Where are you from? Germany
How did you find this forum? Google, pfs
What is your current age, height, weight? 25, 1,73cm, 98kg.
What specific drug did you use? Sulforaphane (Broccoli extract so might also include DIM and Quercetin but wasn’t specified on the packaging)
What dose did you take? One capsule (50mg)
What condition was being treated with the drug? Hair loss
For how long did you take the drug? 3 days
Date when you started the drug? 07.04.23
Date when you quit the drug? 10.04.23
Age when you quit? 25
How did you quit (cold turkey or taper off)? -
How long into your usage did you notice the onset of side effects? From the first dose
What side effects did you experience that have yet to resolve since discontinuation?
[X] Extreme insomnia is the only symptom i have and had (8-14 hours sleep per week for months).
What (if any) treatments have you undertaken to recover from your side effects since discontinuation of the drug? Blood tests, thyroid tests, thyroid hormones, sleeping meds, diet changes, experiment with methyl donation and depletion, vitamins, 10-20 different supplements.
If you have pre or post-drug blood tests, what hormonal changes have you encountered since discontinuing the drug? All hormones in the blood tests are normal. In a 24-hour saliva test i had low cortisol in the day and very high cortisol at night. Since i always had some trouble with sleep it could have been this way before though. I also have a TH-2 shift with high TH2 and IL-4 and low TH1 but this is also only a post-test.
Tell us your story, in your own words, about your usage and side effects experienced while on/off the drug.
Hey guys,
after trying 3 capsules (50g) of sulforaphan for hair loss i have persistent insomnia for 3 months now. Multiple times i wouldn’t sleep for 4 days in a row followed by 1-2 hours the following night. I still rested 10-12 hours per day so i could go through it. Couldn’t work or drive for 1,5 months.
I (luckily) don’t have any other symptoms you guys have.
Backstory:
I’m very sensitive to different substances. Without even knowing pfs i knew that finasteride would throw my whole system. Thats why i didn’t even try it and started with much lower impact sulforaphane.
I always had sleeping problems since i was like 14. Insomnia was always the very first symptom with any drug or supplement but it was always temporary. I would get insomnia from coffee, excercise (no matter when), caloric deficit, multivitamins etc. That’s why i’ve established a not so healthy livestyle with no exercise und no caloric deficit (thus my weight) to help me sleep. With this lifestyle my sleep was ok. (Has probably something to do with MTHFR/COMT mutation. Have a test scheduled).
I always had mixed thyroid symptoms (hair loss, easy weight gain, excessive sweating) with ambiguous blood tests. In the end the doctors settled with latent hypothyroidism or still at the edge of normal (TSH between 3,5 and 5,5).
The good thing is that because of the insomnia i started to adress all those problems now.
What did slighty positively influence sleep in the last month was methyl depletion with high dose nicotinic acid (made me tired and bad mooded during the day), ashwaghanda and eating very late at like 10-11 pm.
What did negatively influence it were thyroid hormones prescribed by the doctor (levothyroxine). The intake of only half a tablet (25 mcg) gave me extreme insomnia for 2 week (after sleep was back to like 2-3 hours per night). Interesting enough it gave me super high energy and was really pleasant the first days (until staying awake for 60-70 hours). Both of those symptoms are to a lesser extend common effects of the medication but according to the doctors unheard of from only half a single dose.
It looks like i’m very sensitive to hormones because taking melatonin also kicks in way harder than it should (mostly groggy, not really sleep) and lasts for multiple days.
Even though Cortisol is relatively low at day (compared to daytime reference) i can’t sleep a single minute at daytime (before i could sporadically, especially under extreme sleep deprivation). That’s why i think the high cortisol at night isn’t party of the short term sulforaphane problem but more of the general endocrinic thing.
Before i had mainly problems with the sleep onset. When i slept i was doing fine (thus no sleep lab or sleep apnea tests so far).
Now it’s onset and waking up but lately even more the waking up part.
Why i’m here:
I want to reverse my sleep to the time before taking sulforaphane. I work with different specialists on the other symptoms but they don’t believe me that sulforaphane was what turned the normal bad sleep into extreme insomnia.
From what i’ve read sulforaphane increases 3a-HSD and a lot of you take it to improve the pfs symptoms and insomnia. Since i don’t have any other pfs symptoms and sulforaphane was the reason for the imsomnia i’m confused what to do.
Should i aim to increase DHT and 5-ar (which isn’t easy since most of the things that increase it like excercise give me insomnia anyway). Or should i try to lower 3a-HSD with something like soy (which would lower DHT and 5ar as well, also had gynecomastia as a child which was removed by surgery).
Thanks for any help!