Blood tests last year [2011] showed I had low Vitamin D levels so I was put on a 50,000 IU once/week regimen for 3 months using a prescription D2 (ergocalciferol). A recheck after 3 months showed my level had hardly changed. A search of PubMed showed conflicting views on using the D2 form. So for the next 3 months I used ProHealth D3 Extreme 50,000 IU (via Amazon.com) instead of another D2 scrip my doc had given me. I always took the D2 or D3 in the morning (just lucky happenstance.)

The second recheck, after the second 3 mo., showed my Vitamin D level was normal. I hadn’t put it all together until seeing this post, but when using the D3 I had the same effect [as what is described in this post] — when I got tired, I got *really* tired right at bedtime, and slept like a rock.

Even though it has been less than a month since stopping the weekly dose, I have noticed my sleep degrading somewhat, and lately not even being tired when I should.

I asked for details:

Tell me about yourself.

I’m a 50 year old reasonably healthy guy who is a lifetime Massachusetts resident. I’m in the IT profession (managing computer systems, programming and such). So I am someone who 1) lives at a higher latitude, 2) during the day garners minimal Vitamin D from the glow of LCD displays and fluorescent lights, and also 3) generally dislikes the heat of summer and burns easily.

Why did you take D3 once/week rather than once/day?

My intent was to mimic the original doctor’s prescription of a single 50K/wk dose, while substituting D3 for the prescribed D2. At the time, I had no good reason to change to a daily schedule, although it intuitively struck me as odd to take a single large dose rather than smaller, more evenly distributed doses.

What time in the morning did you take it? What time do you get up in the morning?

I get up around 6-6:30 am. I would take the D3 around 6:15-6:45 am.

Why did your doctor prescribe D2 rather than D3?

I think it was simply rote procedure and cost. When I asked him after my first 3 months on D2, he said that the prescription D2 was cheaper than the prescription D3, and that he had seen the D2 usually work quite well to bring up Vitamin D levels, although it did sometimes take multiple 3-month courses to achieve normal levels. He seemed unaware of the literature criticizing the use of D2 as a supplement.

You write: “When using the D3 I had the same effect of when I got tired, I got *really* tired right at bedtime, and slept like a rock” What was it like when you were taking the D2? What was your sleep like before you started the D2?

To the best of my recollection I did not have a similar response when taking D2. However, since this was not something I intentionally tracked, I may be mistaken.

Before taking D2 or D3 I thought I slept reasonably well. However, in retrospect, I would awake a few times during the night, take longer to fall asleep, and awaken less refreshed than with my “Vitamin D sleep”.

You write: “not being tired when I should” — when is that?

What I meant is that when I’d get into bed at night, rather than feel tired (in the sense of “an onset to sleep”, not “worn out”) I would feel either wide awake or worn out, or both. By contrast, when taking the D3, almost as soon as I would lie down in bed I would feel an onset to sleep. Yesterday morning, I took one of my leftover 50K D3 pills and last night’s sleep did seem to confirm the efficacy of the D3.

When you took the D3 once per week, you slept better every night? Or just the night after you took the D3?

To the best of my recollection, I slept well every night. I don’t recall there being any noticeable variance relative to the day I took it.

Addendum by Seth. It is impressive that two things appear true: (a) the time of day D3 is taken mattered (other stories) and (b) a dose once/week at the right time improved sleep for seven nights (this story). The combination of the two supports the idea that our sleep is controlled by an oscillator and D3 at the right time gives that oscillator a push, increasing its amplitude.

Since reading some of the other D3 stories, I increased my D3 [morning] dosage to 5000 IU/day [from 3000 IU/day] two days ago.

1. I immediately slept even better – no longer being aware of mid-sleep turning-over.

2. I’ve had a large boost of energy and the clarity of thought that both Robin Barooah and Alexandra Carmichael mentioned.

3. A year-long injury – specifically a dislocated coccyx – has suddenly taken a step forward, and I found myself running for the  Tube last night – something I can’t remember when I last did it. Is this a direct effect of the D3, or an indirect one resulting from much better sleep?

This agrees with what both Alexandra and I experienced: a dose of 4000 IU worked much better than a dose of 2000 IU.

Thanks to Anne Weiss, Phil Alexander and Dave Lull.

For what it’s worth, I’ve taken Vitamin D at different times of the day, and I’ve never noticed any effect on my sleep. Of course, my sleep is already pretty good, in the sense that I fall asleep quickly and don’t usually wake up during the night. (My sleep is not good in the sense that I don’t get enough of it.)

By email, I learned that Alex is now taking Vitamin D3 — this particular product, which is vegan (“plant-source”) — at 5000 IU every other day. On weekdays, he takes it at about 8:00 am, on weekends, 9:30-10:00 am.

What might explain Alex’s failure to notice better sleep?

1. Not enough D3. I found that 2000 IU/day had no noticeable effect, whereas 4000 IU/day did produce noticeable benefit. Alex is getting 2500 IU/day — or less, if he takes it too late on the weekends.

2. His source of D3.

3. Individual differences large enough to matter. If you do sensitive psychology experiments, you will learn there are individual differences in everything.

4. Ceiling effect. Alex’s sleep is too good to notice improvement.

Those are the just the obvious possibilities.

The saga began last year, when Strauss and Anziska, both veterans of corporate legal work, filed lawsuits against New York Law School and Thomas M. Cooley Law School, in Michigan. The allegation: That Cooley and NYLS, by allegedly inflating post-graduate employment numbers, had committed fraud and violated local consumer protection acts. . . . The job market for lawyers has been contracting for years; hiring is down across the board. At the same time, law schools have continued to crank out young lawyers at an alarming rate.

This is the legal version of the joke that people go to law school because they aren’t good at math. So far twelve schools have been sued. I look forward to learning how the teachers at those schools react. Which side will they take? .

More about the lawsuits. I blogged about the deception a year ago. The California Culinary Academy in San Francisco was successfully sued for similar deception a few years ago. Inside the Law School Scam, a blog.

Elizabeth Funderburk emailed me:

I’ve always suffered, rather lightly I guess, from SAD in the winter.  In 2010 I started eating primal, which I thought would help – it helped in many ways but I still got gloomier all winter and didn’t even realize it til that first warm sunny spring day when I “woke up.” Your November post about D3 reminded me that I wanted to try it this winter, so I got a bottle and started taking it in the morning. I forgot a few times and took it in the midday or afternoon, and yes, I felt noticeably more spazzy and awake those evenings. Now, if I forget, I just skip it if I remember later than 10 am. I do think I sleep better. I take 4000-6000 IU daily.

I asked her for details.

Tell me about yourself.

I live in Reno, NV, USA, and I’m 34.  I do home renovations.

What brand?

Kirkland D3 2000 IU gelcaps. The first bottle I got was from Walgreen’s, so I guess it was Nature’s Bounty gelcaps. Both seem to work equally well. I have not tried capsules. I take the D3 while I’m waiting for my coffee, usually 6 or 7 am.

How has your sleep improved?

With D3, I would guess I fall asleep in 10-30 minutes most of the time (trouble falling asleep once every 7-10 days). The wave noise thing by my bed is on a 45 minute timer. If the wave sounds stop and I’m still laying there conscious, I categorize that as a “trouble falling asleep” night and I will usually get back up and read for an hour.
In the fall before I started the D3, I’d take more than 45 minutes to fall asleep more often than after starting D3.

But I think more importantly, the quality of my sleep was not restful more often before D3 – I slept well (lightly, vivid dreams, woke up briefly, woke up feeling rested) maybe twice a week. I slept poorly (heavy, dark pit of sleep, no remembered dreams, unwilling to wake up and get up) 5 nights a week. It’s pretty binary; I usually sleep well or poorly, not “so-so.” Now, taking D3, I sleep well 6 nights a week, and poorly once a week.

What do you mean by “spazzy” (“more spazzy in the evening”)?

When I did take it in the afternoon, I noticed that I felt energetic when I’d prefer to feel sleepy – really raring to go at 7 or 8 instead of starting to wind down. I think it would be a fabulous tool for people working swing or graveyard shifts!

“thanks for the reminder” — you mean you had read elsewhere that Vitamin D3 first thing in the morning is a good idea?

You gave me the idea to take it IN THE MORNING.  You “reminded” me about it in the sense that it’s one of the few supplements Mark Sisson (mark’s daily apple) suggests everybody could benefit from – I noted that when I gave up grain and started eating primal in early 2010, but it wasn’t something I’d bothered to take at that point, because I spend a lot of time outside in the spring/summer/fall. (Winter, too, but because I’m all covered up in clothes and the sun is so weak, I don’t seem to get the natural level of D3 I need.)

Thanks to Aaron Blaisdell, Alex Chernavsky and Navanit Arakeri.

The number of scientific “heretics” is growing . . .  Perhaps the most inconvenient fact is the lack of global warming for well over 10 years now.

Here is a rebuttal by a biological anthropologist named Greg Laden:

Shameful. . . . . Out and out lie, easily falsified  . . . So bad that this is what we can say about the “16 scientists” who signed this letter: They are idiots. . . . . Their ability to make even the simplest of judgements is now in serious question. . . . Let Google forever know who these jokers are.

Peter Gleick, MacArthur “genius” Fellow, also wrote a rebuttal. What about the lack of warming for the last 10 years? Here’s Gleick:

The authors claim there has been a “lack of warming” for 10 years. The reality? 2011 was the 35th year in a row in which global temperatures were above the historical average and 2010 and 2005 were the warmest years on record.

I have not omitted quotation marks. Here’s how Peter Fromhoff at the Union of Concerned Scientists made the same point:

The authors claim there has been a “lack of warming” for 10 years. Here’s what we know: 2011 was the 35^th year in a row in which global temperatures were above the historical average and 2010 and 2005 were the warmest years on record.

I went to the link given to support the “35th year in a row” claim. Here is the only global temperature graph at that link:

The law firm I work at specializes in toxic torts. We represent people who have been occupationally exposed to chemicals and are now sick, dying, or dead. Most of our clients have been exposed to benzene and developed some kind of leukemia. We sponsor various leukemia charities, walks, and other events. [On January 21, 2012] in Woodland Hills, CA, the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society held its first annual Blood Cancer Conference. Although the speakers were mainly doctors, it was a conference meant for laymen. The chair was an oncologist from UCLA Medical Center.

After introductory remarks and the keynote speaker, there were several breakout sessions. I attended a session on acute lymphoblastic leukemia and acute myeloid leukemia. The speaker was [Dr. Ravi Bhatia,] a doctor specializing in leukemia from City of Hope in Duarte, CA. His talk was almost exclusively about new drugs and clinical trials. Very dry and dull. Things got more interesting during the question period. At one point, [Dr. Bhatia] told an attendee not to experiment on his own because “you won’t learn anything and others won’t learn from it, either.”

I would have liked to ask Dr. Bhatia three questions:

1. What’s the basis for this extreme claim (“you won’t learn anything and others won’t learn from it”)? Ben Williams, a psychology professor at UC San Diego, wrote a whole book (Surviving “Terminal” Cancer, 2002) about taking an active approach when faced with a very serious disease (in his case, brain cancer). Likewise, the website Patients Like Me is devoted to (among other things) learning from the experimentation of its members. Lots of forums related to various illnesses spread what one person learns to others. MedHelp has many forums devoted to sharing knowledge.

2. What’s so bad about “learning nothing”? Why should that outcome stop one from trying to learn? It doesn’t seem like a good enough reason.

3. Do you have a bias here? In other words, what do you want? Do you prefer that your patients not self= experiment? Doctors may prefer that their patients not experiment for their (the doctors’) own selfish reasons. When a patient self-experiments, it makes their doctor’s job more complicated and makes the doctor less important. If Dr. Bhatia is biased (he wants a certain outcome), it may bias his assessment of the evidence.

I (and my family) started to take Vitamin D3 because we are all dyslexic/dyspraxic and had Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD, a type of depression). Previously we had tried using light boxes (minimal effect), getting out every lunchtime (more useful) and finally 5HTp — which works but is expensive and if you start it once you are in SAD you can end up ‘wired’. Our SAD symptoms were mainly sleepiness and lack of energy (= hibernation), and brain fog (= difficulty concentrating).

We started taking D3 (2000 IU, Solgar) in gelcaps. That first winter, for the first time ever, no one had any seasonal affective disorder. I had had it since the age of 21, my youngest child when only 4 yrs old, and my other two children by the time they were 18 yrs old. At this point, we were taking the D3 at random times, commonly lunchtime or later, often when everyone was together and the vitamin pot was handed around!

This autumn, all the youngsters had moved out. I found I was forgetting the D3, so I moved it to the bathroom and started taking it first thing in the morning (8-9 am). Then in September, I started taking 3000 IU (instead of 2000 IU). We’d been in Greece and had come back to a gloomy autumn and I wanted to make sure SAD didn’t kick in. In a month I started sleeping through the night most nights.

Before I started taking D3 first thing in the morning, I only slept through 10% of my nights, and had been doing so for at least 15 years. I would wake at 3-4 am, but didn’t get up unless I had been awake for more than 3/4 hr. Then I would be awake until 6 am. Now I sleep without a break (other than turning over) from midnight to 8 am. I sleep like this 95% of my nights, and that includes the odd night when I took the D3 much later in the morning because I had slept in – and consequently woke the following night.

As a coeliac, I take the supplements many coeliacs take – probiotics, minerals, vitamins – but none of these affected my sleep either way. So it really looks as if it is the timing plus the correct dose of D3.

BTW the extra daytime energy is fantastic.

She is 5 feet 4 inches, 64 kg. Notice that 2000 IU first thing in the morning did not improve her sleep but 3000 IU first thing in the morning did. I had a similar experience: 2000 IU had no clear effect  but 4000 IU did.