lnufnu's comments

I have many triggers. Some foods (probably histamine/tyramine sensitivity), smells, and weather. After a few years they became chronic and almost always had a migraine.

A combination of Zonegran, Botox every 12 weeks, and sphenopalatine ganglion nerve blocks and naproxen for acute migraine have them under control now. Topirimate negatively impacted my language skills and memory, but Zonegran is more tolerable and effective. SPG has a long history for TMJ and facial pain, and the Allevio and Sphenocath devices make the procedure easy. Other nerve blocks and Cephaly have been helpful in reducing the severity of the pain. A lower carbohydrate diet has also helped.

Vaping medical CBD has aborted a migraine immediately multiples times, but is not available where I live yet.

There are new CGRP blocking drugs that are supposed to be on the market soon. Aimovig is the first, and it's a preventative.

My doctor actually wrote an app to help people track their headaches: http://www.iheadache.com/

It has been unregulated for a while and already is encouraged as an alternative to opiates and has value as an antioxidant. [1] What do you have against people using this recreationally or outside of opiate addiction? How do you think regulation will curb statements about its value?

1. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25081682

Kratom actually does not cause respiratory depression and there is doubt the powdered leaf (not concentrate) alone can causes death. It began to be used in place of opium in Malaysia starting in 1836. [1]

It has already been on the market in the US for many years. It was researched by Smith, Kline & French (acquired by GlaxoSmithKline) and one of its alkaloids was patented in 1963. [2] It is aiding people in quitting opiates/heroin and is much easier to withdraw from.

Companies sell it as botanical specimens, soap ingredients, and generally label it as not for human consumption and consumers understand what they are getting. There has not been a problem, aside from the contamination with O-desmethyltramadol and consumers mixing drugs. In fact, the CDC reported only one death in six years involving kratom, as well as paroxetine and lamotrigine. There are 16 deaths where kratom has been found in autopsy reports and 14 in the scientific literature. [3]

Regulation is important. Users should be able to know that the product they are buying is safe and would probably like to know the alkaloid content, the same way marijuana strains are tested. Schedule 1 is not appropriate for this plant. It is going to encourage synthetic alkaloid production. In fact, PZM21 is being synthesized to be able to curb addiction without respiratory issues. [4] While this is great for addiction treatment, it is unfortunate that kratom will not be available for those who use it in place of opiates.

If you are interested in the research that is available, someone has uploaded it all here:

https://drive.google.com/drive/u/0/folders/0B_SMhCuwVcKjZWxS...

1. http://gradworks.umi.com/15/87/1587128.html

2. https://www.google.com/patents/US3324111

3. http://www.forbes.com/sites/jacobsullum/2016/09/01/the-deas-...

4. http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/natu...

In case it gets removed, here are individual links to the research:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23725528

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23024321

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20869223

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23846544

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24314525

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25216455

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25616583

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25825913

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/3419199

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22133323

https://www.google.com/patents/US8648090

https://www.google.com/patents/US8247428

https://www.google.com/patents/US20100209542

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/268515893_Marketing...

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/268183866_Molecular...

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10428019

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3202507/

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22018854

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18482427

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11419-009-0070-5

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25950592

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19536806

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19294483

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17882605

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25081682

http://gradworks.umi.com/15/87/1587128.html

http://www.americankratom.org/science

I really have respect for the work of Weston A. Price. Although his work seems to be discounted and too fringe for a lot of people, I have learned a lot through his Foundation about nutrition as well as practices like culturing foods, soaking grains, making broth.

He was a dentist who started looking into the relationship between diet and teeth in the early 1900s. He decided to do a series of ethnographic nutrition studies in villages in Switzerland, Gaelic communities in the Outer Hebrides, Eskimos and Indians of North America, Melanesian and Polynesian South Sea Islanders, African tribes, Australian Aborigines, New Zealand Maori and the Indians of South America during the 1930s and find out what common denominators they had in their diets that contributed to their great teeth and good health. He published these in his book, Nutrition and Physical Degeneration.

I'm not exactly sure why his studies are neglected, but I agree that it's possible to learn about nutrition using other methods.

Naturally occurring trans fats (vaccenic acid and conjugated linoleic acid) occur in trace amounts in animal products. They also have been shown to possibly be beneficial for LDL and triglycerides, while hydrogenated oil is harmful.

Dr. Robert Lustig has a talk called Sugar, the Bitter Truth, in which he talks about his research into pediatric obesity. He shows that many populations have thrived both low-fat and low-carb diets, then demonstrates why you cannot have both high fat and simple carbohydrates without expecting to see high rates of inflammatory disease. If you can predict that the population is going to keep consuming high amounts of sugar, would it be better to recommend a low fat diet?

Trans fat is a fat that has hydrogens next to double bonds on both sides of the carbon chain. The natural trans fats that sometimes occur in beef and milk have been shown to possibly have a positive effect on LDL.

The main source of trans fat in the modern diet has been through artificially created trans fat made in a process using high heat and a catalyst like nickel to rearrange the bonds. Partially hydrogenated fats are ones where not all the hydrogen bonds are saturated, and are technically cis fats.

They did a six year study with monkeys, using fat as a control in the diet. One group ate trans fat, the other saturated: http://www.wakehealth.edu/News-Releases/2006/Trans_Fat_Leads...

Fish oil is not a trans fat. As far as a government boogeymen go, you may be confusing the research done in the late seventies that led to government recommendations against consuming saturated fats. You can read more about that, trans, and cis fats here: http://chemwiki.ucdavis.edu/Biological_Chemistry/Lipids/Fatt...

"The test series, unfit in our view for production use, will however continue to be available to the public to avoid impact to the Gentoo Hardened and Arch Linux communities."

Why would you have to migrate to OpenBSD? Is the test series unstable?

Previous discussion:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10103815

The Environmental Working Group has great resources. They are a non-profit that has databases of household cleaning products, body care, baby care, and cosmetics reviewed and rated according to risk. You can find many brand name products, learn about common ingredients, and find new recommendations with little risk by searching a generic catagory. You can check out the individual ingredients in the database with what research supports the specific risks associated with it. They also publish excellent consumer guides for produce, cleaning, and sunscreen.

You can adapt to xylitol in your diet. It is best to introduce it slowly into your diet. Chewing gum is a great way to use it daily and increase your intake over time. Dental recommendations are 6-10 grams per day, but most people would experience discomfort starting off at that amount.

Xylitol is probably the best sugar alternative you can use. Dr. Ellie Phillips promotes it in her book Kiss Your Dentist Goodbye because the reseach has demonstrated that harmful bacteria are unable to utilize it for energy. I would assume since this is why it is beneficial to use in oral products, it would also provide the same benefits for stomach bacteria. It seems that erythritol is also unable to be used for energy. This is not true for all sugar alcohols; after exposure to sorbitol over a short period, bacteria can adapt to use it as an energy source. It also can contribute to reflux.