maintenance dose question

This forum will focus on the interesting topic of titrating oral vitamin C intake to so-called bowel tolerance, the point just prior to the onset of diarrhea

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Lunar
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maintenance dose question

Post Number:#1  Post by Lunar » Mon Jun 01, 2009 10:13 pm

Hi,
on the famous page I read:

"Maintenance doses are established by the patient taking bowel tolerance doses 6 times a day for at least a week. He observes if there is any unexpected benefit such as clearing of sinuses, decrease in allergies, increase in energy, etc. Should any chronic problem be benefitted, then the dose is decreased to the minimum amount producing the effect. Otherwise a dose such as 4 to 10 grams a day divided in 3 to 4 doses is recommended.

In addition, the patient is told to increase the dose on stressful days."


I always thought that the bowel tolerance dose, was supposed to be the daily total dose. Apparently, tolerance dose is to be taken 3 to 4 times a day, so if my tolerance dose is 12g, I should ingest 48 grams daily, (12 x4).

Can you confirm ?

Thanks,
Lunar

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Re: maintenance dose question

Post Number:#2  Post by ofonorow » Wed Jun 03, 2009 4:15 am

This is a great question, and subject to a series of debates over the years here at the forum.

There seems to be two tolerances. The first is an intake limit - the amount the gut can absorb, lets call it the capacity. You can take some amount at one time that will cause diarrhea, but this does change. For example, in my case at the start of a cold, I can take 8000 mg every 20 minutes for 2 hours without diarrhea. Presumably my body is able to absorb all 8000 mg because the theory is that diarrhea results when vitamin C enters the rectum. I can take a lesser amount continually after that.

Then there is the daily limit, lets call it the saturation limit. This seems to be the total daily amount and should match Catchart's table orthomed.com/titrate.htm Presumably this is the situation where all the cells/tissue that require ascorbate are satisfied, but why this lowers absorption is beyond me. Its almost as if the "pipes" through the intestinal wall that vitamin C passes through to the blood stream expand or retract, depending on the need (which equates to stress, illness, etc.).

There are people with a very small absorption limit - so most of the C passes to the rectum, but I doubt they are getting the optimal amount of C in the blood stream and tissues. For these people, we are lucky to have liposomal forms of vitamin C - e.g. Lypo C from livonlabs.com. This seems to ensure that ALL the vitamin in the product enters the blood stream - intact.

So I guess the answer is, find out how much you can take at one time, and then find out if you can sustain that amount every 4 hours or so, or what you can sustain.

Is it obvious that I am a little confused too?
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Re: maintenance dose question

Post Number:#3  Post by Lunar » Thu Jun 04, 2009 12:16 am

Oh, so I see people were troubled as I am by this issue :) .
It's a fact: intake limit definitely increase when body is stressed: like each year since I was born, it is now time for sever pollen allergic rhinitis here is france where I leave. This week end I was caught in mega allergic breakout. On next day, I increased my vit c intake to usual bowel tolerance level: allergy very rapidly stopped without medicine, but didn't get the bowel effect. And it's been like this for several days. This tolerance increase on stress is probably the best proof of this all mega vitamin c theory.
There is no question that it lowered my allergic symptoms by i would say 60 to 90 % .
However, I noticed I must repeat intake every 4 hours or my symptoms will come back. I perfectly imagine how my body would produce huge dose of C throughout all day hadn't I lost the gene to produce it.

My only concern is that with oral intake, kidney has to process all this, where this is not the case for animals with the gene.
Currently i'm taking a mineral ascorbate form of c from perque. They are strong supporters of vitamin c theory and greatly learned from them:
http://www.perque.com/pdfs/Pt_Ascorbate_Flush_FINAL.pdf
http://www.perque.com/pdfs/potentCr.pdf

What they say really make sense and they have very precise instructions on how to do a flush and then maintain.
However, they strongly advocate mineral ascorbate form. I'm taking it since almost a month, and I recognize that it really doesn't have any side effect: very gently on stomach, never a cramp. Also it subscribes to the theory that one must maintain an alkaline diet, and than acidic diet exhaust the body because it must make lots of effort to keep blood ph arround 7.2.

So I admit i'm a little concerned about the minerals in this ascorbate form; altough it's well balanced with calcium, but also potassium and magnesium. Since I take it everyday, i'm wondering on long term use for excess minerals, kidneys and such.

i ordered your recommended vitamin c foundation (hope it'll ship soon), and will give it a try. Maybe it will take less to get the flush effect (which I seek for my constipation). Maybe i'll take my maintainance dose of 6mg daily with your C, and do a massive flush twice a week with the ascrorbate form ?

Anyway vitamin C has been a giant step in my life, i'm just struggling a bit to find the right method.

Thanks for reading,
Lunar

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Re: maintenance dose question

Post Number:#4  Post by ofonorow » Fri Jun 05, 2009 4:36 am

There is no question that it lowered my allergic symptoms by i would say 60 to 90 % .
However, I noticed I must repeat intake every 4 hours or my symptoms will come back. I perfectly imagine how my body would produce huge dose of C throughout all day hadn't I lost the gene to produce it.

My only concern is that with oral intake, kidney has to process all this, where this is not the case for animals with the gene.
Currently i'm taking a mineral ascorbate form of c from perque. They are strong supporters of vitamin c theory and greatly learned from them:


I trust you have studied Cathcart's famous paper http://www.orthomed.com/titrate.htm

When you say, "this is not the case for animals with the gene" - do you mean because the endogenous production is low and constant? Or are you refering to the minerals?

It is notable that Pauling had a life threatening kidney disease at age 40, and yet he adopted an ultra high (18,000 mg) regimen of vitamin C about 20 years later. (He did learn to reduce protein intake, as that seemed to be key to his kidney condition, and he learned to drink a lot of water.)

I agree with you that the issue with mineral ascorbate at high dosages - is the minerals, and these may put a load on the kidney as minerals, unlike vitamins in general, are toxic at some dosage. The only "mineral" ascorbate we generally recommend is sodium ascorbate, since some, half, or most of the ascorbate in the blood stream is attached/associated with a sodium molecule/ion. Pauling himself added sodium bicarbonate to his drink.

I'll try to make time to take a peek at those web sites.
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Re: maintenance dose question

Post Number:#5  Post by Ralph Lotz » Fri Jun 05, 2009 9:10 am

Relatively small amounts of sodium ascorbate have been shown to be effective against allergies.
Along with ascorbic acid, you can try about 3 grams of sodium ascorbate mixed in water and used as a nasal spray.
For instance, you can mix 2 parts ascorbic acid to 1 part of baking soda and consume the mixture to get a partially reacted sodium ascorbate solution or squirt it up your nose. (Regular ascorbic acid may be irritating to mucous membranes.)

The Perque product is not suitable for megadose therapy. You can buy highest quality ascorbic acid from The Vitamin C Foundation or get the cheap stuff from Trader Joe's for $10, which is most likely the same stuff sold in HF stores for 2-3 times the price.
"Unless we put medical freedom into the constitution...medicine will organize into an undercover dictatorship..force people who wish doctors and treatment of their own choice to submit to only what..dictating outfit offers." Dr. Benjamin Rush

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Re: maintenance dose question

Post Number:#6  Post by Lunar » Fri Jun 05, 2009 12:12 pm

Hi,
your post brings new questions, thanks for answering.

I already ordered foundation's vitamin C. It has shipped and will definitely give it a try. I'm still in the active learning phase.
I also ordered Pauling book. Now the questions (i'm not talking about nose route, only regular):

1) If I add sodium bicarbonate (baking soda) to my daily intake of pure C, will it raise my daily consumption of sodium (salt) ? Sodium has lots of negative effects, or maybe it's not the same ?

2) If I add sodium bicarbonate to alkalinize the C beverage, why not just take an ascorbate mix such as perque's, which already has alkalanizing minerals ?

3) Why in your opinion is perque's not suitable for mega daily supplementation ? What I don't understand, is why ascorbate minarals C is not recommended, yet, Pauling was taking baking soda to alkalinize his C. What's is the difference between ascorbate C such as perque's.... and specifically sodium ascorbate added to pure C ?

Thanks,
Lunar

Shawn

Re: maintenance dose question

Post Number:#7  Post by Shawn » Sun Jun 21, 2009 8:11 am

Lunar,

I wrote you a PM but I guess I could write out the same things on here.

I read that same article about vitamin c flushing and still don't understand it. Cognitively, I'm not at my best becuase I know it's pretty simple.

Today, I took around 4 teaspoons of sodium ascorbate. I rounded it off so that brings me to about 36grams of vitamin c. Within the past hour or so, I've started to get rumbling, gurgling, and a lil cramping. So what does that mean? IS that my bowel tolerance and I should be done taking C for the rest of the day?

I want to use vitamin c therapeutically to help build my chronically ill body. If it can help me detox, then that's how I want to use it because I am heavy metal poisoned. The biggest thing is l don't know how to use vitamin c therapeutically to help myself.

I want to use the most my body needs everyday to build and not just maintain. Would this be the same as doing a flush everyday? lol sorry if I'm kinda out of it right now and confused. I feel pretty stupid.

This guy I met used glutathione to detox from heavy metals and he was sick like me. Well, I started taking a product called Immunocal which is glutathione and like the vitamin c flush article said, after taking it I would get this feeling of "well being" for like an hour. It wasn't long at all but it was definitely noticeable that something was happening. I think that was the same thing that the article talks about. Glutathione is similar to vitamin C right Owen? It's like an antioxidant. I couldn't continue taking the glutathione cause it was too expensive and I knew I needed to increase it so it was gonna be even more money.Anyways, I'm hoping vitamin c can get that going for me and I can afford to increase it to the amount I need to build like I need to.

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Re: maintenance dose question

Post Number:#8  Post by Dolev » Sun Jun 21, 2009 4:02 pm

Shawn,

Glutathione is a molecule made up of three amino acids - glutamine, glycine and cysteine. There are different opinions about whether these get separated before they are absorbed, so there may not be benefit in taking glutathione in the form you buy it, which is expensive. Since glutamine and glycine are rarely lacking, the amount of cysteine seems to be the rate limiting amino acid in the formation of glutathione in the liver. Therefore by supplementing L-cysteine, which is a lot cheaper than a glutathione supplement, you can probably increase your glutathione level just as well.

In a addition to L-cysteine, I suggest taking 200 mcg of selenium. This mineral joins glutathione to form the important detox enzyme, glutathione peroxidase.
Dolev

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Re: maintenance dose question

Post Number:#9  Post by Ralph Lotz » Mon Jun 22, 2009 12:35 pm

Good advice form DOLEV.
Also, some think that N-acetylcysteine (NAC) may work better than L-cysteine?
Alpha-lipoic acid also increases glutathione.
"Unless we put medical freedom into the constitution...medicine will organize into an undercover dictatorship..force people who wish doctors and treatment of their own choice to submit to only what..dictating outfit offers." Dr. Benjamin Rush

Shawn

Re: maintenance dose question

Post Number:#10  Post by Shawn » Tue Jun 23, 2009 12:47 am

i don't want to focus on glutatione. i want to focus on how to use vitamin c. i'm getting overwhelmed with all this and can't afford all the different supplements.

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Re: maintenance dose question

Post Number:#11  Post by ofonorow » Wed Jun 24, 2009 2:30 am

Shawn wrote:i don't want to focus on glutatione. i want to focus on how to use vitamin c. i'm getting overwhelmed with all this and can't afford all the different supplements.


Okay, is there a specific question? How much vitamin C are you currently consuming?
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Re: maintenance dose question

Post Number:#12  Post by Ralph Lotz » Wed Jun 24, 2009 12:02 pm

1) If I add sodium bicarbonate (baking soda) to my daily intake of pure C, will it raise my daily consumption of sodium (salt) ? Sodium has lots of negative effects, or maybe it's not the same ?

2) If I add sodium bicarbonate to alkalinize the C beverage, why not just take an ascorbate mix such as perque's, which already has alkalanizing minerals ?

3) Why in your opinion is perque's not suitable for mega daily supplementation ? What I don't understand, is why ascorbate minarals C is not recommended, yet, Pauling was taking baking soda to alkalinize his C. What's is the difference between ascorbate C such as perque's.... and specifically sodium ascorbate added to pure C ?


1) 1/8th teaspoon of baking soda contains 150 mg of sodium. Since I don't have a gram scale I use 1 part baking soda to 2 parts ascorbic acid. measuring by volume which is a little off, but close enough for me. One teaspoon of ascorbic acid contains between 1,000 mg and 1,250 mg, so you would get around 150 mg of sodium per one gram of ascorbic acid using my crude but practical method. It is inexpensive because baking soda costs less than $1 per box.
Source Naturals Sodium Ascorbate has 140 mg of sodium per one gram of vitamin c, but you will pay at least $15 per pound.
In addition to this mixture, I also take at least 3 grams of ascorbic acid daily.
When I feel ill or out of sorts, I take some form of vitamin C every 4 hours to achieve dynamic flow.

2, 3) Why not use Perque's? Because it has too much calcium to be used for megadoses of vitamin C, too little magnesium and costs too much. There is nothing wrong with using mineral ascorbate mixtures for a few grams of vitamin c. I have been using Emergen-C for years when traveling and for children and grandchildren.
"Unless we put medical freedom into the constitution...medicine will organize into an undercover dictatorship..force people who wish doctors and treatment of their own choice to submit to only what..dictating outfit offers." Dr. Benjamin Rush

Shawn

Re: maintenance dose question

Post Number:#13  Post by Shawn » Wed Jun 24, 2009 5:05 pm

i apologize to you dolev and ralph if i was rude. i'm really stressed and scared about whats going on with me because i don't want to have this forever. i just hope i'm not putting too many eggs in one basket with one nutrient.

i would just like to know how to use vitamin c like the article that lunar posted talks about?

http://www.perque.com/pdfs/Pt_Ascorbate_Flush_FINAL.pdf

i need to build energy and flush out toxins and heavy metals. that's what's causing all the chronic symptoms is the poisons in me. cognitively i'm not doing very good so even that simple article is difficult to understand.

do you guys think i can use vitamin c like the article talks about or are they promoting their product? if i could get to a point of detoxing doing a "flush" then that would be awesome. then ther other days take 75% of that dose apparently. i'm just confused with bowel tolerance and finding the right dose for myself everyday or just how to use C effectively therapeutically to see a noticeable difference.

also, i believe diet is gonna be important for me too becuase i've been addicted to sugar and carbs since i was a kid. it's like that's all my body wants and i've read where that is just part of this condition. also candida craves those things.

thanks for all your help you guys and i'm grateful for this forum where we can learn and get advice.

shawn

Shawn

Re: maintenance dose question

Post Number:#14  Post by Shawn » Wed Jun 24, 2009 5:18 pm

i forgot to write in my message above that i'm taking 2-3 teaspoons of sodium ascorbate a day. one day though, i took about 15 teaspoons throughout the day and got up to 60grams of sodium ascorbate. as i kept taking it, i did start to get rumbling in the gut and some cramping. also, i had more gas all day which i know was from the vitamin c. i didn't get watery stool so i guess that's not bowel tolerance and i didn't get any flush. but i guess that tells me i can get to more than 60g a day. on the jug it says i get 1.69g of C per half teaspoons and 210mg of sodium.

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Re: maintenance dose question

Post Number:#15  Post by Lunar » Wed Jun 24, 2009 10:21 pm

Thanks for your answer.
I researched and indeed, I don't feel long term use of massive dose of ascorbate with calcium and potassium might be a good choice:
http://www.tomlevymd.com/health_ebytes/issue_9.html

Pure vitamine C in large dose might also be a bit problematic, from the acidic ph.... so I think I find a good alternative to sodium while discussing with a medic specialized in digestive issues: Ascorbate of magnesium only:
http://www.health4youonline.com/health_ ... b_8101.htm

So even if I take my trigger dose (9grams), I only have additional less than 500mg magnesium with is perfectly safe and may even help more with my constipation problem. Haven't tried it though, still shipping.

Lumar

Ralph Lotz wrote:
1) If I add sodium bicarbonate (baking soda) to my daily intake of pure C, will it raise my daily consumption of sodium (salt) ? Sodium has lots of negative effects, or maybe it's not the same ?

2) If I add sodium bicarbonate to alkalinize the C beverage, why not just take an ascorbate mix such as perque's, which already has alkalanizing minerals ?

3) Why in your opinion is perque's not suitable for mega daily supplementation ? What I don't understand, is why ascorbate minarals C is not recommended, yet, Pauling was taking baking soda to alkalinize his C. What's is the difference between ascorbate C such as perque's.... and specifically sodium ascorbate added to pure C ?


1) 1/8th teaspoon of baking soda contains 150 mg of sodium. Since I don't have a gram scale I use 1 part baking soda to 2 parts ascorbic acid. measuring by volume which is a little off, but close enough for me. One teaspoon of ascorbic acid contains between 1,000 mg and 1,250 mg, so you would get around 150 mg of sodium per one gram of ascorbic acid using my crude but practical method. It is inexpensive because baking soda costs less than $1 per box.
Source Naturals Sodium Ascorbate has 140 mg of sodium per one gram of vitamin c, but you will pay at least $15 per pound.
In addition to this mixture, I also take at least 3 grams of ascorbic acid daily.
When I feel ill or out of sorts, I take some form of vitamin C every 4 hours to achieve dynamic flow.

2, 3) Why not use Perque's? Because it has too much calcium to be used for megadoses of vitamin C, too little magnesium and costs too much. There is nothing wrong with using mineral ascorbate mixtures for a few grams of vitamin c. I have been using Emergen-C for years when traveling and for children and grandchildren.


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