I’m curious what dosage of the black seed oil and how long you used (and the typical Thymoquinone % in black seed oil) it and what was the recovery timeline in more detail. It sounded like you may have used it for 8 months, but could you give us more details on the response timeline and the effects along the way?
I notice you talk about how capsules did not seem to work for people and mentioned some higher doses in teapsoons. A capsule would have much less than a teaspoon. However, some capsule products are not black seed oil inside, but instead are extracts. For example from Triquetra and Nootropics Depot. These are extracts standardized for the Thymoquinone content with specific milligrams listed.
I would prefer to use these standardized extracts in general since I try to avoid seed oils due to their high Linoleic acid content and Black Seed Oil is very high in these. Though, I can see how that may not be a primary concern.
The Thymoquinone in the black seed oil is an Acetylcholine esterase inhibitor, meaning it will slow the breakdown of Acetylcholine. So, it will function similar to a nicotine patch. Also, if you look at Alpha-7 Nicotinic Receptor agonist you will see Nicotine is one of them, but Ivermectin is a positive allosteric modulator. So, that means Ivermectin potentiates the activity of Acetylcholine agonists, including natural Acetylcholine. That may be why it helps. Alpha-7 nicotinic receptor
I think you used the black seed oil and Ivermectin, but did not use the patch. I think I will avoid the Ivermectin. One issue I’m having with the nicotine patch and black seed oil I think is that they are making me very cold. I’m not sure if others have experienced that. I tend to get very cold too however when my digestion is not happy with certain things. I developed digestive issues at some point along the way. I think the hypothermic response is also triggered by Choline in the digestive system and read some paper on that in rats.The effects of Choline on body temperature in conscious rats
I also take a good amount of glycine and have heard that can have a cooling effect, but it wasn’t that strong for me I don’t think. Choline is just quad methyl glycine, and acetylcholine uses choline.
Extracts: Ok with some sleazy companies, they use super cheap extracts and sell you pretty much zero active ingredient. I never really collected data on extracts. However, I’d probably just go with the oil because it has been eaten as a supermarket food, it’s cheap, a tablespoon is a lot, etc.
Keep in mind that people have different experiences with all of these things… and it’s probably the nature of the condition. The treatment/intervention may make you worse off, in which case you should stop.
I used nigella sativa and it didn’t fix the issue. it did make me age backwards (my skin became younger, more energy, i lost weight, my spine straightened, etc), also made any cuts I got heal in half the time. I used both high quality expensive 2-3% thymoquinone and random lower quality types, I would be on it on and off, probably longer than 15 months total. higher quality had a bigger anti aging effect and I don’t know about the wound healing because I don’t end up scratching myself by accident that much
I did have the hypothermia issue extremely badly but I didn’t link it to the nigella sativa; didn’t seem to be correlated for me, I was in a much worse-off place maybe?
I worked around it by taking hot baths and pumping my heat up. I remember chlorella would always make me warm after I took it, and I would also take b vitamins and iodine and those would help. it was a very very bad and serious problem; I would turn purple when I would strip for showers for example and violently shiver, and in the winter going outside is basically a no-no. this happened before I was even trying drugs
the hypothermia no longer bugs me thankfully now however. b vitamins and iodine helped, but I also started eating 100 gram liver a week, and then I noticed if I took epsom salt bath my brain got better for a couple of days. Epsom salt has magnesium sulfate in it, and I already tried magnesium pills and they had no effect on me, so I started looking into sulfur. things with sulfur always had a positive effect on me, so I ended up buying various substances with sulfur and loading up on it, and eating organic eggs regularly, and I seem to be improving and don’t have cold issues anymore at all. and it’s actually extremely strange because my sensitivity to the cold was extremely terrifying before. it was so very bad. but now my body can go outside in -20c weather and it feels basically no different than me being indoors. whatever that hypothermia problem I had before was extremely traumatic. no clue really what it was. it was like my whole metabolism broke
my food insensitivities also seems to be improving since I’ve started loading up on sulfur. I stopped being able to drink camellia sinensis teas, eat dark chocolate, or drink coffee. and I couldn’t eat any sugar or much carbs without getting dementia. now I can consume these things in small amounts and my tolerance seems to be going up over time. I also can’t eat most fruits and vegetables, and those have not improved but I’m thinking they will
Glen, do you still take the black seed oil? Also, 1 table spoon is a lot of thymoquinone. I wonder which brand you got and how potent. 1 third of that at 1 tea spoon can have 50 to 75mg. So you could have been taking 150mg? From my experience 50mg was very potent. I just tried taking 50mg again today and will see what response I get.
Acetylcholine is a mitochondrial nutrient and I think the black seed oil is working by providing a acetylcholine, due to thymoquinone being an acetylcholinesterase inhibitor. Carvacrol is an even more potent acetylcholinesterase inhibitor. However, oregano oil is not as often consumed and there seem to be some concerns with that. I have some essential oil from oregano, but it would have to be diluted with carrier oil and perhaps applied topically.
The mitochondrial biogenesis can then help the peroxisomes which performs beta oxidation and create more acetylcholine and acetyl coenzyme A, needed for energy. Reducing endoplasmic reticulum stress can also help the endoplasmic reticulum. TUDCA does this. Then the ER can also work with the mitochondria to repair to peroxisomes and restore beta oxidation. Root cause can be gut dysbiosis causing redox stress through lipopolysachirides (LPR), so if gut dysbiosis is not fixed then relapse could occur or not be successful.
TUDCA has given me diarrhea as I couldn’t tolerate it. But, combining TUDCA with black seed oil should work well. I will try TUDCA again now that I have some support for my digestion. I have oregano essential oil, but that requires dilution in carrier oil and may try topically. Consumer Labs rated the Prime Natural brand black seed oil was reated top with more than stated thymoquinone 75mg instead of 50mg. Triquatra extract 50mg was also rated top, which is what I have. Reducing redox stress with things like CoQ10, vitamin A,C,D,E etc. could also be beneficial while doing the rest. Tocotrionol form of vitamin E and nicotine increase ER stress or mitochondrial stress I believe, so should not be used. Taking pantathine and glycine may help support acetylcoenzyme A.
Also, I wonder what caused your bleeding on stools and if that could have been anal fissure. I have problems with that as well and have to keep my stools stoft. This acetylcholine / muscarinic receptors are used for these smooth muscles in the pelvic floor which have to relax properly. Some might call related things Prostatitis as well with the pelvic floor pain. I get sharp pain by folind legs or sitting indian style.
I still take it (roughly a teaspoon but I don’t measure)… not sure if it does much nowadays though. I suppose that thymoquinone concentration can vary from brand to brand… it would depend on how the plants are grown.
By the way, some people have negative experiences with black seed oil. So I don’t think that people should expect only positive results or a nothingburger. It probably cuts the other way in some people.
Also, I wonder what caused your bleeding on stools and if that could have been anal fissure.
Oh I don’t have that anymore. It was related to my diet… dairy and pork would cause it. I don’t think it was an anal fissure… that’s different.
Did you ever notice a stimulant effect? I guess you don’t now. There is also Bacopa/Brahmine which is an AChE inhibitor. It has been used in Ayurvedic similar to black seed oil. Eating plenty of egg yolks is good for Choline source. It looks like Bacopa works both to inhibit the breakdown of acetylcholine (AChE), but also increase the enzyme that creates it Choline Acetyltransferase (ChAT).
I’ve only tried Huperzine A little bit of proprietary undisclosed dose years ago from a product called “Parasym plus” which also had alpha-GPC, acetyl-carnitine in it. I didn’t take it for very long as I was looking for an effect on my digestion, not a long term theraputic effect. I think Huperzine A is very strong and has more negative reviews. Bacopa might be better and Nootropics Depot sells bacopa, but not Huperzine. Huperzine A dose is like 50 micrograms not milligrams, so I think I don’t like that. It also does not have historical ayurvedic use like Bacopa I think. Huperzine A has a long half life 10-14 hrs as does bacopa, so you don’t dose every day either, so that makes it more difficult to deal with that black seed oil or Bacopa. https://nootropicsexpert.com/huperzine-a/
Thymoquinone halflife is under 5 hours.
People have gotten sick taking too much AChE inhibitors like Hupperzine A for example, is a popular one similar to Bacopa. You can read reviews of bad reactions.
Yes, I think it is very low though. I can’t find the paper on the content I’ve read, or in your linked paper. I remember reading papers on the content of similar molecules in black seed oil and oregano and thyme. I realized that thymoquinone probably is related to Thyme plant name, but Thyme has mostly just Thymol at 51% and carvacrol at 3.7%
[essential oil from thymus vulgaris]
These all provide AChE inhibition in this order of potency: thymohydroquinone > carvacrol > thymoquinone > essential oil > thymol > linalool.
“carvacrol was 10 times stronger than that exerted by its isomer thymol”
Nothing really has much thymohydroquinone I think. I may have read it isn’t very stable either.
In vitro acetylcholinesterase inhibitory properties of thymol, carvacrol and their derivatives thymoquinone and thymohydroquinone
It has been a few hours since I took the 50mg thymoquinone and not noticed anything yet. It seems to take a while to feel it from what I remember, but I remember a very stimulated effect and maybe even sweating. I wonder if taking 3g of glycine and 50mg of pantethine reduce side effects due to support Acetyl-CoA.