L-Dopa is well documented to cause permanent motor problems with continued use. There are 122 hits for l-dopa dyskinesia (in quotes) in pubmed! : (http://www.ncbi.nlm....ced dyskinesia")
Do not take Mucuna or anything else containing L-Dopa if you do not have professionally diagnosed Parkinson's disease. It was used traditionally in Aryuveda to treat Parkinsons disease and was NOT used by otherwise healthy people.
Mucuna is being used for a variety of health problems in aryuveda. I think everyone here agrees that pure l-dopa is toxic at higher dosages. If you have studies showing the same for mucuna pruriens seed powder, where l-dopa content has not been artifically increased, I would like to see them. However, there are studies showing neuroprotective and neurorestaurative activity of mucuna seed powder, contrary to concentrated l-dopa preperations. In addition, there is a theory that a lack of serotonin is the actual cause of dyskinesia (dopamine surpresses serotonin and vice versa). If that was the case, it could not happen with mucuna pruriens seed powder, because it was shown to increase serotonin as well. Keep in mind that a patient treated with very high amounts of l-dopa will have severely depleted serotonin levels and it might take a long time until the normal levels return, and most patients will not be able to stop l-dopa therapy this long since the parkinson symptoms come back.
A good example of misuse.
Which is to be expected for any substance that has significant effects on the dopaminergic system (such as adhd meds, drugs...).
I never got a drug like trip feeling on mucuna though, it just makes my brain work more normal.
During the 18th and 19th centuries, Mucuna was grown
widely as a green vegetable in the foothills and lower hills of the eastern Himalayas and in Mauritius
(Watt 1883; Piper and Tracy 1910; CSIR 1962). Both the green pods and the mature beans were boiled
and eaten. Burkill (1966) and Watt (1883) suggested that Mucuna was eventually replaced as a
vegetable in Asia by more palatable legumes, although it is still used as a famine food and as specialty
food in northeastern India (CSIR 1962). In Guatemala and Mexico, M. pruriens has for at least several
decades been roasted and ground to make a coffee substitute; the seed is widely known in the region
as "Nescafé," in recognition of this use. The use of Mucuna spp. as minor food crops has also been
reported in Ghana (Osei-Bonsu et al. 1995), Mozambique (Infante et al. 1990), and Nigeria (Ezueh
1977). However, an outbreak of acute psychosis in Mozambique was attributed to the inappropriate
consumption of velvetbean: because of famine and drought, the water used to boil the seed was not
discarded, as it normally is, and larger than normal quantities of this liquid were consumed (Infante
et al. 1990).
Strong dopaminergic activity always has the risk for psychosis. That goes for mucuna, l-dopa, dopamine agonists etc. Especially contraindicated for people with psychosis! Those people must have gotten a LOT l-dopa though. I mean, far away from dosages we are talking about if it affected a whole group of people that strongly (or they all were almost psychotic anyways, maybe through similar genetic mutations, who knows).
I haven't had any issues with Mucuna whole herb powder. I've used it extensively last months, no real side effects, withdrawals or even tolerance issues (couple teaspoons a day). Also using extract with EGCG has been fine too but it's probably not as safe route long-term. Mucuna gives me increased drive (especially sex drive gets strong), confidence, strength and muscle mass. I've taken some breaks and haven't had any dopamine-depletion issues or anything. Only side effects have been oily skin and some pimples (probably due to its testosterone-increase) and perhaps some restlessness when combined with somewhat high caffeine amounts. I have to say though that three years ago when I used Mucuna extracts a lot I did get issues like feverish feeling and anxiety. So I think it's an herb that should be treated with respect. As a "brain tonic" and bodybuilding-aid it's excellent. Magnesium, Schisandra and other neuroprotective things may be good augment.
Exactly. I have had no withdrawal issues too. Thats why the researchers call it neurorestaurative. In general everything that effectively changes neurotransmitter levels should be treated with respect.
Sidenote about EGCG: I've been experimenting with it a while ago. Concretely, I have been drinking strong tea made of a special kind of green tea that had the highest amount of EGCG. This was back in the day when I was just starting to experiment with the dopaminergic system. In my case, the tea (and I suspect the EGCG content to be the cause) blocked dopamine not only in the body, but in the brain too. I was going out celebrating someones birthday, but I had no positive effect from alcohol (the usual happy feeling). What I had, however, was a major blackout, and I normally do not have something like that. Also, my girlfriend told me that I was a completely different person (in a very negative sense) - while normally people perceive me as nice when I am drinking.
I concluded from this that EGCG's effects are happening in body AND brain. This fits to other effects of egcg has on the brain - how could it if it does not pass the bbb? So this would mean that its senseless to combine a dopamine producing substance with egcg.
Its pretty pointless to use a dopa decarboxylase inhibitor if it works in the brain, too. That is, if you intend to increase the dopaminergic system.
I have never used the egcg rich tea again, and this situation also never came back. I have no interest in reproduction for science though.
Well, the problem is that, often, and even especially when substances are researched with good outcomes, guys and gals go out and get the enhanced or concentrated form that was not studied. You can notice that impulse in the statements of what posters were/are using, just before your above quoted post (and this is without good studies). The thinking goes something like this: "Well, if Mucuna is good, then 6%/10%/20% L-Dopa Mucuna must be better!". And so it goes. Except, in the case of Mucuna, that type of thinking leads to higher concentrations of a neurotoxic substance. Once more, that fallacious illogical impulse likely won't disappear anytime soon. My personal thinking on the subject of L-Dopa isn't dose dependent. Although there are certain medical uses for a small amount of toxin, I don't believe that there is any logical reason to assume that this is one of them. Certainly, the risk isn't one that people should take in the case of this substance. The penalty for being wrong is just too high, in my opinion.
Thats indeed one of the biggest problems here. It was very confusing for me at first too, sources speaking about l-dopa toxicity, others about neuroprotective effects, until I figured out that the difference was between the isolated compound, or extracts, and the whole bean powder. This is why I always point out that I mean the seed powder, and NOT any extract. And the generalization of more concentrated = more potent, is, like any generalization not always true, and this case must be communicated as often as possible so that it becomes common knowledge.
Do not forget that the body produces l-dopa too, and this is for a reason. Therefore to call it a toxin is wrong. It becomes a toxin due to higher dosages then normally used in the body(Remember, l-dopa is used for parkinson, and there we are speaking about MASSIVE doses of l-dopa daily), through direct effects as well as indirect effects through putting pressure on the catecholamine metabolism. Also it surpresses serotonin at higher dosages. Then l-dopa is always used with a dopa decarboxylase inhibitor, this means that ALL of it is being used in the brain exclusively. Mucuna pruriens seems to taggle those problems, making it a lot safer. My hypothesis is that this plant has do deal with its l-dopa content, and the way this plant does it, is the same way it helps the human body deal with l-dopa.
So in a way, it would be VERY interesting to conduct a study on mucuna seed powder that has NO l-dopa in it, and see if the neuroprotective and neurorestaurative effects are still there. That would be very interesting.
Researchers also speculate that mucuna pruriens has some form of unknown dopa decarboxylase inhibitor, making it effective. But from my personal experience I can tell you that this must be wrong. I suffered from restless leg syndrome for years, and both tyrosine, and now mucuna pruriens solved this problem for me. Dopamine is not only needed in the brain, but in nerves throughout the body too, so when you use a dopa decarboxylase inhibitor there will be no dopamine in the body - only in the brain. This means that RLS gets even worse. But it does not. Therefore, I speculate that there is no inhibitor in the plant.
