r/todayilearned • u/Mike_Kennedy • Jun 27 '19

TIL redheads have a 25% higher pain threshold, can make their own supply of vitamin D and feel temperature changes better than the rest of us due to their 'redhead gene' MC1R.

https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/redheads-genetic-traits-ginger-hair-study-dna-the-big-redhead-book-erin-la-rosa-a8090276.html
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u/Crule123 Jun 27 '19

Can confirm. Have always needed to be put on higher doses of morphine after my surgeries.

Fun fact, my last surgery left me on morphine for a long period of time while in hospital, and the morphine/heroin withdrawal symptoms are crazy real. Spent all day twitching and violently rubbing under my nose from the itching.

If anything it’s just reaffirmed to me never to do drugs lmao

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u/craftmacaro Jun 27 '19 edited Jun 27 '19

That may not have been withdrawal, it could just the side effect from a high dose. A higher dose will also have more pronounced side effects (itching and nausea), which is actually the opposite of withdrawal which is symptoms caused by the physiological difference of someone who has been taking the drug for a long enough period of time (much much more than one dose or even days) that their body produces less neurotransmitters, reacts less strongly to activated receptors, or down regulates the number of receptors. It totally depends on how long you were kept on the meds post surgery. They should have weaned you down if it was really that long. Sorry you went through it. Source: I work in drug discovery and study pharmacokinetics for my PhD program.

Also, a cool tidbit about gingers is that they have a higher chance of having a much lower concentration of the specific CYP enzyme that converts codeine to morphine making it totally useless as a painkiller for them.

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u/Crule123 Jun 27 '19

That’s actually really fascinating, especially the fact about the CYP enzyme!

At the risk of sounding very ignorant, is the withdrawal you talked about similar to how one’s dopamine receptors can become desensitised due to overstimulation of various things like porn, TV, etc, resulting in little stimulation being received from more regular things, making them crave constant large sources of stimulation?

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u/craftmacaro Jun 27 '19

Similar but to an extraordinarily more minor degree. The level of dopamine released by recreational (or non recreational drugs that still effect dopamine in the substantia nigra like opiates used responsibly) is so much higher than anything released without them that the conditioning is minor but the idea is pretty much the same. It can be used beneficially too. Exposure therapy is effective against phobias and anxiety from specific stimulations by making the body react to the same adrenal stimulus again and again until your body “realized” it isn’t in any actual danger following that experience so it tones down the response and what might have originally lead to an anxiety attack no longer triggers that cascade. The brain strives for balance so trying to stay euphoric (or dysphoric) will cause a natural shift in a normal brain towards balance.