My first biohacking supplements

Soft push in the right direction

For my thirty-ninth birthday, I had a party. I had some fifteen people over for a late lunch and socializing. I was a good host, I entertained my guests, and didn’t drink much. I only had three gin-tonics over something like 6 hours. I can hold my liquor and I was not drunk in the slightest, but tomorrow I woke up with a crushing hangover. Completely tired, feeling the weight of the world and a headache pulsing in the back of my head.

My first Biohack

I remembered an article I read about some old mice that took some supplements and had the same muscles as young mice. I believe it was this one . I started digging and of course, the Internet hit me with words like “Youth fountain”, “End of aging” and tons of commercials for NAD boosters. Now the most advertised were NMN (nicotinamide mononucleotide) and NR (nicotinamide riboside).

One would think I jumped on that wagon and all was Great and I am twenty again. First thing, in the country where I live – you could not get any of them. Yes you could order on the internet, but most of them did not deliver here (we were a too small market then), and some known supplement brands did not even sell those kinds of products in my country. I started digging deeper and got this !!

Affordable variant

Niacin, a simple vitamin B3 form from the 1930-s I believe, raised blood NAD levels to 8-fold! Humans in this study had also a disease that causes a lack of NAD in muscle cells and that got up to normal levels. I had my candidate. But of course, Niacin was not the form of vitamin B3 sold in my country at the time so I took – nicotinamide. Nicotinamide is a bit different molecule, hey some brands even claimed to me it is the same thing in their customer support emails.

Finally I started taking nicotinamide, for the first about nine months. Until Niacin got available so I switched to that for two months last summer. Funny fact nicotinamide was made because niacin causes flushing. Yep had that 20 to 30 minutes of redness over my entire body, and I found it funny. If you experience that, just know it is the effect of capillary expansion in your skin and it is not harmful. It just means your blood is overflowing with NAD. And for the last 6 months, I got my hands on NR (finally have it available in my country as well), nicotinamide riboside chloride to be correct.

Did it work?

Does it work? Scientifically I am not qualified to answer, also I do not have an identical twin (or twin of any sort) that is off supplements.I needed a test – and found a good one. My fortieth birthday. 40 is a lot, statistics say more likely than not half of my life (yes I am working to beat statistics on that). Soooo…. I had a kind of a party… Three parties to be honest, in three weeks (one each weekend… yeeey!!!!). Fun biohacking fact – alcohol is bad for you, avoid it. On the other hand, I think I shamed the most resilient of frat boys – had no hangover, haven’t even been tired day after.

But how?

Apparently liver uses NAD from blood to process alcohol, so hangover might be partially caused by sudden drop of our NAD in blood – I feel like my NAD blood levels said bring it on, or come and get them or some other spartan/macho stupid thing and just brushed it off.

Enough about my personal experiences, the next article will be about NAD precursors and how I understand them to work.

Yeah just one more thing to take into consideration, those mice that were old and had muscles like young mice. They exercised in the test… meaning no pain no game. Just a pill helps, but an active lifestyle (for me push-ups, chin-ups, squats…), enough rest, and good food are a must.

Take care and enjoy your life