Tracking my efforts to beat Myalgic Encephalomyelitis (ME), aka CFIDS, aka CFS

Tracking my efforts to beat Myalgic Encephalomyelitis (ME), aka CFIDS, aka CFS

Monday, May 14, 2012

Study mentions green tea as **bad** for ME/CFS

This research article regarding the development of a home monitoring method for Th1/Th2 imbalance has been mentioned on some of the forums lately.  It sounds as if the test itself is a long way from being something that the average person can buy/use on a regular basis.  But, what's interesting is that the article mentions green tea as being bad for PWMEs because it stimulates the Th2 side of the immune system -- exactly what I don't want, according to my doctor.

I find this particularly interesting because I drank a cup of green tea (decaf.) yesterday afternoon and woke up feeling horrible today.  Still do, in fact.  I had just climbed out of a brief two-day crash,  the brevity of which I believed was a good sign that the Equillibrant was working.  So today's unexpected dip right back into crash mode makes me wonder if the green tea had anything to do with it.

[5/23/12 update:  Here's an article explaining why green tea is bad for Th2 dominant people.]

6 comments:

  1. I tried taking green tea (in pill form) for years after reading research on how it might help CFS. I never noticed any effects at all, either good or bad, so I finally decided I was wasting my money and gave it up.

    Very interesting to me that it could make Th2 dominance worse - maybe that is why I never had any positive effects from it.

    Sue

    Live with CFS

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    1. That's interesting Sue, I didn't know that Green Tea was once touted as an actual *treatment* for CFS until you and Dan (below) mentioned it. (I'm still new to this world.) If that theory was based on the the research summarized here (http://forums.phoenixrising.me/index.php?threads/green-tea-extract-and-me-cfs.194/), it seems flawed based on what we know now about Th1/Th2 imbalance.

      The scientists injected bacterial toxins into the mice that they deemed to cause a "CFS-like" state. But reading it carefully, it says that the toxins induced a *pro-inflammatory* cytokine production. PRO-inflammatory is a Th1 shifted state...exactly the opposite of CFS. So given that the green tea helped those mice, it means the tea shifts the immune system toward Th2, which agrees with what the article in the original post said.

      The mice study appears to have been flawed by assuming that the "CFS-like state" they induced in the mice had the same etiology as actual, human CFS--a HUGE leap, which we now know (we think!) is dead wrong.

      Things like that make me wonder what we'll know if 5, 10, 20 years that make today's treatments seem misguided...

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  2. yeah I bought some good quality sencha green tea a while back thinking it would help, but actually made me worse too!! If you're looking for another energizing drink, "tulsi" tea is quite good.
    All the best,
    Dan

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    1. Dan, thanks for that suggestion. I've never heard of tulsi tea. I'll definitely look into it.

      Regards,

      Patrick

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  3. Late to the party but I found this http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15857209 in this research they find that it could help CFS

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  4. My understanding is if you have to avoid any type of stimulant.It can be tempting to seek something to pick you up a bit but you will not be resting your body which is what it needs.

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