Chapter 1: Behind the Brain
The brain is one of the largest and most complex organs in the human body. This master organ that weighs about 3.3 lbs. (1.5 kilograms), commands our nervous system. It does that by taking information from our sensory organs and our environment and then using this information to regulate our physical and emotional responses.
We have many specialized brain systems that work across specific brain regions to help us talk, feel emotions, behave in certain ways, solve problems and make sense of what we see. Every human function is governed by a specific brain region.
While all the parts of your brain work together to make us who we are, each part of the brain, each brain region, is responsible for a specific function.
Let’s see what are the different parts of our brain and what each of them does.
Cerebrum
The cerebrum is the largest part of the brain and is the part responsible for our consciousness. This is the brain region that has been evolving for millennia and makes us different from all other mammals. The cerebrum is divided into left and right halves, which are called cerebral hemispheres.
The left hemisphere manages all the muscles on the right-hand side of the body, whereas the right hemisphere manages all the muscles on the left side. Usually, one hemisphere may be more dominant than the other and this determines whether you are writing with your left or your right hand.
The popular belief about \”left brain\” and \”right brain\” division and functions like creativity versus logical thinking are generalizations that are not supported by core evidence. However, these two brain areas have some differences. For example, the right brain processes visual and auditory information, spatial skills and creativity. However, the left brain also plays role in our creativity because it contains the parts responsible for speech and language. Also, the right hemisphere is associated with mathematical calculations. It is important to stress out that everyone uses both hemispheres all the time.
Each cerebral hemisphere has four lobes named after the bones of the skull that cover them: frontal, parietal, temporal, and occipital.
Frontal lobes
The frontal lobes control executive functions such as thinking, planning, organizing, problem-solving, decision-making and self-control. Basically, everything that makes us human. Also, the frontal lobes are associated with our short-term or working memory and movement.
parietal lobes
The parietal lobes receive inputs from different senses and manage sensations such as taste, temperature, and touch. The parietal lobes influence spatial orientation and navigation, handwriting, and body position.
temporal lobes
The temporal lobes are mostly responsible for our long-term memory with the help of the amygdala and the hippocampus. The hippocampus helps create and file new memories by storing them in appropriate sections of the cerebrum and then recalling them when necessary. The amygdala is the fear center that activates our natural \”fight-or-flight\” response to confront or escape from a dangerous situation. For example, if you touch a hot stove, your amygdala will create a memory of fear so that you can avoid hot stoves in the future.
occipital lobes
The occipital lobes process images from your eyes and link that information with images stored in memory.
Brainstem
Underneath the cerebrum lies the brainstem. The brain stem connects to the spinal cord and transfers information from the brain to the body and vice versa. Basic functions like breathing, heart beating, and sleep are controlled here.
thalamus and hypothalamus
Between the cerebrum and brainstem lie the thalamus and hypothalamus.
The thalamus helps us increase our perception of our environment because it passes all sensory (except smell) and motor signals between the spinal cord and the cerebral hemispheres. This information is translated into what we understand as touch, pain or temperature.
The hypothalamus connects the nervous system to the endocrine system through the pituitary gland. The endocrine system is where hormones are produced.
The hypothalamus controls emotions and homeostasis by regulating our basic functions of hunger, thirst, sleep, body temperature, water balance, and blood pressure.
Cerebellum
Behind the brainstem sits the cerebellum.
The cerebellum or else \”little brain” helps us coordinate our movement, muscles and body posture by combining sensory information from the eyes, ears and muscles.
All these parts work together to coordinate thought, emotion, behavior, movement and sensation in split seconds. Think how fast you jump when you are scared, or when you hit your little toe against the corner of the table.
How do the brain parts communicate with each other and with the rest of the body?
The different parts of the brain are hard-wired with connections, much like the different hardware of a computer are hard-wired with electrical wiring.
In the case of the brain, the connections are made by more than 100 billion nerves, called neurons. This is also called the \”gray matter” of the brain.
Neuron cells consist of a body, an axon (or spine), and dendrites, which extend from the neuron body like branches from a tree. The small gaps between two nerve cells are called synapses.
To communicate with different parts of the brain and with other parts of the body like muscles, glands or organs like the gut, neurons send electrochemical signals called neurotransmitters. Neurotransmitters are to the brain what electricity is for a computer.
Neurotransmitters transfer information when they are released from the axon of one neuron and then travel across the synapse so they can dock with the receptors located on one or more other neurons.
The relationship between receptors and neurotransmitters is often compared to that of a lock and key. The receptor of a neuron is like a lock that can be opened only with the proper chemical key. We have many different types of neurotransmitters, and each type docks on specific receptors.
Here are some of the most important neurotransmitters that affect our emotional and physical health
Serotonin
Serotonin helps control many functions, such as mood, appetite, pain, and body temperature. PMS is thought to be associated with lower serotonin levels.
Being a natural anti-depressant, this chemical contributes to feelings of calmness, better sleep patterns, and normal mood functioning. Balanced serotonin levels make us more resilient against the unhappy events.
Dopamine
Dopamine gives you energy, concentration, and clear thinking by regulating the flow of information coming in from other areas of the brain.
Most importantly, dopamine boosts our mood, improves sex drive and gives us the ability to enjoy life. No dopamine no joy. This neurotransmitter is our internal reward system and plays a central role in the positive reinforcement of our behaviors- whether these behaviors are beneficial or destructive.
We do something we enjoy -> our brain produces dopamine -> we feel good -> we want to repeat the behavior that gave us is this joy.
Endorphins
Endorphins are one of the most influential neurotransmitters because they can both enhance or inhibit intellectual and emotional function. In the limbic brain, they counteract dopamine and help you relax by relieving anxiety and worry. Just the opposite happens in the prefrontal cortex where they activate dopamine to improve concentration, mood, and cognition.
Endorphins are the morphine within; they calm anxiety , elevate mood, mediate pain and regulate stress. When endorphins levels are low, you feel on edge.
Glutamate/ Glutamine
In the body, glutamic acid (an amino acid) turns into glutamine. When it reacts with sodium it produces glutamate.
Glutamine is used to fight depression, enhance metabolic energy, increase mental alertness and improve mood and behavioral problems.
Glutamate is the brain\’s primary excitatory neurotransmitter as it boosts the electrical flow among brain cells. In addition, it is crucial to the normal functioning of our learning and memory. Autistic people have abnormal levels of glutamate.
Norepinephrine
Norepinephrine is a good friend of dopamine and increases our energy, alertness, and concentration. This neurotransmitter elevates our mood and helps us sleep, dream and learn. Norepinephrine is also released as a hormone into the blood, where it causes the blood vessels to contract and the heart rate to increase.
Acetylcholine
Acetylcholine is the major neurotransmitter in the peripheral nervous system apart from norepinephrine. This chemical fuel triggers muscle contraction and stimulates the excretion of certain hormones.
In the central nervous system, it is involved in memory, learning, remembering, wakefulness, attentiveness, anger, aggression, sexuality, and thirst, among other things.
GABA (gamma aminobutyric acid)
GABA is produced in the body from glutamic acid and it is a calming neurotransmitter. It reduces anxiety, fear, and panic by relaxing the muscles and slowing down the activity in the part of the brain called the limbic system. The limbic system is the emotional alarm bell. GABA is the chemical maestro of your calm and inner peace. Mild imbalances may make you fearful or may contribute to insomnia.
The Endocrine System
Beneath the hypothalamus is our endocrine system which consists of glands that control and produce other chemicals, called hormones. Hormones are chemical messengers too. They regulate many bodily functions as well as our emotional health.
The main glands that produce hormones are:
Hypothalamus: The hypothalamus releases hormones that control our body temperature, hunger, thirst, sleep, sex drive, and mood.
Pancreas: The Pancreas generates the hormone insulin that helps control sugar levels. Diabetic people can’t produce or use efficiently the hormone insulin.
Thyroid: The thyroid gland produces hormones mainly associated with your metabolism and heart rate.
Adrenal: Adrenal glands release the hormones responsible for our sex drive and the hormone cortisol that regulates stress.
Pituitary: the pituitary gland makes hormones that triggers growth and it controls other glands too.
Pineal: The pineal gland is also called thalamus and regulates melatonin- the hormone that affects sleep.
Ovaries: The ovaries, only in women, exert the hormones estrogen, testosterone and progesterone, which are the female sex hormones.
Testes: This gland, only in men, produces sperm and secretes testosterone, which is the male sex hormone.
Chapter 2: The reasons behind of your chemical imbalance
The human body is filled with chemicals of various types, such as hormones, enzymes, and neurotransmitters. When these chemicals are in balance we are mentally and physically healthy. However, even small imbalances can make us vulnerable to mental problems or even diseases.
On the same breath, not addressing the problems caused by our chemical imbalance, harms our chemical balance even more. It’s a vicious circle.
Factors that cause chemical imbalance
Genetic
There are certain traits that parents pass on to their children through their DNA, including eye color, hair color, height, and other physical characteristics. However, they also pass on certain neurotransmitter and chemical imbalances. These can account for migraines, insomnia, memory, fear, curiosity, shyness, extroversion, neuroses, alcohol dependence, ADHD, autism, depression, and anxiety.
It is important to note that these are just tendencies that will manifest depending on someone’s environment, life experiences and habits. In most cases, amino acid therapy and nutrition can balance the neurotransmitters.
nutrient deprivation
Our brain uses up to 30% of all the energy we derive from food. So food matters. The body requires many different vitamins and minerals that are crucial for development, normal functioning, good mood and protection against diseases. A nutritional deficiency occurs when the body doesn’t receive or absorb the necessary amount of nutrients. Deficiencies can lead to a variety of health problems.
For instance, mineral deprivation can cause our kidneys to stop filtering waste from the blood. This, in turn, leads to accumulated toxic waste to the tissues and organs. Specifically, a deficiency of magnesium and calcium can cause imbalances of the neurotransmitter acetylcholine.
In addition Omega-3 fatty acids deficiency, will reduce the production of vitamin D and can put the immune system out of balance, and cause depression. Omega-3 fatty acids are mainly derived from seafood.
Finally, when you don’t consume enough protein, your body cannot supply the amino acids that produce neurotransmitters.
Allergy Sensitivity
Allergies to food can cause your immune system to create antibodies… to fight off a food! This reaction affects the central nervous system and creates serotonin imbalances that in turn, result in fatigue, slowed thought processes, irritability, agitation, aggressive behavior, nervousness, anxiety.
Continuous allergic reactions are linked to depression, schizophrenia, and hyperactivity.
food intolerance
Food intolerance is the difficulty in digesting certain foods like dairy products, grains that contain gluten, beans, and others.
Food intolerance is different from an allergy because it doesn\’t stimulate the immune system. Its symptoms may take days to manifest and they might affect the skin, the respiratory tract and the gastrointestinal tract (GIT).
However, gastrointestinal disorders harm our neurotransmitter balance since over 90% of the body’s serotonin is located in the GI tract. This can cause depressive and anxious feelings and well as insomnia and headaches.
Inflammation
When something harmful or irritating affects a part of our body, there is a biological response to try to remove it. The signs of this process, manifest as inflammation. An inflammatory response that lasts only a few days is referred to as acute inflammation, while a response of longer duration is called chronic inflammation.
Inflammation is triggered by viruses, bacteria, physical trauma, burns, radiations, acids, toxins and stress. Inflammation is also caused by autoimmune diseases like psoriasis, lupus, rheumatoid arthritis. In autoimmune disorders, the body mistakes healthy tissues and cells with pathogenic ones. Therefore, it triggers an immune response and attacks these healthy cells.
Consequently, this immune response triggers an inflammatory response, which creates chemicals called cytokines. Normally, cytokines fight off infections during an immune response. Nevertheless, when cytokines become pathological, they damage our brain.
In fact, elevated cytokines are seen in serious conditions as Alzheimer\’s disease, Parkinson\’s disease, multiple sclerosis and even autism.
TOXICITY
Toxicity is our body’s state of ill health caused by harmful substances, called toxins.
Although toxins can be internal, like bad bacteria, yeast or stress, we are exposed daily to a number of external toxins through the polluted air, the water we drink, the food we eat, the medicines we consume and the products we use.
Toxins can affect our health in many ways. Some can kill the friendly bacteria in our gut, deprive our blood from oxygen, affect our DNA, interfere with vital enzymes our body needs to function properly and prevent the normal absorption of vitamins and minerals. To illustrate, processed food has chemicals and pesticides that affect our neurotransmitters and cause problems- from muscle cramps to irritability and emotional instability.
Another cause of toxicity is heavy metals that disturb your brain chemistry causing depression and anxiety and also weaken your immunity. Mercury, which can be found in amalgam fillings can cause depression and add to anxiety. Mercury and cadmium can compromise your immune system and cause allergies. Lead poisoning particularly obstructs GABA balance, which makes you anxious and prevents you from thinking properly. At last, aluminum, cadmium, and arsenic block dopamine production causing your motivation, energy, and happiness to drop.
On top of that, glyphosate, an herbicide used to kill weeds and grasses that compete with crops, and can be found in your food, not only damages your health but also makes other toxins and heavy metals more damaging to the body than they otherwise would be on their own.
LIFESTYLE HABITS
Our lifestyle habits determine how our genetic predispositions will affect our life. There is a broad spectrum of habits that affect our chemical balance the most common of them are:
Addictions.
Addictive substances such as nicotine, tobacco, cocaine, marijuana and caffeine are natural plant products and are easily accessible to people. They alter the mood by affecting our neurotransmitters and they cause addiction.
On the one hand, an existing neurotransmitter imbalance may attract us to addictive behaviors in an attempt to get a high that we are lacking because of our initial imbalance. On the other hand, when we keep indulging in addictive substances we harm our chemical balance even more.
Specifically, Caffeine, nicotine, alcohol all cause depletion of GABA.
Caffeine, alcohol, sugar and tobacco, trigger epinephrine and norepinephrine are natural antidepressants. Excessive use of these neurotransmitters leads to their depletion.
In addition, sugar and tobacco and alcohol cause our serotonin levels to fall over time. This adds to moodiness and depression. Serotonin imbalances also mean imbalances in our eating (increased carbohydrate cravings), sleep cycle, pain control and immune system function.
Besides, some addictive substances like nicotine have shapes similar to that the neurotransmitter dopamine. So when nicotine reaches our brain, it tricks the receptors of our neurons and docks at the place where dopamine is supposed to be. As a result, nicotine blocks access for the neurotransmitter dopamine and the brain produces less dopamine, thinking that we have enough. With time we fall more and more out of balance and we begin to depend on nicotine to feel normal. This chemical imbalance disrupts all of our natural functions and affects our mood, energy , temperament, sleep, and health.
Stress
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimates that up to 90% of all illness and disease is due to stress.
Stress can kill the good bacteria and yeast that live in your gut and keep your immunity levels high and your digestive health in balance. As the good bacteria and yeast die off, the bad bacteria and yeast are able to take over. Hence, your inner ecosystem gets severely damages and this creates the onset of mental and physical illness.
Actually, long periods of chronic stress gradually deplete serotonin and epinephrine as the body tries to minimize excitatory signals in periods of stress. Once epinephrine is depleted, our heart rate and blood pressure stop being regulated and increase. This creates more physical symptoms of anxiety. When serotonin is very low, our nervous system gets a free pass in stimulating us even in the face of minor events, which often leads in prolonged states of anxiety, agitation, panic attacks as well as sleep disturbances. This might lead someone to a point where they can’t relax anymore.
Furthermore, prolonged stress can lead to depression and pain and it may even cause brain shrinkage and tissue loss in the prefrontal cortex and the hypothalamus.
Diet
Following a starving diet also harms your chemical balance. Going several hours without food means that you don’t get enough glucose so the sugar levels in your blood drop. Since glucose is a primary source of energy, the lack of it causes fatigue. Not getting enough nutrients and glucose from your food, your brain suffers so you feel on edge and you can’t think properly or concentrate. On top of that, when you are not eating enough, your body reduced your metabolic rate in an attempt to save energy. When your metabolism is slow, it becomes harder to lose weight.
On the other end of the spectrum, excessive weight gain, obesity, and a sedentary lifestyle increase your risk for heart disease, diabetes, and various other chronic disorders. It is established that obesity impairs memory function, especially in pear-shaped women who carry extra pounds around their hips.
As far as physical motion is concerned, being active and exercising helps your brain regenerate brain cells. Therefore, a sedentary lifestyle affects your brain and the shape of certain neurons. Whereas, a more active lifestyle can enhance and boost your brain function by triggering the creation of new brain cells. The good thing is that you don’t need to be an athlete to get these benefits- even mild exercise or daily 10-minute walks can help you.
Insomnia
Our body needs sleep so it can rebuild dead cells and balance our neurotransmitter levels.
When you miss a night or two of sleep, you experience memory lapses, you are not able to concentrate, you feel weak and of course you feel moody. This happens because our body needs sleep so it can rebuild dead cells and balance our neurotransmitter and hormone levels.
Suffering from insomnia or even not getting enough sleep from time to time, can cause your circadian rhythms, or else biological clock to fall out of balance. A biological clock that doesn’t function properly affects your limbic system, which in turn affects your hormones. Therefore, sleep deprivation causes mood swings between feelings of happiness, sadness, anger and other emotions.
Trauma
Trauma is another main avenue for chemical imbalance. From a blow to the head, a car accident and combat to sexual and emotional abuse, trauma can damage or destroy many neurons in the brain, leading to decreased neurotransmitter function and impairment of many brain areas.
To be more precise, trauma overstimulates the amygdala, which is the fear center of the brain. This causes the amygdala to be highly alert triggering emotional memories, hyper-arousal, flashbacks, nightmares, and sleep disturbances. In addition, trauma alters the hippocampus, which is the memory center. A damaged hippocampus causes past memories to be relieved as if they are happening in the present. Finally, traumatic experiences cause stress that is associated with increased cortisol and norepinephrine that disrupt the chemical balance in the body.
Chapter 3: The importance of neurotransmitters
Your emotional health is a combination of your attitudes towards life events, your personality, and your brain’s neurotransmitter levels. Neurotransmitters practically regulate all functions in life, such as cognitive, physical and mental performance, sleep cycle, weight, emotions, fear, pleasure, joy, anger, mood, memory, cognition, attention, concentration, alertness, energy, appetite, cravings, and the perception of pain.
Just imagine that for you to cry, your neurotransmitters have to cry first and for you to feel desire and excitement, your neurotransmitters have to be elevated.
Your brain fuels get stronger or weaker depending on your overall health, diet, exercise, sunlight exposure and the conflict and tensions in your life.
Neurotransmitters affect every cell, tissue, and system in your body and minor shifts in their flow may have serious consequences for your mental health.
Let’s see how each neurotransmitter can affect your life and mental well-being.
Serotonin
Serotonin is the most widely studied neurotransmitter since it helps regulate a wide range of psychological and biological functions. Excess amounts of serotonin cause relaxation, sedation, apathy and a decrease in sexual drive.
On the other hand, serotonin deficiency is associated with low mood, aggression, sexual problems, lack of will power, low pain threshold, and poor temperature regulation in the body.
Medical conditions associated with disruption of the serotonin levels include disturbance in the sleep-wake cycle, eating disorders like obesity and well as chronic pain. In addition, people with depression often have abnormally low levels of serotonin.
Dopamine
Dopamine plays a critical role in the way our brain parts communicate with each other and control our movements and our mood.
When our prefrontal cortex is not pumping enough dopamine, this might lead to a decline in neurocognitive function. Therefore, we perform poorly, we lack attention, we can’t think straight and we feel depressed. Having too little dopamine may play role in disorders like schizophrenia or attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).
As we grow old, our brain produces less dopamine. This can result in Parkinson\’s disease, a disorder that affects a person\’s ability to move as they want to, resulting in tremors or shaking, and other symptoms.
Therefore, elevation of dopamine levels often leads to an improvement in mood, alertness, libido and an enhancement in verbal fluency and creativity.
However, when dopamine is unnaturally elevated we might catch ourselves overindulging in naturally rewarding experiences such as food, sex, abuse of drugs or gambling.
Norepinephrine
Norepinephrine is synthesized from dopamine and it is responsible for our “fight or flight” response to stress.
When elevated, it can cause physical reactions like increased heart rate and blood pressure. Most importantly, norepinephrine imbalances cause mental reactions like anxiety, hostility, panic and even manic depression disorder, called bipolar disorder.
Hence, balancing this neurotransmitter can improve focus, concentration, energy, insomnia and persistent anxiety and panic attacks.
ENDORPHINS
Endorphins are the predominant chemicals that regulate pain and stress. Stress and pain are often triggers for endorphin production, but too much exposure results in overproduction of the neurotransmitter. Over-production depletes the supply of serotonin before the brain can produce more.
As a consequence, serotonin deficiency causes depression and a low tolerance for pain which manifests as chronic pain. In many instances, low levels of this neurotransmitter are misdiagnosed as depressive disorders. Another cause of endorphin depletion is a lack of adequate exercise.
With higher levels of endorphins, you become more resilient. You can mediate physical and emotional pain as well as stress.
Nevertheless, when we produce endorphins excessively, our body may not be able to experience or recognize pain.
Glutamine/ Glutamate
Glutamine serves several key functions in our health. Most notably, it serves as a key building block for glutathione, which is the body\’s antioxidant complex.
Glutamine also raises blood sugar levels and may help in the treatment of hypoglycemia as well as control cravings for sugar and carbohydrates. For that reason, glutamine deprivation can increase cravings, drop blood pressure and cause fatigue.
Considering glutamate, its depletion has been linked to many mental disorders, including autism, obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), schizophrenia, and depression. Also, glutamate helps our memory. That’s why the lack of it is observed in patients with Alzheimer’s disease.
It is important to underline that excess glutamate can kill brain neurons resulting in anxiety, depression, mood swings, headaches, confusion, difficulty concentrating, lethargy, sleepiness, and hyperactivity.
Acetylcholine
Acetylcholine produces muscle contractions and is found in the motor neurons. In the hippocampus, this brain fuel is involved in memory formation, learning and general intellectual function. Other functions controlled by this brain fuel are our heart rate, digestion, respiration rate, salivation, perspiration, pupil dilation, the discharge of urine and sexual arousal.
Thus, acetylcholine deficiency can cause paralysis, erection problems in males and memory impairment. On the contrary, the surplus of the same neurotransmitter may cause abnormal muscle spasms.
GABA
GABA helps the brain cells communicate with each other and plays a major role in behavior, cognition, and the body\’s response to stress.
Low GABA levels slow down brain functioning and trigger depressive feelings. When GABA deprivation is combined with stress-related hormones like cortisol, we experience anxiety, sweating, and tremors.
As a matter of fact, a brain with low GABA would be vulnerable to irritability, combativeness, and even seizures.
In opposition, Excessive GABA can cause sleeping and eating disorders.
What can be done for Neurotransmitter Imbalances?
Neuroscience knows that these brain fuels are the maestros of your brain and are vital to your health and well-being. They might be the most crucial factor contributing to your day to day happiness. The truth is that you don\’t know how good life can be until you nurture your brain chemicals. If you can maintain robust brain chemicals, then you can improve your overall health and most likely your happiness. Moreover, it is vital to appreciate that even minor improvements in your brain fuels may offer you remarkable, life-changing benefits.
You can balance your neurotransmitters with nutraceuticals (medical grade supplements), BHRT (bio-identical hormone replacement), vitamin therapy, herbs, minerals, natural remedies and diet and lifestyle modifications. You can also resort to amino acid therapy which provides the body the building blocks that it needs to make more neurotransmitters.
For example, the amino acids phenylalanine and tyrosine, along with other factors such as B vitamins, influence the production of dopamine.
Considering GABA, it can be increased by glutamic acid, vitamin B, and zinc.
Testing will pinpoint exactly which of your neurotransmitters needs the most help.
Testing Your Neurotransmitters
3 Reasons you need to test your neurotransmitter balance
1. The symptoms of neurotransmitter imbalances share common symptoms with other conditions. For example, problems with your brain fuels can trigger symptoms similar to adrenal fatigue or hormone imbalances. That’s why so neurotransmitter testing and screening can help you rule out other possibilities.
2. Different people have different causes for their symptoms. Many symptoms, such as fatigue, weight gain, anxiousness, and sleep disturbances can have strikingly different underlying causes in different people and in different stages of their life. While your poor concentration may be due to low dopamine, someone else’s might be caused by high endorphin levels. You can identify the exact cause of your symptoms by testing your neurotransmitter levels.
3. Knowing your symptoms doesn\’t mean you know what’s causing them. Although you can probably articulate a long list of symptoms, it is hard to know what is causing those symptoms.
Knowing your neurotransmitter levels can give you more information about your symptoms so you can correct an imbalance or better yet, prevent having more severe problems in the future.
How to test your neurotransmitters
You can get a comprehensive view of your body’s neurotransmitter levels with a noninvasive urinary test collected at home.
Alternatively, Dr. Charles Gant, of the Academy of Functional Medicine suggests you can test for the neurotransmitter precursors (amino acids, b vitamins, minerals, and fatty acids) and neurotransmitter metabolites through an Organic Acids Test, RBC mineral test or Amino Acid Plasma.
2016-11-20-1479660926