My Journey To Optimal Health

[charlie]

 

[Cirion]

Did Haidut post that about Cortisol somewhere on the forum? It makes a lot of sense, but if you know the thread, I would be interested in reading it.

Kang (Author of the Impower supplement I use):

Thanks Haidut. Did you try the product, and if so what did you think?

Haidut response

Yes, i did. It made me sleepy juts like a a dose of BCAA/tyrosine usually does, so I took that to mean that it is reducing serotonin. I took 10 capsules in one sitting, which is about 5g total dose of amino acids.

Taken from the amino acid supplementation for poor digestion thread.

Thanks big guy!

 

[Cirion]

Allright so without a doubt now, I need at least some protein and/or fat in the diet. Why do I say this? Well I started tracking a few more parameters recently.

-- How long I sleep the (first) sleep cycle. I noticed as I went low protein and low fat it was fine for a day or two (sleeping 5, 4 hrs before awakening to urinate) and then would drop to 3, 2 hrs.
-- Libido starts to drop reliably after dropping fats entirely within a few days.

Inspired by recent posts by CLASH (never let it be known that I'm not willing to experiment, despite my debates with him =P) and since now I'm taking amino pro, figured I would take a chance and try beef again - but this time in the context of AP, so figured it can't hurt me as bad now, since my Fernstrom ratio was like 0.015 or something super low yesterday. Noticed a definite increase in libido, AND my first sleep cycle went back up from 2 hr to 4 hr (slept from 10pm to 2 am). On top of that, I had zero starch yesterday, and noticed my pre-sleeping body weight measured at 10 pm was lower, I am thinking I have very low fiber intake to thank for that also.

The only problem is my metabolism increased tooo much lol and I had insomnia from like 2am--4am. Or perhaps, I did it to myself by having a mexican cola (caffeine) at 2 am lol. But I had gained some weight the day previous, which I attribute to too much starch, all of which I lost right back last evening. So zero starch, and less than 10 gram of fiber.

However I historically know too much protein is a problem. So maybe one experiment I could play with, is keep meat intake in check like I have been, but perhaps add in some very metabolic fats that CLASH recommends like cocoa butter which is high in stearic acid. I did feel like my inflammation was definitely lower last night, measured by my body weight just before going to bed (I measure pre-bed temp/pulses/wts now also). But it's a tightrope, I know that going too hard on the fats also always gets me in trouble.

Just gotta keep playing with it is all. With how many parameters I am tracking now, it's only a matter of time before I reach the optimal diet (for me at least).

 

[Amazoniac]

3 days so far with stabilized weight changes (either neutral or weight lost), and just as I predicted, also stabilized or increasing temp and pulses. If I can go a couple more days, I'll set a record for longest weight/temp/pulse streak.

Noticed that taking the amino's with my coffee made me a little tired this morning. Haidut said to expect this at least at first, as that's a telltale sign that cortisol has been reduced dramatically. Hip pain almost eliminated too, telling me that I'm providing my body the protein it needs, but without eating protein. I also had decided to take a B-12 supplement yesterday, as my diet currently contains zero B-12.

As followers of my log probably know I'm anti-supplements, but the aminos, and B-12, I have to make exceptions for. At least I have very good reason to take them, I'm positive I am deficient in both, it's not a random guess.

Guru, is it you in the avatar? Looks like a movie scene.

Anyway, judging by your curiosity, you'll want to know how each amino acids is affecting you, but since you have a preset mixture, you won't be able to do it. It's not adjusted based on individual needs either, maybe you could benefit just as much (if not more) from a few of them, or in different ratios. A third problem is that if these amino acids are (supposing) 0.5% impure, considering the amount ingested, you could be adding a lot of industrial crap; 100 mg of contaminants for example is a lot, hopefully they're of the benign kind; this point is based on Raj's work with Wagner, they trained me on this issue. It's devoid of nutrients and b12 isn't the only problem, B-vitamins in general and various others factors*. It's also not digested normally as proteins, which might have detrimental effects in terms of signalling or coordination; for example, it's digested much faster than the b12 that you're including.

*Novel aspects of health promoting compounds in meat

It's an interesting supplement, it must have been challenging for the guy to come up with it, but it seems more like an emergency tool.

 

[Cirion]

Guru, is it you in the avatar? Looks like a movie scene.

Anyway, judging by your curiosity, you'll want to know how each amino acids is affecting you, but since you have a preset mixture, you won't be able to do it. It's not adjusted based on individual needs either, maybe you could benefit just as much (if not more) from a few of them, or in different ratios. A third problem is that if these amino acids are (supposing) 0.5% impure, considering the amount ingested, you could be adding a lot of industrial crap; 100 mg of contaminants for example is a lot, hopefully they're of the benign kind; this point is based on Raj's work with Wagner, they trained me on this issue. It's devoid of nutrients and b12 isn't the only problem, B-vitamins in general and various others factors*. It's also not digested normally as proteins, which might have detrimental effects in terms of signalling or coordination; for example, it's digested much faster than the b12 that you're including.

*Novel aspects of health promoting compounds in meat

It's an interesting supplement, it must have been challenging for the guy to come up with it, but it seems more like an emergency tool.

Thanks man, that means a lot coming from you since I always learn a lot from your posts! Yes, it's me, back in the days when I was very healthy -- and following a ray-peat-esque diet (It's what first got me to believe RP's principles) of a very high carb very low fat diet. I was a lot leaner then too =P But I'll get back to it eventually, I have no doubt. I had a lot more self confidence then for sure, I had a lot of fun picking out a red suit etc. No, it wasn't a movie scene tho lol. Once I can fit into that red suit again, that's when I know I've arrived at my ideal weight again. A good goal to shoot for perhaps.

Yeah it has crossed my mind that there could be a lot of contaminants. So far I seem to be doing reasonably OK on them, but time will tell. Anywho, I've decided to not go protein free after all, but I think I will continue taking amino pro at least for as long as it seems like it is benefitting me, because I like being able to drop my Fernstrom ratio below even 0.02. Seems like getting it below 0.02 has remarkable benefits for me.

Anyway So this morning great news:

-- I am now the lowest weight I have been in a little over a month (And that's at consuming an average of 4300-4400+ calories a day)
-- 98.6F temp and 88 bpm pulse rate (surprise surprise, I'm constantly proving to myself that temp and pulse = weight loss)

In fact, with all the manipulations I've made, I think I am going to have to bump average calories up a bit more. I had 4500 calories yesterday, was quite hungry, and dropped 2 lbs.

Improving metabolism is they key to health and weight loss full stop. Every day I continue to prove this to myself.

If I can drop 5 more lbs, I'll be at the lowest weight I've been in 3 months. That's my next goal. Baby steps....

 

[Vinny]

Anyway So this morning great news:

-- I am now the lowest weight I have been in a little over a month (And that's at consuming an average of 4300-4400+ calories a day)
-- 98.6F temp and 88 bpm pulse rate (surprise surprise, I'm constantly proving to myself that temp and pulse = weight loss)

In fact, with all the manipulations I've made, I think I am going to have to bump average calories up a bit more. I had 4500 calories yesterday, was quite hungry, and dropped 2 lbs.

Congrats, master!

 

[Cirion]

Congrats, master!

Thanks man. After great deliberation and data examination, I have also decided I plan to eat 50 gram fat for now. This generally will happen automatically through eating 93% lean beef, but on any day I might be under that, I'll fill the gaps with cocoa butter which I've just ordered also.

This is why I decided upon 50 gram of fat. (These are 3 day rolling average plots to minimize the daily volatility)

The point of inflection of most weight loss occurs around the 50g mark.

Point of inflection for waking temp is in the 60g-70g range roughly.

 

[Cirion]

Slight setback today. Always seem to get setbacks on monday it seems. This time not as bad as last monday though, I only regressed one day in terms of weight instead of two days, so I guess it's not too bad. In any case, I think it was due to two reasons and not just because it's monday lol:

-- Too much fat (I was a little too much into trying out the new cocoa butter that arrived in the mail and ended up at 70 gram of fat yesterday). Interestingly, I was tracking my body weight throughout the day to try to understand what causes inflammation for me, and my body weight didn't increase noticeably until shortly after having the cocoa butter.
-- Too much sleep

I now realize, I think, you need to minimize time in bed (but without compromising on actual amount of hours slept). What do I mean by this? Well last night I was basically in bed for 10 hr. Whereas, the night prior, I only got like 7 hr of sleep, but woke up at 98.6 and 88 bpm despite that.

What's going on? Well, I think it is blood sugar levels / fuel in the body. If you sleep too long, it's very likely you will have run out of fuel. I think the absolute best case scenario is you go to bed, and get up once you wake up the first time. For sunday morning that was 7 hr straight slept with no awakenings. So I think the goal is probably to try to be awake for roughly 16 hr a day most days, as that is 16 hrs that you can regulate glucose / food easily, then you only have to fast for 8 hrs instead of say 10 or even 12 hrs, neither of which a hypo person is capable of even doing anyway. I still absolutely believe you should never wake up to an alarm, so I think the key is go to bed as late as you can to still wake up on time without an alarm.

Historically, I'd go to bed earlier, and inevitably wake up in the middle of the night hungry to get something to eat, then go back to bed. I am starting to think the whole "Don't eat at night!" has truth to it now, to an extent. Just eating a small piece of food, I no longer believe is at all sufficient to restore glucose levels. Once your body wakes you up, you have a MAJOR (not a minor) glucose deficiency, so at this point, you need to just start your day probably.

In other news, there is absolutely a correlation between pre-bed pulse/temp/weights now for sure. As I mentioned earlier, my pre-bed weight was higher than the pre-bed weight before, so I kinda knew I would have weight gain this morning, and sure enough, I did. Although what I was planning to do was fast (no midnight snack) this time, I woke up at 3-4 am really really hungry so I ended up eating anyway, and sure enough, it went to my gut. What's interesting is I woke up with a high libido at 3-4 am (Don't worry, won't go into details) and when I ate the food, it disappeared entirely. This makes me really wonder, that "Hunger is a lie" sometimes and just can't be trusted. Because if I had fasted instead of eaten, I have a feeling I would have actually woken up with good temps (98.6) today also. Usually I agree with ray that fasting is a poor thing to do, but in this case, it might have helped me out this morning (Due to the inflammation I built up)

 

[Runenight201]

In other news, there is absolutely a correlation between pre-bed pulse/temp/weights now for sure. As I mentioned earlier, my pre-bed weight was higher than the pre-bed weight before, so I kinda knew I would have weight gain this morning, and sure enough, I did. Although what I was planning to do was fast (no midnight snack) this time, I woke up at 3-4 am really really hungry so I ended up eating anyway, and sure enough, it went to my gut. What's interesting is I woke up with a high libido at 3-4 am (Don't worry, won't go into details) and when I ate the food, it disappeared entirely. This makes me really wonder, that "Hunger is a lie" sometimes and just can't be trusted. Because if I had fasted instead of eaten, I have a feeling I would have actually woken up with good temps (98.6) today also. Usually I agree with ray that fasting is a poor thing to do, but in this case, it might have helped me out this morning (Due to the inflammation I built up)

In my experience hunger always means the body needs energy, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that food must be consumed. When I was eating inappropriate foods, I’d end up with a constipated GI tract, which I theorize wasn’t allowing me to extract all the energy from my food. This would result in hunger signals since I never acquired the sufficient energy from the food I consumed , leading me to eat more food and bloat and constipate further. When I gained awareness over what constipation felt like, i would often try to fix the situation through the consumption of refined sugar, which seemed to alleviate the hunger signals as a result of the constipation. However, with time I began to notice how the refined sugar on its own inflamed me, and while it provided instant energy and relief from hunger, it would always end as a net negative, as it wasn’t providing my body true strength and health. Eventually I learned to drink water to help relieve the constipation and push the matter through my GI tract, alleviating the hunger signals and keeping things flowing.

Now I’m focusing on avoiding constipating foods in the first place. Without a doubt I know that excess meat and starch constipate. The past couple days I have been experimenting with no animal flesh (much to my surprise and in stark contradiction of what I previously believed) of any kind, and subsisting entirely on eggs, white rice, white bread, fruit, soup, beer, milk, tobacco, coffee, and maple syrup. My moods, hair, and skin are easily the best they’ve ever been, largely because I’ve been avoiding constipation and inflammation, and consuming easily digestible foods. Milk must be consumed with coffee and maple syrup, and then the digestion is perfect, milk on its own bloats. Rice must be consumed with mushroom, egg yolk, lard soup, on its own it constipates. Bread with butter, eggs, tomatoes, on its own it constipates. Excess fruit inflames me and provides no strength or true satiation. I will easily be hungry 30 mins-1 hour later after eating any amount of fruit. Milk, coffee, and maple syrup provide instant ecstasy, drive, motivation, and energy. Pair it with music and I achieve rapture that exceeds any other drug I’ve ever done (and the latte is actually providing me nourishment to boot!)

Tobacco and beer lower my vocal chords and make me feel very good, I feel very androgenic with those substances, ESPECIALLY paired with eggs. Eggs boost my test so much, my muscles always harden up after consuming them and I can feel my body becoming thick with strength.

Im still on the fence with meat. I think it could be fine to eat right before going to bed, as i have plenty of time to rest and digest the meat, and being sleepy is a welcome side effect. While my waking hours are very good, my sleep could still improve, as I still wake up stressed and hungry (albeit at a much later hour than it used to happen in the past).

I think it could be helpful if you focused less on the hard data and took a step back and increase your focus again on how different foods affect your mood, digestion, energy, and strength. I do truly believe that is the best way to be sustainably healthy for life. While my weight loss was comparably much less than yours, i dropped from 185 to 170 these past couple months without even thinking about my macros or total calories consumed, all while getting stronger in the gym and having my muscles become much harder. I always focused on satiation, moods, sleep, strength, and energy, experimented with all the foods, and settled on the foods that best solved whatever physiological context I found myself in.

 

[corvetteseeker]

Tobacco and beer lower my vocal chords and make me feel very good

Any diet that claims good results with beer has my full attention, haha

You have a very unique approach. I'm not sure I agree that 100% of the time that you feel good after a meal also means that you had a meal conducive to weight loss but I could be wrong.

I'm impressed you have reached so many specific conclusions with so many food variables and combos. Most people would have never gotten this far.

 

[Cirion]

Thanks, but I am definitely finding it is far, far more difficult to achieve health when you're as overweight as I am so a lot of strategies and foods don't work for me. I have trouble digesting just about everything. I've gotten to the point where I think I will try Visionofstrengths strategy of using massive caffeine doses to improve digestion so that I can actually digest things lol.

And the fasting idea did not work, I figured it wouldn't, but thought I would experiment anyway, just to say I tried it. I mean, it did provide some damage control to my weight this morning (dropped a tiny bit) but my waking temp is awful this morning (97.8F).

I am thinking part of my problem is too much liquid. I was getting a bit liberal lately with things like mexican colas, water with heavy amounts of syrup in it etc.

 

[Runenight201]

Any diet that claims good results with beer has my full attention, haha

You have a very unique approach. I'm not sure I agree that 100% of the time that you feel good after a meal also means that you had a meal conducive to weight loss but I could be wrong.

I'm impressed you have reached so many specific conclusions with so many food variables and combos. Most people would have never gotten this far.

All foods are tools which I select based on specific physiological needs. Most of the time I’m attempting to fix a pure energy problem, ie I need to raise my energy state so that I’m not fatigued and able to be on my feet and train people all day. This is when I’m consuming primarily milk, coffee, and syrup, which make me very perky, happy, and sociable. However if I consume that late into the night, I won’t sleep until very late, so I switch over to beer, which will relax and calm down. 1-2 bud lights is usually all my body can handle before my stomach gets taxed.

In our modern day climate with such a wide range of food availability, I think obesity to be a result of an underdeveloped awareness of self. When I did not know my body well, I would often eat McDonald’s and think that was helping me, but later I came to understand how that food sat heavy and give me little health and vitality. Eating healthy isn’t a matter of choosing foods that everyone else thinks is healthy, but rather selecting the most appropriate foods in any given context that will bring most closely what is needed, solely based on a set of experiences and memories that I have of how those foods affect me. I’m able to visualize and then forecast how a given meal will affect me, and I can update my mental models after repeated trials and experiences.

 

[Cirion]

All foods are tools which I select based on specific physiological needs. Most of the time I’m attempting to fix a pure energy problem, ie I need to raise my energy state so that I’m not fatigued and able to be on my feet and train people all day. This is when I’m consuming primarily milk, coffee, and syrup, which make me very perky, happy, and sociable. However if I consume that late into the night, I won’t sleep until very late, so I switch over to beer, which will relax and calm down. 1-2 bud lights is usually all my body can handle before my stomach gets taxed.

In our modern day climate with such a wide range of food availability, I think obesity to be a result of an underdeveloped awareness of self. When I did not know my body well, I would often eat McDonald’s and think that was helping me, but later I came to understand how that food sat heavy and give me little health and vitality. Eating healthy isn’t a matter of choosing foods that everyone else thinks is healthy, but rather selecting the most appropriate foods in any given context that will bring most closely what is needed, solely based on a set of experiences and memories that I have of how those foods affect me. I’m able to visualize and then forecast how a given meal will affect me, and I can update my mental models after repeated trials and experiences.

Don't get me wrong, I do track in my notes how I felt some days and if I noticed a particularlly beneficial (or negative) reaction to a food or set of foods, it is indeed one thing I do keep track of. I am thinking it's the liquids, I really think so, because looking back at the weeks where I saw some tangible benefits on Vegan back a couple months ago, I was having almost all solid foods, a lot of which was starch. I still don't think starch is ideal, but on an old VoS thread in another forum this one guy said that in terms of digestibility its starch > fat > liquid. So liquid calories being the hardest to digest, followed by fat, followed by starch. Starch may be more difficult to digest than sugar, but it's a lot better than trying to digest liquid, or fat, and I tend to agree based upon my Vegan experiment.

Ray Peat also recently himself said in his latest podcast that he prefers espresso, because he wants to minimize the water content and maximize the caffeine content, essentially.

 

[Cirion]

Today reducing liquids and also playing with more caffeine intake. I forgot how awesome caffeine is LOL. I am hot and resting pulse 100 bpm and feeling better, libido increase too. Was reading "Theory of Digestion" thread on the other RP forums and the guy said he fixed all his problems with massive (2000 mg) caffeine intake a day. I am feeling less bloated too, I had to bring in my belt another notch. I don't think I will have 2000 mg, but I'm not ruling out like 1000 mg. I'm already at 500 mg for the day.

 

[opson123]

I've also read that thread. Iirc during his recovery he also ate up to a pound of honey a day, and lots of oj concentrate. Those were his best digesting sugars. I get loose and burning poop from a tablespoon of honey lol. It's interesting how differently people are messed up.

 

[Cirion]

I've also read that thread. Iirc during his recovery he also ate up to a pound of honey a day, and lots of oj concentrate. Those were his best digesting sugars. I get loose and burning poop from a tablespoon of honey lol. It's interesting how differently people are messed up.

Lol yeah, I'm not following all his ideas. But I think he's right that digestion is the key to health, since 95% (according to Haidut) of serotonin is formed in the gut, it stands to reason fixing the gut/digestion fixes everything else.

 

[opson123]

He also ate a lot of calories iirc and lost fat. He has many posts on this forum too, look them up if you're interested.

 

[ilikecats]

@Cirion @opson123 Former RPF poster "Sea" was a metabolic all star... as is/was visionofstrength... wish we had more metabolic champions to learn from on this forum

 

[Cirion]

@Cirion @opson123 Former RPF poster "Sea" was a metabolic all star... as is/was visionofstrength... wish we had more metabolic champions to learn from on this forum

Agreed man. Well, we shall have to carry on the torch in their absence then.

 

[lampofred]

Just one cigarette a day makes everything so much easier since it shifts everything in the right direction (too much has the opposite effect though)... Plus nicotine is great for gut/digestion...

Dr. Peat said small amounts of nicotine are beneficial for old people... Guess I have the brain of an old person even though I am in my early 20s...