Thread: galantamine

Found this link, sounds a little scary to me. If you want to take a suppliment, I would recommend 3mg of Melatonin 2-4 times a month.

http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/druginf...er/a699058.html

OMG! Look at those side effects:

seizures *
fainting *
black and tarry stools *
vomiting material that looks like coffee grounds [/b]

One of the side effects says "difficulty falling asleep or staying asleep". I dont see how this medication could help your dream intensity if it doesn't even allow you fall asleep or stay that way.

Try B6 dude, that other stuff will kill ya.

thanks for the info. I was told galantamine was some sort of plant extract, thought it might be safe. I'll try the B6 and/or melatonin. I have serious problems getting to sleep at night, and staying asleep through the night. Maybe those would help.

Melatonin will help, but your body quickly develops a tolerance for it, as is the case with most sleep aids.

Valerian might be a better way to go if you're looking for something to help you get to sleep. It's a root and I don't think you build a tolerance for it. Don't think there's side effects either.

Choline or DMAE supplements will create a similiar effect as galantamine (increased ACH levels), but are a hell of a lot safer and cheaper. But make sure to do some research before you try either of them.

Also, 3mg of Melatonin is a bit much. Always try to use the lowest effective dosage of any drug.

.5mg's usually works fine for me. Some nights I have gone as high as 2mg's. There's no reason to start with 3mg's if you've never even tried it before.

I just researched a little on DMAE cuz recently ive ben experimenting with vitamines to help with my dream intensity and recall... b6 works great, do you think combining b6 and DMAE would work..

and what exactly does DMAE do for you dreaming? it says on all the suplement sites that it helps with adhd and alziemers how does this help with dreaming?

I'm feeling a little lazy here, so I'm just gonna paste some random notes I've copied off a couple sites. But don't just take my word for it. Make sure you keep doing your own research...

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"DMAE (Dimethylaminoethanol) is a very important B-vitamin. It flows easily through the brain's
blood barrier, where it is converted into Choline. During REM, Choline is added the coenzyme A
(Vitamin B-5), and we have Acetylcholine, the neurotransmitter in use during REM."

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"DMAE (dimethyl-amino-ethanol) is a chemical substance similar to choline. It has been known to increase intelligence, memory, learning, and the vividness of dreams. It is a mild stimulant that should be taken in the early part of the day, and may be used in combination with lecithin and B6 for optimal benefit.

Typically, you want to start with a relatively small dosage, such as 100mg, and increase it incrementally to up to about 500mg. It really does work, and it can be found in many vitamin stores and even your everyday grocery store if you're lucky. In Europe it goes by the name of Deanol. Sweet dreams!

Lecithin, DMAE, and Vitamin B-5 all influence the levels of the neurotransmitter acetylcholine. Acetylcholine plays a vital role in memory, and consequently plays a major role in memory consolidation during REM sleep. Lecithin contains the active ingredient choline as one of its components. Choline is the precursor to acetycholine. It's a good idea to take lecithin with vitamin B-5 so that the choline can be converted into acetylcholine. Research has shown that lecithin and B-5 act synergistically to improve the performance of normal, healthy humans in a variety of intelligence and memory tests. All the B Vitamins (B-Complex) are required to deal with stress and to maintain a healthy nervous system. DMAE, a naturally occuring substance, accelerates the brain's synthesis of acetylcholine and thereby improves mental function. It also helps with ADHD in some individuals. Finally, 5-HTP and melatonin both influence the levels of the neurotransmitter serotonin. Serotonin regulates mood and sleep. If you search around the web for "smart drugs", there will be more information available.


DMAE, despite the fact that it's a "multi-syllabic-hyphenated-acronymed chemical compound", is naturally found in small amounts in the brain and in some sea food. Its suggested dose is usually 500 or 1000 mg. If you take more than the recommended dose it can result in dull headaches and tension. As with most "smart drugs", taking more DMAE than recommended does not neccesarily make it more effective, and with synergistic substances less can work equally well. For me, the first night of taking DMAE was amazing with regard to its lucid dream enhancement, although I've read that it may take up to three weeks for it to boost intelligence. BTW, www.nootropics.com is a great site!"

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That should help clear things up.

A couple other things to know, it usually takes up to 3 weeks for the effects of DMAE to be felt, so make sure you remain at a low dosage (50-100mg daily) for those first 3 weeks, before considering increasing the dosage. And then, only increase it by another 50-100mg's at a time, and wait at least a week between each increase. 500mg's should be more than enough for most people. Many find 100mg's effective for increasing LD's.

Some people feel extra energy throughout the day from taking DMAE. So it may not be a good choice if you have trouble sleeping at night.

And of course, always remember to be cautious when taking any new supplement. Start with the lowest recommended dosages and if necessary, increase them gradually. Monitor yourself for any adverse reactions and above all, remember that LD'ing is a natural skill. Pills may be helpful, but they are NOT necessary. So your goal should always be to develop the ability to enjoy LD's without them.

Best of Luck!

Ok, I posted a long boring message about this the other day, but apparently I picked a bad time because then the server went down and now there is no record of that or my account. So I'll try this again.

I found out about galantamine from Stephen Laberge when he was lecturing in Boulder a few months ago. From both speaking with him and from my own experience since then it is hands down the most efficient supplement in aiding with lucidity.

It is a plant extract, from a flower called a snowdrop (which I think is a kind of daffodil). Galantamine is used as a supplement primarily for people who suffer from alzheimers, who use it as a memory aid. The scientific explanation, as best as I can understand, for why it works as a dream aid is that it is an acetylcholinesterase inhibitor. This is pretty much jibba jabba to me, but Laberge explained it as our brain produces an amino acid called acetycholine, which is a chemical transmittor for the nervous system and may be an important part of dreaming. The body also produces acetylcholinesterase to block/break it down. As we age we produce more of the acetylcholinesterase, so the galantamine basically blocks this resulting in a temporary boost in acetycholine levels. Anyone with a better understanding of science, please correct/clarify any of that.

Anyhoo, my first concern was also the side effects. If you google galantamine and side effects you will find a list of pretty scary side effects. But if you read up on it you will notice that most of the side effects were experienced by a minimal percentage and after prolonged use. As a lucidity aid, you would want to only take galantamine at the time when you conduct your experiment. The only side effects that I personally have experienced are mild headaches the morning after and a high pitched noise before falling asleep. Laberge also however assured me that he would post some more information on his web site, and there is none. When I asked Laberge about the safety he told me that the biggest risk would be building up a tolerance, though again if you do some research, you will find that there are potentially some serious side effects. All I can perfectly confidently say about its safety and efficacy is what I have personally experienced.

As for it making it harder for you to fall asleep, I have definitely experienced that, but I feel that it is a blessing in disguise. Once I do fall asleep I tend to cycle back and forth repeatedly between wakefulness and dreaming. Not only that, but I can't say for sure if I am every actually waking up, or just dreaming it because while experimenting I have had a TREMENDOUS amount of false awakenings. Not only that, but going in and out of dreams that rapidly could feasibly be an efficient method for practicing WILD, something I have always had trouble with. In any case, the false awakenings have resulted in a number of instances of lucidity. Even the high pitched noise has been incorporated as a dream sign for me, usually as some kind of strange music.

The galantamine does take effect pretty quickly after ingestion, so it would make sense to wake up and take it toward the end of the night when your REM periods are longer to maximize your chances for lucidity. Also, I would recommend starting out experimenting with the lowest possible dose and then moving up from there. I have most recently been experimenting with 16mg, which I just today decided was too much. The dreams I had once asleep were extremely detailed and vivid, and I did experience a number of false awakenings, but it was very hard to fall asleep. I have had the same successes on lower doses. Laberge also warned of a small lady who experimented on a particularly large dose and woke up thinking she was hallucinating, her dreams were that vivid.

Which brings me to another point; that vivid dreams are also listed as one of the potential side effects. Though that sounds wonderful to anyone who wants to achieve lucidity, an abnormally vivid dream can easily become a nightmare. Nightmares can also be wonderful tools for achieving lucidity, but its something to be prepared for nonetheless.

I have given doses of galantamine to 2 of my friends. One of these friends almost never recalls dreams and the other recalls them regularly but has very little experience with lucid dreaming. The one who never recalls dreams noticed nothing at all and the one who regularly recalls them told me he had by far and away the most vivid dreams of his life. Neither experienced any side effects. So the best I can guess is that galantamine alone wont make you go lucid. However, if you already have significant dream recall you will notice a difference, and if you are working toward lucidity you will greatly increase your chances. In my experience it has been HANDS DOWN the most effective aid in terms of a supplement.

Anyway, I hope this info helps, if it didn't put anyone to sleep. I think I wrote it better the first time around. I would love to here some other experiences or opinions. If anyone has any questions or would like to hear some specific experiences, please let me know.

I saw this and felt I must chime in. Galantamine's most common side effect appears to be upset stomachs from taking more than around 10mg. Less than that you'll find few reports of ill effects. I use it, and it has contributed more towards lucidity than anything else there is, and if you can name it, I've probably tried it. I was having one a month for years...now I have 2 or 3 a week after discovering this stuff.

In fact, galantamine is the "natural substance" that is given to the participants of the Lucidity Institute's Hawaii retreats. An article was written in the New York Times Magazine giving a first hand account by someone who went there (on google, type in galantamine lucid kalani into the search bar, no quotations...it's the first link.) It is also included in Dr. Laberge's patent application for a "substance that helps incduce lucid dreams," along with numerous other compounds. They've actually done quite a bit of research, they just haven't released it. On google (I love google) type in "patent laberge galantamine lucid" without the quotes. You'll find numerous links to the full-text of the patent application, which, since it's a patent application, is now public knowledge, even though they haven't officially released their findings.

Zilcho,

I'm glad to hear from someone else who has experimented with this. A few questions: How often do you use galantamine and at what dose? Also, have you noticed any hints that you are building any sort of resistance? Have you noticed a difficulty falling/staying asleep at any dose?

Thanks,
-mark

Mark,

I use it about 3 to 4 times per week. I don't go lucid every time I use it, but I've found that there is a MUCH higher probability that I will when I do. One of the reasons I'm averaging more LD's per week now is that that often times I'll have more than one lucid dream during the nights I use it successfully, which, for me, was unheard of before I discovered it. My dose has always been 8mg. The kind I bought comes in 4mg gelcaps, so I'm limited to trying multiples of 4mg. And like I said, I've read reports of those that have used 12 or even 16mg, and become very nauseated. Like anything, use the smallest dose that works. As for tolerance, that's the main reason I only use it 3-4 times per week, because I was afraid of that happening, and so far the 8mg dose still seems to work fine. I would stay away from taking it right before bed. Every time I've done that I find it extremely difficult to get to sleep, sometimes completely without success. I wake up after my third sleep cycle (4.5 hours) take 8mg, then go right back to bed. No trouble falling asleep after that since I'm usually really tired anyway. It starts to work pretty fast, so by the time you're in your next REM cycle, it's working.

Z

Zilcho,

Mine also come in the 4mg form. I started with 4 and eventually worked my way up to 16mg, which I have found to be very effective, but probably a bit much. It's very difficuly to stay asleep, but that results in a huge amount of false awakenings (I understand if you didn't read my earlier post on the subject. I made it waaay too long and boring). I'll try 8mg tonight after about 4.5 hours. I've been trying to use it later in the night using the wake/back to bed method, but my problem thus far is that if I stay awake for a period of time it still takes me a little while to fall back asleep (and it kicks in pretty quick). I like the idea of waking up expressly for taking it and going immediately back to bed. Thanks for the info.

-mark

Mark,

I'll try and find your other post, I actually didn't see it yet.....I was only reading the ones on this thread! If you CAN fall asleep while taking it before bed, by all means go for it, if that's what works for you. But it does start to work quickly and I think it would probably peak sooner than your longest REM periods which tend to be after your 3rd REM period, so you'd probably not get the most out of it. Also, getting out of bed specifically for the purpose if taking a "lucid dream pill" can help set your mind for the purpose of realizing you're dreaming, even though you're only up for a couple minutes. Staying up for any length of time longer than it takes to go to the bathroom usually makes it harder for me to get back to sleep quickly, and I definitely like to get back to sleep as quickly as I can.
I'm not entirely sure about how adept the body is at building a tolerance to this stuff, but to be sure, I'd limit myself to every other day at least, to be safe. With all the good effects it has, you don't want to spoil it for yourself.

Z

z,

I like that idea. I'm going to try it tonight, and I'll let you know my results. BTW the post I was talking about is the one right before your first post in this topic.

-mark

Ohhh, okay, I was confused I guess, I thought you were talking about some other post somewhere else. I definitely read your post in this thread.

Z

Z,

I tried it last night. It was great, no trouble getting to sleep and I went lucid a couple hours later. Unfortunately I got woked up by alarm about a minute after I went lucid, but the experiment worked great at 8mg. Thanks for the tip.

-mark

Hello all,

Where are you guys getting this supplement?...im having trouble finding it. thanks for info.

LDreamer99,
Try googling "Galantamind." That brand has choline and B5 in it too, I think. I tried a bunch of health/nutrition stores and couldn't find it, so I ordered it online.