Posted by linkadge on August 17, 2007, at 21:55:08
In reply to Re: Did Lithium make me irritable and anti-social? » linkadge, posted by Squiggles on August 17, 2007, at 21:19:00
>As for Robin Williams, his genius resulted
>from mania when he was at his peak;Genious does not result from illness.
Sexual dysfunction for instance can be a "side effect" of lithium. Ie, a stable person on lithium can have sexual dysfunction. One could argue (incorrectly) that lithium only decreased the mania, and therby decreased the sexual drive.
If a person on lithium can experience decreased sexual desire when stable on lithium, why is it so inconcievable that they experience decreased creativity?
I can give you one possably explination. Lithium lowers DHEA, a powerful steroid hormone that is involved in differentiation of cells in certain regions of the brain. DHEA acts at sig-1r receptors to increase neurite outgrowth in the presence of nerve growth factor. By decreasing DHEA, lithium would reduce such outgrowth and possably creativity. Of course this is speculative, but a possability nonetheless.
Reduced DHEA is observable in mice reciving lithum with normal DHEA levels. Ie there is evidence that lithium can lower DHEA levels even when they are normal.http://biopsychiatry.com/lithium-dhea.htm
>should lower the li for hypomania does not
>mean that he lacks creativiy on lithium; just
>that he lacks the euphoric, exceptionally
>wild comic genius - in itself a creative
>rarity.If Robin is creative only when he is hypomanic, and the lithium kills the hypomania, than lithium has, by default, has killed his creativity.
To me it seems nonsensicle that somebody would try to dismiss what many lithium users have reported.
Linkadge
poster:linkadge
thread:776541
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20070815/msgs/776863.html