Log / Day One

[javin]

How are you @javin

I've been well! :)

I read two books by Matt Stone this week. "Eat for Heat" and "Diet Recovery: Restoring Hormonal Health, Metabolism, Mood, and Your Relationship with Food".

Both were insightful and fun to read. My main takeaway was to consume less liquids to the point where your pee is always yellow (concentrated). You don't want to dilute your extracellular fluids. Consuming less liquids and eating more salt has definitely kept me more warm this week. A lot of Peat followers think it's fine and dandy to consume massive amounts of milk and OJ, but all that liquid would definitely cool you down a bit. I think it's better to drink only when you're thirsty.

A cool quote from "Eat for Heat":
"But, bless us, we're humans after all. We have these big brains that can do some neat things, but leave it to us to do something as stupid as drink when we're not thirsty. No other creature does this. No other creature is so removed from its own instinctual programming to the point of accidentally overdrinking."

 

[Luann]

They say serotonin causes thirst, I'm trying so hard to reach the point of yellow pee but serotonin & stress are high these days, it makes SO much more sense to drink less though, thus depleting less

How were your books?

That quote seemed like it was somewhere else on Peat this week, VERY good lol and it's so funny to see muscleheads with the waterbottles that like measure the liters and everything just so they make sure they're getting ENOUGH too-much-water. Lol

Log stuff: life is weird these days, feelin alright, craving condensed sweetened milk and pie-filling fruit but haven't been able to go shopping for a couple days. Vit A is probably low, my depression reared its head after a few days of not caring about PUFA intake and it took a few more days to drive the demon back down. It is better now :)

 

[Luann]

the depression is pretty much gone. Happy productive thoughts and feelings of being connected to people. Feeling like I know how things work without being told, also I'm having a great time with calcium from eggshell powder, homemade: it actually gives me a very good feeling abt 15 minutes after taking it in a meal, a happy light space in my mind, relaxed. TRY it lol

 

[Luann]

How is everyone getting niacin?? Seafood supplement or other? Seems like all the sources have PUFA

 

[CarbAppreciator]

strong coffee plus occasional supplement

 

[Luann]

coffee has that much niacin? !

 

[CarbAppreciator]

Idk to be honest, peat says it is a good source of magnesium and niacin, cronometer says it isn't, but i figure if you make it strong, that makes a big difference.

 

[tara]

How is everyone getting niacin??

Me: niacinamide powder morning and evening.

 

[Luann]

Me: niacinamide powder morning and evening.

thank you tara

Idk to be honest, peat says it is a good source of magnesium and niacin, cronometer says it isn't, but i figure if you make it strong, that makes a big difference.

i can dig it

today's report: very bad depression yesterday. but it was a funny experience because sometimes my depression is like a self-loathe type that brings with it violent thoughts or deep hopelessness - but while i was functioning at work last night, i just kept seeing myself, like watching myself from out of body, and having so much pity and love for the person who was going through it. in a way i forgave whatever part of me was causing this pain or not living up to expectations or otherwise wasting time in what seemed like a world so different than the one my coworkers lived in. it felt like two parts of me reunited and understood each other.

 

[tara]

Hi Liubo,
Did you get around to logging/estimating typical or average calories, carbs, protein, etc? And checking over the micronutrients? Cronometer's one way to get a rough idea - there are probably others too.

 

[Luann]

over-drinking really doesn't help my depression and in fact i think better - like put two-and-two together, have ideas, in general survive better, when i'm the least bit dehydrated (given properly caffeinated, of course).
My cals are about 1600 a day, with sufficient vitamin a, magnesium, potassium, and calcium. Diet is starch-based with potatoes and sweetened pumpkin as a base and sweetened milk in small amounts, protein could be low?

 

[tara]

My cals are about 1600 a day, with sufficient vitamin a, magnesium, potassium, and calcium. Diet is starch-based with potatoes and sweetened pumpkin as a base and sweetened milk in small amounts, protein could be low?

That could well be a/the major contributor to your trouble. 1600 cals is unlikely to be enough to run a healthy metabolism for any adult. If there is not enough fuel, the body can make various adaptations for the sake of survival, but they all have costs. This opinion is more from here:
Recovery From Undereating - Youreatopia
than from Peat, but Peat has also said that 1500 cals indicates a pretty low metabolism.
Whether it's better to increase gradually or call in one go, I don't know (there are various opinions here), but I think it's very likely that you won't be able to sole your key issues unless you eat more.
Energy flowing through the system supports good carbon-dioxide production, good oxygen delivery, and allows the cells to do all the stuff they need to do to support you - build healthy structure and keep you functioning well. Fuel isn't the only factor in good energy production, but it is a necessary one.

 

[Luann]

Yeah I am not eating enough. You are right. I am getting there cause my second regular period came this month. But my tendency is to skip / limit myself

 

[Luann]

Yesterday was a really good day. Some users on here have said their anxiety went away on Peat diet only to return again, but I'm hoping mine is gone for good. Not having a migraine in a month is convincing me that my serotonin is much lower than it used to be.
Breakfast right now: coffee with white sugar, a mash of Rice chex crunched up with milk and eggshell calcium. It helps the eggshell go down and is delicious, kind of like eating the last crumbs of the cereal (used to love that lol). My diet is still root-based, potatoes, carrots, with rice and fruit and low-fat dairy; high in caffeine, low in liquid, nice and salty.

Found this little tidbit: Diet of Kenyan Runners | Level Renner
"

• Sugar – plain sugar – accounted for 20 percent of daily calories. The Kenyans love their tea (in fact, tea consumption was greater than water consumption – 1.243 liters per day on average) and they love putting lots of milk and sugar in their tea. Having trained with some Kenyans myself, I can attest to just how much tea they drink and how much milk and sugar they use. It’s incredible.However, a large amount of this sugar also comes from fruits. Immediately after most runs, Kenyans consume some type of fruit, typically watermelon, cantaloupe and honeydew. The simple sugar and water from the fruit speeds glycogen to their muscles post workout."

Notice the caffeine to water ratio

 

[Luann]

All the signs of low protein. like joint pain, low mood, yada yada. It's really funny, I saw Ray Peat's painting today - Youth - I didn't know he was a painter but when I talked about that moment I had experienced a "coming back together", a really therapeutic moment at work when I forgave myself for being depressed, well that painting really applied to that moment. It literally felt like a part of me, a wise older part of me, was hugging the young confused part of me.

 

[Luann]

Not, so great, the depression came back, I didn't know what it was that was "off" until the world started feeling like it was SO much work, the word "pain" came to mind uninvited and something big and scary started looming overhead. That's how it felt. Eating now; also, my fat count from the last two days has been REALLy high, most of it saturated but probably something like 55 grams of fat in two days, enough of that gets oxidized, that would explain the depression, no? Ugh. Back to square one.
But it's not really square one because my headaches have stopped. One whole month w/o migraine as opposed to once a week :) And the moments of pain have a different feel; it's not imaginary, the serotonin is evening itself out.
Here's another piece of the puzzle: my mom has dieted / calorie-restricted most of her life, she actually is really smart and has always been on the cutting edge of nutrition stuff, which means basically she was low-carb before everyone else was. I think she might have been doin something like that when she got pregnant, so I have had depression and sensitivity to negative stuff since childhood and was probably a low-serotonin baby.

 

[Luann]

Been thinking about the Japanese diet and how it fits in with long life / Peatarianism. You know, fish is a pretty good substitute for not having milk. It's low in fat and iron and provides protein calcium and N3 to protect you from the pufa N6. Rice, fruit, etcetera. So Peat might be like an improved Japanese diet?

 

[Luann]

Day 3 of as-close-to-zero-fat-as-possible, HFCS makes me feel weird, sticking to white sugar, coffee, potatoes, fruit, rice, fat-free milk.

 

[Luann]

Day 4, fat-free, over a month w/o migraine. wondering if anyone has noticeably lowered their serotonin, cured depression or anxiety on this diet???

 

[Luann]

Day 6, fat-free.

Weird bouts of edginess but other than that no pronounced pain or depression. I mentioned I need to eat more protein and am going to buy some dry milk today.