GABA Against Stress/Anxiety

Today’s almonds have been activated by:

⏰ IN A RUSH?

Today’s 30-Second Summary

If you don’t have time to read the whole email today, here are some key takeaways:

• GABA (gamma-aminobutyric acid) is a neurotransmitter that has an inhibitory effect on many functions, but we can (and do) use that to our advantage

  • We make it in our bodies, and/or can get it from food, but it’s popularly enjoyed as a supplement to reduce stress and anxiety

  • However, it can also have a cognitive-enhancing effect, which is counterintuitive, but there’s science for why (see our main feature)

• Have you tried everything for sleep and still find yourself getting to sleep later than you’d like, and/or sleeping less soundly than you’d like?

  • Today’s sponsor Cornbread Hemp is offering gummies that combine organic CBD with lavender, valerian, and chamomile, for a synergistic soporific effect that’ll have you peacefully snoozing in no time, guaranteed (literally, they offer a guarantee).

Read on to learn about these things and more…

👀 WATCH AND LEARN

The Most Underrated Stretches (7:28)

How many of these did you know?

Click Here If The Embedded Video Doesn’t Load Automatically!

Stretchy menu:

• 0:40 | Hips

• 1:24 | Cowface

• 2:30 | Tilted eagle

• 3:31 | Lateral tilt

• 5:07 | Supine assisted

• 5:52 | Fascia

• 6:30 | Plantar fascia

Want to watch it, but not right now? Bookmark it for later 🔖

🥥 RECIPES WORTH SHARING

Delicious Kilimanjaro Coconut Curry

This one is from Molly Patrick & Luanne Teoh at Clean Food Dirty Girl, specializing in whole-food plant-based oil-free meals.

In this case, it’s a variation on mchicha, which is a delicious Tanzanian spinach-and-peanut curry (this one has the spinach switched out for kale, but follow your heart if you prefer spinach!), with added chickpeas for the nutrition and flavor.

_{For all those who asked for more text-based recipes… Enjoy!}

💊 MAIN FEATURE

A Neurotransmitter Less Talked-About

GABA is taken by many people as a supplement, mostly as a mood modifier, though its health claims go beyond the recreational—and also, we’re of the opinion that mental health is also just health, and if it works, it works. We’ll explore some of the claims and science behind them today…

What is GABA?

GABA stands for gamma-aminobutyric acid, and it’s a neurotransmitter. It’s a lot less talked-about than for example dopamine or serotonin, but it’s very important nonetheless.

We make it ourselves inside our body, and we can also get it from our food, or supplement it, and some drugs will also have an effect on its presence and/or activity in our body.

What foods is it found in?

• Animals, obviously (just like in human brains*)

• Fermented foods (many kinds)

• Yeast

• Tea

• Tomatoes

• Mulberries

For more details, see:

γ-Aminobutyric acid found in fermented foods and beverages: current trends

*However, we do not recommend eating human brains, due to the risk of CJD and prion diseases in general.

What claims are made about it and are they true?

For brevity, we’ll give a little spoiler up-front: all the popular claims for it appear to be valid, though there’s definitely room for a lot more human trials (we skipped over a lot of rodent studies today!).

So we’ll just drop some of its main benefits, and human studies to back those.

Reduction of stress and anxiety

GABA decreases task-related stress and anxiety within 30 minutes of being taken, both in subjective measures (i.e., self-reports) and in objective clinical physiological measures:

Oral intake of γ-aminobutyric acid affects mood and activities of central nervous system during stressed condition induced by mental tasks

Cognitive enhancement

It’s not a does-everything nootropic like some, but it does have clear benefits to episodic memory:

One of the things that makes this one important is that it also deals with the often-asked question of “does GABA pass the blood-brain barrier”:

Read more:

Supplementation of gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA) affects temporal, but not spatial visual attention

Potential for more

We take care to give good quality sources, so the following study comes with a big caveat that it has since been retracted. Why was it retracted, you wonder?

It’s about the sample; they cite “30 healthy adults”, but neglected tp mention that this figure was initially 46. What happened to the other 16 participants is unclear, but given that this was challenged and the challenge not answered, it was sufficient for the journal (Nature) to pull the study, in case of deliberate sample bias.

However! Running the numbers in their results section, a probability of 0.03 is very compelling unless the disappearance of 16 subjects was outright fraudulent (which we regrettably cannot know either way).

Here’s the study (so take it with a pinch of salt, considering the above), and taken at face value, it shows how GABA supplementation improves accurate reactions to fast-moving visual and auditory stimuli:

RETRACTED ARTICLE: γ-Aminobutyric acid (GABA) administration improves action selection processes: a randomised controlled trial

…so, hopefully this experiment will be repeated, without disappearing participants!

The sweet spot

You may be wondering how something that slows a person down (having a relaxing effect) can also speed a person up. This has to do with what it is and isn’t affecting; think of it like a “focus mode” on your computer or other device that greys-out everything else a bit so that you can focus on what you’re doing.

It’s in some ways (by different neurochemical pathways, though) a similar effect to the “relaxed alertness” created by l-theanine supplementation.

There’s also a sweet spot whereby GABA is toning some things down just the right amount, without adversely affecting performance in areas we don’t want slowed down. For the science of this, see:

Too Little and Too Much: Hypoactivation and Disinhibition (Reduced GABAergic Inhibition) of Medial Prefrontal Cortex Cause Attentional Deficits

Is it safe?

GABA is “Generally Recognized As Safe”. However:

• you should speak with your pharmacist if you are taking any medications for blood pressure or epilepsy, as GABA supplementation may cause them to work too well.

• you should absolutely not take GABA with alcohol or opioids as (dose-dependent for all the substances involved, and also depending on your metabolic base rate and other factors) its acute depression of the CNS can mean you relax and slow down too much, and you may find yourself not breathing often enough to sustain life.

Aside from that, it is considered safe up to at least 1g/kg/day*. Given that popular doses are 120–750mg, and most people weigh more than 750g, this is very safe for most people:

United States Pharmacopeia (USP) Safety Review of Gamma-Aminobutyric Acid (GABA)

Where can I get it?

We don’t sell it, but for your convenience, here’s an example product on Amazon 😎

Enjoy!

❤️ OUR SPONSORS MAKE THIS PUBLICATION POSSIBLE

Think you’ve tried everything? Use the oldest herb in the book for quality sleep.

Feel like you've tried everything? It's time to turn to the oldest herb in the book for a sleep solution that stands the test of time. Hemp-derived CBD is your ticket to a night of uninterrupted rest, and Cornbread Hemp’s CBD Sleep Gummies take it to the next level.

Bid farewell to those nights of waking up halfway through and the grogginess that follows. So, what makes their gummies unique?

They harness the power of all-natural ingredients, combining organic CBD with lavender, valerian, and chamomile. These plant powered ingredients work harmoniously together to guide you into a peaceful slumber while ensuring you wake up feeling refreshed.

Featuring a 25mg CBD and 1mg THC introductory dose and a 50mg CBD and 2mg THC stronger dose, you can choose the strength that's right for you.

Order now and experience the time-honored benefits of all-natural sleep support.

Plus, get 25% off with code SLEEP25. Sweet dreams, guaranteed.

Please do visit our sponsors—they help keep 10almonds free

🤫 A WORD TO THE WISE

📖 ONE-MINUTE BOOK REVIEW

How Emotions Are Made: The Secret Life of the Brain – by Dr. Lisa Feldman Barrett

We've previously reviewed Dr. Barrett's (also good) book Seven And A Half Lessons About The Brain, and this one is very different, and of more practical use:

The main thrust of the book is: the bioessentialist model of emotions is flawed; there is also no Platonic perfect form of any given emotion, and in fact emotions are constructed by the brain as a learned adaptive response.

She argues this from the dual vectors of on the one hand hard sciences of affective neuroscience and clinical psychology, and on the other hand sociology and anthropology.

In the category of criticism: Dr. Barrett, a very well-known and well-respected cognitive neuroscientist, is not an expert on sociology and anthropology, and some of her claims there are verifiably false.

However, most of the book is given over the psychophysiology, which is entirely her thing, and she explains it clearly and simply while backing everything up with mountains of data.

The usefulness of this book is chiefly: if we understand that emotions are not innate and are instead constructed adaptive (and sometimes maladaptive) neurological responses to stimuli and associations, we can set about rewiring things a little in accord with what's actually more beneficial to us. The book also outlines how.

Bottom line: if you'd like to be able to not merely manage emotions as they are, but also prune and/or grow them from the stem up, then this book provides a robustly scientific approach for doing that.

Click here to check out How Emotions Are Made, and get more discerning about yours!

Wishing you the very most well-informed start to the week,

The 10almonds Team