Replied by Art from California on 12/30/2023

Hi GertJr,

Yes, vodka can work as substitute for gin, however a friend recently wrote me that when she ran out of gin, she tried using vodka to make her melatonin lotion and for some reason, she found that it required significantly more vodka to dissolve the melatonin and this ultimately made the finished lotion much more watery. Both products were labeled 80 proof, so it is hard to understand this discrepancy. She said she would go back to gin in her future batches as she is having very good benefit from the lotion she had been making with gin.

It is important to dissolve the melatonin in order to end up with an effective melatonin lotion.

Please come back and let us know how melatonin lotion works for you.

Art

Replied by Debra from USA on 04/29/2025

I’m curious about the melatonin strength in the lotion? On Amazon I found PURE (brand name) and it’s 20 mg and advertised as - NOT FOR SLEEP, but cellular healing. Your thoughts, experience or recommendation? TY

Replied by Art from California on 04/29/2025

Hi Debra,

For the easy mix that I described, each ounce contains approximately 250 mg of melatonin and the breakdown looks somewhat like this :

3 oz. = 750 mg melatonin

2 oz. = 500 mg

1 oz. = 250 mg

3/4 oz. = 187.5 mg

1/2 oz. = 125 mg

1/4 oz. = 62.5 mg

1/8 oz. = 31.25 mg

1/16 oz. = 15.625 mg

You are trying to compare a 20 mg capsule of melatonin to the lotion and they are not really comparable because with oral melatonin only about 3% is bioavailable to the body and it is pretty much done within 5 hours in the body. Whereas topically applied melatonin lotion (ML) or melatonin gel (MG) accumulate in the stratum corneum layers and then release over an approximate 24 hour period, somewhat similar to a patch. ML and MG also reach much higher local tissue levels. As an example of how this makes a significant difference between ML and oral melatonin, a friend who had liver cancer would get pain in the area of his liver that 360 mg of oral melatonin could not touch, but ML applied directly over the liver area could stop the pain very effectively in less than 5 minutes.

I have written a lot about the health value of melatonin on EC and you can find much of it by searching the index. Melatonin is protective of the major organs while be anti inflammatory and a potent scavenger of reactive oxygen species. It helps fight the toxicity of heavy metals as well as helping to protect against ionizing radiation among many other health benefits that it offers to humans, animals and plant life. It also is a cancer fighter through multiple methods of action.

Art