I've been taking iodine for about a month now. For the first two weeks, I definitely had some detox reactions, primarily low level headaches and brain fog, with occasional bouts of nausea. I've also been taking the cofactors as well (riboflavin and niacinamide, along with selenium), plus tyrosine (Jarrow's N-Aceytl tyrosine). I did self muscle testing initially and came up with 16 drops (40mg) of Lugol's 2% (J. Crow's brand), initially 4 200mcg pills of selenium (Life Extension brand, later dropped down to one, now back to 4), two tyrosine, two riboflavin, and I think two niacinamide (Thorne research brand). I've also been doing the salt water in the morning, and mixing it with glycine.
After about two weeks of that, I felt like my thyroid suddenly kicked on one day and I was warmer than usual (normally cold), but that hasn't entirely sustained yet. I have a running hypothesis that chocolate may tend to make me colder or inhibit the Thyroid/iodine (saw the earlier research on caffeine having a negative impact in that regard, so it could be that, or related to a negative impact on the adrenals which also affects temperature regulation). I've got to do some more extended testing without chocolate to see if that's a significant factor.
I feel like my energy has generally improved, have clearer thinking and I think I would say more will power or determination, fewer thoughts/feelings of "people don't care what I have to say", and less cold in general (I used to start shivering if I was outside in 50F or less within a few minutes, even with a jacket--frustrating). I think I've also lost some body fat. My sleep hasn't improved significantly and it may be an influence in going to bed a little on the late side recently (more energy and lots of things on my mind), but that could be unrelated.
Since I've spent a lot of time and energy (and money) before this on removing heavy metals and other environmental toxins and eliminating various pathogens, I think those aren't a significant factor in my case and I suspect that the detoxing was primarily from halogens, which as far as I've read thus far, can only be removed with iodine. I'm almost finished with Dr. Brownstein's book as well.
Aragorn said:
I'm gonna be a bit of a 'doubting Thomas' here, but considering the "non-scientific nature" of this muscle testing, how do you know you can trust the information you gain by this procedure?
I think this is a really interesting question and one that I've spent some time thinking about after having worked with an applied kinesiologist and seen results that I consider to be pretty much nothing short of miraculous. The biggest issue I can think of with it is that you don't know what you don't know: so you may get data or an answer or results, but is it the whole answer, or is there something being missed? The second issue that I've wondered about is if a person has pathogens for example, could those pathogens influence the test such that something that would kill the pathogens would test negatively, or could they cause a false negative when attempting to diagnose the pathogen's existence, effectively "hiding" from the muscle test? I'm not sure and I kind of suspect not (especially since I've had pathogens and pathogen treatments diagnosed with muscle testing), but I think it's a relevant question to explore.
From my experience, I've seen it work and work incredibly well, so I know first hand that it works due to the results of the testing. I had my doubts initially, but after trying it, it became very clear that the practitioner I was working with was getting accurate results, then consistently got them over and over again. Considering the known issues of blood testing and blood work in general, I personally think there's a lot of potential with muscle testing being a superior diagnostic method. Like all things though, I suspect that the quality of the data depends a lot on the practitioner.
As for the science behind it, I've read a bit into this, but not a lot, and I think there is some grounded science behind it (beyond just extended anecdotal reports of efficacy, of which there is quite a lot) that provides possible explanations for the mechanism:
How Muscle Testing Works Part 1: The Physics of BioElectric Fields:
_http://www.muscletesting.com/bloghow-muscle-testing-works-part1/
The description in the above link describes essentially a relationship between sodium potassium pumps and a bio-electric field and the interactions of these fields altering the sodium potassium pumps and the functioning of muscles because of that.
Having spent some time reading about muscle testing (not a ton, but enough to find out that there's a lot of information out there), I find it to be incredibly fascinating and with some interesting complexities. First, you have to be testable--being dehydrated, for example, can make you not properly testable, as well as other things that might make a person not properly testable, I think. I went to a new Applied Kinesiologist a month or so ago and he informed me of this because I was dehydrated--an interesting trick he used was to put a vial of water on me, which then made me testable. Then there's a question of what you're testing, since muscle testing is often related to meridians (discussed heavily in chinese medicine and acupuncture) in AK stuff that I've read--for example, testing an arm extended out in front of you tests a muscle on the stomach meridian, whereas if you extend it to your side, you're testing on the lung meridian, so something that you're ingesting or that affects the stomach may have an impact when tested against the stomach meridian, but not the lung meridian. Then there's also apparently actually three results with muscle testing: weak (hypotonic), strong, and too strong (hypertonic). I think too strong is some kind of added complication that has to be corrected before the problem can even be diagnosed (I'm not even close to fully understanding this, so I could be off here).
One of the most interesting things I've read with regards to muscle testing was this:
Matrix Response Testing (MRT) Method
_http://www.radicalmedicine.com/mrt-method/
I haven't read it again recently (but am going to), but goes a bit into the theory behind this method and its potential efficacy. It claims that it tests the body's connective tissue, rather than the autonomic nervous system. This stuff absolutely fascinates me with all of it's complexities and because I've found it to be the fastest, easiest, and most powerful diagnostic and corrective method that I've ever encountered.
This past weekend I took a trip to see the Applied Kinesiologist/CPK (Chiro Plus Kinesiology) doctor that I had been seeing for about a year who helped me with a great number of health issues for some questions, and brought him the iodine supplements that I've been taking. This guy is particularly interesting because he not only uses muscle testing, but he uses a "resonator", which is a disc type device that he wears on a belt that, when paired with "hand modes" (a kind of sign language that essentially serves as questions) that he uses, makes a kind of quacking noise when there's a match with the question. He's explained this to me as essentially reading the quantum field of a person (perhaps bio-electric field is more accurate) and the thing interacting with it; the process is similar to dowsing, but refined and with more precision than can be had with a pendulum. If you're having doubts at this point I can't blame you because it sounds kind of ridiculous, but again the results I got with this guy were nothing short of miraculous (he cured my mammal meat allergy which, to the best of my knowledge, no one else on the planet has done) and he was right so many times that it was clear that it wasn't guess work and that there's something else going.
He tested my thyroid and said it was working pretty well, then tested the iodine and gave me a range of 10-18 drops (25mg-45mg) per day, specifying that over 18 drops was the toxicity level for me. Then he prescribed 3 (1500mg) niacinamide per day, 2-3 tyrosine per day, and 4 200mcg selenium per day, with a one month time frame for the selenium (he didn't give me time frames for the other ones and I didn't ask due to time constraints). I had self muscle tested negatively for riboflavin after a month or so, so I wasn't taking that anymore and didn't bring it to him to test.
One other piece of information from him that might be useful is that I did ask him earlier this year about feeling cold on a regular basis and he tested my thyroid and it was weak, so then he tested my hypothalamus and it was also weak. For that, he gave me Standard Process Hypothalmex (https://www.standardprocess.com/Products/Standard-Process/Hypothalmex), which also then made my thyroid test strong. To me this suggests that issues with the thyroid, and possibly iodine supplementation due to stimulating the thyroid, could be related to an issue with a higher in command regulating organ, so correcting that organ may be helpful or necessary before proper functioning of the thyroid can occur. Unfortunately it can be difficult to get Standard Process supplements if anyone wants to try any of them, so working with an Applied Kinesiologist or good Chriropractor can be the cheapest and easiest way to get them, though Hypothalmex can be purchased on Amazon (but it's expensive).