Anne, thanks for the information re freshness time. I like the idea of buying a few different sizes of ALA as it gives you more options when splitting them. I think it is best to do increased doses in small steps.
Yeah, after doing two 50 mg doses, I switched to 33 mg for the remainder of the round. I don't know if this is recommended or not, but from my very limited understanding it doesn't seem much worse than other options, e.g., stopping cold or seeing it through at the higher dose.
It sounds weird, but I was mildly encouraged that I hit a tiny roadblock at only 50 mg. It makes me think that the mercury (and for me, to a lesser extent lead) issue is my core health problem. The numbers of course aren't important, just the progress.