Liver And Oysters Aren't Health Foods?

[Twohandsondeck]

I'll quickly say here that in the grand scope of the last 1-2 years, there was a time where I received great energetic benefit from consuming liver and oysters. During a short time of a few weeks I'd venture to say that I even over-consumed them in an attempt to load up on these dietary elements that I had seemingly been missing for my entire life.
However, in the last 4 months, each time I have eaten liver or oysters, the benefit has not seemed to compare as it did over a year ago. In fact, often each of them sets me back by triggered auto-immune symptoms.

With regard to liver, as most on this forum are aware, Grant Genereux has a controversial thread on whether or not retinoic acid is a poison or not. Garrett Smith also parrots these ideas with his own angle of research. I find it all very respectable what these men are saying, but I will not dare draw any certain conclusion.

With regard to oysters, Morley Robbins has a wealth of research that centers around iron, bioavailable copper, and magnesium, among other key minerals. His take is that eating oysters is such a large amount of zinc that it renders copper useless in it's ability to regulate iron, so he doesn't recommend anyone consume oysters for this reason.
Besides this, oysters are quite high in omega-3. I'm looking at a box of Crown-Prince oysters soaked in olive oil, and it boldly prints on the back: "Contains 1,305mg of Omega-3 Fatty Acids Per Serving."
I know Peat has suggested <2g of PUFA per day, but this is still worth mentioning for the sake of this thread.


Contributions welcome.

 

[Maljam]

If you were very low in vitamins and ate a nutritionally dense food, of course you could feel more benefit when you were nutritionally depleted, than when you were nutritionally replete (you said you over consumed them) this isn't anything new.

Just because a food is nutritionally dense doesn't mean you need to over consume it and it doesnt then make not a health food because you are over doing certain vitamins.

Peat recommends less than 4g a day, not 2g, and if you are trying to get below 2g you are orthorexic IMO. This takes a lot of planning, effort and over thinking in the diet.

Stop worrying about what is a health food and what isn't, if a food makes you feel good, eat it, if it makes you feel bad, don't eat it.

 

[gaze]

I remember Ray saying something about the way liver is sold in the US isn't fresh the same way it is in Mexico, which can give it an odd taste and make it worse.

I think the oysters have so much copper as well (isn't it like 700% daily value?) that the high amounts of zinc and iron are balanced.

 

[mrchibbs]

As @Maljam indicated, I think we can develop lifelong deficiencies, and focusing intently on eating nutritious foods like liver and oysters for a couple months or a year, can fill those needs and with time reduce the benefits of their consumption, so that we need less.

 

[Twohandsondeck]

Stop worrying about what is a health food and what isn't, if a food makes you feel good, eat it, if it makes you feel bad, don't eat it.

Thanks coach.

I'm inclined to think that there's a deficiency of co-factors or an obstruction such as dysbiosis that prevents proper metabolism.

Sure, the stockpile could be full, but in my past experiences there has been nothing wrong with the food I'm consuming, it was just that I was lacking certain nutrients and my gut was polluted with fungus that led to all kinds of sensitivities. When the latter two were corrected for, things swam along just fine.

I remember Ray saying something about the way liver is sold in the US isn't fresh the same way it is in Mexico, which can give it an odd taste and make it worse.

Fortunately I have a supplier that slaughters pasture-raised cattle himself, but I've also had buffet liver and chicken liver from chickens that were certainly treated with hormones and likely antibiotics. The difference on all accounts is night and day in the raw state, but nonetheless a backfiring of benefit started months ago regardless of the source which has lead me to post this thread.

As @Maljam indicated, I think we can develop lifelong deficiencies, and focusing intently on eating nutritious foods like liver and oysters for a couple months or a year, can fill those needs and with time reduce the benefits of their consumption, so that we need less.

Sounds practical.

I suppose taking a look at the half-life and storage capacity by the body of the nutrients in question might give a better idea as to how much and how often.

 

[boris]

I don‘t know why it happens, but according to Peat, eating liver makes you hypothyroid for a while.

 

[mrchibbs]

I don‘t know why it happens, but according to Peat, eating liver makes you hypothyroid for a while.

I think he said eating a "big meal" of liver makes you hypothyroid. Because vitamin A suppresses thyroid function when supplied in excess.

Conversely, a tablespoon of liver pate can be very pro-thyroid and increase metabolism, at least in my experience.

 

[mrchibbs]

I suppose taking a look at the half-life and storage capacity by the body of the nutrients in question might give a better idea as to how much and how often.

I think that wouldn't necessarily work, because I suspect individual requirements for certain vitamins and nutrients can be vastly different from one person to the next.

 

[baccheion]

Just maintain the zinc:copper ratio. 8:1?

There are labs to check if everything is still in range.

 

[ursidae]

Heavy metals are more of a concern with oysters/bacteria if eaten raw
Still I’m never gonna stop them. Never in my life have I felt this euphoric from food. I don’t eat the canned ones though, they never made me feel that way. Fresh and raw

liver on the other hand has always tasted disgusting to me. Eating too much of it resulted in my skin literally falling off my face and my first ever panic attack. Poison

 

[Maljam]

Heavy metals are more of a concern with oysters/bacteria if eaten raw
Still I’m never gonna stop them. Never in my life have I felt this euphoric from food. I don’t eat the canned ones though, they never made me feel that way. Fresh and raw

liver on the other hand has always tasted disgusting to me. Eating too much of it resulted in my skin literally falling off my face and my first ever panic attack. Poison

Skin was literally falling off your face? How do you mean?

 

[boris]

I think he said eating a "big meal" of liver makes you hypothyroid. Because vitamin A suppresses thyroid function when supplied in excess.

Conversely, a tablespoon of liver pate can be very pro-thyroid and increase metabolism, at least in my experience.

Oh right, thanks for clarifying. Personally I never felt bad after eating liver, but I also can‘t eat much of it.


@Twohandsondeck What I mean to say: maybe that is what you were experiencing as your setback, the hypo phase from a big portion?

 

[Tristan Loscha]

I'll quickly say here that in the grand scope of the last 1-2 years, there was a time where I received great energetic benefit from consuming liver and oysters. During a short time of a few weeks I'd venture to say that I even over-consumed them in an attempt to load up on these dietary elements that I had seemingly been missing for my entire life.
However, in the last 4 months, each time I have eaten liver or oysters, the benefit has not seemed to compare as it did over a year ago. In fact, often each of them sets me back by triggered auto-immune symptoms.

With regard to liver, as most on this forum are aware, Grant Genereux has a controversial thread on whether or not retinoic acid is a poison or not. Garrett Smith also parrots these ideas with his own angle of research. I find it all very respectable what these men are saying, but I will not dare draw any certain conclusion.

With regard to oysters, Morley Robbins has a wealth of research that centers around iron, bioavailable copper, and magnesium, among other key minerals. His take is that eating oysters is such a large amount of zinc that it renders copper useless in it's ability to regulate iron, so he doesn't recommend anyone consume oysters for this reason.
Besides this, oysters are quite high in omega-3. I'm looking at a box of Crown-Prince oysters soaked in olive oil, and it boldly prints on the back: "Contains 1,305mg of Omega-3 Fatty Acids Per Serving."
I know Peat has suggested <2g of PUFA per day, but this is still worth mentioning for the sake of this thread.


Contributions welcome.

This Robbins guy has a fair explanation. The Zn effect of depressing Cu uptake via induction of Metallothioneine is well known, iirc it starts around 30mg of Zn per sitting. This is the long term relationship; GI competition sets in immediately and also favors Zn.

 

[Tristan Loscha]

This Robbins guy has a fair explanation. The Zn effect of depressing Cu uptake via induction of Metallothioneine is well known, iirc it starts around 30mg of Zn per sitting. This is the long term relationship; GI competition sets in immediately and also favors Zn.

This comment from Kammas is correct; so the issue isnt the mechanism i described.
"I think the oysters have so much copper as well (isn't it like 700% daily value?) that the high amounts of zinc and iron are balanced."

 

[ursidae]

Skin was literally falling off your face? How do you mean?

I suffer from acne. It became severe and cystic once I stopped consuming grains and introduced dairy, red meat, coconut oil, safe starches and citrus to my diet as per peat's recommendations. Once I began eating liver it began to leave atrophic scarring. The lesions would scab over and the scab would fall off prematurely leaving a hole in my cheek. It made my skin incredibly dry, itchy and painful. I'm still suffering from this and I'm unable to stop it. it continues to ruin my life and looks but the scarring it leaves is not as severe now
I also suffered from severe sebborhoeic dermatitis at the time and the skin around my brows was red, burning and falling off in large patches. Lots of sunlight and vitamin d fixed that to the point that eating small amounts of liver does not affect it

 

[Tristan Loscha]

I suffer from acne. It became severe and cystic once I stopped consuming grains and introduced dairy, red meat, coconut oil, safe starches and citrus to my diet as per peat's recommendations. Once I began eating liver it began to leave atrophic scarring. The lesions would scab over and the scab would fall off prematurely leaving a hole in my cheek. It made my skin incredibly dry, itchy and painful. I'm still suffering from this and I'm unable to stop it. it continues to ruin my life and looks but the scarring it leaves is not as severe now
I also suffered from severe sebborhoeic dermatitis at the time and the skin around my brows was red, burning and falling off in large patches. Lots of sunlight and vitamin d fixed that to the point that eating small amounts of liver does not affect it

have you tried supplementing with higher dosed Bs, and Zn and the normal Multivitamin thing?

 

[ursidae]

have you tried supplementing with higher dosed Bs, and Zn and the normal Multivitamin thing?

I regularly get 2-3 times the daily recommended for Bs just with food but I also started eating nutritional yeast to get some extra amount and I eat beef and oysters for zinc. I'm wary of supplements because I used to take a lot of those and I feel like they were breaking me out even more. I would consider supplementing even more zinc though

 

[Tristan Loscha]

I regularly get 2-3 times the daily recommended for Bs just with food but I also started eating nutritional yeast to get some extra amount and I eat beef and oysters for zinc. I'm wary of supplements because I used to take a lot of those and I feel like they were breaking me out even more. I would consider supplementing even more zinc though

What was your supplement routine like? How much Protein do you get, and your Fatsources if you dont mind?

 

[ursidae]

What was your supplement routine like? How much Protein do you get, and your Fatsources if you dont mind?

I was taking b complex, vit e, vit d, magnesium, chromium, zinc, niacinamide, folic acid, coq10, aspirin and a bunch of other stuff I don't remember.
All I take now is magnesium glycinate, occasionally k2mk4 and will be taking the idealabs vit e soon

I eat 150-180 g protein
Sources of fat: cocoa butter, fatty beef/bison, small amounts of olive oil (trusted source), raw eggs, coconut oil (Ive been avoiding it lately), raw seafood. I try to eat mostly raw fat

 

[Andman]

I was taking b complex, vit e, vit d, magnesium, chromium, zinc, niacinamide, folic acid, coq10, aspirin and a bunch of other stuff I don't remember.
All I take now is magnesium glycinate, occasionally k2mk4 and will be taking the idealabs vit e soon

I eat 150-180 g
cocoa butter, fatty beef/bison, small amounts of olive oil (trusted source), raw eggs, coconut oil (Ive been avoiding it lately), raw seafood. I try to eat mostly raw fat

thats 150-180g of cocoa butter/day?