Low Toxin Diet Grant Genereux's Theory Of Vitamin A Toxicity

[stargazer1111]

How do people even believe in grant so much. It's literally N=1. I remember years ago he kept postponing his hormonal panel because he didn't want to pay. Bro you put all this effort writing these books but you are going to be cheap over that it's pathetic. And his hormonal panel is minimal we need way more information. People shouldn't change their entire diet because of one person wild theory but of course I fell for that because I was vulnerable and had a skin issue.

Grant eczema wasn't even a big deal. I had it on my hand and it goes away even without treatment has zero to do with vitamin A. Last time I was on his blog it was a cult with no one healing and everyone saying they needed few more years lmao.

Biggest regret I have in life is wasting one year on this diet when I could have enjoyed so much food and not been paranoid over a sprinkle of pepper. It's so retarded even thinking about it pisses me off. The guy is a complete charlatan no different than delusional carnivore dieters. One look at him and I see a puffy man looking like a middle aged woman. Don't even get me started on his hamster experiment where he killed those poor things. His books are a joke and you have to be in a very desperate mindset to buy into it.

I don't believe he even follows his diet. This is not a normal diet and goes against everything my ancestors ate he literally tries to rewrite history. He could be lying about everything because he's so invested in his theory. His sidekick 'Dr. Waston' is even worse and more despicable.

I am an actual scientist who studies biomedical science. I am not saying that to be arrogant, but just pointing out that I have a fair amount of biomedical scientific training. I've read all of his books in detail. There are so many problems that I can't list them all.

I'll give you one egregious example. He claims in his books that the number of molecules of vitamin A that would be needed to support vision is so large that it would be lethal to anyone based on the prevailing theory of how vision uses vitamin A.

This is just flat out incorrect. I did the math using the molecular weight of vitamin A and avogardo's number. Even a fraction of the RDA (which is 900 ug for men and 700 ug for women) would provide more than enough molecules of vitamin A to support vision and these doses are well demonstrated to be safe in the literature.

He jumps to conclusion after conclusion based entirely on circumstantial evidence and personal anecdote.

The books are free and I don't see him making money off this so I don't doubt that his intentions are pure. I think he's a good but exceedingly incorrect guy.

 

[somuch4food]

You should get your blood levels tested. It can take years for them to drop into the deficient range.

The reason Grant hasn't had vision problems yet is likely because he had a very large store and his blood level hasn't dropped low enough yet.

I am suspicious of him because he has yet to post a blood test. If he posted a blood test showing him to be in the severely deficient range while having no vision (or other) issues, I would be more inclined to take him seriously.

For now, it's all anecdotal and circumstantial and the bulk of the scientific evidence refutes his hypothesis that vitamin A is not needed for vision.

In this link: Six-Year Update

He mentions being in the severely deficient range for the last 3 years. His eyesight has not suffered.

 

[stargazer1111]

Great that you found what works for you.
I can't tolerate juice. I have a severe reaction to fructose, even 1 gram, that can last between weeks to months.
I also can't tolerate fiber, starch and carotenoids, lutein is the worst for me.
Trying to base my diet on mostly whole milk and small amounts of meat.

You and I sound very similar except that sucrose/fructose really helps me a lot. I wonder why you can't tolerate the fructose.

I can't tolerate any carotenoid either. It's truly bizarre.

 

[stargazer1111]

In this link: Six-Year Update

He mentions being in the severely deficient range for the last 3 years. His eyesight has not suffered.

I see no blood test for serum vitamin A.

Until I see that, I remain skeptical.

 

[Mito]

I see no blood test for serum vitamin A.

Until I see that, I remain skeptical.

Five Year Update

It’s now been five years on my low vitamin A diet. My health continues to be good. However, I’ve only seen small improvements over the last year. But at least they are improvements, and my health c…

ggenereux.blog

 

[stargazer1111]

That is certainly more convincing. That is equal to 2.86 ug/dl which is far less than my 9.4 ug/dl reading a couple of months ago.

Still, it's a single anecdote. My anecdote, many other anecdotes, and the bulk of the literature on vitamin A deficiency all directly contradict his anecdote.

There is a possibility that the tolerance for low vitamin A levels is quite variable between people as well. Some people's eyes may be able to conserve or recycle vitamin A more efficiently in the context of deficiency.

My eye site was failing at 9.4 ug/dl, and I mean really failing to the point at which I couldn't see much of anything. The only thing that corrects it is vitamin A.

 

[Korven]

I was doing low VA diet for 19 months and saw some improvements initially, probably because it was low PUFA, low carotenoids and low fructose.
Overall my health kept deteriorating after a short while. I think it caused me pretty bad vitamins and minerals deficiencies including VA.
I think my main issue is aldolase b deficiency, like tca300.
I added back whole milk about a week ago and saw some improvements. I'm planning to work my way up to at least 5 liters.
The heat I'm getting from milk is incredible, I was freezing no matter how much rice, beans and beef I ate.

I had a very similar experience on the low VA diet. I desperately wanted this to work so I could stop having to worry about my diet and just be healthy and live my life. Alas...

The only noticeable improvement from low VA was that my bacne went away completely + blackheads on my back vanished. This was awesome. Though I think this has to do with cutting out pasteurized dairy and milk, not so much the vitamin A.

All other aspects of my health were NOT improving, in fact things were getting worse. I felt hypometabolic, similar to when I had been eating a vegan diet for 3 years. Eating starch with every meal seems to really slow things down for me. Cold hands and feet. Sleep was awful, waking up sweating many times through the night. The pustular eczema on my face had progressed to oozing, bleeding sores that wouldn't heal. Chronic fatigue syndrome also worse than ever, though admittedly no diet or supplement I've tried has done anything for me.

Sugar and fructose are sketchy, seems to make my skin worse. Starch is also no bueno. Aspirin is like adding fuel to the fire when it comes to my ezcema, and I seem to react negatively to all fruits and vegetables (maybe due to salicylates or carotenoids?).

When I eat ONLY milk and meat things my skin calms down and I feel pretty good. Just a few days ago my skin was 100% clear. But then I go kind of insane from being so restrictive and want to add things back in again... then things get worse again. Might try the raw milk and raw meat diet because I'm sort of at my wits' end here. Where and how did I mess up so badly that I can only tolerate 2 foods? If I try to eat "normally" I get very sick and my skin looks like a shipwreck.

 

[tim333]

@Korven

How long did you go low vA for? My serum retinol is still high after 2 years. The normal experience is cycles of symptoms that lessen over time meaning they are due to periods of higher than normal retinoic acid levels. My health has consistently improved since I started low vA. If someone has Hypervitaminosis A and they go on a low vA diet their health will always improve but it may get worse first, the liver seems to dump retinoic acid into the blood in a similar way to how excess ketone bodies get released when someone is fasting for the first time. The liver is releasing retinoic acid that has been stored for many years. Who knows what toxins are also released along with it. When I first began the low vA diet I could barely work for a month and a half I was so sleepy and fatigued, I had to go to bed really early and I would sleep for 11 hours at a time. I had unusual symptoms like an eyelid spasm that continued for two weeks straight.

Dairy is not a perfect food for anyone but a calf. Vitamin A, lactose, casein, BCM-7, hormones, excess calcium... there is a lot to not like about it. In the middle ages dairy was seen as a food for the poor, people that couldn't afford meat. Yes, certain groups have made some adaptations to it and I'm not saying everyone needs to avoid it, obviously plenty of people did well on it in the past.

All the symptoms you listed sound like symptoms of elevated retinoic acid levels. They are not symptoms of low levels. They were definitely not caused by low levels if they occurred shortly after beginning the diet.

 

[Korven]

@Korven

How long did you go low vA for? My serum retinol is still high after 2 years. The normal experience is cycles of symptoms that lessen over time meaning they are due to periods of higher than normal retinoic acid levels. My health has consistently improved since I started low vA. If someone has Hypervitaminosis A and they go on a low vA diet their health will always improve but it may get worse first, the liver seems to dump retinoic acid into the blood in a similar way to how excess ketone bodies get released when someone is fasting for the first time. The liver is releasing retinoic acid that has been stored for many years. Who knows what toxins are also released along with it. When I first began the low vA diet I could barely work for a month and a half I was so sleepy and fatigued, I had to go to bed really early and I would sleep for 11 hours at a time. I had unusual symptoms like an eyelid spasm that continued for two weeks straight.

Dairy is not a perfect food for anyone but a calf. Vitamin A, lactose, casein, BCM-7, hormones, excess calcium... there is a lot to not like about it. In the middle ages dairy was seen as a food for the poor, people that couldn't afford meat. Yes, certain groups have made some adaptations to it and I'm not saying everyone needs to avoid it, obviously plenty of people did well on it in the past.

All the symptoms you listed sound like symptoms of elevated retinoic acid levels. They are not symptoms of low levels. They were definitely not caused by low levels if they occurred shortly after beginning the diet.

I did a low VA diet for about 8 months - so yeah theoretically it is possible that I was going through periods of "detox" where my liver was trying to get rid of retinoic acid, causing all these nasty symptoms.

Though there are a few things that makes me question whether that is true (at least in my case).

Initially I did feel a bit better, possibly due to eating less fructose (?) or excluding potential allergens such as egg/dairy protein. But for the last few months of eating low VA my health was just degenerating at a steady pace. No signs of any improvements or detox cycles followed by better health. I was hoping for the slow and steady trickle of improvements that you and others have reported, but my health was only becoming worse and worse the stricter I was with my diet. I suppose it is possible that things would turn around eventually if I just stuck with it, but as mentioned there were NO signs of things getting better. When I ate rice, beans and beef 3x per day my eczema was so, so bad I wanted to cry due to the constant itching.

Furthermore, excluding certain foods seem to impact my health to a greater degree than manipulating my vitamin A intake. For example by cutting out starch I can visibly see drastic improvements in my ezcema in just a few days. This makes me think that there are other more important factors besides vitamin A intake. Taking aspirin makes things flare up really, really bad.

It's great that people are improving their health with a low VA diet and I'm not saying it's BS. But for me it didn't seem to move the needle much at all. I doubt I'll ever touch liver again and I'm not gonna go crazy with my retinol intake. I think there's a case report where one individual had hypervitaminosis A and managed to reduce liver stores by eating lots of protein, while still eating 4000 IU per day. Maybe I could do something similar?

 

[Nomane Euger]

Great that you found what works for you.
I can't tolerate juice. I have a severe reaction to fructose, even 1 gram, that can last between weeks to months.
I also can't tolerate fiber, starch and carotenoids, lutein is the worst for me.
Trying to base my diet on mostly whole milk and small amounts of meat.

your reactions to fructose include raw organic honey and fruits?did you try differents starchs,tapioka potatos sweet potatos?

 

[ursidae]

Where and how did I mess up so badly that I can only tolerate 2 foods? If I try to eat "normally" I get very sick and my skin looks like a shipwreck.

Antibiotic use? Sometimes I feel like things might be less complicated/mysterious than they seem and it’s all about a seriously messed up gut flora

 

[Korven]

Antibiotic use? Sometimes I feel like things might be less complicated/mysterious than they seem and it’s all about a seriously messed up gut flora

Yeah it's possible that I've killed off all the normal bacteria through multiple antibiotic courses + no fiber carnivore experiments. Now I only have evil bacteria that hate me. Not sure how to fix this, I've eaten boxes of expensive probiotics with no improvement...

 

[Nomane Euger]

Yeah it's possible that I've killed off all the normal bacteria through multiple antibiotic courses + no fiber carnivore experiments. Now I only have evil bacteria that hate me. Not sure how to fix this, I've eaten boxes of expensive probiotics with no improvement...

how is your vitamine D status?

 

[Korven]

how is your vitamine D status?

It's okay, slightly on the lower end of reference range @ 32 ng/ml. Oral vitamin D doesn't work for me, at the moment I am trying topically through navel application.

I feel like I might be derailing the low VA thread so perhaps we could take this through PM or elsewhere!

 

[tim333]

I did a low VA diet for about 8 months - so yeah theoretically it is possible that I was going through periods of "detox" where my liver was trying to get rid of retinoic acid, causing all these nasty symptoms.

Though there are a few things that makes me question whether that is true (at least in my case).

Initially I did feel a bit better, possibly due to eating less fructose (?) or excluding potential allergens such as egg/dairy protein. But for the last few months of eating low VA my health was just degenerating at a steady pace. No signs of any improvements or detox cycles followed by better health. I was hoping for the slow and steady trickle of improvements that you and others have reported, but my health was only becoming worse and worse the stricter I was with my diet. I suppose it is possible that things would turn around eventually if I just stuck with it, but as mentioned there were NO signs of things getting better. When I ate rice, beans and beef 3x per day my eczema was so, so bad I wanted to cry due to the constant itching.

Furthermore, excluding certain foods seem to impact my health to a greater degree than manipulating my vitamin A intake. For example by cutting out starch I can visibly see drastic improvements in my ezcema in just a few days. This makes me think that there are other more important factors besides vitamin A intake. Taking aspirin makes things flare up really, really bad.

It's great that people are improving their health with a low VA diet and I'm not saying it's BS. But for me it didn't seem to move the needle much at all. I doubt I'll ever touch liver again and I'm not gonna go crazy with my retinol intake. I think there's a case report where one individual had hypervitaminosis A and managed to reduce liver stores by eating lots of protein, while still eating 4000 IU per day. Maybe I could do something similar?

At 8 months I was still getting plenty of excretion symptoms.

You're reducing things down to direct causes. Starch is not the root indirect cause for your eczema obviously. Excess retinoic acid is a root cause.

Sounds to me like you need to deal with dysbiosis. In my opinion you'll make that worse through taking probiotics. If you have SIBO you'll need to take herbs or antibiotics to kill it off. I've previously discussed the herbs I used for my SIBO which I successfully treated myself.

I think that case report is problematic. You have to cut vitamin A out to deplete it.

Whatever your reasoning is for taking aspirin, I think it's not likely to helpful.

If you restrict your diet you'll be missing out on certain micronutrients and it'll be harder to heal. Be sure to include chicken stock and gelatin in the diet.

 

[Tarmander]

@GorillaHead I get similar energy when I eat some VA. I got into salmon for a few days, felt absolutely awful on it...almost like hyperthyroid symptoms, but after getting off felt great energy for a couple days. Very strange.

As for those criticizing Grant. His books are full of inaccuracies, and a lot of this is anecdotal, n=1

But the dude has won whether you know it or not. All he did was look at the foods that were not recommended for eczema and saw that they all had high levels of VA. Stupid simple.

Before Grant, no one was talking about how you could literally go years without VA in your diet and have serum levels like mine. No one balked at taking 5000 iu per day, or whether that had any kind of downside at all: "just make sure you take some vitamin D with it!" lol.

Of course he is probably wrong about the extremes, but DUDE CHANGED THE GAME

 

[Tarmander]

@stargazer1111 thanks for sharing your story

 

[Svdmeere]

I had a very similar experience on the low VA diet. I desperately wanted this to work so I could stop having to worry about my diet and just be healthy and live my life. Alas...

The only noticeable improvement from low VA was that my bacne went away completely + blackheads on my back vanished. This was awesome. Though I think this has to do with cutting out pasteurized dairy and milk, not so much the vitamin A.

All other aspects of my health were NOT improving, in fact things were getting worse. I felt hypometabolic, similar to when I had been eating a vegan diet for 3 years. Eating starch with every meal seems to really slow things down for me. Cold hands and feet. Sleep was awful, waking up sweating many times through the night. The pustular eczema on my face had progressed to oozing, bleeding sores that wouldn't heal. Chronic fatigue syndrome also worse than ever, though admittedly no diet or supplement I've tried has done anything for me.

Sugar and fructose are sketchy, seems to make my skin worse. Starch is also no bueno. Aspirin is like adding fuel to the fire when it comes to my ezcema, and I seem to react negatively to all fruits and vegetables (maybe due to salicylates or carotenoids?).

When I eat ONLY milk and meat things my skin calms down and I feel pretty good. Just a few days ago my skin was 100% clear. But then I go kind of insane from being so restrictive and want to add things back in again... then things get worse again. Might try the raw milk and raw meat diet because I'm sort of at my wits' end here. Where and how did I mess up so badly that I can only tolerate 2 foods? If I try to eat "normally" I get very sick and my skin looks like a shipwreck.

I can relate. Beef, rice en beans make me feel awful. After a lot of experimenting, I settled on light toast/crackers made entirely from oat/rice flour, and applesauce. Both make out the bulk of my diet and bring only minor symptoms. For meat, I rely on ostrich which digests a lot better than beef and brings about more micronutrients than turkey. The only problem I still have is getting enough folate: currently trialling beetroot...

 

[Korven]

I can relate. Beef, rice en beans make me feel awful. After a lot of experimenting, I settled on light toast/crackers made entirely from oat/rice flour, and applesauce. Both make out the bulk of my diet and bring only minor symptoms. For meat, I rely on ostrich which digests a lot better than beef and brings about more micronutrients than turkey. The only problem I still have is getting enough folate: currently trialling beetroot...

It's strange isn't it how some people seem to thrive on a diet of mainly meat and rice, while others (us) do miserably? Too much white rice makes me constipated, gives me ezcema and acne, and insomnia.

So you're doing a low VA diet with oat/rice crackers, applesauce and ostrich meat? Noticed any health improvements?

Whole milk makes me feel wonderful but I do get more bacne from it. Anything that makes me more androgenic and happy seems to have this effect. I will try raw A2 milk and see if that makes any difference.

 

[Svdmeere]

It's strange isn't it how some people seem to thrive on a diet of mainly meat and rice, while others (us) do miserably? Too much white rice makes me constipated, gives me ezcema and acne, and insomnia.

So you're doing a low VA diet with oat/rice crackers, applesauce and ostrich meat? Noticed any health improvements?

Whole milk makes me feel wonderful but I do get more bacne from it. Anything that makes me more androgenic and happy seems to have this effect. I will try raw A2 milk and see if that makes any difference.

Improvements came slowly (no honeymoon period for me) after 6 months and are now, after 18 months, really noticable: markedly less fatigued, a lot less anxiety, more mental focus, better sleep, emotionally more stable, less OCD/autistic behaviour. Serum retinol has dropped from 40 to 18 mcg/dL. The only thing that has barely improved is my inflamed gut and associated food intolerances. As long as I stick to this insanely strict diet, I'm doing really well but once I start deviating too much (while experimenting), the gut starts acting up and my energy level quickly follows.