oils and hair loss???

[pharaoh]

shelley ive written before about my trauma with my hair. it all started after a way too high dose of accutane (high vitamin a) for about five months. there always seems to be some trigger for my hair loss and it usually stops and grows back.

before i used to think vitamins made my hair fall out more (i can see an increase the next day) and now im really thinking its OILS!! all kinds..when i was on flax seed (usually great for everyone) my hair poured out...fish oils...up to 250 hairs out a day...i have had ongoing loss now for eight months and have been using emu oil on skin, castor oil on eyebrows (to promote growth) scrubbing oils on my body (to soften skin), jojoba oil on my head to promote hair growth etc....all off and on but something or two things once a day.

last night i put baby oil on lots of my skin, arms, stomach, neck etc...this morning my hair POURED out of my head...
could it be something with my liver and oil...fatty liver...my hair thinks it should fall when it has oils>>>from accutane ????/does this make ANY sense?

[shelley]

Yes, it makes total sense. I don't know why I didn't think of it before. It seems you are still overdosed or at least highly susceptible to Vitamin A toxicity due to the Accutane because Accutane is basically Vitamin A. One of the side-effects of Accutane and Vitamin A toxicity both is rapid hair loss. And when people have Vit A issues, applying oils activates their stores of A and can then cause localized toxic reactions.

So what you want to do is get your Vitamin A only from beta-carotene rather than pure A for awhile, avoid sources of A and beta-carotene as much as possible, but get more D and Zinc so your body can handle your stores of A properly.

Fat soluble vitamins are not shed as rapidly as water soluble, so it takes much much longer to recover from toxicity. It's important to lose some weight - lose fat - and do detox baths so they can be eliminated.

[pharaoh]

shelley,
you honestly believe me... i thought i was losing my mind!!! so even baby oil can stir up the vitamin a in my liver???? i will stay away from all oils now. what about eating it..like olive oil or vinegar and oil..stay away from that too? also how much zinc will help me..the regular 50mgs a day??
im running on the treadmill and will use this as a very good reason to keep exercising. will the exercise help stir up the vitamin a and get it out of my system??
and please what kind of detox baths. i feel like i might really be able to lick this with your help. !! thank you sosososos much!!

[shelley]

50 mg of zinc daily is more than enough! You might want to take it just 5x a week.

You will need SOME oils in your diet that's for sure, but limit them. Stick to olive, flax, borage, black current, as much as possible.

The best detox bath protocol in the world (IMHO) is in the fAQ I think I put it under Vital health management as it's one of the basic tools. Anytime you are dealing with a chronic issue it's smart to do one detox bath a week.

There are other lesser detox baths that are safer to do more often, or in between the major detox bath.

[pharaoh]

Thank you so much!! i will work out hard...eliminate all external oils and start with my zinc and the detox baths. thank you for your insight. i feel really good about this. i knew my body was telling me something...just took me awhile to figure it out...and i wouldnt have been able to without your help!!

[healthymusician]

So is it possible that a zinc deficiency can lead to vitamin A toxicity? I am struggling with hair loss too and I am very zinc deficient. I also took accuate years ago. Would regular liver support help with this? Should I avoid carrot juice and cod liver oil?

Jen

[shelley]

Yes. For Vitamin A to be released from the liver and utilized effectively in metabolic functions, you need Zinc, which acts much like a co-enzyme in the process. Hmm... trying to think of a good analogy...

Let's say Vitamin A is a magic softball that repairs whatever it touches. To catch and hold a softball, you have to shape your hand just right. What shapes your hand properly is the softball glove. Zinc is one of the things that makes the glove be there in the right shape for Vitamin A to take hold, and zinc is also the thing that makes it possible for the magic softball to be thrown in the first place.

That's how important zinc is.

[pharaoh]

shelley,
Im going to supplement with 50mgs of zinc five times a week for a while..how long do you think? a few months at least or now forever since i have this stupid vitamin a stuck in my liver?
im really working out hard and going to start the detox baths this weekend..what about suanas? would they help get rid of the overdose...


and healthymusician....just a note and shelley please correct me if im wrong..but cod liver oil is loaded with vitamin a...since ive been off accutane (8 years) i cant touch cod liver, fish oils of any kind, retin a or any vitamin a derivitives ...or i will regenerate a bout of hair loss. really try to stear clear of all of it...just thought it might help!

[shelley]

yep, cod liver oil is loaded with vitamin a, which is why I recommend it to most people. You accutane people are different, tho! Now if you didn't overdose in it you are probably okay with it, so long as you take zinc too, but if you were overdosed by a physician who didn't read the specs well enough, like Pharoah was, stay away for awhile.

Really try to use kinesiology to determine how often and for how long you should take zinc. OR once the bottle runs out, find a Liquid zinc so you can do the taste test. I've always found that to be highly accurate.

But really you can probably take it 5 days a week for up to a month with no problem. Just be sure to get enough potassium at the same time. After a month take a break, like 10 days, before you resume, and by then you'll probably only need it 1-3x a week at most.

Be sure to read www.acu-cell.com, it has a page on zinc. It's smart to know the signs of overdose, imbalance and toxicity any time you take a lot of supplements.

Saunas are great, anything that helps you sweat is fine so long as it doesn't exhaust you.

[pharaoh]

thanks again shelley....fortunately the doctors are now much wiser about accutane and have really cut back on doses. There are not AS many bad side effects now as before. It's us people that were on the drug 5-10 years ago that have more problems...I weighed 105 lbs and was on 80 mgs!!! of accutane every day for FIVE MONTHS...now they have doses as low as 20mgs and not even every day..It's insane. I feel i can lick this. it's just hard because when i think...um i cant use oils....people think im insane!!!!

[healthymusician]

okay, I think I get it... If you don't have the zinc, the vit. A can't be processed appropriately, it gets stuck in the liver, and it causes hair loss. Whew! So zinc supplementation and liver cleansing protocol right? My DC said that the zinc def could be because of heavy metals and she wants to give me a urine test. Does this sound right? It is $55!

I think I told you this before, but since taking accutane I have this little brown spot in my eye white. I read somewhere that that can mean liver toxicity and if that is the case this is starting to all make sense!

Thanks!!

Jen

[shelley]

I wouldn't bother with the urine test unless it's the 24-hour urine test taken after you take chelation agents. That one is okay, but hair analysis is less of a bother. And those chelation agents can make you feel really sick. Not safe if you're not taking milk thistle.

[chickpea]

Shelley, Pharoah and Healthymusician,

I don't suffer from hair loss but I do have similar issues in that I suffer from vitamin A toxicity due to taking it in a concentrated form for a while. I still have problems taking cod liver oil, it's soooo annoying as I so want to take it!!! I bought some more recently and literally dipped my tongue in a teaspoon of it, so had about 1/3 of a teaspoon and STILL felt a bad effect from it over the last 24 hrs, as if it had overloaded my liver.

Shelley I am taking 15mg of zinc a day....should I up it to 50mg for a week or so? Can it lower your iron levels? My iron is usually lowish in blood tests. For iron I can only eat certain veggies, nuts and seeds at the mo. I will check out acu-cell.

I also have mercury toxicity so it could also be down to that as merc affects zinc levels in turn affecting vit A metabolism.

Anne

[shelley]

15 mg of zinc a day is fine, stick with that for awhile.

Definitely supplement with iron, it's one of the toughest ones to get. Try using molasses as your main sweetener and you'll get plenty. That would be safest. Shouldn't spark up any heavy metal issues. Liver and eggs are good too. People who test out low for iron should not be vegetarians. If you're supplementing with zinc you should supplement iron too if iron is low, as they fight for the same receptor sites. I take Solaray's iron ascorbate, it doesn't cause constipation.

[h0ppy]

For iron, what about Redmond's sea salt?