Self-experiment with L-theanine: effect on sleep and cognition

https://metasophi.com/blog/does-l-theanine-work-for-me/

by sheefrex • 2 years ago

77 43 2 years ago

jvans2• 2 years ago

fitbits and similar are fine for measuring awake vs asleep but really terrible at breaking up the stages

taeric• 2 years ago

I've been curious about this. They all are reporting it, nowadays. I'm assuming they have reason to think they are getting better at it?

pintxo• 2 years ago

I have reason to believe product management wants not to be left behind by the competitors, independent of the quality of their implementation.

jvans2• 2 years ago

metrics sell, even when they're not that accurate, and even when people know that.

dyauspitr• 2 years ago

Well at the end of the day the underlying metrics are still just heart rate and movement which can only tell you so much.

sheefrex12• 2 years ago

They're not as accurate as polysomnography but there is some correlation which should allow these measurements to serve as a useful proxy over 100-180 days. See this review for example:

"The findings of this systematic literature review indicate that the devices with higher relative agreement and sensitivities to multistate sleep (ie, Fitbit Charge 4 and WHOOP) seem appropriate for deriving suitable estimates of sleep parameters. However, analyses regarding the multistate categorization of sleep indicate that all devices can benefit from further improvement in the assessment of specific sleep stages."

Source: https://mhealth.jmir.org/2024/1/e52192/PDF

wslh2• 2 years ago

It is great the author highlights that green tea already includes L-theanine where it is common to read about buying supplements.

sheefrex12• 2 years ago

Indeed, but you would really need to drink a lot of green tea to get the same amount of L-theanine you would in a supplement: "2.5 litres of brewed green tea would be needed to get 200mg of L-theanine". Also a question of how much dose you want of course...

wslh2• 2 years ago

And matcha tea?

aitchnyu• 2 years ago

Will we discover one day that we shouldnt have consumed the equivalent of jugs of green tea in a pill? I'm having trouble braining the internet saying short term L Theanine consumption "generally recognized as safe" but green tea (with all its chemicals) and supplements have been harmful.

https://www.sysrevpharm.org/articles/adverse-effects-of-gree...

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/29078257/

ssebs• 2 years ago

I've taken L-theanine for anxiety before, and it seems to help. I'm not sure if it's a placebo or not, but either way it seems to help

biomcgary• 2 years ago

Same here. I find that I am less likely to wake up in the middle of the night. Based on the post, my guess is that I'm less likely to wake up during REM from anxiety.

ulnarkressty• 2 years ago

This study was not blinded so there could be a placebo effect.

Saved you a click.

sheefrex12• 2 years ago

My view on this is if you don't find any effect or a tiny effect (the case here) that is already useful information. For most supplements, my bet is that you won't even benefit from a placebo effect.

And if you do find an effect, then you should do a more high-effort self-blinded test.

pinkmuffinere• 2 years ago

This seems reasonable to me too — first test feasibility, and then if it’s feasible let’s go do a more in depth study. But still, the feasibility result isn’t very interesting to external folks like us, and probably shouldn’t make the news. I think it should _just_ motivate the new study you mention

andkenneth• 2 years ago

bold of you to assume I'd ever read an article rather than just skimming the comments

marmight• 2 years ago

I would have liked to have seen if there was any difference in the effects over time. I think it is easy to find something that helps with anxiety in the short term, but over enough time habituation, tolerance, and dependence can develop to most substances.

sheefrex12• 2 years ago

Yes, you are very right: this is something I will definitely add eventually.

bagful• 2 years ago

For my biology, L-theanine (200 mg) rounds out caffeine by stamping out the anxiety-inducing effect. By itself it just gives me a headache sometimes.

sheefrex12• 2 years ago

Indeed, one of the studies cited supports this view.

hisnameisjimmy• 2 years ago

I don't even notice it without caffeine (coffee), but it has transformed coffee for me from something I had to be super careful with to something that is incredibly enjoyable and productivity-inducing without feeling sick and insane.

naruhodo• 2 years ago

Absolutely. This is what I came here to say.

Coffee gives me the anxious jitters. L-theanine turns that into focused alertness. I have reduced my coffee intake overall and supplemented my caffeine intake with a small glass of energy drink each day (not a whole can).

My daily supplements intake includes L-theanine (the brand depicted by the video thumbnail in the linked post), St Johns Wort and an IBS support supplement (NutraLife Gut Relief) that contains 2000mg of glutamine per dose.

All of that really helps with anxiety and depression. If I want extra energy, throw in some L-carnitine.

mentos• 2 years ago

I once was sitting at my desk and had this overwhelming calm come over me. I was trying to figure out what I had eaten that morning/afternoon and then realized the 2-3 'Just Chill' sodas in my trash my mom had gotten me contained L-Theanine. Was a pretty blind test but I wasn't able to reproduce it effectively with L-Theanine supplements I found on amazon.

sheefrex12• 2 years ago

Very interesting: maybe it could have been something else in the sodas? Alternatively, the quality of the amazon supplement might not have been great (unless you tried from multiple sources)

smokeydoe2• 2 years ago

Quality of L-theanine seems to vary wildly across brands. I’ve had one that does nothing, one that gives me consistent headaches, and one that gives me consistent diarrhea.

huuhee3• 2 years ago

I tried an L-theanine supplement for anxiety. It had a notable short-term effect, but when I was off it my anxiety significantly worsened. Got better once I stopped taking it, so I guess it was a dependency kind of thing.

So, I would say that it definitely has an impact. Perhaps it would have worked better with a smaller dose.

oigursh• 2 years ago

gwern.net has entered the chat

perihelion_zero• 2 years ago

Been mucking around with huge doses of B Vitamins (especially B3/Niacin) and 5-HTP (a serotonin precursor). Both of those are rather, uh, effectful. 500mg+ Niacin will turn you red unless you're actually deficient. And you do not want to mess with the 5-HTP and alcohol at the same time, plus 5-HTP can cause some nasty side effects in some people.

Seems like a nice way to have some weird dreams while probably improving my health (high dose B vitamins seem to do great things for mental disorder and the only apparent downside is colorful piss and possibly turning into a cherry).

For people who don't do vita-drugs, there's always tea, coffee, chocolate, and matcha.

sheefrex12• 2 years ago

Good to hear they seem to be working out for you. I tried L-tryptophan a few years ago but discontinued rather quickly as I thought my sleep quality was going down (I think I was waking up during dreams more often). I guess 5-HTP would have been even more powerful.

84adam• 2 years ago

Be careful with large doses of Niacin. It may be bad for the heart.

Source: https://newsroom.clevelandclinic.org/2024/02/19/cleveland-cl...

_DeadFred_• 2 years ago

I don't really notice a change when I take theanine but the times when I have taken it consistently I notice I stop biting my fingernails.

I just realized this week I haven't been biting my nails and from this popping up thought about it, went and checked, and the new magnesium drops I started taking have theanine.

cfcf14• 2 years ago

L-theanine (200mg) with around 100-150mg of caffeine has an extremely noticeable, positive effect on my ability to focus, feeling of "well-situatedness", and overall calmness. L-theanine by itself doesn't seem to do much. Caffeine on its own wakes me but makes me feel jittery and anxious, so it's definitely an interaction effect. Taurine has a much smaller effect on calmness, sans interactions - often indistinguishable from any other mild focus exercise like box breathing or stretching.

sheefrex12• 2 years ago

Quite good support for the caffeine/theanine interaction in the literature -- I was mainly trying to see if it could improve sleep which is why I didn't take it with caffeine. Would be interesting to do some blinded cognitive test at some point though to get some estimate on how much congitive performance is increased. I need to think about ways to measure that, aside from flashcards. I actually have the website connected to a chess API so that might be a nice test.

darthrupert• 2 years ago

Are you consuming these things pure or via tea/coffee?

coreyh14444• 2 years ago

Kindof softof related - I also "discovered" L-tyrosine effectively cured my Restless Leg Syndrome (RLS). The tl;dr version of that story is I used to take electrolytes for it and switched from the Heed brand regular version to the "extreme" version which didn't do anything for RLS, compared the ingredients and L-Tyrosine was the key. For going on 15 years now I take it daily before bedtime and it is effective 98% of the time. Bottom line is these amino acids deserve more attention and research.

sheefrex12• 2 years ago

Very interesting -- I often move my legs when seated and this annoys people haha

Curious to try this out now -- have never tested L-tyrosine before. I wonder what other effects it could have.

Havoc• 2 years ago

Tried it too a didn’t go well. No immediate effect and then after a couple of days experienced severe emotional fragility. That “about to burst into tears“ type feeling. Quickly dropped that stuff

binary132• 2 years ago

Anecdotally, my theanine use correlated strongly with my development of terrible chronic migraines which lasted years. But I was also experiencing severe stress during that time, so it could just be that. However, when I stopped taking L-theanine, my headaches did lessen in severity and frequency, so there may be something there and I’ve heard others mention headache in relation to it.

sheefrex12• 2 years ago

Yes, apparently headaches are listed as one of the possible side-effects

smokeydoe2• 2 years ago

This is also my experience. I would get pretty bad next day headaches especially when taken at night.

Self-experiment with L-theanine: effect on sleep and cognition

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