Where Can I Get My Hands on Some Oxytocin?
The latest report about how oxytocin makes people more willing to trust after betrayal really struck a nerve. People really really want to get their hands on this stuff: For everyone who is afraid of being hurt, there are five people who are dying to open up.
Someone wrote to me asking where to get oxytocin; he and his wife are having problems. I wrote about my experience taking oxytocin in 2006, here. This is how I answered:
I performed this experiment on myself a couple of years ago, when it was quite easy to purchase oxytocin over the internet. At the time, searching for oxytocin brought up several paid ads from reputable companies that supply chemicals to researchers, and I was able to purchase with a credit card. I notice that these ads no longer appear, probably because these companies realized that many people ordering the product were consumers.
In any case, when you buy oxytocin this way, it's difficult to handle. It degrades quickly when it's mixed with water, and it's a minuscule amount. I was guided by the blog of a guy who made all sorts of wild experiments with such chemicals that he ordered online.
I don't think it's ethical or wise for me to provide any more details about where or how to buy oxytocin. I believe -- but don't know for sure -- that it's not a controlled substance in the United States; I don't know about in other countries.
Someone wrote me that he had tried the oxytocin spray that had been prescribed for his lactating wife. And a psychiatrist in Canada sometimes prescribes this inhalant for kids with autism. These are called off-label uses: the doctor obtains the drug legally and prescribes it legally, but for a condition that the drug hasn't been approved for.
Several drug companies are working to develop oxytocin-based drugs to treat social phobia and some trials have begun.
All that said, let me propose an alternative: Oxytocin is usually released naturally when we are with another person in a situation where we feel safe. Also when we're stroked, make love and orgasm. However, this brain response seems to be learned after we're born, in the first few years of life -- although the brain continues to grow and change throughout our lives. If you and your wife have "normal" oxytocin responses, it could be a matter of simply making love, making sure that you move very slowly through her arousal to orgasm. Often, when couples have problems, sex is the first thing to go. But I think that a lack of happy satisfying sex also can lead to relationship problems. I experience this myself in my relationship. Oxytocin makes us calmer and more easy-going, so the partner's bad habits don't bother us as much.
Other things you can try are massaging each other, if you're both able to do so in a soothing way that feels good; getting massages together at a spa or weekend retreat; taking some kind of workshop that has exercises which allow you to go into "limbic resonance," the state in which your bodies are attuned. Attunement likely invokes the oxytocin response.
Someone wrote to me asking where to get oxytocin; he and his wife are having problems. I wrote about my experience taking oxytocin in 2006, here. This is how I answered:
I performed this experiment on myself a couple of years ago, when it was quite easy to purchase oxytocin over the internet. At the time, searching for oxytocin brought up several paid ads from reputable companies that supply chemicals to researchers, and I was able to purchase with a credit card. I notice that these ads no longer appear, probably because these companies realized that many people ordering the product were consumers.
In any case, when you buy oxytocin this way, it's difficult to handle. It degrades quickly when it's mixed with water, and it's a minuscule amount. I was guided by the blog of a guy who made all sorts of wild experiments with such chemicals that he ordered online.
I don't think it's ethical or wise for me to provide any more details about where or how to buy oxytocin. I believe -- but don't know for sure -- that it's not a controlled substance in the United States; I don't know about in other countries.
Someone wrote me that he had tried the oxytocin spray that had been prescribed for his lactating wife. And a psychiatrist in Canada sometimes prescribes this inhalant for kids with autism. These are called off-label uses: the doctor obtains the drug legally and prescribes it legally, but for a condition that the drug hasn't been approved for.
Several drug companies are working to develop oxytocin-based drugs to treat social phobia and some trials have begun.
All that said, let me propose an alternative: Oxytocin is usually released naturally when we are with another person in a situation where we feel safe. Also when we're stroked, make love and orgasm. However, this brain response seems to be learned after we're born, in the first few years of life -- although the brain continues to grow and change throughout our lives. If you and your wife have "normal" oxytocin responses, it could be a matter of simply making love, making sure that you move very slowly through her arousal to orgasm. Often, when couples have problems, sex is the first thing to go. But I think that a lack of happy satisfying sex also can lead to relationship problems. I experience this myself in my relationship. Oxytocin makes us calmer and more easy-going, so the partner's bad habits don't bother us as much.
Other things you can try are massaging each other, if you're both able to do so in a soothing way that feels good; getting massages together at a spa or weekend retreat; taking some kind of workshop that has exercises which allow you to go into "limbic resonance," the state in which your bodies are attuned. Attunement likely invokes the oxytocin response.
Will there ever be Oxytocin based 'drugs'? It hass been stated many times that the only way to get it into the brain is to administer it nasaly. However, the BBC carried a report yesterday which also said that 'drug trials' are being undertaken.
Posted by: Gary | May 22, 2008 at 11:53 PM
At least in the trials underway by Eric Hollander to treat symptoms of ASD with oxytocin, it will be inhaled. Inhalant drugs are, in fact, a growing sector. There are inhalants for diabetes, and, of course, many for asthma.
Posted by: Susan Kuchinskas | May 23, 2008 at 06:36 AM
Oxytocin IS a controlled substance in the United States, meaning that it is only available through a prescription (and rather tightly so). It can induce early labor in pregnant women/animals (one of its primary uses) which is one of the primary reasons it is prescription only.
Posted by: imrational | May 29, 2008 at 10:32 AM
That makes sense -- except that you can still buy a product over the internet that supposedly contains some oxytocin. this product is recommended to be sprayed on the body, not inhaled, but still. You can't buy other controlled substances without a prescription just because you're not going to inhale or ingest them. Have a link to the govt list of controlled substances?
Posted by: Susan Kuchinskas | May 29, 2008 at 10:45 AM
Okay, here is the gov's information on controlled substances:
http://www.deadiversion.usdoj.gov/21cfr/cfr/2108cfrt.htm
I haven't had time to look at the whole thing, but I did quickly page through Schedules I thru V, and did not see oxytocin. Any more data or links that may help answer this question are most welcome.
Posted by: Susan Kuchinskas | May 29, 2008 at 10:52 AM
With Carbetocin's longer half-life its a waste of time to bother with oxytocin.
Oxytocin is not a controlled substance in the US. Granted a person selling it for human consumption might feel the long arm of the FDA.
Posted by: theta | May 30, 2008 at 03:01 AM
In fact, the controlled trials for treating symptoms of ASD will use carbetocin, not oxytocin.
Posted by: Susan Kuchinskas | May 30, 2008 at 06:53 AM
I find this very interesting because my son is autistic and I have SAD symptoms.
Posted by: Dewayne Lyle | June 24, 2008 at 08:25 PM
While you wait for a pharmaceutical version, you might try some forms of therapy designed to "rewire" the brain, such as neurofeedback. You could also experiment with some of the experiential methods of causing a natural oxytocin release, such as massage. If your own oxytocin response, or your son's, isn't triggered by social interactions, it may still be by less social, more physical experiences.
Posted by: Susan Kuchinskas | June 25, 2008 at 08:46 AM
Probably would be relatively easy to just go to Alibaba.com or similar B2B business searches in China and do search for "oxytocin" or for the chemical name. Dozens of manufacturers will come up and likely would be willing to sell small samples.
Posted by: blaine | June 30, 2008 at 12:24 PM
Is the drug really available at a pharmacy and if so do you think that your doctor would be comfortable with writing the prescription? Has any one been written a prescription for this stuff?
Posted by: Elias Nogueras | July 16, 2008 at 08:08 AM
They prescribe oxytocin inhalants regularly in Canada and Europe for lactating women, and psychiatrists there might be comfortable prescribing it for off-label use.
In the U.S., it's used intravenously during hospital births. I think it's unlikely that a doctor would be willing to let a patient inhale this. But stay tuned!
Posted by: Susan Kuchinskas | July 16, 2008 at 08:19 AM