Hi everyone,

My husband has suffered from asthma since he was a child. It comes during the summer. Well, this summer it started early due to an early spring and he had already had to sleep sitting up a couple of times when due to a different illness that our son had we read that vitamin C controls asthma. We figured that he had nothing to lose so he started taking 15-25 grams a day and after a few days his symptoms disappeared. After a couple of months he tried going off the vitamin C for a couple of days and his asthma symptoms started to return so he went back on the vitamin C again and the asthma went away again. Then we told a friend who's son takes an inhaler for allergies to mold, etc. and the vitamin C works for him, too.

The trick is to take enough of the vitamin C. If you need 20 grams then taking 5 grams a day won't do anything for you. The way to tell is by finding your bowel tolerance, which means that you take just a little less than the amount that gives you diarrhea. An adult would start with something like 6 grams and take 3 grams every half hour until he starts to feel like he might have diarrhea or until he has a loose stool. You could take 5 grams every half hour if you are in a hurry and don't mind a little diarrhea, it isn't the cramping kind, but you do need to have a bathroom handy. Sorry about all the talk about diarrhea, but a little painless diarrhea is nothing compared to asthma. This gives you a starting point and you have to experiment a bit to find the amount that works for you. You have to take it twice a day because your body clears it out so fast. You can take it more often in smaller doses if you want. You can't just take one big dose a day, that doesn't work very well.

Our friend's son takes 6 grams in the morning and 6 grams in the evening, and that works for him.

If any of you decide to give this a try please post your results in this thread saying how much you took and whether it helped your symptoms. It only takes 2 - 3 days to find out if it can help you.

Oh, we like to use the powder form of ascorbic acid. Usually 1 teaspoon has 4.5 grams of C and we put it in water and add a stevia sweetener, you could use aspertame or even sugar, mix, then add baking soda in an amount that is 1/4 the amount of C powder. This fizzes and creates carbon dioxide, which is what is in soda pop, so it makes a tasty treat if you like soda pop. It also lowers the acidity if the acidity bothers your stomach. You can use diluted juice and do the same thing to vary the flavor. One semi heaping teaspoon is about 6 grams.

Hope this helps,

Kime

Hi Kime,
I thought your post on Vitamin C to cure asthma was interesting. I have read dozens of articles and books that point to vitamin C deficiency as a reason for asthma in many people. I have mild asthma and take vitamin C especially if I have a flare up or a cold coming on, but I have never taken it in an extreme amount like you are suggesting. My question is, how long do you have to take it before you can see a difference in symptoms? Also, when I take vitamin C, I sometimes have a loose stool after only 3 grams ( 3000 ml. on bottle) . Do I need to work up to the dosage that you suggest? I would be willing to give this a shot, as this seems like a safe thing to do. I've never heard of any serious side affects with vitamin C. thanks,Cindy
Oh, I have another question, where do you buy ascorbic acid?

Apparently anti-oxidants work a bit like anti-inflammatories. They do nt stop the inflammation process but they clear up any free radicals formed by cytokines etc!

Hi Cindy,
Sorry it has taken so long for me to reply. It's embarassing to say, but I got banned for a week so I couldn't reply until now.

It only took a few days to help my husband, but he made sure that he got up to bowel tolerance each day. His attitude is that asthma is a lot worse than the effects of going a little beyond bowel tolerance. If you have a loose stool after only 3 grams try taking 3 or 4 three gram doses spread out through the day instead of only 2 doses. You have to experiment around a little to find what works for you. Also you might find that you can work up to more. The thing is that what you need and what my husband needs are two different things. My husband can take 10 grams at once without reaching tolerance. It isn't the particular amount that is important, what is important is that you find what is the right amount for you. Sometimes you need more or less depending on if you are fighting off a cold or are under some other stress, too. I buy the NOW brand of ascorbic acid in the 3 LB containers online, but I can't tell you where because it is against the posting rules. I'm sure you can find a source. One of our sons takes between 80 and 90 grams a day, and it really helps him. Vitamin C is safe. If you take more than your body needs the extra just goes right through the bowels without being absorbed. They think that is why you get diarrhea when you finally reach the amount that passes what you need, because the extra vitamin C in the colon pulls more water into the stool.

Kime

Hi kime
Yah i do find vitamin C helpful. I had asthma since childhood and now i am 20 years old. I have fewer attacks such as twice a year. In the past i have one attack every 2months haha. Actually not haha, since it is really a suffering experience to have asthma. I took 250 to 500mg vitamin C a day and i found it help to prevent me from getting a cold. Not to forget to mention that my asthma had always been triggered by cold virus. So i am really scared of getting a cold because it will never be a cold alone!

We have discovered that my husband is actually helped by a combination of vitamin C and niacin. He was taking the niacin for something else and so we didn't realize until he stopped taking it for awhile that it was helping his asthma. Now he has tried each separately and neither of them work as well without the other. He takes 100-400mg of niacin.

Kime, how long do you think it would take before noticing a difference with the Vitamin C/Niacin combination?

It should only take a day or two to notice a difference but you should make sure you take enough of each to give it a fair trial. If you get up to bowel tolerance on the C and flushing with the niacin you will know that you have enough of each. You need to take them twice a day for the best results, but you don't need to take as much of the C the second time. The level you need of both can be different on different days. I don't know if it would help everyone, but it is easy to try and not expensive so it seems to me that it is worth a try. If you take more than 5 grams of C at a time it is better to make sure you don't have a lot of food in your stomach or it can cause bloating. On an empty stomach you can take a lot without having the bloating. My husband often takes 15-20 grams of C at a time in the morning, but that would be too much for a lot of people, it isn't dangerous, but you can get bad diarrhea for a while. It isn't painful but it is a nusiance.

Kime,
Do you know why the niacin works? I don't know that much about niacin other than I think my grandmother used to take it and it would turn her face red. Is there some kind of anti-inflammatory component in niacin you think? I have had an awful time the last two weeks. Not really so much with asthma but with my hayfever symptoms. Our allergy report shows high on ragweed and it has been really windy. So I have been taking anywhere from 10 to 20 grams of C a day along with Aller-Plex. It has Quercetin, bromelain, C, and other anti-inflammatory things in it. I think it has helped me some, although I don't see an overwhelming difference. My nose just stays so itchy and swollen. I think I need a really good nasal spray, but trying to stay away from the steroid sprays if I can. Any suggestions?
Cindy

Hi Cindy,

When I first posted about the C we thought it was just the C that was helping my husband's asthma, because he had already been taking the niacin for a couple of weeks before he started the C, and he didn't notice any difference with the niacin alone. But now he has tried both alone and together and he needs both. It only takes a few hours for the niacin to work after the flush. Niacin will cause you to flush, which is what you remember about your grandmother. This starts at the top of your head or ears and your skin feels tingly and like you have a sunburn and it is caused by a release of histamine in the skin. I have read on a couple of sites online that people with asthma shouldn't flush because the release of histamine might aggravate their asthma, but I think that is based on theory only because that hasn't been my husband's experience at all. Niacinamide, which doesn't cause flushing, might work just as well, but we haven't tried that for asthma, so I don't know. I think it works either because it gets rid of histamine by the flush, in which case the niacinamide wouldn't work, or else it blocks histamine, I know it blocks adrenaline, and so does C. I don't know if it will help hay fever, but I think it is worth a try and in any case niacin is good for a lot of other things, just like C. In any case if you want to try it try the regular niacin first and then if it works you can switch to niacinamide and see if that works for you as well. Take 100mg every 10 or 15 minutes until you flush. If you have a full stomach it takes longer to be absorbed and sometimes the flush comes later after you forget about it and surprises you. Its' sort of like bowel tolerance with C in that the amount that makes you flush is dependant on the amount you need, so the flush tells you when you have enough. My husband took 600mg to flush the first time and now he takes 100-400mg to flush probably depending on how many allergens he is being exposed to. (I took 3200mg the first time! But I did have a full stomach and that makes it take more. Now I usually flush with 100mg because my niacin stores are no longer depleted. And I don't even have asthma!) If it works for you you can try a little less than amount that makes you flush of niacinamide but take it twice a day. For best results you should take it more than once a day to keep the blood levels more even.