L-tryptophan

[FaatFaat]

I got some lucid dreams last night. Woo hoo! :happyme:

What I did was take 200mg L-tryptophan. I also took 1/2 teaspoon of magnesium in the form of epsom salt.

I finished eating dinner at 8.30pm, then at 9.20pm I took the supplements. At 11.00pm I turned off my lights and went to bed (I slowed down my night schedule to half speed).

Normally I take a long time to fall asleep, but this time it was lights out pretty quickly. At 4.00am I awoke and couldn't remember any dreams. I had to go to the toilet so I went to the potty without turning on the lights so I didn't disturb any melatonin production that may have been going on. When I went to sleep again I had lucid dreams! I thought they were very lifelike when I was dreaming, but when I woke up I realized they weren't quite so lifelike afterall. On my last part of lucidity, I leapt into a pool and could feel most of the sensations of being in water. That woke me up though.

I need to decide what to do in my LDs for next time. I was wondering 'Gee, what am I going to do?'. I also need to remember my RC so I can get lucid sooner.

I think I'll try the same thing again tonight. If anyone wants to take L-tryptophan, avoid taking it with protein because that competes with the supplement. Turkey, milk, and whatever probably don't work very well. Also take it on an emtpy stomach, at least 3/4 of an hour after eating. I have a very dark room as well. Maybe that helps too.

[towarmforacoat]

What exactly is L tryptophan? Is it a vitamin? Or a drug?

[FaatFaat]

What exactly is L tryptophan? Is it a vitamin? Or a drug?
[/b]

L-tryptophan is an essential amino acid. It is a pre-cursor to 5-Hydroxytryptophan (5-HTP), serotonin, and melatonin. Taking it during the day leads to increases in both serotonin and melatonin, while taking it at night leads to increases in melatonin only.

Taking it continually will probably lead to resistance, so it maybe best to cycle on and off, i.e. as soon as results seem to be tapering off, take a few days off.

[FaatFaat]

No LDs last night, but my non-lucid dreams were as vivid as the other night. The difference was that I didn't get up and go to the toilet at 4.00am. It was 6.00am when I went and by then it was too late. I couldn't get back to sleep.

I will try to get up at 4.00am next time.

[FaatFaat]

I didn't have any LDs last night. I'm not sure when I got out of bed to do WBTB, but I didn't leave my room because there was a light on outside. My recall wasn't as good but I know my dreams were more vivid than normal.

OK, tonight, I really will get up properly. Hopefully it will be at a good time.

If that doesn't work, then I guess I was just lucky the first time around and I will listen to BrainWave Stimulator 2.1 on the LD setting, for 10 minutes. This is a software program that comes with Subliminal Message Flash. This consistently gives me more vivid dreams.

[FaatFaat]

Ok, nothing again. That sucks. I woke up 3.00am and went to the toilet. There were lights on downstairs and I felt that it was a bit difficult to get back to sleep.

Tonight, I will listen to 10 minutes of BrainWave Stimulator 2.1 on the LD setting. I will also take 3 capsules of ZMA in place of the epsom salts... Oh yeah, I took them last night. These contain:

30mg zinc monomethionine
450mg magnesium aspartate
10.5mg b6

I'll see what happens when I don't get out of bed, so I can recover from my sleep debt.

[FaatFaat]

I ended up getting out of bed at 4.30am because I had to go to the toilet. No lucid dreams, and less dream recall. I took 500mg of L-tryptophan.

The end :)

[Dream Sailor]

I ended up getting out of bed at 4.30am because I had to go to the toilet. No lucid dreams, and less dream recall. I took 500mg of L-tryptophan.

The end :)
[/b]

Sounds like no real conclusion...darn it. Well, just yet anyways...

[neuf08]

L-tryptophan is a supplement, not a drug. It is used for sleeplessness, depression, anxiety, and muscle pain. Seems like unless one needs it for depression or anxiety, that L-tryptophan (http://www.seacoastvitamins.com/topic.php?health=l-tryptophan) might be best not to take daily, as it affects the serotonin levels in the brain. But it is a useful supplement.

[moe007]

Tryptophan is perfectly safe to be taken daily. You cannot become tolerant to protein, just throwing that out there.

It is an amino acid that you must have consumed some of at least on a daily basis to survive. Unless you take a whole bottle of the supplement type tryptophan, you should be alright.. Worst case senario is, you urinate the excess. According to a study, you would have to take 300mg/kg of body weight in order for it to be toxic. That would be about 65x300mg or about 20 grams. I doubt it is possible to consume such a large dose at once.

Taking tryptophan alone will not yield much results, as tryptophan needs Vitamin B6 in order to be metabolized into Serotonin and then melatonin.

Instead of taking this long twisted route, I would recommend taking straight 5-HTP supplements, which would let you bypass the consummation of two synthesized supplements.

Taking 150-300mg of 5-HTP before bed is sufficient in suppressing REM sleep for the first half of the night, resulting in heavy REM rebound during the morning hours, causing very intense and vivid dreams.

[Nihao]

Just apart from the efficiency. I have L-Tryptophan in 500mg capsules. quite big for my throat so I decided to mix it (one capsule) with small amount of water and drink quickly before bed. It was so disquisting that I gave up any WILD later and had next day really bad. I couldn't kill this awful taste.