[js367124]

@compaq 4887 wrote:

Has anyone ever looked into how much our ancestors masturbated and/or had sex? That would be interesting.

I agree. As a matter of fact they probably had the ideal frequency simply based on how they lived.

This is ofcourse speculative but just thinking about it I dont think our paleoithic ancestors masterbated or ejaculated alot at all.

The vast majority of their sexual experiences where probably limited to actual sexual encouters with females. How frequently this happend I suppose was dependant on how desirable a given male was. but either way assuming this is true there is no way their frequency was even close to what modern day males do.

I seriously question whether they masterbated at all. If so probably fairly rarely. Either way I dont see dopamine insensitivty due to excesive sexual acts being a problem for them. Same way diabeties/insulin resistance, heart disease, strokes are a modern day epidemic and didnt affect our ancestors

[js367124]

@DrMariano 4672 wrote:

Monamine Oxidase Inhibitors (MAOI) – like Selegiline in the EMSAM transdermal patch – block the destruction of serotonin, dopamine, and norepinephrine produced in the body. MAOIs generally increase Serotonin primarily, dopamine secondarily, unless the dose is low enough (e.g. 5-10 mg a day of Selegiline orally, when dopamine can be increased more prominently).

Whenever dopamine signaling is increased – no matter what the form – one will always lose a certain number of dopamine receptors, leading to a reduction in the effectiveness of treatment. The dose at which this occurs varies from person to person. With EMSAM, many people improve significantly with the 6 mg/24H patch. Does this warrant a trial at the higher dose to see if they work better? Depends on the person. One can always return to the previous dose if higher ones cause more adverse effects or have no improvement.

Note that when one finds an antidepressant that works, great. If the antidepressant seems to stop working, then generally, it is not the antidepressant that stopped working. Rather, some other problem was not addressed in the body that caused further changes that caused depression to return.

Depression – at its core – is the sum of numerous factors in the body that lead to an overall pro-inflammatory signaling state. Antidepressants only address a few – particularly those in the nervous system. It is important to look for and address problems in the endocrine system, immune system, gastrointestinal system, etc. These systems along with cellular metabolism and nutrition are components of the mind, determining thought and mental function.

Dopamine is one of the anti-stress signals. When one experiences higher levels of stress, dopamine signaling is reduced.

Lifestyle interventions which aim to help a person maintain a relaxed state despite stress help change nervous system structure and processing to maintain dopamine signaling. These include participating in practices such as yoga and therapeutic interventions involving mindfulness and other forms of therapy. Many times, people have not developed adequate skills to manage their stress and problems because of earlier experiences in life. Psychotherapy with a therapist one feels comfortable with would be very helpful to help restructure nervous system connections to a healthier state. Regular exercise (but not in excess since exercise itself is a stress) helps maintain a sense of wellbeing and help externalize stress.

Addictive substance use are attempts by a person to improve their sense of well-being. Unfortunately, these also have adverse effects that cause the opposite – an impaired ability to function. This a person may not realize until he or she hits bottom given a human’s ability to rationalize away the truth. Humans have an amazing ability to rationalize – its built right into the nervous system – a function of the left cerebral cortex called the interpreter. It can blind you from many things in an attempt to find some semblance of the truth.

Low nutrient density food is so common these days, it is difficult to avoid eating excess calories. Unfortunately, fat cells when excessively large, send leptin and pro-inflammatory signals to get the nervous system to stop a person from eating. When done chronically, the pro-inflammatory signals predispose a person to depression when other problems in the body occur. Caloric restriction helps maintain one’s weight and thus controls adipose cell signals to more positive signals.

Intermittent fasting also helps reduce pro-inflammatory signaling by avoiding overly activating the immune system – which goes into action every time we ingesting a food to help protect us from pathogens in the food. When the immune system is already over-activated from other causes (e.g. infection, autoimmune illness, allergies, etc.), excessive eating adds fuel to the fire of ongoing pro-inflammatory signaling that contributes to depression.

It is a push and pull balance, however. When foods do not have enough nutrition, people have to eat more in order to feel better. When the body is starved of nutrients, the brain will trigger appetite to help find the nutrients it needs. Thus, it would be difficult to do caloric restriction or intermittent fasting in a person who has ongoing nutritional and other problems which would outweigh the attempt to reduce calories.

thank you for your thoughtful answer.

I actually follow a Paleo style diet with protein and fat content making up some 85-90% of my daily calories and the 10-15% of my calories coming from carbs, and this is mostly in the form of vegetables before workouts to fuel my weight lifting.

I have found this dietary approach to be crucial to recovery from many of the problems that plagued my body. It completly reversed my insulin resistance and helped to get my cortisol to good levels.

I even believe it helped lower my norepinephrine output on my fractured catecholamines test and played a part in curing my premature ejaculation and anxiety which were a result of that.

So I am definetly on the same page as you that nutritional is crucial in a well functioning body.

I actually see my psychiatrist this upcoming wendsday and Im sure one of the things we will discuss is upping the dose of emsam from 6mg to 9mg (possibly 12 mg) . And ofcourse as you said if the higher doses are not what I hope then I can always return to the 6mg dose and go with that as it does have positve benefits.

I also absolutly agree with you that depresion is a result of multiple system wide dysfunctions.

In my case fixing my hypothyroid, low T , and insulin resistance already made me markedly less depressed. But something was still missing for lack of a better phrase.

It obviously makes sense that any dopamine promoting drug such as emsam will cause some degree of dopamine receptor down regulation. But I suppose people still experience positive effects because the overall dopamine “signal” is higher . I believe this is the case with me.

So essentially to sum I found that fixing hypogonadism, fixing hypothyroid, fixing partial insulin resistance, and raising cortisol (natually ) improved my functionality and well being some 70% which is ofcourse signficant.

Im hoping directly augmenting neurotransmitters with emsam is the final step and will fix the remaining symptoms.

Thanks again Dr. M for your time.

[js367124]

ya he is located there. Look him up on google or message him on this forum.

[js367124]

Also iv come across some articles online saying that taking 5htp is relatively useless especially when taking B vitamins because 90 percent of it gets metabolized in the gut and only a small amount reaches the brain and central nervous system. this has proven tru in my case because only when i took a high dose 200 to 400 mgs was enough able to get through to the CNS to actually have an efect. What would be the most effective way of avoiding 5htp getting metabolized in the gut?

1) taking trytophan instead?

2) taking 5htp with carbidopa?

3) taking 5htp sublingualy?

any help/advice/info would be greatly apreciated

[js367124]

check your Catecholamines. If you have PE chances are your adrenaline(noephinephrine) is high and it may also be effecting your ability to get erections. I have the same problems and i also overmasterbated. Im getting my blood test results and im fairly certain my Catecholamines are gona be all high were as my inhibitory neurotransitters (serotonin GABA)are gona be low. its worth checking esspecially if your testosterone is that high.

[js367124]

thanks alot

[js367124]

I joned this forum today and this is my first post. I also am suffering from sexual exhaustion since about january of this year. Iam fortunate that I live in NYC and am able to travel to philly to work with Hardasnails and Dr.Overbeck. Hopefully with their help ill be able to get to the bottom of this horrible condidtion and get my life back. I usually post on the sexual exhastion forum http://recover.forumup.org/ but since finding this amazing forum I wanted to hear the advice and expertise of Dr. Mariano and the members.

My symptoms

Premature ejaculation(used to be able to last forever)
Occasional ED
eyefloaters
frequent urination
low back pain(despite avoiding all strain on that area for months)
iiregualr cardio output/shortness of breath

All this started january of this year (freshman year of college). In the months before the symptoms arose I did the following

Increased my masterbation frequency to 1-4 times a day( i started at a young age prob 8 or 9 but usually kept it to 5 to 6 times per week)
Did exstacy twice
did xanax 3 times
smoked marijuana 3 to 8 times per week
worked out 6 days a week(3 days weightlifting and 3 days cardio)

I didnt realize what was causing the problems until about april when i stumbled upon the various Dr. Lin and Dr. richard sites discusing sexual exhaustion and the symptoms. Since then iv stopped all ill practices (masterbation, drugs, alcohol, etc) but obviously no real improvment. Im fairly certain i have blown serotonin and GABA control on the inflatory and exitatory hormones and neurotransmitters. I also probably have low dopamine due to the excesive dopamine -ephinephrine conversion. My testosterone is pretty low for my age. 384, 459, and 414 on 3 different occasions this summer. im sure my parasympathetic nerbous system is serverally weakend and my sympathetic nervous system in in overdirve.

If any one has any advice or help they can offer on the topic i would love to hear what you have to say. When I get my blood tests ill be sure to post them as well. Thank you.

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