Folic acid (stomach issues)

[Littledancingtiger]

Has anyone had to take 5mg folic acid? They are like 5mg of pure hell. Upsetting my stomach no end. Wondered if anyone else had had this and how they dealt with it!

[fbirder]

Have these been prescribed by a real doctor? If so, ask them if it would be OK to swap one 5000 mg dose for several 400 mcg tablets each day.

Otherwise - do you take them with food? If not that would be worth trying.

[Littledancingtiger in reply to fbirder]

yes folate deficient without them I seem to get severe neurological symptoms return quickly despite injecting more B12. I've tried skipping it which my stomach likes but the end result is always neuropathy. I had no idea it could do that although understand they work together. Have been taking with food. Not sure if I can try subbing folate.

Very hard to get doctor appointment this time of year.

[clivealive Forum Support in reply to Littledancingtiger]

Could you 'phone the surgery and ask for a "call back"?

[fbirder in reply to Littledancingtiger]

I would go see a pharmacist and explain that the 5mg tablets don't agree with you. I would ask if you could start taking 3(or 4) x 400 mcg tablets of folic acid, three times a day, with meals. He/she will be able to sell you those tablets without a prescription. Or you could get a supermarket own brand.

It may be that the smaller doses would be easier on your stomach. It may be that the 5 mg tablets contain something that disagrees with you. The pharmacist my suggest a different brand of 5 mg tablets.

Very under-utilised resort, pharmacists. Sadly getting replaced by prescription delivery companies.

[Littledancingtiger in reply to fbirder]

Thank you it also makes sense they'd be familiar with drugs too. The only doc appointment I can get is the 31st which doesn't do me much good. The gastro stuff is incredibly unpleasent but not hospital worthy or anything.

[pvanderaa]

I agree with fbirder. I get the 800 mcg tablets at Walmart here in the USA and spread it out during the day. 2x first thing in the morning, 2x at noon, and 2x during my evening commute. In addition to my weekly cyano injections, I supplement with 5000 mcg methyl-b12 sublingual tablets 2x at noon and 2x during my evening commute.

If I take too much folic acid at a time I get symptoms similar to heart palpitations and thumping in my ears any time I turn my head. Plus the pills don’t last and other symptoms return during the day.

By splitting the dose, I feel more normal throughout the day. I don’t get an upset stomach, except I can get super hungry. Especially after the B12 injection.

Your stomach symptoms may be caused by the repair of the vagus nerve and the stronger signals from the repair are causing your ‘hell’. You some how need to convince your brain that this is a ‘good’ indication of the nerve repair.

Once you stop worrying about it, the stress hormones stop and the brain stops sending signals to the stomach to produce more stomach acid (this is a positive feedback loop that evolution has developed to support the fight or flight reaction that is probably going haywire.)

Have you tried increasing your acidic diet? Orange juice, mild salsa to see how these affect your stomach- in my case, they actually calm the reflux down because my stomach is too alkaline as my stomach doesn’t produce enough acid. I add salsa to just about every meal including my sausage and toast breakfast.

I also supplement with daily multivitamin, D3 (2000 mcg), B1 (100 mg) and B6 (100 mg) which I take with an apple at lunch to support nerve repair. The apple helps calm my stomach issues as well.

Are you keeping a logbook of all symptoms? Stomach issues are one type of symptom. I need the log to sort out the good symptoms from the bad ones. Unfortunately, they can be similar. The ones that appear in sequence and repeat after medication are most likely the good ones and if your brain knows they are coming, it calms down and gets on with other things instead of worrying and stressing out. The logbook gave me a tool to get some control back from the roller coaster ride that starts with medication for the B12 deficiency. The goal is to level out the roller coaster ride.

Do you eat broccoli? I try to add broccoli to my meals as well as it is a more natural source of folic acid and has other minerals that don’t upset my stomach like the tablets can do. I don’t think I would substitute it for the tablets however. I eat it in addition to my tablets.

[Littledancingtiger in reply to pvanderaa]

Hi thanks - I think it’s very much the folic acid unfortunately. I don’t really tend to suffer with my stomach. Although I could be wrong. If I skip it I feel better so I don’t know. This certainly isn’t something I had before at any rate!

[Gambit62 Administrator in reply to Littledancingtiger]

possible that it could be a reaction to something other than the folic acid in the tablet. I'd suggest, as others, speaking to the pharmacist who dispensed them.

[Littledancingtiger in reply to Gambit62]

Thanks I spoke to one in the end. She was very nice said my option may be a liquid possibly but need to speak to my prescribing doctor which I can’t do at the moment. I also react to over the counter tablets as I have tried a smaller dose with same response. The fillers are the same things as I’ve used in other products so I’m a bit clueless on this one. It seems to be a very definite reaction to folic itself.

[Gambit62 Administrator in reply to Littledancingtiger]

hope you find something that works

[Littledancingtiger in reply to Gambit62]

Thank you. I’ve actually used methylfolate in the past though never to correct a deficiency like this one just the standard dosage for adults of childbearing age. Bizarrely I have zero issues from that whatsoever.

I don’t think my GP will be thrilled but I’ll ask him to read guidance on using this instead and ask if he will support me trialling that and monitor my bloods.

I know folinic acid is also another option. It might save all the headache of me not tolerating the folic. I can’t see me tolerating the liquid if I don’t seem to tolerate it in any kind of tablet with different fillers but who knows! The pharmacist did say she doubts I’ll be able to tolerate it ever with the symptoms I’m having.

If anyone’s at all interested I’ll report back in case it helps someone else.

[Hidden]

Go for sublingual or get a B-complex injection. Right now I am on B-complex injections.

[Littledancingtiger in reply to Hidden]

Thank you - not heard of sublingual folic before. Will do some digging. Folic seems to work for symptoms and levels it’s just the horrible stomach side effects. If I could crack that I’d be perfect.

[Hidden in reply to Littledancingtiger]

Go to frunutta.com, you can get sublingual folic acid 1000 mcg or just get B-complex. Both have folic acid in them and both are sublingual, so no stomach issue. Make sure you use the Frunutta brand, as other brands that claim to be sublingual are actually just "fast dissolve" and you still have to swallow the melted pill material. Be careful with the brand EZ melts, they are listed as sublingual but nowhere on the bottle does it say they are sublingual. I hope they correct the listing since I wasted my money.