When I think of serotonin, I picture happiness.
Big Pharma has successfully marketed serotonin as our joyful neurotransmitter. With it, thoughts of happiness, love and enjoyment are profound. Therefore, we can piece together what happens when serotonin is low, but what happens if we have too much?
Serotonin Syndrome has been influencing researchers in recent times. High levels are most often caused by serotonergic pharmaceutical drugs, supplements, and certain illicit drugs. There’s also the chance your neurotransmitter profile is geared toward serotonin dominance.
When your brain is swamped with serotonin, aggressiveness is a very common symptom. This may sound counterintuitive, but an illustrative example is when illicit drug users ‘rage out’, often depicted via media sources.
Dilated pupils are a good indication that you have elevated levels of serotonin, as the muscle groups in the iris become activated. In fact, our body’s ability to find deep sleep comes from our pupils dilating to amber light (think campfire) and initiating not only serotonin production, but also melatonin. This is why your eyes dilate when illicit drugs are used. It’s no surprise that high levels of serotonin cause fatigue, making the person feel very sleepy and drowsy. Dealing with stress and a weak immune system? Check out quercetin australia.
High serotonin has also been linked to high blood pressure and hypertension, and since serotonin plays a role in temperature regulation, some people may have hot and cold flushes, which can lead to constant shivering.
Though the biggest issue with elevated serotonin is its ability to cause mania. This has been directly linked to long-term use of SSRI’s, and is often confused with clinical diagnoses of other mental health conditions such as bipolar disorder.
Serotonin is present in our brain (10%) but mostly within our digestive system (90%). One of its main roles is peristalsis, the movement of our gut. When levels become too high, diarrhoea and vomiting are common side effects.
But there’s hope, and some ways to lower Serotonin can be quite simple.
- Dietary intervention: Try lowering food groups that contain tryptophan (amino acid that initiates serotonin production). Carbohydrates help with the uptake of this amino acid, so a high fat and protein diet would be a good place to start.
- BCAA’s (Branch Chain Amino Acids): Have been found to effectively inhibit tryptophan absorption.
Great post :)! Good to see fitness coaches trying to take a more scientific approach to health and wellbeing, definitely a great move from what is commonly found in commercial gyms. I’d just like to make a couple of corrections in regards to these blog posts. Individuals ‘rage out’ because they’re low on serotonin rather than what you’ve mentioned. Serotonin can be artifically forced to flood and stay between a synapse so that the effects it has is stronger/longer. When the serotonin is depleted from overuse, people become irritable, depressed and aggressive. Also, this is why selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors are the most commonly prescribed medication for depression, it forces the serotonin to stay in the synapse, rather than be taken up to be metabolised by enzymes (this is an oversimplified explanation). In your previous post you stated that DDRIs are the most commonly prescribed anti-depressant, when I think you did actually mean SSRI.
Keep it up :)!
Thank you for the kind words! With many of our posts we like to keep it simple for the reader, but going forward we will certainly look to add more in depth information regarding some of the more technical blogs.
This blog was primarily referenced using Dr Datis Kharrazians work, feel free to look into his stuff… I get the feeling you will love it!
Too better health :)