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I'm not sure we should cover our food in melatonin. People would recoil at the thought of pretty much any other hormone being added to our food supply. It's st

by maltyr 3y ago

I'm not sure we should cover our food in melatonin. People would recoil at the thought of pretty much any other hormone being added to our food supply. It's strange to me how Melatonin is so uncontrolled in usage, dosage, etc., despite being a hormone. The article suggests it's safer than current food additives, but I find that statement questionable. We don't understand the full effect of Melatonin on the human body, so I don't know how you can make that conclusion.

rat9988 3y ago
There are many many studies on melatonin, it's not like we know nothing.
- maltyr 3y ago
  And those studies suggest that melatonin plays a critical part in your circadian rhythm, which kind of implies that adding it to your food would also screw with your circadian rhythm. That alone seems like a good enough reason to caution against adding it into the food supply. Additionally, there are receptors for melatonin in a number of systems in the body, and we don't have much knowledge on what those receptors do.
  - Void_ 3y ago
    Once I took melatonin to get a better afternoon nap. I never felt so groggy in my life. Completely screwed up my internal clock. I’m very careful with it since then. Taking it at night time doesn’t quite show how powerful it is - since you’re sleepy anyway.
    - maksimur 3y ago
      The point is taking it in the night if you're not able to get sleepy, especially if you fucked up your circadian rhythm. Taking it in the afternoon is going to fuck up the circadian rhythm if it wasn't already. For that you're better off taking chamomile and valerian.
    - Palomides 3y ago
      many people misunderstand melatonin, it isn't a sleeping pill, it's a tool for adjusting your circadian rhythm, taking it before a nap is crazy
    - OGWhales 3y ago
      My understanding is that melatonin is useful for adjusting one’s internal clock. As an example, if you were to change time zones you could use it to more quickly adjust to a new bed time. That’s how I try to use it now, only when I want to adjust what time I get sleepy. For the same reason, I only take it for one or two nights. It doesn’t make sense to take it continuously to me.
    - kelnos 3y ago
      Melatonin supplements are not good for napping. If it's having the proper effect, it should get your body into full sleep mode, and you'll want to get a full 8 hours or whatever. Forcing yourself up early will have the exact effect you describe. > Taking it at night time doesn’t quite show how powerful it is - since you’re sleepy anyway. If you're already sleepy enough to fall asleep at what you deem to be a reasonable time, and you're able to sleep deeply enough for the length of time you want, then you probably don't need melatonin supplements.
  - wpietri 3y ago
    > And those studies suggest that melatonin plays a critical part in your circadian rhythm, which kind of implies that adding it to your food would also screw with your circadian rhythm. That alone seems like a good enough reason to caution against adding it into the food supply. I think you're correct. But electric light also screws with your circadian rhythm, and that's a concern almost nobody takes seriously. Years back I built my own automated lighting system [1] and the biggest thing I learned from it is that I'm not a responsible lightswitch user. My sleep schedule used to be very chaotic. But once I set up my screens and my house to dim and redshift in line with a regular day-night cycle, I not only started sleeping very regularly, but my mood and focus improved. When electric lighting was introduced it notably changed sleep schedules. [2] But we got used to that and just kinda went with it, even though surveys show massive problems with sleep. For me now it's a cautionary tale about how little we understand the impact of technologies we adopt. [1] https://github.com/wpietri/sunrise https://github.com/wpietri/sunrise [2] E.g., the "'Til Morning is Nigh" segement here: https://backstoryradio.org/shows/on-the-clock-4/ https://backstoryradio.org/shows/on-the-clock-4/
  - kelnos 3y ago
    Then again, my circadian rhythm has been pretty broken since I was a child. Not only does my body drift toward a 28-hour day (20 awake, 8 asleep) if I'm not careful, but I tend not to get tired enough to sleep until 3am or 4am. Melatonin supplements fix my circadian rhythm. I don't take it every night, but when I do, I get tired and fall asleep within 3-5 hours, sleep for a solid 8 or 9, and then feel pretty good for the next day. And if I take it again that night at the appropriate time, I can keep myself much closer to a 24-hour wake/sleep cycle.
nuxi 3y ago
Are you sure about the recoil? After all, "vitamin" D is a hormone and it's also added to a lot of different foods. And it's also uncontrolled in usage and dosage...
- Dylan16807 3y ago
  It's a precursor to a hormone. And whether it's a vitamin depends on your sun exposure.
  - conorh 3y ago
    I don't think that is entirely correct (and mostly semantics). Vitamin D has multiple forms [1] Vitamin D from the diet, or from skin synthesis, is biologically inactive. It is activated by two protein enzyme hydroxylation steps, the first in the liver and the second in the kidneys. Because vitamin D can be synthesized in adequate amounts by most mammals if they get enough sunlight, it is not essential and therefore is technically not a vitamin. Instead it can be considered a hormone, with activation of the vitamin D pro-hormone resulting in the active form, calcitriol, which then produces effects via a nuclear receptor in multiple locations. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vitamin_D https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vitamin_D
teamonkey 3y ago
It may be uncontrolled in the US but not everywhere. It’s not allowed to be sold without a prescription where I live, and even then it’s only prescribed for chronic sleep disorders. I always ask anyone travelling to the US to bring back a bottle.
- swozey 3y ago
  > chronic sleep disorders Wow. It's been a long time but I've definitely taken melatonin and if I felt any effects at all they definitely weren't strong if even noticable. Here (USA) Ambien is prescribed often for chronic sleep issues and that drug absolutely terrifies me. I've had friends addicted to it who wound up in a lot of criminal trouble for trespassing and wandering around beaches naked and things like that because they'd sleep-walk hallucinate. I had one friend get arrested for sleeping in someones (random) attic on an ambien kick. A pilot, no less. My mom gave me a bottle of it when I was in high school and it made me hallucinate in an unpleasant way. I do plenty of mycology stuff but the ambien was weird. I think I took it twice or three times and just stopped.
  - amelius 3y ago
    And what to think of this book, where the author literally persuades people to megadose on the hormone: https://www.amazon.com/Melatonin-Transform-Melatonin-resilience-longevity/dp/B09VDRSJBV https://www.amazon.com/Melatonin-Transform-Melatonin-resilie... It's mindboggling that this is freely available.
    - baggy_trough 3y ago
      Yes, the absolute mind boggling horror of free people being able to decide for themselves what to ingest.
      - sobkas 3y ago
        > Yes, the absolute mind boggling horror of free people being able to decide for themselves what to ingest. Absolute horror that people ingest things based on a lie. It's on level of this powder doesn't contain asbestos. Just because he isn't a big corp doesn't mean he is free to lie and profit on his lies.
ChrisMarshallNY 3y ago
I think it was here, where I read that the optimal dosage for melatonin was 0.3 mg (300 micrograms). The smallest OTC dosage you can get, is 1mg, and they sell 10mg pills. When I switched from 10mg to 0.3mg, my sleep improved drastically. Also, I stopped getting those really weird dreams. But I don't like taking stuff, and ended up stopping completely, a long time ago.
- diego_sandoval 3y ago
  I can attest to having weirder dreams and more nightmares when taking melatonin (3mg)
- mewpmewp2 3y ago
  Is there a source for the 0.3mg, because the most sleep supplements around here I've tried seem to have at least 0.5mg, or at least 1mg. They contain a mixture of other things as well, like magnesium, leonurus cadiaca, humulus lupulus. Melatonin only supplements mostly seem to start at around 2mg. There may be few of them at 1mg. I can't tell if I've personally had any effects from melatonin specifically though. Sometimes I may have sleep issues and those nights, I think none of those supplements do anything.
  - ChrisMarshallNY 3y ago
    I'll see if I can find the posting. It was a fairly exhaustive article. It was enough for me to give it a try. EDIT: I think this was it. Looks like it's had a couple of turns here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17632668 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17632668
    - sottol 3y ago
      Yes, I think that's the post. I was also just going to post that. What I ended up doing is buy smallest dose of melatonin gummy-bears (3mg afair) and they were easier to cut into smaller pieces/lower doses than pills. I occasionally use these to adjust my circadian rhythm. Naturally I go to bed around 2-4am but I have kids that wake us up at the crack of dawn.
wnevets 3y ago
> It's strange to me how Melatonin is so uncontrolled in usage, dosage, etc., despite being a hormone. You can thank Mel Gibson and industry lobbying [1][2]. [1] https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/documentary/supplements-and-safety/ https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/documentary/supplements-a... [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IV2olDA0w8U https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IV2olDA0w8U
- maltyr 3y ago
  Other hormones don't get the same treatment. I'm not sure why only melatonin is treated as a dietary supplement when the other hormones are not. For example, you can't get testosterone or epinephrine, over the counter. Maybe the only other hormones that are as readily available as melatonin are birth control pills, but those are considered pharmaceuticals, and regulated as such.
  - hombre_fatal 3y ago
    Well, what are the risks and downsides of testosterone and epinephrine vs. melatonin? Melatonin is so harmless I’m still not sure if it’s a placebo half the time I take it.
- hunson_abadeer 3y ago
  > You can thank Mel Gibson and industry lobbying Why do we always need a boogeyman? Melatonin appears nearly harmless. Isn't it strange that we've grown so accustomed to so many things being restricted that we're taken aback by this sliver of medical self-determination, and we publish hard-hitting investigative pieces about how supposedly terrible that is? I get it that we maybe don't want to go back to the era of "patent medicine" containing radium, but when we require prescriptions for birth control, eyeglasses, and non-narcotic sleep aids, maybe we've gone a bit too far.
  - wnevets 3y ago
    > Melatonin appears nearly harmless. Does it? We really haven't done enough science on it. > Melatonin has been linked to headaches, dizziness, nausea, stomach cramps, drowsiness, confusion or disorientation, irritability and mild anxiety, depression and tremors as well as abnormally low blood pressure. It can also interact with common medications and trigger allergies. [1] [1] https://www.cnn.com/2022/02/01/health/melatonin-overuse-wellness/index.html https://www.cnn.com/2022/02/01/health/melatonin-overuse-well... I've personally stopped using it because of how it started to make me feel. "Brain fog" was not uncommon, not to mention the lack of quality control of the dosage amounts on a pill to pill basis.
99_00 3y ago
> The article suggests it's safer than current food additives, but I find that statement questionable. We don't understand the full effect of Melatonin on the human body, so I don't know how you can make that conclusion. Only allowing substances for which we understand the full effect on the human body is not a mainstream criteria or standard used by any agency in the world. I'm not aware of any substance for which we have a full understanding of the effect on the human body.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
joker_minmax 3y ago
They'd definitely need to disclose this, too. Imagine it being unsafe to operate machinery and drive just because you ate a bowl of berries. (Or for me, melatonin supplements always make me wired for some reason. I wouldn't want to feel caffienated after a bowl of berries.)
noodlenotes 3y ago
I would be annoyed if I started getting so much melatonin from my food that my nightly 0.3 mg melatonin stopped making me sleepy. And I imagine everyone else would be annoyed when they stopped getting sleepy at night from their own melatonin. (Apparently 0.1 - 0.3 mg is what we produce naturally?)
Traubenfuchs 3y ago
Because it doesn't do much. The extremely incorrect overdoses of it found in common products often lead to worse sleep and next day drowsiness, making it an unpleasant experience. Even used in correct, very low dosages the impact is low. https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/E4cKD9iTWHaE7f3AJ/melatonin-much-more-than-you-wanted-to-know https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/E4cKD9iTWHaE7f3AJ/melatonin-...
dylan604 3y ago
It sounds like the stuff a conspiracy group would be able to make a lot of noise with like fluoride in the water and mercury in vaccines.
brainzap 3y ago
isnt Melatonin responsible for body development like puperty etc
- matheusmoreira 3y ago
  Melatonin synchronizes the circadian rhythm and the day-night sleep cycle by being released in the absence of light. The release of other hormones such as cortisol, growth hormone and sex hormones are all synchronized to this day-night cycle. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5372003/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5372003/
drevil-v2 3y ago
I saw Andrew Hubermann talking on a podcast(pretty sure it was on Joe Rogan) about Melatonin; he said studies showed melatonin will significantly shrink your testicles. Since then I haven’t touched the stuff.

by maltyr 3y ago

rat9988 3y ago

There are many many studies on melatonin, it's not like we know nothing.

maltyr 3y ago
And those studies suggest that melatonin plays a critical part in your circadian rhythm, which kind of implies that adding it to your food would also screw with your circadian rhythm. That alone seems like a good enough reason to caution against adding it into the food supply. Additionally, there are receptors for melatonin in a number of systems in the body, and we don't have much knowledge on what those receptors do.
- Void_ 3y ago
  Once I took melatonin to get a better afternoon nap. I never felt so groggy in my life. Completely screwed up my internal clock. I’m very careful with it since then. Taking it at night time doesn’t quite show how powerful it is - since you’re sleepy anyway.
  - maksimur 3y ago
    The point is taking it in the night if you're not able to get sleepy, especially if you fucked up your circadian rhythm. Taking it in the afternoon is going to fuck up the circadian rhythm if it wasn't already. For that you're better off taking chamomile and valerian.
  - Palomides 3y ago
    many people misunderstand melatonin, it isn't a sleeping pill, it's a tool for adjusting your circadian rhythm, taking it before a nap is crazy
  - OGWhales 3y ago
    My understanding is that melatonin is useful for adjusting one’s internal clock. As an example, if you were to change time zones you could use it to more quickly adjust to a new bed time. That’s how I try to use it now, only when I want to adjust what time I get sleepy. For the same reason, I only take it for one or two nights. It doesn’t make sense to take it continuously to me.
  - kelnos 3y ago
    Melatonin supplements are not good for napping. If it's having the proper effect, it should get your body into full sleep mode, and you'll want to get a full 8 hours or whatever. Forcing yourself up early will have the exact effect you describe. > Taking it at night time doesn’t quite show how powerful it is - since you’re sleepy anyway. If you're already sleepy enough to fall asleep at what you deem to be a reasonable time, and you're able to sleep deeply enough for the length of time you want, then you probably don't need melatonin supplements.
- wpietri 3y ago
  > And those studies suggest that melatonin plays a critical part in your circadian rhythm, which kind of implies that adding it to your food would also screw with your circadian rhythm. That alone seems like a good enough reason to caution against adding it into the food supply. I think you're correct. But electric light also screws with your circadian rhythm, and that's a concern almost nobody takes seriously. Years back I built my own automated lighting system [1] and the biggest thing I learned from it is that I'm not a responsible lightswitch user. My sleep schedule used to be very chaotic. But once I set up my screens and my house to dim and redshift in line with a regular day-night cycle, I not only started sleeping very regularly, but my mood and focus improved. When electric lighting was introduced it notably changed sleep schedules. [2] But we got used to that and just kinda went with it, even though surveys show massive problems with sleep. For me now it's a cautionary tale about how little we understand the impact of technologies we adopt. [1] https://github.com/wpietri/sunrise https://github.com/wpietri/sunrise [2] E.g., the "'Til Morning is Nigh" segement here: https://backstoryradio.org/shows/on-the-clock-4/ https://backstoryradio.org/shows/on-the-clock-4/
- kelnos 3y ago
  Then again, my circadian rhythm has been pretty broken since I was a child. Not only does my body drift toward a 28-hour day (20 awake, 8 asleep) if I'm not careful, but I tend not to get tired enough to sleep until 3am or 4am. Melatonin supplements fix my circadian rhythm. I don't take it every night, but when I do, I get tired and fall asleep within 3-5 hours, sleep for a solid 8 or 9, and then feel pretty good for the next day. And if I take it again that night at the appropriate time, I can keep myself much closer to a 24-hour wake/sleep cycle.

nuxi 3y ago

Are you sure about the recoil? After all, "vitamin" D is a hormone and it's also added to a lot of different foods. And it's also uncontrolled in usage and dosage...

Dylan16807 3y ago
It's a precursor to a hormone. And whether it's a vitamin depends on your sun exposure.
- conorh 3y ago
  I don't think that is entirely correct (and mostly semantics). Vitamin D has multiple forms [1] Vitamin D from the diet, or from skin synthesis, is biologically inactive. It is activated by two protein enzyme hydroxylation steps, the first in the liver and the second in the kidneys. Because vitamin D can be synthesized in adequate amounts by most mammals if they get enough sunlight, it is not essential and therefore is technically not a vitamin. Instead it can be considered a hormone, with activation of the vitamin D pro-hormone resulting in the active form, calcitriol, which then produces effects via a nuclear receptor in multiple locations. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vitamin_D https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vitamin_D

teamonkey 3y ago

It may be uncontrolled in the US but not everywhere. It’s not allowed to be sold without a prescription where I live, and even then it’s only prescribed for chronic sleep disorders. I always ask anyone travelling to the US to bring back a bottle.

swozey 3y ago
> chronic sleep disorders Wow. It's been a long time but I've definitely taken melatonin and if I felt any effects at all they definitely weren't strong if even noticable. Here (USA) Ambien is prescribed often for chronic sleep issues and that drug absolutely terrifies me. I've had friends addicted to it who wound up in a lot of criminal trouble for trespassing and wandering around beaches naked and things like that because they'd sleep-walk hallucinate. I had one friend get arrested for sleeping in someones (random) attic on an ambien kick. A pilot, no less. My mom gave me a bottle of it when I was in high school and it made me hallucinate in an unpleasant way. I do plenty of mycology stuff but the ambien was weird. I think I took it twice or three times and just stopped.
- amelius 3y ago
  And what to think of this book, where the author literally persuades people to megadose on the hormone: https://www.amazon.com/Melatonin-Transform-Melatonin-resilience-longevity/dp/B09VDRSJBV https://www.amazon.com/Melatonin-Transform-Melatonin-resilie... It's mindboggling that this is freely available.
  - baggy_trough 3y ago
    Yes, the absolute mind boggling horror of free people being able to decide for themselves what to ingest.
    - sobkas 3y ago
      > Yes, the absolute mind boggling horror of free people being able to decide for themselves what to ingest. Absolute horror that people ingest things based on a lie. It's on level of this powder doesn't contain asbestos. Just because he isn't a big corp doesn't mean he is free to lie and profit on his lies.

ChrisMarshallNY 3y ago

I think it was here, where I read that the optimal dosage for melatonin was 0.3 mg (300 micrograms). The smallest OTC dosage you can get, is 1mg, and they sell 10mg pills. When I switched from 10mg to 0.3mg, my sleep improved drastically. Also, I stopped getting those really weird dreams. But I don't like taking stuff, and ended up stopping completely, a long time ago.

diego_sandoval 3y ago
I can attest to having weirder dreams and more nightmares when taking melatonin (3mg)
mewpmewp2 3y ago
Is there a source for the 0.3mg, because the most sleep supplements around here I've tried seem to have at least 0.5mg, or at least 1mg. They contain a mixture of other things as well, like magnesium, leonurus cadiaca, humulus lupulus. Melatonin only supplements mostly seem to start at around 2mg. There may be few of them at 1mg. I can't tell if I've personally had any effects from melatonin specifically though. Sometimes I may have sleep issues and those nights, I think none of those supplements do anything.
- ChrisMarshallNY 3y ago
  I'll see if I can find the posting. It was a fairly exhaustive article. It was enough for me to give it a try. EDIT: I think this was it. Looks like it's had a couple of turns here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17632668 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17632668
  - sottol 3y ago
    Yes, I think that's the post. I was also just going to post that. What I ended up doing is buy smallest dose of melatonin gummy-bears (3mg afair) and they were easier to cut into smaller pieces/lower doses than pills. I occasionally use these to adjust my circadian rhythm. Naturally I go to bed around 2-4am but I have kids that wake us up at the crack of dawn.

wnevets 3y ago

> It's strange to me how Melatonin is so uncontrolled in usage, dosage, etc., despite being a hormone. You can thank Mel Gibson and industry lobbying [1][2]. [1] https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/documentary/supplements-and-safety/ https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/documentary/supplements-a... [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IV2olDA0w8U https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IV2olDA0w8U

maltyr 3y ago
Other hormones don't get the same treatment. I'm not sure why only melatonin is treated as a dietary supplement when the other hormones are not. For example, you can't get testosterone or epinephrine, over the counter. Maybe the only other hormones that are as readily available as melatonin are birth control pills, but those are considered pharmaceuticals, and regulated as such.
- hombre_fatal 3y ago
  Well, what are the risks and downsides of testosterone and epinephrine vs. melatonin? Melatonin is so harmless I’m still not sure if it’s a placebo half the time I take it.
hunson_abadeer 3y ago
> You can thank Mel Gibson and industry lobbying Why do we always need a boogeyman? Melatonin appears nearly harmless. Isn't it strange that we've grown so accustomed to so many things being restricted that we're taken aback by this sliver of medical self-determination, and we publish hard-hitting investigative pieces about how supposedly terrible that is? I get it that we maybe don't want to go back to the era of "patent medicine" containing radium, but when we require prescriptions for birth control, eyeglasses, and non-narcotic sleep aids, maybe we've gone a bit too far.
- wnevets 3y ago
  > Melatonin appears nearly harmless. Does it? We really haven't done enough science on it. > Melatonin has been linked to headaches, dizziness, nausea, stomach cramps, drowsiness, confusion or disorientation, irritability and mild anxiety, depression and tremors as well as abnormally low blood pressure. It can also interact with common medications and trigger allergies. [1] [1] https://www.cnn.com/2022/02/01/health/melatonin-overuse-wellness/index.html https://www.cnn.com/2022/02/01/health/melatonin-overuse-well... I've personally stopped using it because of how it started to make me feel. "Brain fog" was not uncommon, not to mention the lack of quality control of the dosage amounts on a pill to pill basis.

99_00 3y ago

> The article suggests it's safer than current food additives, but I find that statement questionable. We don't understand the full effect of Melatonin on the human body, so I don't know how you can make that conclusion. Only allowing substances for which we understand the full effect on the human body is not a mainstream criteria or standard used by any agency in the world. I'm not aware of any substance for which we have a full understanding of the effect on the human body.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

joker_minmax 3y ago

They'd definitely need to disclose this, too. Imagine it being unsafe to operate machinery and drive just because you ate a bowl of berries. (Or for me, melatonin supplements always make me wired for some reason. I wouldn't want to feel caffienated after a bowl of berries.)

noodlenotes 3y ago

I would be annoyed if I started getting so much melatonin from my food that my nightly 0.3 mg melatonin stopped making me sleepy. And I imagine everyone else would be annoyed when they stopped getting sleepy at night from their own melatonin. (Apparently 0.1 - 0.3 mg is what we produce naturally?)

Traubenfuchs 3y ago

Because it doesn't do much. The extremely incorrect overdoses of it found in common products often lead to worse sleep and next day drowsiness, making it an unpleasant experience. Even used in correct, very low dosages the impact is low. https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/E4cKD9iTWHaE7f3AJ/melatonin-much-more-than-you-wanted-to-know https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/E4cKD9iTWHaE7f3AJ/melatonin-...

dylan604 3y ago

It sounds like the stuff a conspiracy group would be able to make a lot of noise with like fluoride in the water and mercury in vaccines.

brainzap 3y ago

isnt Melatonin responsible for body development like puperty etc

matheusmoreira 3y ago
Melatonin synchronizes the circadian rhythm and the day-night sleep cycle by being released in the absence of light. The release of other hormones such as cortisol, growth hormone and sex hormones are all synchronized to this day-night cycle. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5372003/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5372003/

drevil-v2 3y ago

I saw Andrew Hubermann talking on a podcast(pretty sure it was on Joe Rogan) about Melatonin; he said studies showed melatonin will significantly shrink your testicles. Since then I haven’t touched the stuff.