mental fogginess, depression with strong suicidal thoughts and I was under enormous stress, even though I felt like I had no reason to be depressed. Now, I can recognize these "mental" symptoms as symptoms of magnesium deficiency and/or calcium toxicity. I won't bother you with the details of my hospitalized depressive episode, except to say that I was put on nearly every antidepressant drug known and had severe side effects to all of them and felt sicker and sicker. None worked. I lost a lot of weight, and I was extremely constipated. I also had a cardiac arrhythmia. Being disgusted with the useless and apparently harmful treatment provided, I went home. My doctor told my wife, "Get his affairs in order". Gee! What an empathetic man! I couldn't work and about all I did was sleep, eat cheese, hard candy, fatty foods, bread, ice cream, tapioca pudding, drink a lot of milk, consume other bad-for-you high-calcium delicacies, watch TV and read. Maybe I secretly figured that if I didn't die slowly and agonizingly from depression, maybe I would die quickly with a heart killing diet.
My reading preferences are in the biomedical field. At home, I researched medical journals, books and everything medical that I could find on depression and manic depression. I learned nothing of usefulness, at least nothing that my doctor had not already told me. I did find that certain foods like wheat and high carbohydrate diets can trigger dysphoric rage and depression, so it seemed to me that correcting nutritional problems should be beneficial, and that nutritional research would be worthwhile. On April 12, 2000, I looked like I was dying to several people important in my life. My psychiatrist agreed and took me off all antidepressant medications and put me on a tiny amount of lithium carbonate (150 mg twice a day).
NOTE: At the end of each following section of this essay, I have placed a link concerning my rules for success, and the affirmation that "Depression is not a psychosis.". I apologize ahead of time for being terribly redundant. My rules and my understanding of mood disorders as a magnesium deficiency are so commonly ignored, that I decided they were too important not to heavily emphasize.
Shortly later, I picked up a 1975 copy of Nutrition Almanac, McGraw-Hill Book Company, New York, and happened to open it to the magnesium section. I was interested to find that magnesium was low in the serum of people who were suicidally depressed and others who were seriously depressed. The article indicated that magnesium dietary supplements had been effective in treating depression. Also, a person with a magnesium deficiency is apt to be uncooperative, withdrawn, apathetic, nervous, have tremors... essentially lots of neurological symptoms associated with depression. I was fascinated to notice that cardiac arrhythmias, heart attacks and kidney stones were also mentioned as magnesium deficiency related. Ah-ha! These looked like good clues, but definitely not convincing.
That same day, I found the next clue in my library. It was in a 1995 medical textbook in which I had a published article about zinc lozenges and the common cold. In Handbook of Metal-Ligand Interactions in Biological Fluids - Bioinorganic Medicine, volume 2, Marcel Dekker, Inc., New York, there is a chapter by Durlach et al, entitled "Diverse Applications of Magnesium Therapy". Its authors assert that in their clinical and open trials they found symptoms of chronic magnesium deficiency in neuroses to include anxiety, hyper-emotionality (crying, grieving or other forms of depression), fatigue, headaches, insomnia, light-headedness, dizziness, nervous fits, lump in throat, blocked breathing and respiration, cramps, strong tingling, pricking, creeping feeling on the skin having no real cause, chest pain (either of a cardiac nature or not), palpitations, dysrhysthmias, Raynaud's syndrome, and more including latent tetany, constipation, and myocardial infarction. Some of these symptoms occurred as part of panic attacks, sometimes with the feeling of imminent death. In a paper by the same group, Durlach showed that aging was a risk factor for magnesium deficiency. In another Durlach article, magnesium deficiency and dementia were equated as being one and the same. In another paper, Singh et al. showed that magnesium status was inversely associated with prevalence of coronary artery disease. I had a calcium oxalate kidney stone a few years ago and was told that I needed to increase my dietary intake of magnesium. I didn't but now wish that I had because it is established that magnesium prevents calcium oxalate kidney stones.
In some ways, depression can be thought of as an aspect of aging or premature aging. Perhaps the best web site on the Internet related to anti-aging is the Center for Anti-Aging. Spend much time there, because that semi-medical site shows the close relationship between depression and aging, and premature aging. You will be amazed at the attention given to magnesium.
Of significant interest was Durlach's statement that chronic primary magnesium deficit affects about 15 to 20 percent of the Western population, while other sources more recently place the deficit much higher at nearly 70 percent. One reason given for the deficit is that magnesium-rich foods are rich in energy (fattening), and they are being avoided in an effort to maintain weight, and because we are eating more junk food void of magnesium.
Wow! This magnesium/depression hypothesis is coming together! Just a few months previous to the onset of my depression, I had been hospitalized for chest pains, cardiac dysrhysthmia and an inability to take in more than about 1/5 my normal breath (varient angina pectoris). The hospital found no cardiac problems, and the internist gave me an IV drip of magnesium sulfate solution. A few hours later all of those symptoms vanished as rapidly as they had come. What I was beginning to see was that nearly all illnesses in my adult life were magnesium deficit related.
From which foods do we get magnesium? According to my Nutrition Almanac, a cup of peanuts or almonds would satisfy the RDA for magnesium, while only 1/4 cup of kelp would be needed. Soy flour, bran flakes, whole wheat, raw brown rice, avocado, wheat bran, shrimp, tuna, Brazil nuts, cashew nuts, sesame seeds, walnuts and collard greens also supply significant dietary magnesium. In the audio Bible, Genesis 1:29 - "God said, Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat." I marvel at the similarity of Biblical teaching to the above list of foods containing large amounts of magnesium. Succeed! Depression is not a psychosis!
The National Institute of Health has prepared the following food table showing the best sources of magnesium in the U.S. diet. Look at it! They are nearly all highly fattening foods. I would rather not get fat and just take my magnesium supplements to handle my depression problems. The very idea of loading up on these fattening foods should make anyone depressed. The government is a robot saying over and over "cut down on fattening foods" for your health! BS! For us manic depressives and depressives, following the NIH dietary guidelines suggested in the NIH link on keeping magnesium intake low is suicidal, not just because they limit our intake of magnesium, but of other extremely critical nutrients including taurine, boron and Essential Fatty Acids (EFA) such as the Omega-3 and 6 EFAs, all of which are necessary to treat or prevent depression. Even so, the NIH admits that a sign of magnesium deficiency is depression. Even though the NIH list appears accurate, it may be misleading for us because many of these foods have much more calcium than magnesium. Excess calcium over magnesium inhibits absorption of magnesium from the diet. A list of foods in this web page having more magnesium than calcium is here.
MY STORY
Today, in early 2008, I have re-emphasized magnesium glycinate in this essay. Each of magnesium, taurine and glycine are inhibitory neurotransmitters in the brain and all are often low in depression. Second, magnesium taurate is often difficult to find, while magnesium glycinate and (separately) taurine are usually easier to find. Why not take magnesium glycinate and taurine? It greatly simplifies treatment and appears to be the best way of treating depression using readily available nutrients. Another reason is that in my study of insomnia as a symptom of minor magnesium deficiency, I ran into a problem, that being magnesium taurate did not prevent my insomnia, while magnesium glycinate worked well. Why? There are great individual differences between people in their ability to absorb nutrients, and much of that difference results from the individual's ability to make stomach acid. If the stomach acid pH is too high, some metallic compounds will be too difficult to break down. I think this is the case for magnesium taurate in some people,at some times. For example, magnesium taurate may work well for a while, and then something metabolic might change in the person and then it won't work. Clearly it produces less diarrhea in most people (suggesting poor bioavailability or the effect of taurine - who can say?), but dose-for-dose magnesium glycinate appears easier to breakdown, absorb and utilize than magnesium taurate. The most readily absorbed magnesium compound is always magnesium chloride; simply add some taurine and some glycine and you have the best of all worlds. The problem with magnesium chloride is that it is nearly always sold as a liquid since it is too hygroscopic for use in tablets or capsules, unless it is plated onto a silica gel drying agent. The only example of magnesium chloride tablets are these 62 mg elemental magnesium (518 mg magnesium chloride) tablets by Alta. One would need 10 of these tablets per day to get 620 mg magnesium. I use large amounts of magnesium chloride (25 to 35% solutions) topically, but have never used magnesium chloride orally.
Cured with Lithium or Magnesium?
NIH Table of Food Sources of Magnesium
| Food |
Milligrams
|
%DV
|
| Kelp 100 grams (Warning! very high in glutamate) |
760
|
190
|
| Alfalfa 100 grams (Warning! Very high in glutamate) |
230
|
58
|
| Avocado, Florida, 1/2 med |
103
|
26
|
| Wheat germ, toasted, 1 oz |
90
|
22
|
| Almonds, dry roasted, 1 oz |
86
|
21
|
| Cereal, shredded wheat, 2 rectangular biscuits |
80
|
20
|
| Seeds, pumpkin, 1/2 oz |
75
|
19
|
| Cashews, dry roasted, 1 oz |
73
|
18
|
| Nuts, mixed, dry roasted, 1 oz |
66
|
17
|
| Spinach, cooked, 1/2 c |
65
|
16
|
| Bran flakes, 1/2 c |
60
|
15
|
| Cereal, oats, instant/fortified, cooked w/ water, 1 c |
56
|
14
|
| Potato, baked w/ skin, 1 med |
55
|
14
|
| Soybeans, cooked, 1/2 c |
54
|
14
|
| Peanuts, dry roasted, 1 oz |
50
|
13
|
| Peanut butter, 2 Tbs. |
50
|
13
|
| Chocolate bar, 1.45 oz |
45
|
11
|
| Bran (pure), 2 Tbs |
44
|
11
|
| Vegetarian baked beans, 1/2 c |
40
|
10
|
| Potato, baked w/out skin, 1 med |
40
|
10
|
| Avocado, California, 1/2 med |
35
|
9
|
| Lentils, cooked, 1/2 c |
35
|
9
|
| Banana, raw, 1 medium |
34
|
9
|
| Shrimp, mixed species, raw, 3 oz (12 large) |
29
|
7
|
| Tahini (from sesame seed), 2 Tbs |
28
|
7
|
| Raisins, golden seedless, 1/2 c packed |
28
|
7
|
| Cocoa powder, unsweetened, 1 Tbs |
27
|
7
|
| Bread, whole wheat, 1 slice |
24
|
6
|
| Spinach, raw, 1 c |
24
|
6
|
| Kiwi fruit, raw, 1 med |
23
|
6
|
| Hummus, 2 Tbs |
20
|
5
|
| Broccoli, chopped, boiled, 1/2 c |
19
|
5
|
|
*DV = Daily Value. DVs are reference numbers based on the Recommended Dietary Allowance (RDA). They were developed to help consumers determine if a food contains very much of a specific nutrient. The DV for magnesium is 400 milligrams (mg). The percent DV (%DV) listed on the nutrition facts panel of food labels tells adults what percentage of the DV is provided by one serving. Even foods that provide lower percentages of the DV will contribute to a healthful diet. |
||
Wow! I am lucky to be alive! My diet had excluded all magnesium rich foods for months. I wonder if people who go on diets delete these critical foods from their diet, start to feel a bit low, and rightfully decide to forget dieting. It is well known that some people must eat fattening foods simply to feel well. Is magnesium demand from fattening foods the link between fat people and depression avoidance? I know that I am not as hungry using magnesium supplements. Actually, I think the cure for hunger is magnesium, because the foods (mainly wheat) that used to be our main source of magnesium and other nutrients are no longer good sources for them.
A few days after digesting what I had learned, I checked MedLine for some backup. I looked up "magnesium" AND "depression". Sure enough it was there. Calcium/magnesium imbalances with magnesium being low were found in depressed patients that had attempted suicide. Other articles supported the concept too. For example, high serum and cerebrospinal fluid calcium / magnesium ratios were found in recently hospitalized acutely depressed patients. The further I looked on the web, the more exciting and proliferate the became - which, hopefully, is reflected in this page. Another book in my library, The Dictionary of Minerals, Thorsons Publishing Group, New York, point-blank read, "Therapy with magnesium has been used to treat ...mental depression...". Magnesium has recently been medically demonstrated to reduce severe therapy resistant mania. That was enough evidence for me. That same day I purchased magnesium glycinate, a non-toxic dietary supplement found in a local health food store. How much should I take each day? Was it safe? I really didn't know and didn't much care. I made a decision to start out with about 3 times the 400 mg/day RDA for magnesium, with 400 mg in the morning, 400 mg mid afternoon and 400 mg at bedtime. I used Carlson's chelated magnesium glycinate (200 mg magnesium elemental) product. I was an optimist by this time so I bought 3 bottles.
What did it taste like? To me the first few times I used magnesium glycinate it tasted strangely metallic. But taking it with milk it didn't taste metallic at all. This is an important observation that merits explanation. There are chemicals in milk fats and other food fats that bind magnesium and other bioactive minerals to biologically inactive state. That may be a reason why fatty foods are bad for the heart. One might consume enough magnesium to fulfill the RDA, but if the magnesium is bound so tightly to a stearate or oleate that it is non soluble and is excreted through the feces without being absorbed into the blood, what good is it? What happens to the heart? Heart attack! I think this is why some in the FDA think the RDA for magnesium should be raised to about 900 mg per day. Other people using magnesium glycinate have not noticed any strange metallic taste.
Within a few days to a short week, I felt remarkably better, my depression lifted noticeably, but I was getting a bit of diarrhea. Yeah! I didn't need that damned lithium corkscrew anymore!! (just kidding). Oh, the taste of those tablets! I needed some coated magnesium glycinate tablets. Actually, the taste was bad during the first few weeks only, after that the taste was not noticeable. Who knows what that means.
Within a week to 10 days of starting magnesium, I felt close to being well. I looked so well, that my psychiatrist thought I looked better than he had ever seen me. One interesting fact from The Dictionary of Minerals is that lithium intake is associated with an increase in magnesium, calcium and phosphate blood serum concentrations. A possible explanation for these findings is that Li+ displaces Mg2+ from intracellular binding sites. As I improved, I lowered my dosage of magnesium to find the best dosage for me. I lowered it too much and symptoms rapidly came back. Eventually, I stabilized the dosage at four 200-mg elemental magnesium (as magnesium glycinate) tablets a day. Four hundred mg is the RDA for magnesium for men. Succeed! Depression is not a psychosis!
My depression is completely, totally, absolutely gone, gone, gone! I am active and can function mentally, emotionally, and physically at my best again. My vision and bowels also returned to normal - finally. I consider myself to be back to my good old normal self - although my critics will never admit that I am normal and have never been normal. Whatever normal is. Yet, a strange anxiety that the depression would return remained unabated.
What caused my rapid recovery after being a treatment resistant, non-responder for many months? Why was my depression treatment resistant to everything except magnesium? Did going off those antidepressant meds cause it? Was it my imagination? Would I have gotten well anyway? Was it just the lithium? I seriously doubt it. My bet is on repletion of magnesium, both by dietary supplementation and action by lithium in increasing blood serum levels of magnesium. I can now see that my diet has been deficient in magnesium for years. My diet did not include high-in-magnesium foods listed above. Worse, I had been on a magnesium depleting diet from eating fatty foods and ingesting too much calcium. If I hadn't realized my magnesium problem, I probably would have died of a heart attack, like these guys warn. I repleted my body with magnesium, but did not use a great excess of magnesium as such might be toxic.
If you have time, search the above link's depression links, and do a search or two for "depression", "suicide" and "serotonin". When I conducted a mini search, I was overwhelmed with relating magnesium deficiency with mental illness. Succeed! Depression is not a psychosis!
If you are a medical or science type you might like to read Mechanisms of Action on the Nervous System in Magnesium Deficiency and Dementia. One paragraph in this link is so important that I quoted it here: "Although a neurosis pattern due to magnesium deficiency is frequently observed and simply cured through oral physiological supplementation, neuroses are preeminently conditioning factors for stress (thus increasing demand for magnesium). Neuroses may therefore very frequently produce secondary magnesium depletion. They require their own specific anti neurotic treatment and not mere oral magnesium physiological supplementation, but both genuine forms of neurosis due to primary neural magnesium deficiency and magnesium depletion secondary to a neurosis may exist. These two conditions may be concomitant and reinforce each other. In these stressful patients it may be difficult to establish the primacy of one or the other. In practice, physiological oral magnesium supplements may be added to psychiatric treatments, at least at the start." I interpret this to mean that magnesium alone can prevent stress from resulting in neuroses.
Stress intensifies release of two major classes of "stress hormones", the catecholamines and corticosteroids, which normally greatly increase survival of well animals when their lives are threatened.
Catecholamines are chemically similar small molecules derived from the amino acid tyrosine. The major catecholamines are dopamine, norepinephrine, and epinephrine (old name: adrenalin). Dopamine is a neurotransmitter (a chemical used to transmit impulses between nerve cells) found mainly in the brain. Norepinephrine is the primary neurotransmitter in the sympathetic nervous system (controls the "fight or flight" reaction) and is also found in the brain. Epinephrine is not only a brain neurotransmitter, but also a major hormone in the body. Epinephrine is secreted from the adrenal medulla in response to low blood glucose, exercise, and various forms of acute stress (in the latter case, the brain stimulates release of the hormone). Epinephrine causes a breakdown of glycogen to glucose in liver and muscle, the release of fatty acids from adipose tissue, vasodilation of small arteries within muscle tissue, and increases the rate and strength of the heartbeat. All of the catecholamines are metabolized by their target tissues or by the liver to become inactive substances that appear in the urine: For example, dopamine becomes HVA, norepinephrine becomes normetanephrine and VMA, and epinephrine becomes metanephrine and VMA. Consequently, a urine test for elevated catecholamines is both simple and available. If you want to test your brain neurotransmitters, you can get them tested by using a neuroscience test kit supplied by local physicians. To find a local physician that tests neurotransmitters, contact NeuroScience, Inc.
Corticosteroids are group of natural and synthetic analogues of the hormones secreted by the hypothalamic-anterior pituitary-adrenocortical (HPA) axis, more commonly referred to as the pituitary gland. These include glucocorticoids, which are anti-inflammatory agents with a large number of other functions; mineralocorticoids, which control salt and water balance primarily through action on the kidneys; and corticotropins, which control secretion of hormones by the pituitary gland. They have been thoroughly researched and developed as drugs in the treatment of many diseases but not including depression treatment. Corticosteroids are used to provide relief for inflamed areas of the body. They are extremely strong drugs. They lessen swelling, redness, itching, and allergic reactions. They are often used as part of the treatment for a number of different diseases, such as severe allergies or skin problems, asthma, arthritis and certain cancers and leukemias. They have many well-known side effects.
When magnesium deficiency exists, stress paradoxically increases risk of cardiovascular damage including hypertension, cerebrovascular and coronary constriction and occlusion, arrhythmias, sudden cardiac death (SCD), asthma, anxiety and depression. Dietary imbalances such as high intakes of fat, sodium and/or calcium (Ca) can intensify inadequacy of magnesium, especially under conditions of stress. Thus, stress, whether physical (i.e. exertion, heat, cold, trauma - accidental or surgical, burns), or emotional (i.e. pain, anxiety, excitement or depression) and dyspnea (difficulty in breathing) as in asthma increases need for magnesium. Magnesium deficiency intensifies adverse reactions to stress that can be life threatening. Such reactions are mediated by excess release of the stress hormones, catecholamines and corticosteroids, which are increased by low magnesium and high calcium levels, and which further lower tissue magnesium in a feed back fashion, and suppress testosterone production.
Testosterone production may or may not return upon replenishing magnesium. If it does not return, low testosterone can be an additional source of depression, and testosterone creams, shots and pills are available. The creams are definitely the least likely to produce side effects. Shots and pills of testosterone can result in weird side effects that stimulate dangerously high female sex hormone production in men, which requires a female sex hormone suppressant treatment such as daily tablets of Arimedex. You can end up with more problems than before, thus they are prescription-only items.
More on the consequences of magnesium deficiency on the enhancement of stress reactions; preventive and therapeutic implications is here and in the following figure. Genetic differences in magnesium utilization may account for differences in vulnerability to magnesium deficiency and differences in body responses to stress. There are so many stressors in our active lives that adversely affect magnesium reserves; it is a miracle that we can live on our puny magnesium deficient diets without vastly more cardiac and psychiatric problems.
Magnesium is a required nutrient for people to handle stress in general and stress in neuropsychiatric disorders. Not getting sufficient dietary or supplemental magnesium during medical or depression treatment for stress related disorders such as anxiety and depression is bound to fail. A short and easy to read summary of magnesium and its stress relief action is presented here by Dr. Leo Galland. He points out that stress depletion of magnesium is often so intense that dietary sources are insufficient, and supplementation is required.
Measure your level of stress here. These effects and aggressive behavior are easily observed in the mouse model. Magnesium is now marketed as an anti stress mineral. Stress, diuretics, fluoride, refined flour, chemotherapy, too much sugar, antibiotics, large amounts of protein, and high fat foods decrease absorption of magnesium, as do foods high in oxalic acid (mainly fresh spinach and possibly tea in excess) which deplete magnesium in the body, which in turns lowers one's resistance to stress and depression (a feedback loop). Overweight and obese people are usually low in magnesium, a mineral necessary to metabolize (burn) fat. People working outside in high temperatures and high humidity often become magnesium deficient and have stress related problems.
What blows my mind is that there has already been an extraordinary amount of work collecting data that shows magnesium to be a profoundly important nutrient in preventing and treating hundreds of illnesses and conditions, particularly those illnesses related to stress. It seems that magnesium deficiency in our diet is responsible for many forms of bad health and early death. Don't take my word for it, rather visit Paul Mason's site and see his huge list of magnesium treatable disorders.
Also, the Health-World web site has a growing but still incomplete list of magnesium deficiency symptoms, which include (alphabetically) acute heart attacks, agoraphobia, anxiety, angina pectoris, asthma, back aches, breast tenderness, cardiac arrhythmias, chronic fatigue syndrome, can't take a deep breath, carbohydrate craving (especially of chocolate) and carbohydrate intolerance, chest tightness, chronic cardiovascular disease, chronic fatigue syndrome, coronary artery disease, cramps, depression, diabetes, difficulty swallowing, eclampsia of pregnancy, feeling uptight, frequent sighing, epilepsy, headaches, high blood pressure, hyperactivity, insomnia, jaw joint (TMJ) dysfunction, lump in the throat-especially provoked by eating sugar, menstrual cramps, muscle soreness, muscle tension, mitral valve prolapse, musculoskeletal disorders, neck pain, numbness, palpitations, panic disorder, pre-eclampsia, premenstrual irritability, photophobia, panic attacks, restlessness with constant movement, salt craving, tingling, twitches, urinary spasms, zips, zaps and vibratory sensations.
I remain amazed and perplexed that magnesium deficiency remains, for the most part, ignored, neglected, and forgotten. There is one medical journal Magnesium Research that reports the subject very well, but it is a very difficult journal to find in nearly all medical libraries. It is the official organ of the International Society for the Development of Research on Magnesium. Their first publication date was July, 1988, which makes it a johnny-come-lately among medical journals. The publisher is John Libbey and Company in London. Typically, magnesium researchers find that their work finds no interest by other journal editors, and they end up submitting their work to Magnesium Research simply to get it published, where it is totally ignored by establishment medical doctors and, until recently, remained the subject of academic curiosity. Fortunately, independent-minded physicians and citizens can research the National Library of Medicine's PubMed index and find these precious life-sustaining journal articles. Paul mason is trying to bring much original research on magnesium and health to the Internet. The full text of many vital magnesium and health articles can be directly viewed at this vital link. It seems to me that by ignoring these magnesium deficiency disorders, that medicine has a guaranteed retirement fund. What do I mean? Look at the above list, and other similar lists carefully and you will see that much of medicine is dedicated to developing medications for, and treating these specific symptoms and not treating the underling cause (magnesium deficiency). Consequently, patients remain ill and return to doctors' offices for more expensive pharmaceutical drugs. Folks, billions of dollars of Big Pharma drug company income and physician income is at stake! Be warned!
Can I be so obtuse as to say that magnesium supplementation had nothing to do with my recovery? Can I be so callous as to not recommend magnesium to others who are suffering from depression, bi-polar disorder, or any of the anxiety related symptoms listed above? Or any of the symptoms of magnesium deficiency listed here? Duh!!!
I am positive that all suffering from clinical depression want relief - NOW! No waiting for a med to kick in 4 to 8 weeks! You want it now!!! However, without sufficient magnesium, recovery will most likely be very difficult and prolonged. Succeed! Depression is not a psychosis!
Looking back over the last year, I now realize that the increases in lithium that I was prescribed (a gradual increase from 300 to 1050 mg lithium carbonate per day) was associated with progressive reductions in feeling of well being (sort of a placid zombie-like feeling) and pending damage to thyroid function (excess lithium causes hypothyroidism). On December 5, 2000, I decided that it was imperative for me to stop lithium because I did not want to have to be dependent upon thyroid extract for the rest of my life due to the toxicity of lithium. Even though lithium is a mineral element, it is not found in the human diet except in trace amounts (which are related to even temperament). However, magnesium is a vital to life essential human nutrient. I.E. there is no RDA for lithium (or any drug), but there is for magnesium! Actually, lithium is a drug that is being used to substitute for a nutrient, magnesium! How tricky of those docs! What a way to drum up business!
Surprisingly, I began to feel better, even better than I felt in June when I first started taking low-dose lithium and high-dose magnesium. After several months off of lithium, people say I look ten years younger. I feel much sharper and my mental capabilities have returned to what is normal for me. I hope that I will never again take lithium. I now strongly suspect that the main biochemical function of lithium is to raise magnesium levels in the blood as mentioned above, with the mental benefit coming not from lithium but from lithium induced increased magnesium blood levels. This idea could account for the 40 percent failure rate of lithium in preventing future depressive episodes. That is to say, if dietary magnesium intake is so low that not even lithium can return it to normal levels, then one succumbs to depression or other magnesium deficiency disorders.
I remember meeting people (in group therapy classes and elsewhere) that looking backward seem likely to have been magnesium deficient. I remember a bright young lady that was terribly suicidal. She was totally resistant to all known antidepressants. She was so thin that she was nearly skin and bones and obviously was malnourished. She wanted to commit suicide so badly that she was under constant supervision. I can't help but wonder if she was misdiagnosed, meaning that she was severely, gravely magnesium depleted. I remember meeting many other people who were depressed; one was a single female registered nurse, who was overwhelmed by her stressful hospital duties and her desperate family child care situation. I remember a lovely young suicidal woman whose favorite tune was the theme from M*A*S*H. Apparently, she had no idea of the lyrics to the song "Suicide is Painless". She had been pounding out that song on piano for years. I wonder if she would have been there had her favorite song been something else. A 40ish man who could no longer accept that he was, in his opinion, a failure in his business. A lawyer who couldn't handle further domestic abuse. An internationally acclaimed scientist and editor who was overwhelmed by his time-line oriented job. Young children who were sad all of the time for no apparent reason, even if they were given all the toys they wanted. There was a young gay who desperately didn't want to be gay. Each of these people, and I suspect most depressives, share one thing common in their lives. STRESS! Magnesium deficiency can be brought on by diet too. I know a wonderful young lady who felt that she was too fat for her husband and went on a 1-month starvation diet. She lost enough weight, but became extremely magnesium deficient; and developed very difficult to treat multiple cardiac and depression symptoms causing enormous stress in her life. The strange part about stress is that magnesium deficiency and stress reinforce and build upon each other, resulting in a difficult to manage, unstable downward spiral. Succeed! Depression is not a psychosis!
On 28 July 2006, a State Food and Drug Investigator for the Texas Department of State Health Services, previously the Texas Department of Health, in an inspection of my business, Eby Pharma LLC, found violations of federal law as follows: "A review of the firm's web site, http://www.coldcure.com, showed that the web site promotes and sells Cardiovascular Research Ltd., Magnesium Taurate, 60 capsules, as a product that is intended to prevent, diagnose, mitigate, treat, or cure a disease (disease claims). This is not an all-inclusive review of the web site and the products that the firm markets. For example the web site includes the following information: "...magnesium taurate is the preferred forms of magnesium for treating depression..." and "...magnesium taurate also is wonderful in helping to prevent the diarrhea normally resultant from high-doses of magnesium..." and "...this is also the form of magnesium best for heart and brain health...".
I promised the State of Texas investigator that I would stop selling Cardiovascular Research Magnesium Taurate. OK. No big deal, or is it? How have we as a nation come to legally forbid any reference to "nutrients" as being able to prevent, diagnose, mitigate, treat and cure any disease as mandated by United States law DSHEA - 1994? Can you imagine not treating scurvy with vitamin C? How about Prozac for scurvy? How about Prozac for depression? I am no legal expert, but a friend of mine, John Hammell, owner of the International Advocates of Health Freedom is a world-class expert and witness on what is going on in the Federal government concerning health freedom in the United States. I asked John the following questions:
John, why has there been no (apparently) effort to overturn DSHEA on grounds that it is overly broad? Seems to me that the US has often reversed "overly broad" laws that are not in the public interest. Seems to me that any law that would be in direct opposition to truth would be illegal too. Seems to me that someone needs to attack laws that make it illegal to claim that a nutrient can not be claimed to cure a nutritional deficiency disease. To say that nothing except a drug can cure, treat, prevent or diagnose a disease is "overly broad" because nutritional deficiency can not be cured, treated or prevented by anything except a nutrient. Doesn't make any sense to me that laws like this have not been attacked. Any comments?"
John responded with these words: "DSHEA was passed in direct response to an FDA rule making effort called "The Dkykstra Report". The Dkykstra Report was an Advance Notice of Proposed Rule making that showed exactly what FDA intended to do to DESTROY the dietary supplement industry in America, and they had a congressional mandate through the Nutrition Labeling and Education Act of 1990 to do just that. NLEA was a stealth bill that was rammed through the House at High Speed during the summer when most people were on vacation. I didn't even know about it til August of 1989 when I jumped in with both feet in an effort to defend consumer access to dietary supplements. By the time I was aware of the bill, it was on its way to the Senate like a guided missile aimed straight for the heart of the dietary supplement industry. It would have had the exact same effect as Codex still could have unless we pull off a miracle and kill ratification in July through the last ditch campaign we are organizing. (Note: This may happen! CODEX dealt setback in June of 2005!) When I jumped into the fray to try to kill the NLEA, I was shocked and stunned to learn that the National Nutritional Foods Assn (NNFA) (the biggest vitamin trade association and the one which about half the health food stores belong to) was FOR this horrible bill. At the time, I was unaware that they were not enforcing their conflict of interest disclosure bylaw such that they were allowing pharmaceutical companies to be amongst their membership. NNFA didn't switch their position on this bill and turn against it til it was too late to stop its passage. I and millions of other people fought with every ounce of strength we had to try to kill it in the Senate, but it had too much momentum to stop. We failed, but we at least curbed some of its worst excesses, and we passed DSHEA as additional protection. No piece of legislation is perfect, any piece of legislation involves compromises due to its being shaped by a real diverse group of people including those on the other side. Our biggest opponents during those days were Henry Waxman and John Dingle. They both inserted language into DSHEA that to this day is causing us problems. When Milton Bass, JD; Clinton Ray Miller, Gerald Kessler of Natures Plus, and I attempted to rectify some of the bigger problems found in DSHEA by introducing legislation that could have filled some of the more onerous holes, we didn't get far at all because we were shot down by the pharma dominated vitamin trade associations and also by a controlled opposition group called Citizens for Health. I can't recall the bill number now, its been so many years, but you'll find it on the scroll bar at http://www.iahf.com to this day, I haven't removed it. (The bill we were unable to pass that would have filled some of the worst holes in DSHEA.) Trojan Horse language was inserted into DSHEA by a 5th column group led by controlled opposition group "Citizens for Health." At the time, CFH's biggest financial backer was Nature's Way. Natures' Way was part of a coalition called the "European-American Phytomedicines Coalition" which was actively attempting to harmonize US to German law. They were operating in the US and Canada via two controlled opposition groups Citizens for Health in the USA , and Canadian Coalition for Health Freedom in Canada. IAHF was the sole voice attempting to expose both groups and I had death threats and constant threats of legal trouble for my efforts to expose them and for trying to stop CODEX. DSHEA does allow the making of structure function claims for dietary supplements. While not full fledged health claims, we also won a first amendment victory via Pierson v Schalala that should allow for the making of full health claims except the Supreme Court has refused to hear an additional complaint brought by Pierson that FDA refuses to obey the law. Against this backdrop of FDA refusing to obey current US dietary supplement laws we have the FDA violating US law at Codex meetings in Germany to set us up for harmonization of our laws to outrageously restrictive international standards. IAHF is going to be sending out an updated alert on this in the next few days. In the meantime, please see Suzanne Harris' latest article on Codex at http://www.thelawloft.com We're in a desperate race against the clock. Due to our membership in the WTO, we're no longer living in America. For all intents and purposes, America no longer exists because Congress lacks the political will to get us out of the WTO or the UN and Codex is rolling on us like a runaway freight train with very few people even aware of its existence or the threat it poses due to spin that's been done against my message for the past several years. We're hoping to pull of a miracle. Stay tuned. A new alert is coming very soon.
John Hammell, IAHF
Hummm. OK, that is a fine history of what happened, what is happening and what will likely happen. To sum it up in a nutshell, we are loosing our freedom of speech and our freedom of press and the public's right to buy and sell healthy products, perhaps mainly to continue our 15% GDP tithe to Big Pharma (pharmaceutical companies). As you read this article remember what is actually going on in America, and be warned. For a brief overview of the law, read DIETARY SUPPLEMENT HEALTH AND EDUCATION ACT OF 1994 and for a full review of this matter see the FDA's Dietary supplements review page. Click here for a brief review of CODEX within this page.
BUT! There is more. Turns out that the Life Extension Foundation can advertise and sell tons of nutritional supplements and describe exactly for what indication they are for and the FDA does nothing about it. Why? The Life Extension Foundation's people have sued the United States Food and Drug administration 3 times over freedom of speech issues and won each time at the Supreme Court level. Thank God for the Life Extension Foundation! It seems to me that the FDA had laws written that were in conflict with the United States Constitution. Read about it here. This is why you recently are seeing advertisements for foods and nutrients to "prevent" disease. Next, the Supreme Court will be asked whether or not the FDA can prohibit people from marketing nutrients to "treat"diseases. So, If you carry a big enough stick, it is possible to make the FDA bend over.
Even though the Texas Department of Health doesn't like magnesium as a cure for depression, magnesium has a long record of use as a depression treatment and for many different disorders in homeopathy, including depression realated disorders. For example magnesium chloride (Magnesia Muriatica), magnesium carbonate (Magnesia Carbonica), magnesium phosphate (Magnesia Phosphorica), magnesium sulfate (Magnesia Sulphurica) are all listed for use in treating the many disorders (click on item of interest in left-hand columns). However, if we want to look only at "MIND", then magnesium chloride (Magnesia Muriatica) is listed as being suitable for treating:
MIND
Consequently, to the regulators that think that magnesium is a
"new" drug treatment for depression, I say they are wrong. Magnesium has been around much longer than they, and humans have recognized it as treatment for many disorders and diseases much longer than the Food and Drug Administration and its lackeys have been in business. Fortunately, The Congressman who wrote the FDA law, the Pure Food and Drug Act of 1939, was a homeopathy supporter named Sabath, from Illinois, and he made certain that homeopathy would remain legal. Consequently, any governmental regulator that says that we can not make drug claims for magnesium as a treatment for depression, a depression treatment, cure for depression, or means to prevent depression and a wide variety of related mental condition is on legally shaky grounds. All we have to do is use the proper Latin words!
I quit taking and quit recommending magnesium glycinate without additive taurine because glycine, in the doses taken and while taken for a protracted period of time, will damage its delicate balance with another amino acid, taurine (unless it is also taken). Taurine is vital to mental and cardiac health and must not be disturbed, while glycine is ubiquitous and appears highly unlikely to be bothered by too much taurine. For example, diets with up to 1% as taurine had no adverse effect on test animals. Long term high doses of glycinate may cause cardiac arrhythmias, and will never allow total recovery from depression or other mood disorders. However, most people will find that magnesium glycinate works miracles for them in the short-term. Also, both magnesium and taurine have been proven to be low in depression in about 80% and 100% of depression cases respectively, so why not take glycine and taurine and magnesium? Read Shealy's article starting here. See sentence immediately before the Discussion section. This does not mean magnesium glycinate is harmful in the short- or near-term, it just means one shouldn't use it year in and year out (without taurine), and it must be IMMEDIATELY stopped if side effects, particularly cardiac arrhythmias (PACs) occur. Taurine is the antidote to many cardiac problems. See this page for the first and only scientific discussion on how taurine prevents and treats experimental extra systoles (pre atrial contractions PACs) and many other serious heart conditions.
Glycine (the second component of magnesium glycinate) chelates (removes) mercury from the body. Citric acid and cysteine also remove mercury. The first stability constants for mercury binding with glycine or cysteine or citric acid are in the log 10 to log 14 range, which are vastly stronger bindings than can be broken by any natural biology or chemistry event occurring in the body. Glycine is a non-essential amino acid, but for people with mercury poisoning, it, cysteine and citric acid may be highly important. Because of these amazing chelating, sequestering or binding powers, if they reacted with mercury in any form in the body, they should be able to bind them much more tightly, making mercury biologically unavailable in the body. Perhaps, consumption of large amounts of these amino acids from high quality protein sources, and consumption of citrus help protect from the toxic effects of mercury. Mercury is extremely toxic and can cause depression and many symptoms associated with depression. These symptoms include, insomnia, nervousness, memory loss, dizziness, anxiety, loss of self-confidence, irritability, drowsiness, weight loss, tremors, paraesthesia (numbness and tingling), hallucinations, headaches, fatigue, muscle weakness, hearing difficulties, emotional instability, skin inflammation, incoordination and kidney damage. The common areas where mercury is found are: auto exhaust emissions, used motor oils, pesticides, fertilizers, dental amalgams (silver fillings), drinking water (tap and well), leather tanning chemicals, felt, bleached flour, processed foods, fabric softeners, fish (tuna, swordfish, shark, king mackerel and tile fish), calomel (mercury chloride contaminant in talc, body powder), paint pigments and solvents, cinnabar (mercury sulfide - used in red jewelry items), inorganic mercury laxatives, mercurochrome/methiolate anti-infectives, cosmetics (mascara), floor waxes and polishes, wood preservatives, water plumbing & piping, adhesives, batteries, used air conditioner filters (better here than in the air), broken thermometers, and some electronic equipment. Consequently, supplementing several grams of these chelating agents daily is a good idea regardless of current mental health. However, DMSA is the drug, apparently a harmless drug, of choice for removing heavy metals. Succeed! Depression is not a psychosis!
Now, more than 3 years after my very rapid recovery, I still ponder the correct dosage for magnesium, perhaps because this is the number one question asked by readers. What are the facts? There are some in the
Dosage depends on the ligand, the thing to which the magnesium is attached. In the case of magnesium glycinate, the ligand is "glycinate or glycine". Absorption is largely a property of contact of the magnesium ion with the lining of the stomach and intestines. If magnesium is lightly bound to the ligand, then the acidity of the stomach can "ionize" the magnesium from its ligand and convert it to magnesium chloride (from the stomach acid hydrochloric acid) and finally into a positively charged ionic form for transfer into the blood where it is then picked up by various other ligands for transport to cells. Stomach acid can reduce the magnesium compound to the ionic form for metal complexes that have low to modest chemical stability, releasing both the magnesium ion and the ligand. The following magnesium compounds have sufficiently low stability that they offer very high absorption and are well tolerated. Magnesium acetate, chloride, citrate, gluconate, glycinate, lactate, malate, succinate and sulfate are all very good, ionizable sources of magnesium. Intravenously, hospitals give magnesium sulfate. Magnesium chloride would be best, but it is very hygroscopic and difficult to properly package, but it makes a wonderful oily skin lotion when present in more than 25% concentrations in water and is readily and beneficially absorbed. I like the "Ancient Minerals" magnesium chloride product sold by LL's Magnetic Clay. It is supposed to be from an ancient European mineral deposit called the "Zechstein magnesium salt bed" in Europe.
On the other hand, magnesium oxide, magnesium hydroxide, magnesium stearate and magnesium carbonate are totally useless (and potentially dangerous) because they are too tightly bound together for the stomach acid to dissociate into ionic form and they will not benefit humans at all. If you rely on them for your daily magnesium, you will soon die or become so ill that you will change your ways. This medical journal article abstract reported that "taking magnesium citrate was best absorbed, and that magnesium oxide was no better than taking placebo." This medical journal article reported that "Results indicated relatively poor bioavailability of magnesium oxide (fractional absorption 4 per cent) but significantly higher and equivalent bioavailability of magnesium chloride, magnesium lactate and magnesium aspartate." Another article reported "The increment in urinary magnesium following magnesium citrate load (25 mMol) was significantly higher than that obtained from magnesium oxide load (during 4 hours post-load, 0.22 vs 0.006 mg/mg creatinine, p less than 0.05; during second 2 hours post-load, 0.035 vs 0.008 mg/mg creatinine, p less than 0.05). Thus, magnesium citrate was more soluble and bioavailable than magnesium oxide." This can be interpreted to mean that magnesium oxide raised blood levels of magnesium only 1 / 37 that of magnesium citrate. NOTE: I personally know someone that took 500 mg of magnesium from magnesium oxide every day for 40 years and died of a massive heart attack. These dirt cheap inorganic forms of June 7, 2000
Stress as Ultimate Cause of Depression
January 19, 2001 Update and Miscellaneous Musings
FURTHER RESEARCH
Government Censorship of this Page
Homeopathic Uses for Magnesium
Back to My Story
Back to my history and how I learned to cure my depression. When I purchased my first bottle of magnesium glycinate, it was not from intelligence that I chose that particular compound of magnesium. It was just what was available on the shelf at the store I visited. After considerable research, I found that the store provided the best form of magnesium that I could have chosen to treat depression. Both glycine and taurine have been used to effectively treat depression, and both should be taken with magnesium while treating depression. Also taurine has been shown to be low or absent in 100 percent of people with depression and chronic pain according to Shealy.
Collected Thoughts on Dosage