Leaky Blood-Brain Barrier
The blood-brain barrier is a semi-permeable barrier that filters needed proteins, nutrients, and hormones into the brain, and keeps all irritants out of the brain.
The junctions of a normal, healthy blood-brain barrier only allow nanoparticles to pass through while preventing the passage of antigens and environmental compounds.
Causes for breakdown of the blood-brain barrier:
1. Chronic stress
2. Alcohol
3. Elevated glucose and diabetes
4. Chronic environmental toxic exposure
5. Elevated homocysteine from B vitamin deficiency
6. Poor diet and antioxidant status
7. Systemic inflammation
GABA, a supplement used for its calming, relaxing effect, nanoparticle size exceeds the blood-brain barrier and does not have a blood-brain barrier transport protein and technically cannot cross the blood-brain barrier in a normal healthy brain. If you take GABA and notice it has an effect, then it’s possible you have a leaky blood-brain barrier.
How to Perform the Blood-Brain Barrier Test
1. About 2 hours or more after dinner, on a night that you have nothing planned, take 800–1,000 mg of GABA. It is best to take GABA between 6 p.m. and 9 p.m. so you can sleep it off if it sedates you.
2. Go about your business as usual.
3. Notice any unusual slowing down type feelings, ranging from drunken to lethargy, or simply slowed down.
4. Notice any excitation, agitation, or other stimulation such as feeling wired, which will happen in approximately 20% of the cases of compromised blood-brain barrier. Eating some protein may help alleviate these symptoms. Most will feel inhibited.
5. Go to bed. If you are slowed, it will be gone by the morning. If you feel hung over in the morning, the process of neurodegeneration is more advanced, and requires significant attention.
6 Any change, excitation or inhibition is a positive test for damage to the Blood Brain Barrier.
Feeling no change after taking GABA is a good sign your blood-brain barrier is intact. GABA should produce no symptoms as GABA can not pass through a healthy blood-brain barrier.
It’s useful to do the GABA challenge periodically to see how various things might affect you. For instance, if you are gluten/grain intolerant a GABA challenge can show you that eating gluten/grains will cause leaky brain for a week or two (which can be restored simply by avoiding gluten/grains).
If that’s the case, then you know to be careful after an accidental exposure to gluten/grains. This can mean making sure you get enough sleep, avoiding stressful situations, avoiding pesticides or pollutants, and being careful to avoid sugars, alcohol, and high-carbohydrate foods. All these steps will help reduce inflammation and the possible exposure of your brain to antigens that could trigger the microglia cells.
In addition to removing the triggers for leaky brain, certain nutritional compounds have been shown very useful in repairing the blood-brain barrier.
If permeability of the blood-brain barrier is suspected then chelation of heavy metals should be avoided until the blood-brain barrier has been repaired.