Diabetes, Depression, and B Vitamins - Connected?

Diabetes, Depression, and B Vitamins - Connected

?

1993 was the year that I was diagnosed with type 2 diabetes. Well before that date, I was dealing with emotional depressions of varying depths. Perhaps for so long that I was not aware of another way of feeling about things. I wanted to feel like other people professed to and acted like - but different therapies, medications, and other alternatives didn't provide these results.

This journey hasn't been chosen, it's been forced on me. Type 2 diabetes and depression seem to be related to how well B vitamins are used by certain people. The peer-reviewed opinions of medical professionals say the same thing.

B vitamins can be proven to be related to depression control, here's some proof. In a report published in Psychosomatics in the late 1980's by A. Missagh Gharirian of McGill University in Montreal, it was stated that low levels of the B vitamin folic acid was linked to depression. Relief of depression was achieved with folic acid supplementation when people that had both issues were studied under Dr. Ghadirian's care. Modification of depression occurred within 100 days of folic acid supplementation.

Rates of folic acid for individuals was 400 mg a day for adults, 500 mg a day for nursing mothers, and 800 mg a day for soon-to-be mothers to prevent birth defects. Unused amounts are removed within 24 hours by the body - it is water soluble.

Raw vegetables are a good source of folic acid as they dissolve in cooking water.

Prescription and over-the-counter drugs will interfere with the bodies' use of B vitamins. This list includes aspirin (which is commonly prescribed in 'baby' strength to diabetics to combat heart/blood vessel damage, I was told that a diabetic is seen in a doctor's eyes of already having a heart attack - I've been taking one a day for at least 3 years), acetaminophen (Tylenol), several chemotherapy drugs, and high levels of vitamin C.

Vitamin B12 absorption is interfered with by metaformin, a common type 2 diabetes drug that encourages insulin sensitivity and controls glucose. The Diabetes Self Management blog notes that between 10 and 30 percent of metaformin patients exhibit proof of decreased B12 absorption. At that website there are comments that note that supplementing B12 has increased energy dramatically for some people.

A lack of energy will certainly encourage -- is that the right word?-- depression, and a nervous system that produces numbness and tingling in the feet certainly isn't up to snuff as well. Based upon all of this (as well as my personal journey), I find it easy to draw a conclusion that there could be a link between type 2 diabetes, depression, and B vitamin deficiency. Can't you?

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