Carrageenan Induced Ankle Edema

Birdie

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Another Ray Peat life lesson for me.

Yesterday, both my husband and I awakened with edema of both our ankles. When thinking about any new supplements or new foods, we came up with only the NY cheesecake we ate a couple of nights ago.

So, we figured out that the cream cheese used to make the cheesecake probably contained a gum and probably carrageenan. All the commercially available ones contain carrageenan.

Doing a Duck search, what comes up but, "Carrageenan-Induced Paw Edema." It's a common thing used to induce edema in rats, so that anti-inflammatories can be tested on them.

It's taken two days for my edema to disappear but my husband says his has not resolved.
 

LadyRae

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Birdie

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Wow! I have spraying some coconut Reddiwhip on my homemade gelatin dessert...and within a couple hours have noticed heavy legs, edema, even puffiness on my face. The ingredients clearly show carrageenan and xanthum gum?...

And it takes awhile to pee it off, a couple days like you said. Succinic acid helps.

I'll have to go back to my mashed fruit topping
Glad to see your reply! And to update, it took months for my husband's ankles to go back to normal, but it's finally resolved.
 

schultz

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Yep carrageenan is used to induce inflammation in lab animals. Endotoxin as well.
 

schultz

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I am So sad! I loved my Reddiwhip. I guess I'll jyst have to make my own...

Yeah the carrageenan in cream is one of the most irritating things. Cream without it is a lot harder to find and much more expensive. I really wish generic cream just didn't have it!
 
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Birdie

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Yes, @schultz, I used to find the cream without gums, but now it's vanished. Back, living in a small town, I could find them side by side. When they stopped carrying the good cream, I could order the other one.
 

artist

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Carageenan effs me up hard, for like two days. One of the few “natural” ingredients that’s a hard no for me no matter what, the other being soy.
 

LadyRae

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Carageenan effs me up hard, for like two days. One of the few “natural” ingredients that’s a hard no for me no matter what, the other being soy.
Yeah I'm still puffy, and I feel something moving through my guts
 

Jessie

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I think carrageenan and gums are probably an underappreciated aspect of optimizing nutrition. They can be every bit as bad as PUFA or phosphate. My Whole Foods sells a organic cream cheese product that has no thickening agents in it. The brand is like "Green Pastures" or "Green Valley." I can't remember right off the top of my head, but it's something "Green." Their 365 brand heavy cream is also free of carrageenan and gums. I know cream is another one of those heavily tainted products.
 

LadyRae

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I think carrageenan and gums are probably an underappreciated aspect of optimizing nutrition. They can be every bit as bad as PUFA or phosphate. My Whole Foods sells a organic cream cheese product that has no thickening agents in it. The brand is like "Green Pastures" or "Green Valley." I can't remember right off the top of my head, but it's something "Green." Their 365 brand heavy cream is also free of carrageenan and gums. I know cream is another one of those heavily tainted products.
Absolutely. I used to make "anabolic ice cream"- from Greg Doucette, and it called for a teaspoon of guar or xanthum gum... I felt addicted to it for months last fall and winter. I suffered from horrible bloating after I ate it, edema, brain fog, insomnia... It was crazy. It took 6 weeks quitting cold turkey before I quit craving it.

I used Idealabs' Camphosal, oil of oregano (I encapsulated my own), cascara Sangrata, and Berberine, and charcoal to kill off the rampaging bacteria. Carrots every few days, although I don't really like them....This was in early March. I also quit drinking my home made kombucha.... Finally my stomach has flattened out. I sleep better. But then the Reddiwhip swooped in.... ?...

Gums and carrageenan are in so many things, and I think they trigger bacterial cravings in the gut...
 

Jessie

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Absolutely. I used to make "anabolic ice cream"- from Greg Doucette, and it called for a teaspoon of guar or xanthum gum... I felt addicted to it for months last fall and winter. I suffered from horrible bloating after I ate it, edema, brain fog, insomnia... It was crazy. It took 6 weeks quitting cold turkey before I quit craving it.

I used Idealabs' Camphosal, oil of oregano (I encapsulated my own), cascara Sangrata, and Berberine, and charcoal to kill off the rampaging bacteria. Carrots every few days, although I don't really like them....This was in early March. I also quit drinking my home made kombucha.... Finally my stomach has flattened out. I sleep better. But then the Reddiwhip swooped in.... ?...

Gums and carrageenan are in so many things, and I think they trigger bacterial cravings in the gut...
Yes indeed, when I removed all the gums out of my diet my food cravings and insatiable hunger stopped. I think it definitely played a role, but I was changing so many things about my nutrition at the time it's really hard to give all the credit to one thing. I think correcting my leptin resistance helped too.
 

LadyRae

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Yes indeed, when I removed all the gums out of my diet my food cravings and insatiable hunger stopped. I think it definitely played a role, but I was changing so many things about my nutrition at the time it's really hard to give all the credit to one thing. I think correcting my leptin resistance helped too.
Could you speak about correcting your leptin resistance?
 

Jessie

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Could you speak about correcting your leptin resistance?
Yeah. At the time I was doing a low carb keto based diet. I lost some weight on the diet (as do most people), but I wasn't successful at changing my body composition much. Also, I never really achieved a "flat" look in my belly. There was like an extra 10 or 20 pounds of fat that just wouldn't leave my stomach no matter how low carb I went. I was basically still fat, even though my BMI was normal, I had very little muscle. Long story short I had more pressing health concerns at the time which made me go back to carbs, I wasn't even thinking about my stomach fat at the time. I remember reading an article from WAPF website titled "recovery from low carb diets" and seemed to make things click for me. I pretty much abandoned keto right there.

I was basically a nomad for a while, I tried the WAPF protocol, which is essentially a bunch of animal fats and traditionally prepared grains. I did GAPS and high-carb paleo for a while too. Then I discovered Paul Jaminet's PHD (Perfect Health Diet) and did that for several months. I was finally introduced to Ray Peat's work through and exchange on between Paul and Danny Roddy on Paul's website. I also noticed and article Mary Enig wrote on WAPF about Peat and EFAs. It was actually a smear piece, but I think it actually ended up turning more people to Peat's work, lol. At least it did me.

By the time I was getting into Peat's work I was already convinced from prior experiences that I did best on carbohydrate based diets. Problem was I had gained some weight back on the PHD protocol. I would also get hungry to quick after meals. I wouldn't stay full feeling long, maybe and hour or two and that's all. Looking back now, I definitely think all that combined fat and starch that Paul recommends was screwing with my insulin and leptin. After I lowered my dietary fats, I noticed my hunger was extremely intense. It was really bad for about 3-4 days, then it leveled out and my appetite stared improving considerably. I can't really be sure why those first 3 or 4 days was so bad, but I literally couldn't eat enough to stay satiated. My guess is I went from a rather high fat intake to a really really low fat intake basically cold turkey.

A slower transition may have been easier, idk though. As for leptin, I started investigating why a low fat diet may have improved the sensitivity, and I basically found all sorts of contradictory information. Leptin seems to be something researches haven't really figured out yet. But there is some evidence starting to accumulate. For example, insulin promotes leptin production. If carbohydrate secretes insulin, and if FFAs (free fatty acids) cause insulin resistance, then it would follow logic that reducing FFAs and increasing carbohydrate would increase leptin sensitivity. There's also some studies showing low fat diets correct appetite and improve leptin.

Unsurprisingly, at least from the research I've seen, whatever improves insulin sensitivity also has a positive impact on leptin sensitivity as well. And considering the current models for treating insulin resistance seem misguided at best, and downright fraudulent at worst, it's no surprise that they're still confused about leptin as well. They won't solve the leptin riddle until they get on the right track about insulin.
 
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Birdie

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@Birdie

hi! Did anything help for the edema?
As I recall, Motif, it took a few weeks but it resolved (we avoid all gums usually and did that) and we are back to avoiding the gums! My husband's edema took much longer to clear than didn't mine. Maybe a couple of months for him.
 
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Birdie

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I don't get that, but those gums do give me this nervous energy. It feels disordered, and messes with my sleep.
That's interesting. I can't remember if we got that effect. I wouldn't be surprised if we did. No more for us if we can help it. There must have been a huge amount in those cheesecakes. We each ate a whole piece of the stuff.
 

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