Help Me Figure Out How I Lost Weight Without Trying

[yerrag]

About 4 years ago, I started losing weight at a steady pace. In a span of 6 months to one year, I gradually lost about 28 lbs. from a starting weight of 155 lbs. to 127 lbs. I wasn't overweight to begin with, and my BMI was around 25, and my body fat was somewhere around 16-18%. When I was at my lightest, I think my BMI was around 21, and my body fat was in the 12% range. I'm male btw and my height is 5'7". Since this was some time ago, I may be off slightly with my figures, so please cut me some slack if I'm off a little bit. Besides, I have stopped weighing myself for a long time already, nor have been measuring my BMI nor my body fat. I have since slowly regained my weight. 6 months ago, I was at 145 lbs.

I couldn't figure out then what happened to cause me to lose weight. I didn't change what I ate, and I didn't become more active in my lifestyle. In fact, I had stopped running and had already stopped going to gyms for working out. At that time, I've already decided to stop exercising for a year just to see what will happen to me. The only change I could attribute my weight loss was my joining a spa for a year's membership. I joined because the spa had a facility where I could do hot-cold therapy. This was a therapy where I would repeatedly go thru 6 cycles of hot sauna for 15 minutes, followed by 1 minute of being submerged in 12C water. This was intended as a detox for me, as I was undergoing oral chelation to remove lead from my body. I was taking a mixture of chlorella and cilantro daily that time.

I only expected to rid my body of lead. Years prior, I had removed my body of mercury from dental fillings, and had undergone mercury detox that involved intravenous chelation. This time, I learned of oral chelation and didn't want to have another IV chelation, as it was time-consuming and much more costly.

As I've been busily catching up and learning a lot from this site over the past weeks, it occurred to me that a year before I underwent this therapy, I had also stopped taking fish oils and EFAs from flaxseed and hemp seed. However, I had already accumulated enough PUFAs from at least 10 years of supplementing with supposedly EFAs such as fish oils. I however, have continued with taking VCO, and I would continue to eat fats from animal sources.

With this background, I have a few thoughts about how this all fit together to trigger my losing weight that much. But I would rather have you figure it out first than tell you my thoughts so that I don't add any personal bias to it.

By the way, a friend was worried seeing me so thin and suggested my taking a blood test to test my thyroid. The test didn't show my thyroid being outside the normal paramaeters, conventionally medically speaking.

But what spurred me to ask this forum is if my losing weight had anything to do with my body having an innate wisdom/instinct to purge itself of the PUFA toxins I have accumulated for at least 10 years of "healthy" supplementation. I would appreciate if you could shed light by way of your theory on the mechanism by which I lost weight. A lot of the weight lost is the fat as my body fat percentage went down. Thanks.

 

[tara]

Some wild speculations.
Not knowing what you were eating, I'd wonder whether your detox procedure involved other changes to diet, and they were instrumental? Possibly the chelation also removed some iron too, and that removing the toxic metals and some excess iron eased the brakes on your metabolism for a while?
I don't know if your previous exercise habits were pushing your limits, but if they were, stopping it may have reduced stress and/or energy deficiency?
Some other changes in your life changed your life wrt stress/satisfaction etc?
Wondering what the thyroid tests showed.

 

[yerrag]

Thanks for sharing your thoughts, Tara. My detox didn't involve a change in my diet. As far as iron goes, I used to have high blood iron, a condition called hemochromatosis, which went away after I donated blood 5 years prior. Subsequent tests showed my blood iron to be normal, at 94 Ug/dL (normal range 37-181). It's possible that losing weight was related to my going through some major readjustment with regard to my finances, and maybe I was troubled and stressed about it.
My TSH was 0.812 uIU/ml (normal at 0.27-4.20). My T3 and T4 at 1.59 and 120.60 nmol/l, respectively (normal range being 1.30-3.10 and 66-181 respectively).

 

[tankasnowgod]

My thoughts- I think the hot-cold therapy sessions probably had a lot to do with your weight loss. The sauna certainly caused you to lose water weight, while the cold sessions may have sped up your metabolism and/or built up some brown fat. They may have very well had a synergistic effect. It actually sounds like a pretty pleasant protocol, I wouldn't doubt it helped to lower some stress hormones.

If you lowered iron, I could also see where this would have an effect. I used to have very high iron, and lowering it has allowed me to be a lot more active, and handle higher carb meals much easier. A lot of the things you mentioned could have an indirect effect on calorie intake as well. And it could be that less pufa and less iron lead to a higher metabolic rate.

 

[yerrag]

My thoughts- I think the hot-cold therapy sessions probably had a lot to do with your weight loss. The sauna certainly caused you to lose water weight, while the cold sessions may have sped up your metabolism and/or built up some brown fat. They may have very well had a synergistic effect. It actually sounds like a pretty pleasant protocol, I wouldn't doubt it helped to lower some stress hormones.

If you lowered iron, I could also see where this would have an effect. I used to have very high iron, and lowering it has allowed me to be a lot more active, and handle higher carb meals much easier. A lot of the things you mentioned could have an indirect effect on calorie intake as well. And it could be that less pufa and less iron lead to a higher metabolic rate.

It's a nice protocol. I didn't expect to lose weight using it though, as I used it for my detox. Funny thing is - I was the only one using it. The water was cold enough to drive other people away.

As for the iron, it was a long time before I used the therapy that I got rid of the excess iron through blood donation. I haven't been able to donate blood since then, as my blood pressure had always been high at 180/120 and that alone would make my blood donation unacceptable.

I may have stopped taking PUFA for a year then, but there were still plenty of PUFA stores in my body. My guess is that it has my oral chelation and the hot-cold therapy was working together in getting rid of my body fat. The heavy metals, like lead, as I understand it, are stored in the adipose tissues of the body. As the chelation is taking effect, it would be drawing the lead out of the fat stores and binding to them. As it draws the lead out, it may also be somehow breaking down the fat stores in order to access the lead. With the fat stores breaking down, the fat would more readily be broken down into fatty acids, and be metabolized.

The problem with this theory though, is that my lifestyle had not changed during this time. I was eating the same and I was not being more active. But there is a lot of energy from the fat that has been expended to cause me to lose a lot of weight. Did my basal metabolism increase? I do not recall nor do I have a way of telling.

 

[yerrag]

I just read the Peatarian wiki and came across an item with Ray Peat saying that the best way to burn fat is at rest. Any reason why he said that?

But anyway, that is what I felt happened with me. I burned fat without trying to. It was very likely used for my basal metabolism.

 

[tara]

I just read the Peatarian wiki and came across an item with Ray Peat saying that the best way to burn fat is at rest. Any reason why he said that?

AIUI, when muscles are working, they tend to burn sugar. When they are at rest, they tend to burn fat.

 

[yerrag]

AIUI, when muscles are working, they tend to burn sugar. When they are at rest, they tend to burn fat.

I learn something new everyday. So when we're lying down or sitting down, muscles tend to burn fat?
What if a person is in a very cold environment but immobile? Is he burning fat to keep warm? And what if the person is in a very hot and humid place and sweating a lot but not moving? Is he still burning fat also? Or is he just shedding water to keep cool?

 

[managing]

What kind of oral chelation were you doing?

Effect of catecholamines and metal chelating agents on the brain and brown adipose tissue Na,K-ATPase. - PubMed - NCBI

 

[yerrag]

My thoughts- I think the hot-cold therapy sessions probably had a lot to do with your weight loss. The sauna certainly caused you to lose water weight, while the cold sessions may have sped up your metabolism and/or built up some brown fat. They may have very well had a synergistic effect. It actually sounds like a pretty pleasant protocol, I wouldn't doubt it helped to lower some stress hormones.

I googled brown fat. Nice to know about it. Perhaps it helped me build up my brown fat. I'm interested in knowing more about it. Learned that babies are born with brown fat to help protect them against hypothermia. And that as a person grows, the surface area of his body grows as well, and the surface area growth makes the amount of brown fat less able to protect the increase in surface area. I've heard that taking cold baths increase immunity. Is it because exposure to cold temperatures makes the body develop more brown fat in reaction to it? But one anecdote I have goes against that thought. When I went to Rochester NY years back, which is a pretty cold place, and I came from the tropics, I was warned of the biting cold weather and to be prepared for it. I was surprised to find myself taking the cold weather much better than locals who grew up there. It had me thinking then it was the genes then. But now, the shifting thought towards epigenetics made me think that genes alone can't explain that. Now, my thinking is that what we eat has a lot to do with how we adapt to our surroundings, as it would probably make it easier for our genes to express themselves in adapting toward a change in our environment. At that time, I wasn't yet exposed to the false notions of EFAs, and had grown up eating saturated fats. Perhaps that made a difference?

 

[yerrag]

What kind of oral chelation were you doing?

Effect of catecholamines and metal chelating agents on the brain and brown adipose tissue Na,K-ATPase. - PubMed - NCBI

I took this:

http://www.seeknatural.co.uk/product-1819.html

Still trying to make sense of the article you linked. It's pretty deep. The chelation did not involve EDTA etc., so it may not apply to this form of chelation?

At any rate, this form of oral chelation is said to be more gentle than IV chelation. The reason is that it does not leach many needed minerals such as calcium and magnesium from our body, as a side-effect of scavenging and binding the heavy metals. Supposedly, there is less of a need to supplement with minerals to compensate for the loss during treatment. But just the same, I still took minerals (calcium, magnesium etc.) just to play it safe.

 

[tankasnowgod]

At that time, I wasn't yet exposed to the false notions of EFAs, and had grown up eating saturated fats. Perhaps that made a difference?

Very likely, especially if it was coconut based fat. I've noticed that coconut oil can significantly raise pulse and body temperature, and that fructose containing sugars have a similar effect.

 

[yerrag]

Very likely, especially if it was coconut based fat. I've noticed that coconut oil can significantly raise pulse and body temperature, and that fructose containing sugars have a similar effect.

Yes, it was coconut-based fat. Our cooking oil was refined coconut oil. Although I didn't take VCO, we had coconut jam. Some dishes, curry-like, were based on coconut milk. And pork and chicken feed incorporated by-products of coconut meat left over from extracting the coconut oil, thus making their fat less filled with PUFAs. Of course then, Wesson "healthy oil" was expensive, and margarine was heavily advertised. Glad, I didn't like margarine that much then, even as a kid. It didn't feel as real as butter. Didn't drink much Coke then with a strict father, and only had them on special occasions, but the Coke was and still is made from real cane sugar.

 

[managing]

I took this:

http://www.seeknatural.co.uk/product-1819.html

Still trying to make sense of the article you linked. It's pretty deep. The chelation did not involve EDTA etc., so it may not apply to this form of chelation?

At any rate, this form of oral chelation is said to be more gentle than IV chelation. The reason is that it does not leach many needed minerals such as calcium and magnesium from our body, as a side-effect of scavenging and binding the heavy metals. Supposedly, there is less of a need to supplement with minerals to compensate for the loss during treatment. But just the same, I still took minerals (calcium, magnesium etc.) just to play it safe.

I would say the same results are possible, even likely, although not proven. If what you took was effective at removing heavy metals, it could be expected, according to the study (and there were more) to enhance brown adipose metabolism. I think this is a very neat explanation as cold therapy is also known to do same.

If so, you could call this a very healthy weight loss. Any thoughts on your muscle strength, volume, and tone before/during/after this weight loss?

 

[yerrag]

I would say the same results are possible, even likely, although not proven. If what you took was effective at removing heavy metals, it could be expected, according to the study (and there were more) to enhance brown adipose metabolism.

By that, do you mean the protocol I took burned up more brown fats? Or is it the other way around?

If so, you could call this a very healthy weight loss. Any thoughts on your muscle strength, volume, and tone before/during/after this weight loss?

I haven't been working out for some time, but when I have to carry heavy weights around, like a 50lb. sack of rice, I can still do it, carrying over my shoulder. My arm, shoulder, and calf muscles maintained their volume and tone, but my face looked very gaunt, and my chest, and my thigh muscles lost volume and tone somewhat. But it was nowhere like losing weight by running. It seemed to me running burned a lot of muscle then, especially around the chest.

 

[managing]

By that, do you mean the protocol I took burned up more brown fats?

Yes, that^. That is what the evidence suggests to me. But you don't burn brown fats. Brown fats burn white fat. You want (all other things being equal) more brown fat, or at least more effective brown fat.

 

[Bahaa El wazzan]

@yerrag did it cause you mental problem the chelation

How did you work with ca and mg ?