Hoping Someone Can Help Me Sort Out My Issues

[Douglas Ek]

Welcome @DanielleB. I appreciate the courage it took for you to be honest and open yourself up to criticism. I just wanted you to know that we have a lot of caring members here that are serious about health and please don't take any responses the wrong way. I believe they come only from genuine concern. I'm glad you joined, thrilled you stopped meth and I truly wish you the very best.

agreed

Can I ask how you upped your iron levels?

Iron supplements specifically 2x 25mg pills/day in the form of iron bisglycinate for about 2-3 months. But I wouldn't recommend you to try it before getting a ferritin test since some people have a genetic disorder called hemochromatosis and for these people, it would be dangerous to take iron supplements. Getting a ferritin test that shows you have low ferritin would basically tell you that you A. are iron deficient and B. that you don't have hemochromatosis.

 

[Douglas Ek]

I may be over exercising but my issue with stopping the exercise is that it gives me beneficial endorphins and my job is quite sedentary so I was under the impression the exercise was doing me good. Peat advocates for low-impact exercise. I am doing 45 min of low impact weight lifting a day. This is literally my only exercise daily. I am worried about cutting out exercise completely because if I do that and then continue to up my calories to stoke the metabolism, it would seem unavoidable that I would start gaining weight as the metabolism isn't repaired yet...


I haven't had recent blood tests but will be getting some soon. I know in the past I have had low iron and I had all of the symptoms you mentioned for low iron. However, since Peating consistently. My symptoms from the low iron have pretty much alleviated. Some days they are worse than others but they seem to be getting better since peating.

No need to cut it out completely keep exercising. Just giving you pointers that it could affect you but you best feel this yourself. Night sweats are often an indicator that you're overexercising. If it's true you had low iron previously I'm very sure that you're probably still borderline low i would get a ferritin test. It doesn't cost much at all probably 20-30 dollars.

For women the test range is about following:
20-200 nanograms per milliliter in women and anything under 20 is you feel horrible
20-80 nanograms per milliliter you still have lots of symptoms and a lot of women even experience excess hair shedding and this doesn't stop for some until they go over 80
90-130 I would say is optimal for women helping metabolism and feeling warm and energized all day
150-200 probably excessive but still wouldn't do any harm to you

Think about it iron deficiency is the worlds most common mineral deficiency. 1/4 have a slight deficiency. Especially women. You exercise often. do you eat a lot of red meat? you have a previous history of iron deficiency. Well, I'm pretty sure you would benefit from getting it checked and optimizing your levels

 

[Douglas Ek]

Can I ask how you upped your iron levels?

What's your location Danielle? The US?

 

[DanielleB]

agreed


Iron supplements specifically 2x 25mg pills/day in the form of iron bisglycinate for about 2-3 months. But I wouldn't recommend you to try it before getting a ferritin test since some people have a genetic disorder called hemochromatosis and for these people, it would be dangerous to take iron supplements. Getting a ferritin test that shows you have low ferritin would basically tell you that you A. are iron deficient and B. that you don't have hemochromatosis.

I will have to look into getting that test soon. Isn't low iron caused by low thyroid though? So essentially, if you supplement the iron, it may only help with a few symptoms when it seems the goal should be instead to fix the thyroid and metabolism overall, otherwise it would seem the supplementation isn't doing much in the way of addressing the entire disorder?

 

[DanielleB]

No need to cut it out completely keep exercising. Just giving you pointers that it could affect you but you best feel this yourself. Night sweats are often an indicator that you're overexercising. If it's true you had low iron previously I'm very sure that you're probably still borderline low i would get a ferritin test. It doesn't cost much at all probably 20-30 dollars.

For women the test range is about following:
20-200 nanograms per milliliter in women and anything under 20 is you feel horrible
20-80 nanograms per milliliter you still have lots of symptoms and a lot of women even experience excess hair shedding and this doesn't stop for some until they go over 80
90-130 I would say is optimal for women helping metabolism and feeling warm and energized all day
150-200 probably excessive but still wouldn't do any harm to you

Think about it iron deficiency is the worlds most common mineral deficiency. 1/4 have a slight deficiency. Especially women. You exercise often. do you eat a lot of red meat? you have a previous history of iron deficiency. Well, I'm pretty sure you would benefit from getting it checked and optimizing your levels

I'm not sweating at night at all, so that's good I guess. I do have hair loss as well so I can guess my levels are quite low already, sadly. I do have a past history of iron deficiency/anemia during pregnancy. I don't eat a lot of red meat, maybe only 1-2x per week....

 

[DanielleB]

What's your location Danielle? The US?

Yes, I live in the US, in Colorado

 

[Douglas Ek]

I will have to look into getting that test soon. Isn't low iron caused by low thyroid though? So essentially, if you supplement the iron, it may only help with a few symptoms when it seems the goal should be instead to fix the thyroid and metabolism overall, otherwise it would seem the supplementation isn't doing much in the way of addressing the entire disorder?

They interfere with each other. Deiodinase an enzyme responsible for thyroid hormone activation and deactivation is heavily dependent on iron. So this, in turn, causes hypothyroidism. And hypothyroidism weakens your stomach acid. A strong acid is needed for proper nutrient absorption especially iron. So you get the picture

 

[DanielleB]

They interfere with each other. Deiodinase an enzyme responsible for thyroid hormone activation and deactivation is heavily dependent on iron. So this, in turn, causes hypothyroidism. And hypothyroidism weakens your stomach acid. A strong acid is needed for proper nutrient absorption especially iron. So you get the picture

So it would be beneficial to supplement iron then if ferritin is shown to be low with blood testing? You say a strong acid is needed to absorb iron so should I be taking digestive enzymes to be able to fully absorb the iron supplement if thyroid causes low stomach acid?

 

[raypeatclips]

It’s not something one readily mentions in forums like this out of fear of getting responses exactly like yours.

You made a sweeping statement about ephedrine and amphetimines causing weight loss. I’m refuting or challenging that statement by saying it didn’t work for me....WHY. I took meth for 3 months on weekends and I didn’t lose weight. I’m not denying it’s not great for your health but chastising someone’s choices doesn’t change them, you know. So let’s work with the current scenario, can we? No one talks about the amount of alcohol they drink regularly and alcohol is just as damaging in ways as meth.

You asked us for health advice, it seems like a glaring thing to mention. People definitely criticise alcohol here, you must not have looked enough. If someone asked for help advice then 5 posts down "mentioned" they drank 20 beers on a weekend they would certainly be called out for it.

I appreciate the response but no one is really in a position to say anything to me about my drug usage. I DONT REGULARLY do them. I have STOPPED doing them. Don’t judge what I do or don’t do if you’ve ever drank alcohol or taken any drugs period. I’m an adult and I knew full well what I was getting into. Addiction isn’t an issue for me at all, hence why I was able to quit cold turkey without issue. I didn’t do it regularly either and I certainly don’t need to defend my methods or reasoning to people over the internet. The health issues began 3 years ago before I ever tried any meth.


I do not smoke tobacco and never have...I do however use the nicotine pouches in my mouth. Like snus but only nicotine, no tobacco. Would those still be something I should be quitting or looking into giving up? It seems to have a positive effect on raising temp and helping with BM’s...

Why are you justifying your taking of meth if someone has ever drank alcohol? Vast majority of the population, I would agree they certainly aren't the same. You came to us asking for help.

 

[Douglas Ek]

So it would be beneficial to supplement iron then if ferritin is shown to be low with blood testing? You say a strong acid is needed to absorb iron so should I be taking digestive enzymes to be able to fully absorb the iron supplement if thyroid causes low stomach acid?

Iron supplements work better than absorbing through food but you need a higher dosage iron bisglycinate is the best absorbable form and you need to take between 50-100mg. No need to take digestive enzymes. Take this dosage with a big glass of orange juice. The vitamin C helps absorption I don't recommend supplemental vitamin C better to get the real deal. Also calm down with the coffee drinking if you drink a lot. Coffee been shown to hinder iron absorption by up to 80% from your food

 

[Douglas Ek]

Yes, I live in the US, in Colorado

ok googled it and you can book ferritin test online in Colorado for 36 USD

 

[fradon]

Thank you for the reply! I’m thinking it could be thyroid too. However you did mention that ephedrine and amphetimines raise metabolism and cause weight loss except I was doing meth intermittently...over weekends only for the last three months and did not experience ANY weight loss! So if they do raise metabolism why did I not lose weight even on meth? I’ve stopped now and it was honestly mostly to see if I could lose weight for it.

The excercise thing seems self-contradictory. If I don’t excercise, I don’t get the endorphins which help with the depression. I like to excercise...is it really that counterproductive when thyroid issues are at play?

most stimulants would have to be uses daily for them to trigger weight loss but the rebound is a lot of weight gain once off the drugs.

so you do have depression...that can also cause weight gain since it slows down metaboslims and can cause you to eat more food or more high calorie foods to make you feel good but will pack on the pounds

there are TWO TERMS you need to get familiar with CATABOLIC AND ANABOLIC

Catabolic makes you lose weight and anabolic makes you gain weight

if you lift weights after spending all day at a sedentary job you are becoming more ANABOLIC meaning you are adding more weight either fat or muscle

you need to become more CATABOLIC to do that you need to trigger you ADRENALS. sitting isn't going to do it and neither is weight lifiting...you need to speed up your body and metabolism....stimulating your mind and body will speed up your metabolism

the THYROID issue is also a factor and you can change your diet to help that including eat a bit more protein as well as zinc and selenium foods like liver and tuna fish.

 

[Douglas Ek]

most stimulants would have to be uses daily for them to trigger weight loss but the rebound is a lot of weight gain once off the drugs.

so you do have depression...that can also cause weight gain since it slows down metaboslims and can cause you to eat more food or more high calorie foods to make you feel good but will pack on the pounds

there are TWO TERMS you need to get familiar with CATABOLIC AND ANABOLIC

Catabolic makes you lose weight and anabolic makes you gain weight

if you lift weights after spending all day at a sedentary job you are becoming more ANABOLIC meaning you are adding more weight either fat or muscle

you need to become more CATABOLIC to do that you need to trigger you ADRENALS. sitting isn't going to do it and neither is weight lifiting...you need to speed up your body and metabolism....stimulating your mind and body will speed up your metabolism

the THYROID issue is also a factor and you can change your diet to help that including eat a bit more protein as well as zinc and selenium foods like liver and tuna fish.

That's so badly explained. Gaining fat is not anabolic in any way. Anabolic steroids for example makes you lose fat and increase muscle. Anabolic basically just means you're body is in its right element to shift its focus on things like building muscle. It's a survival mechanism. Anabolism happens when you're doing well and getting enough nutrients, sleep etc all the basics for survival are covered then instead of channeling your energy to maintaining basic body functions your body starts channeling that extra energy into hormones ans into muscle building. If youre starving your body from sleep or food youre under a stress and you body shuttles and shifts its focus on maintining and surviving. At this point you can gain weight more easily because your body thinks it will need to hold on to fat for an emergency. You will also have higher cortisol and noradrenaline because of stress responce to keep you alert and awake and your sleep wont be as restfull etc

Catabolism is just the opposite of anabolism like i mentioned. Its your body thinking you are starving and it will break down muscle tissue and preserve fat for when its needed. Its really bad. This is why things like over-exercising and eating to little calories will actually harm you long term.

Being in a catabolic state will automatically lower your thyroid because when you starve you dont want a high metabolism. Your body wants to keep it low so that you dont burn unnecesarry energy.

This is why making sure you eat plenty actually can help you lose weight. Best macro to preserve anabolism is carbohydrates. Specially sugars like glucose and fructose which has been shown to conpletely reverese muscle breakdown during starvation.

And in some cases a high sugar diet have cured peoples hypothyroidism just because of its cheer power as fuel for your body making your body feel like it has what it needs to survive. Yes SUGAR.

Thats why coffee and sugar is sucha great combo. The caffeine energizes you increasing your metabolism and the sugar helps keep the stress response away removing jitters from high doses of caffeine. Together its a real thyroid booster and fat burner combination

 

[fradon]

That's so badly explained. Gaining fat is not anabolic in any way. Anabolic steroids for example makes you lose fat and increase muscle. Anabolic basically just means you're body is in its right element to shift its focus on things like building muscle. It's a survival mechanism. Anabolism happens when you're doing well and getting enough nutrients, sleep etc all the basics for survival are covered then instead of channeling your energy to maintaining basic body functions your body starts channeling that extra energy into hormones ans into muscle building. If youre starving your body from sleep or food youre under a stress and you body shuttles and shifts its focus on maintining and surviving. At this point you can gain weight more easily because your body thinks it will need to hold on to fat for an emergency. You will also have higher cortisol and noradrenaline because of stress responce to keep you alert and awake and your sleep wont be as restfull etc

Catabolism is just the opposite of anabolism like i mentioned. Its your body thinking you are starving and it will break down muscle tissue and preserve fat for when its needed. Its really bad. This is why things like over-exercising and eating to little calories will actually harm you long term.

Being in a catabolic state will automatically lower your thyroid because when you starve you dont want a high metabolism. Your body wants to keep it low so that you dont burn unnecesarry energy.

This is why making sure you eat plenty actually can help you lose weight. Best macro to preserve anabolism is carbohydrates. Specially sugars like glucose and fructose which has been shown to conpletely reverese muscle breakdown during starvation.

And in some cases a high sugar diet have cured peoples hypothyroidism just because of its cheer power as fuel for your body making your body feel like it has what it needs to survive. Yes SUGAR.

Thats why coffee and sugar is sucha great combo. The caffeine energizes you increasing your metabolism and the sugar helps keep the stress response away removing jitters from high doses of caffeine. Together its a real thyroid booster and fat burner combination

you just complicated something that was so simple...thanks.

 

[Douglas Ek]

That's so badly explained. Gaining fat is not anabolic in any way. Anabolic steroids for example makes you lose fat and increase muscle. Anabolic basically just means you're body is in its right element to shift its focus on things like building muscle. It's a survival mechanism. Anabolism happens when you're doing well and getting enough nutrients, sleep etc all the basics for survival are covered then instead of channeling your energy to maintaining basic body functions your body starts channeling that extra energy into hormones ans into muscle building. If youre starving your body from sleep or food youre under a stress and you body shuttles and shifts its focus on maintining and surviving. At this point you can gain weight more easily because your body thinks it will need to hold on to fat for an emergency. You will also have higher cortisol and noradrenaline because of stress responce to keep you alert and awake and your sleep wont be as restfull etc

you just complicated something that was so simple...thanks.

What you said was completely false and missleading. You told her to become more catabolic. That equalls lowering ylur thyroid more.

I can explain it even simpler than what you said in first place

Anabolic=high thyroid function
Catabolic=hypothyroid

And dont eat tuna fish. Heavy metals and omega 3 is bad. It lowers thyroid more.

 

[fradon]

What you said was completely false and missleading. You told her to become more catabolic. That equalls lowering ylur thyroid more.

I can explain it even simpler than what you said in first place

Anabolic=high thyroid function
Catabolic=hypothyroid

And dont eat tuna fish. Heavy metals and omega 3 is bad. It lowers thyroid more.

this is not a competition...we're here to help the lady to get healthy...you are simply distorting information...not good for anyone and criticizing her for her lifestyle not cool.

 

[DanielleB]

That's so badly explained. Gaining fat is not anabolic in any way. Anabolic steroids for example makes you lose fat and increase muscle. Anabolic basically just means you're body is in its right element to shift its focus on things like building muscle. It's a survival mechanism. Anabolism happens when you're doing well and getting enough nutrients, sleep etc all the basics for survival are covered then instead of channeling your energy to maintaining basic body functions your body starts channeling that extra energy into hormones ans into muscle building. If youre starving your body from sleep or food youre under a stress and you body shuttles and shifts its focus on maintining and surviving. At this point you can gain weight more easily because your body thinks it will need to hold on to fat for an emergency. You will also have higher cortisol and noradrenaline because of stress responce to keep you alert and awake and your sleep wont be as restfull etc

Catabolism is just the opposite of anabolism like i mentioned. Its your body thinking you are starving and it will break down muscle tissue and preserve fat for when its needed. Its really bad. This is why things like over-exercising and eating to little calories will actually harm you long term.

Being in a catabolic state will automatically lower your thyroid because when you starve you dont want a high metabolism. Your body wants to keep it low so that you dont burn unnecesarry energy.

This is why making sure you eat plenty actually can help you lose weight. Best macro to preserve anabolism is carbohydrates. Specially sugars like glucose and fructose which has been shown to conpletely reverese muscle breakdown during starvation.

And in some cases a high sugar diet have cured peoples hypothyroidism just because of its cheer power as fuel for your body making your body feel like it has what it needs to survive. Yes SUGAR.

Thats why coffee and sugar is sucha great combo. The caffeine energizes you increasing your metabolism and the sugar helps keep the stress response away removing jitters from high doses of caffeine. Together its a real thyroid booster and fat burner combination

This makes a lot of sense to me, thank you for taking the time to explain. The thing is, my temps have been getting consistently better. This morning they were 98.0 upon waking up, 98.4 after drinking some milk, and then 15 minutes later, up to 98.7 before 8am! That's really good for me and they have been increasing since starting a Peat diet. What I don't understand though is that bowel movements are not regular (have to take magnesium supplements to go) and I am not losing weight. Am I just being too impatient with expecting those things to right themselves since my temps are going up? I am eating low fat too....about 30-40g a day only with most calories coming from fruit and protein.

 

[DanielleB]

most stimulants would have to be uses daily for them to trigger weight loss but the rebound is a lot of weight gain once off the drugs.

so you do have depression...that can also cause weight gain since it slows down metaboslims and can cause you to eat more food or more high calorie foods to make you feel good but will pack on the pounds

there are TWO TERMS you need to get familiar with CATABOLIC AND ANABOLIC

Catabolic makes you lose weight and anabolic makes you gain weight

if you lift weights after spending all day at a sedentary job you are becoming more ANABOLIC meaning you are adding more weight either fat or muscle

you need to become more CATABOLIC to do that you need to trigger you ADRENALS. sitting isn't going to do it and neither is weight lifiting...you need to speed up your body and metabolism....stimulating your mind and body will speed up your metabolism

the THYROID issue is also a factor and you can change your diet to help that including eat a bit more protein as well as zinc and selenium foods like liver and tuna fish.

Fradon, thank you for the advice and the input and for now being unnecessarily critical towards the choices I made in the past and rectified. I have done weight lifting for years though and I do know that catabolic and anabolic are different than the explanations you gave. I do have depression but unfortunately, that's what has down-regulated the thyroid which in turn has down-regulated metabolism, which in turn keeps me tired and depressed...it really becomes a vicious cycle.

 

[Blossom]

Ill keep this thread updated with my progress. Like I stated initially, I will be doing a Peatish IF diet as to mitigate the stress hormones but still maximise fatloss. And I suppose I will have to learn how to count these calories so many people speak of at some point haha
Here is a youtuber that has an awesome diet plan it is kinda a same approach.

@DanielleB, I thought about you when I saw this post (not that I think you need to lose weight!).

 

[Douglas Ek]

most stimulants would have to be uses daily for them to trigger weight loss but the rebound is a lot of weight gain once off the drugs.

so you do have depression...that can also cause weight gain since it slows down metaboslims and can cause you to eat more food or more high calorie foods to make you feel good but will pack on the pounds

there are TWO TERMS you need to get familiar with CATABOLIC AND ANABOLIC

Catabolic makes you lose weight and anabolic makes you gain weight

if you lift weights after spending all day at a sedentary job you are becoming more ANABOLIC meaning you are adding more weight either fat or muscle

you need to become more CATABOLIC to do that you need to trigger you ADRENALS. sitting isn't going to do it and neither is weight lifiting...you need to speed up your body and metabolism....stimulating your mind and body will speed up your metabolism

the THYROID issue is also a factor and you can change your diet to help that including eat a bit more protein as well as zinc and selenium foods like liver and tuna fish.

And

this is not a competition...we're here to help the lady to get healthy...you are simply distorting information...not good for anyone and criticizing her for her lifestyle not cool.

I'm not competing in anything or have nothing to prove. What you wrote was incorrect information. Telling someone to stress their adrenals. What you talking about sounds like raising cortisol and that's will lead to muscle breakdown and weight gain. I did not criticise her lifestyle at any point. I said if she's smoking quit. If she's doing drugs quit. The only thing I did criticise was taking meth as a means to lose weight. And you can ask any reasonable person or doctor out there about that and they would agree. But everyone made stupid decisions I've done drugs in the past which I did admit to and I don't regret it but I will never do it again.

This makes a lot of sense to me, thank you for taking the time to explain. The thing is, my temps have been getting consistently better. This morning they were 98.0 upon waking up, 98.4 after drinking some milk, and then 15 minutes later, up to 98.7 before 8am! That's really good for me and they have been increasing since starting a Peat diet. What I don't understand though is that bowel movements are not regular (have to take magnesium supplements to go) and I am not losing weight. Am I just being too impatient with expecting those things to right themselves since my temps are going up? I am eating low fat too....about 30-40g a day only with most calories coming from fruit and protein.

I think you should try to up your fat intake if that's the case. I would do 50% carbs/30% fat/ 20%protein. Main sources of fat should be butter and coconut oil. I buy both types of coconut oil the one that has coconut taste and then one that they removed the taste and I basically always have a bit of coconut oil in all my food now. Fat is so important for hormone synthesis and signialing to your body that you have nutrients so you can up your metabolism. Coconut oil is great for increasing thyroid. Don't over do it at the same time though. Better to mix the fat in with every meal than some people who take 3 tablespoons coconut oil then have diarrea :P