07/02/2024
Heh, another "St. John's Wort interferes with meds, it's dangerous, dangerous I tell you" comment on a simple question about using SJW, in a plant-related forum.
I wrote a rather long answer, and would like to save it for posterior, er, posteriority.
Here it is.
The comment:
"If anyone decides to use SJW internally, be advised that it interacts with MANY different medications, including antidepressants and birth control."
My reply:
this is interesting ...
.. the birth control thing came about in 1997 or 1998, after SJW hit it big in the USA, on a TV program called 20/20 in 1995. The pharmacogiants looked at each other, this is eating into our profits, what to do ...
.. and whammo, in 1998 came BIG BIG headlines, two women in Sweden had taken both the pill and SJW in 1997 and gotten pregnant.
In order to take this seriously, we would also need to know how many women in Sweden had taken the pill and not taken SJW, in 1997, and gotten pregnant. This info never showed up. I later learned that it's around 10 % of all ladies on the pill, because
- if you forget one, the pill won't work for that month,
- if you get diarrhea, the pill won't work for that month,
- and it says right on the package, 99,5 % certain, so every 200th s**g would be a hit anyway.
So the "it interferes with birth control" thing is right out propaganda against SJW. Very well executed, to be sure to be sure, as it's always trotted out whenever somebody talks about taking St. John's wort, but propaganda nonetheless.
The antidepressants now, it won't interfere with their action, but it can (rarely, I think) make side effects worse. Which again is very interesting, as they did research on the efficacy against severe depression in the early 00s. They took SJW vs placebo vs a very well-known antidepressant. The result was, placebo was better than SJW was better than the drug. The headlines screamed from the rooftops "placebo better than SJW", same for the summary, and you had to read the actual paper to get to the fact that ooooo nice, SJW is better than the drug.
My advice if you suffer from depression is,
- take nutrients,
- go out into the woods and meadows regularly (nevermind the weather),
- take herbs which help you get rid of your stresses and stressors,
- get therapy, if you have been abused,
- and take SJW, rather than drugs.
Depression is not a drug deficiency, not a herb deficiency, but it rather too often includes a deficiency in nutrients we need for feel-good hormones. Magnesium, the B:s, D, and less important but still needed, chromium, zinc, C, E, fats, proteins, iron (if you hemoglobin is low), plus a good multivitamin.
🙂
Have a great summer, and do go out into the woods and meadows, preferably every day. It's gorgeous out there.
(Hedges work too, just walk along rows and rows of them, admire them and check what all is growing and moving in there.)
Edit: Serotonin syndrome is a dangerous interaction with SSRI-type depression meds. It hits some, others not. Start slowly, and if there's racing heart, you feel hot, or you get low blood pressure, back off.
Thank you all for pointing this out to me. 😊
