Worried about melatonin?

[Captainfalcon8]

Iv'e been taking melatonin for about 4 years now, as prescribed to me by my former psychiatrist, due to anxiety and other problems getting to sleep, i recently decided to try and lower my dosage in an attempt to come of due to the fact that in my research iv'e barely been able to find any example of people taking it for such an extended period, im worried that it may have made a permanent change to my natural melatonin production, can it do this? im very concerned about it. also this is my first post so apologies if iv'e messed something up.

[MyNameIsTerry]

Hi and welcome to NMP

Its an interesting question.

I think what you need to determine is a) does the overload of melatonin excrete via the liver each day thus removing it from your system and b) does any of it convert back into serotonin.

If its being excreted as has no impact on serotonin, then removing it should mean reverting back to its normal method of synthesis in the pineal gland from tryptophan. If a load of it is converting back to serotonin, then removing supplementation could reduce serotonin production. I've read before than it does convert, but in reading scientific sources it seems more than serotonin reduces & melatonin increases due to the circadian cycle as influenced by light and seratonin is converted in smaller quantities but only due to the present of tryptophan.

Another question to ask is what has been happening to any tryptophan you have been ingesting. Has it been converted to serotonin in the day and simply excreted due to wastage at night due to the melatonin supplemenation? If it has been excreted, then you won't know whether your intake is enough for both processes.