The Brainhacking Saga Continues

There are many ways to grow and prepare Lion’s Mane. Since the market is unregulated, just blind-buying a bottle of the stuff doesn’t guarantee a thing. For example it can be grown in sawdust, harvested from trees, grown in water, or even grown on a grain substrate.

You’ll see sellers claim that growing it in sawdust is somehow more “eco-friendly” because they are “recycling the trees” and turn it into a selling point. I wish that was a joke. Some sellers also claim that if it’s grown on a grain substrate (such as rice), it’s not as pure…which may not be total bs–it seems that the ‘shrooms meld inseparably with the grain during the growth process, but I didn’t come across any evidence that this is a detriment to the final product. (Might even be a feature.)

Tons of brands out there proudly proclaim that their Lion’s Mane extract came from “whole fruiting bodies”. They’ll say stuff like, “Some vendors sell Lion’s Mane with 0% actual mushroom in it, and we find that a travesty! We’ve made it our mission to sell only true mushrooms with pure, whole fruit body extract.”

Sadly, this is propaganda from Chinese mushroom farmers trying to undercut US and European markets. The fruiting bodies (the main part of the mushroom) DO NOT contain erinacines, which is the only compound in Lion’s Mane that boosts the Neuron Growth Factor (NGF).

If you get fooled by this propaganda and buy “whole fruiting body” supplements, you won’t see NGF benefits at all. If you want a good laugh, read the product reviews under these whole fruiting body brands and you can witness the placebo effect in all its glory.

The fruiting body isn’t a bad thing to take. It does help boost your immune system and get rid of the Amyloid β(25-35) peptide, which is believed to help prevent and even treat Alzheimer’s. None-the-less, the fruiting body is not the part of the ‘shroom that does the heavy nootropic lifting. That would be the mycelium.

Apparently it’s best to receive a blend of both the mycelium and the fruiting body. It also would be best if it were grown in a liquid instead of a solid substrate. And, unfortunately, the only way to find out how this stuff is farmed or sourced by a particular brand is to do your own research.

For example, one vendor out there bills themselves as a happy newlywed couple who started a small mushroom farm in New York. But if you do a little digging, you’ll find they’re actually 100% sourced from China. Their whole shtick is basically a sham. Heck, the couple’s photo might even be a stock image.

To further add to the confusion, you can get this stuff in liquid form, capsule form, or powdered. You can even get it as a tea. Doesn’t seem to make a difference which you choose, except the powder form can get “clumpy”.

I navigated through all this nonsense and managed to find a twice-extracted (once with water, once with alcohol), water-grown source for Lion’s Mane that is a blend of mycelium and the fruiting body in an eight-to-one (8:1) extract.

But Lion’s Mane doesn’t increase dopamine. In fact, one of the possible side-effects from taking Lion’s Mane is a “lack of ambition”. There aren’t very many studies for this stuff, and there are no long-term studies regarding alternate substances and ADHD.

Here’s one such short-term study, but always ask yourself why someone would fund this. There’s always an ulterior motive, and it always reveals itself if you follow the money.

In this case, two of the three doctors that ran this study co-developed the “Breath-Body-Mind” program, so they spend an unhealthy amount of time in this otherwise professional study pushing their very biased beliefs that ADHD children and teens should be practicing zen yoga at least 20 hours a week, no doubt awakening their inner-chakras to earn their crowns of light and explore the Gnostic world.

Yes, this is basically a glorified commercial for their yoga program. It’s also a study they can conveniently cite if any parents of ADHD children decide to disagree with their worldview.

But it did give them an excuse to do a series of real double-blind studies on the effects of nootropics on ADHD-afflicted children, including racetams (some say piracetam is one of the best motivators) and Rhodiola Rosea. (The findings on R. Rosea in particular are fascinating, but I’ll leave you to read it if you’re interested.)

Apparently the dopamine levels in your brain decrease by about 10% per decade. This decline starts from early adulthood. If that’s not a ticking timebomb wakeup call, I don’t know what is.

If true, your willingness to do that thing you need to do decreases year-by-year. If you didn’t do your thing in 2021, chances are 2022 isn’t going to be any easier. In fact, it may well be approximately 1% harder to muster up the needed willpower.

So let’s talk about dopamine supplements.

First, how does one keep up their dopamine levels naturally?

I previously mentioned that caffeine is a stimulant that binds to our A1 receptors. This can actually create a temporary boost to dopamine. The problem is, it doesn’t activate those receptor nodes like adenosine would, and it drains our dopamine quickly as a result. Our brains can only produce so much dopamine in a day, so this spike is short-lived and can actually have the reverse effect once the “caffeine high” is done.

In fact, decreasing caffeine intake is recommended to help your overall dopamine levels. While the amount in a typical soda is too low to have much an effect, I highly advise against dosing on the stuff as a supplement.

So, how do you raise dopamine?

Protein. Meat, poultry, eggs, fish, and dairy products will get you there. Iron and Vitamin B6 are the main things your body likes to have in order to supply you with dopamine.

I already mentioned R. Rhodea (sometimes called “golden root”). Another dopamine booster is an amino acid called L-Tyrosine. The nice thing about amino acids is that they are about as safe as nootropics come. The side-effects are almost non-existent, and it would be very hard to overdose on them. (They say you can even take up to a maximum of 5000mg daily, dependent on body weight.)

High amounts of L-Tyrosine can be found naturally in chicken and in egg whites. Avocados, bananas, seaweed, and all sorts of other options have this amino acid as well.

L-Tyrosine is one of the safest options, and it boosts dopamine. Just what I’m looking for! So twice daily, along with 500mg of Lion’s Mane, I am taking 750mg of L-Tyrosine. (Also, you’re supposed to take L-Tyrosine on an empty stomach.)

They say L-tyrosine boosts “performance”, alertness, fat loss, and concentration. All good stuff if true! (I very well could be a sucker, but you can’t say I didn’t put my fair share of research into this and I feel I did come into it with a healthy dose of skepticism.)

The problem with boosting your dopamine is that it has a teeter-totter effect with your serotonin levels. Raise one, the other lowers. This is because there’s a special enzyme within our body called aromatic L-amino acid decarboxylase (AAAD). It converts L-Tyrosine into dopamine, and L-Tryptophan into serotonin (and eventually melatonin).

In short, boosting dopamine keeps your AAAD busy doing one job … even when it should be doing the other.

I think I made a mistake in trying to boost both serotonin and dopamine at once. (Perhaps I have a dopamine deficiency, but I am probably not serotonin-deficient, so it would’ve been better to focus on just one.)

Because I didn’t know about this teeter-totter effect when I ordered my supplements, I’m taking 75mg of 5-HTP (which is made from L-Tryptophan) twice daily, and this is the recommended 1-to-10 ratio to L-Tyrosine. (75mg of L-Tryptophan to 750mg of L-Tyrosine).

My hasty decision ensures I’m keeping my AAAD extra-busy these days.

I’m taking another amino acid I also probably don’t need, which, just like 5-HTP, is generally for people who are depressed. I am not depressed. None-the-less, I’m taking 200mg of L-Theanine.

Furthermore, I’m taking 300mg of Ashwaganda root (to combat a potential side-effect of Lion’s Mane), 250mg of muscuna pruriens extract, and 375mg of Taurine, which rounds my “stack” out, as the trend-ites call it.

If I could do it over again, I would probably forego all the depression supplements and go with L-Tyrosine, Lion’s Mane, Ashwaganda, and/or R. Rhodea.

A few weeks in, I’m not suffering any side-effects and am finding time to write, so maybe I didn’t screw up too badly. Time will tell.