http://www.reddit.com/r/Nootropics/comments/2ihklk/gotu_kola_impressive_yet_underrated_anxiolytic/BitcoinOperatedGirl is intelligent and knowledgeable (rare). Brought this to my attention.
I think that the anti-anxiety effect I experienced is comparable to 750-1000mg of phenibut. This herbal anxiolytic has comparable strength to pharma-grade drugs, which is impressive, and a little scary at the same time. The googling I did seems to suggest that this drug is not a direct GABA agonist, but that it activates the enzyme which produces GABA from glutamate. There has to be some tolerance potential, but I haven't found any negative reports or horror stories online, mostly just praise.
Sweet, I have a hypothesis that the effect on glutamate modafinil has could be what causes the significantly negative effect on my mood. Could be the same for piracetam, but this is more speculative, I'd need to read more about how it effects the glutamatergic system to be sure, but a search suggests this is a definite possibility. When reading about depersonalization disorder a correlation between it and low serotonin levels combined with excessive levels of glutamate was mentioned, and drug trials show evidence of glutamate playing a key role. A look through the NCBI shows this lines up with depression. Yeah, after some speed reading it definitely seems sound. It's so little talked about, there are some very good thorough papers worth considering.
I wanted to try Lamotrigine to lower effective glutamate levels some time ago and see what effect it had, although not a perfect method, but this could be even better if the reduction is significant enough. Two birds with one stone, and lack of side effects. The combination with bacopa sounds interesting, it was on my research list too.
You know, after this round, GABA HcG glutamate, I don't think there's going to be anything left for me to experiment with. Not unless a good oxytocinergic drug comes out, although that would be something everyone should try.
