Inositol

 
Author: Michael Murray
Excerpt from:  Encyclopedia of Nutritional Supplements
 
Drink a lot of coffee –  more than two cups a day? You might be depleting your body of its natural reserves of inositol – a critical B vitamin. As an exporter of fats from the liver, inositol helps redistribute the fat throughout the body to be used more efficiently as energy, which may even help detoxify the liver. But there is more to this nutrient: inositol is also necessary for proper brain, nervous, and muscle functioning, helping to form and hold structure to our cell membranes.
 
Support a balanced mood – Certain neurotransmitters or chemical signals in our brains responsible for our feelings of adequacy and well-being require inositol to function properly. Because people who suffer from depression and other less-than-positive mood states have been shown in some cases to have lower levels of inositol in their bodies, some experts have theorized these patients may benefit from supplementation of inositol at greater amounts. For this reason, inositol has been studied extensively for treating mild depression, anxiety, intense stress, memory loss, and various other mental challenges and has shown a high rate of success. And in many cases when supplemented, it does increase a sense of well-being, even showing mild anti-anxiety effects.