My Journey To Optimal Health

[redsun]

Yes, in hypothyroid, consuming carbs produces both lactic acid and CO2. Basically, it's a damned if you do damned if you don't situation. CO2 is mandatory in hypothyroid recovery which means carbs are also mandatory. So, steps must be taken to reign in the lactic acid that accompanies it, to avoid the problems from that. This only means one should NOT exercise during hypothyroid, as this produces even more lactic acid. Even at rest, a hypo individual produces enormous amounts of lactic acid. I certainly believe it.

Basic natural carbonic anhydrase inhibitors are the bare bones though. Specifically B1, B3, B5, and biotin basically necessary for normal CO2 levels. High carb intake will necessitate higher doses as well.

You could eat all the carbs in the world but more carbs do not prevent carbs from turning to lactic acid, b-vitamins and other cofactors in the citric acid cycle do. Doesnt matter how relaxed and chill life is, without required cofactors you cant follow through the citric acid cycle properly, decreasing CO2. Then you can always use pharmaceuticals to bump it up more as @tankasnowgod suggested.

 

[Cirion]

Basic natural carbonic anhydrase inhibitors are the bare bones though. Specifically B1, B3, B5, and biotin basically necessary for normal CO2 levels. High carb intake will necessitate higher doses as well.

You could eat all the carbs in the world but more carbs do not prevent carbs from turning to lactic acid, b-vitamins and other cofactors in the citric acid cycle do. Doesnt matter how relaxed and chill life is, without required cofactors you cant follow through the citric acid cycle properly, decreasing CO2. Then you can always use pharmaceuticals to bump it up more as @tankasnowgod suggested.

I'm still not interested in supplements for the most part. I've already proven to myself that a Vegan diet results in almost normal health for me -- clarity of mind, energy, motivation, no brain fog, well-rested / high morning temps and pulses etc... My best days were low to zero animal protein days, which is why I am all but certain acidity is the answer, not really a lack of B vitamins or any of that. Well, I'll be a little fair and say B vitamins might be some of the trees in the forest, but they're not the forest per-se. That said, I'm absolutely all for nutritious foods that are rich in B vitamins, I just am not a believer in forcefully intaking supplements anymore (Except, perhaps bicarbonate). And I've already proven to myself I can achieve 100% Metabolism (measured by Temp and Pulses) -- this was done while doing a pseudo-Vegan diet (+Supplemental Gelatin). I'm going back on this diet this week because I know it works but this time with added bicarbonate, to further lessen acid loads. If that goes well, I might slowly try to bring back animal protein starting off with 4 oz just to start it off light while keeping bicarbonate high to avoid acidity.

However, at this point, because I'm interested in the truth and not speculation, I did order some pH strips to test my urine and will compare it against the Kopp guidelines to see for sure whether or not I am indeed bicarbonate deficient or not and this will let me know for 100% certainty.

Addressing the carbs point - interestingly I DID find out there is a fall-off of benefit for carbs for me and it seems to be around the 1,000 gram mark. But you absolutely do need lots of carbs when hypothyroid, my opinion will never change at this point, especially based upon what I just plotted earlier today on 2 day rolling avg plot:

A 2 day rolling average of 100 means I scored 100% two days in a row. So there's definitely a sweet spot, of that there's absolutely no debate on now, but the sweet spot is definitely very high for me. And that actually makes sense in the lens of lactic acid. I do agree that it's partly because I waste carbs, no doubt. I am just not convinced that supplements are effective. They never have been before for me. I'm honestly not at all interested in going down the supplement road again. I am convinced I can fix myself almost entirely with the correct dietary changes.

100% metabolic marker, skipping the math, I've defined 100% as 98.6F waking temp and 85 BPM pulse (or better). If I have got 100% before with no supplements, I can and will do it again, and not only do it again, but eventually consistently every day.

 

[TheBeard]

I'm still not interested in supplements for the most part. I've already proven to myself that a Vegan diet results in almost normal health for me -- clarity of mind, energy, motivation, no brain fog, well-rested / high morning temps and pulses etc... My best days were low to zero animal protein days, which is why I am all but certain acidity is the answer, not really a lack of B vitamins or any of that. Well, I'll be a little fair and say B vitamins might be some of the trees in the forest, but they're not the forest per-se. That said, I'm absolutely all for nutritious foods that are rich in B vitamins, I just am not a believer in forcefully intaking supplements anymore (Except, perhaps bicarbonate). And I've already proven to myself I can achieve 100% Metabolism (measured by Temp and Pulses) -- this was done while doing a pseudo-Vegan diet (+Supplemental Gelatin). I'm going back on this diet this week because I know it works but this time with added bicarbonate, to further lessen acid loads. If that goes well, I might slowly try to bring back animal protein starting off with 4 oz just to start it off light while keeping bicarbonate high to avoid acidity.

However, at this point, because I'm interested in the truth and not speculation, I did order some pH strips to test my urine and will compare it against the Kopp guidelines to see for sure whether or not I am indeed bicarbonate deficient or not and this will let me know for 100% certainty.

Addressing the carbs point - interestingly I DID find out there is a fall-off of benefit for carbs for me and it seems to be around the 1,000 gram mark. But you absolutely do need lots of carbs when hypothyroid, my opinion will never change at this point, especially based upon what I just plotted earlier today on 2 day rolling avg plot:

View attachment 13945

A 2 day rolling average of 100 means I scored 100% two days in a row. So there's definitely a sweet spot, of that there's absolutely no debate on now, but the sweet spot is definitely very high for me. And that actually makes sense in the lens of lactic acid. I do agree that it's partly because I waste carbs, no doubt. I am just not convinced that supplements are effective. They never have been before for me. I'm honestly not at all interested in going down the supplement road again. I am convinced I can fix myself almost entirely with the correct dietary changes.

100% metabolic marker, skipping the math, I've defined 100% as 98.6F waking temp and 85 BPM pulse (or better). If I have got 100% before with no supplements, I can and will do it again, and not only do it again, but eventually consistently every day.

I’ve noticed that when I’m having my animal products raw (uncooked meat, uncooked eggs, raw milk), I don’t feel acidic at all, my muscles don’t burn, and my gout subsides.

I also don’t have the brain fog associated with cooked meat.

Have you tried?

 

[Rand56]

I'm going back on this diet this week

You keep changing your diet faster than Bill Clinton can catch his next ride on the Lolita Express, lol. Mainly joking here, and I hope you find your ideal diet for yourself.

 

[Cirion]

You keep changing your diet faster than Bill Clinton can catch his next ride on the Lolita Express, lol. Mainly joking here, and I hope you find your ideal diet for yourself.

Haha, you're not necessarily wrong, but it's actually worked in my favor, because now I have a massive and diverse dataset that I've kept full track of. And I have data on both extremes (like for example that carbohydrate plot). This was the only way to find my truly optimal point.

 

[Cirion]

I’ve noticed that when I’m having my animal products raw (uncooked meat, uncooked eggs, raw milk), I don’t feel acidic at all, my muscles don’t burn, and my gout subsides.

I also don’t have the brain fog associated with cooked meat.

Have you tried?

I eat my meat usually pretty rare but not quite completely raw. I guess I can't get over the fear of food poisoning.

 

[Cirion]

I may have found the perfect evening meal + ritual. Last night I just relaxed in my whirlpool w/ Epsom salts + 2 cups added baking soda to the bath, while eating jello and potatoes for dinner. I have noticed looking at my past data that two things seem consistent with days I've done well - potatoes and jello too. Well last night I didn't get out of bed to urinate once, although I did briefly wake up at 12 am, but went back to sleep easily and without getting up. I woke up a little early a few hrs later, measured my body temp, at 98.1F. I didn't have to wake up yet, so I decided to experiment and took 1 tsp of baking soda in a small glass of water, slept for 2 more hrs, when I woke up, body temp 98.4F -> had a morning bowel movement before food, -> 98.8F. Also heart rate was resting at 90 bpm. Perfect. Feeling a lot better this morning too. Once again, always feel better when temps and pulses are on point =) I think my potato and jello dinner will be here to stay now. And prolly also eat while chilling in the whirlpool. Seems like the ultimate anti-stress combo, perfect before bed.

 

[somuch4food]

Baths with epsom salts and/or baking soda seem to have a good therapeutic effect for me as well.

I was seeing them as a chore and a waste of tume before, but they are starting to be a part of a routine. I'm now seeing them as a time investment since I get more done if I feel better.

 

[Cirion]

Baths with epsom salts and/or baking soda seem to have a good therapeutic effect for me as well.

I was seeing them as a chore and a waste of tume before, but they are starting to be a part of a routine. I'm now seeing them as a time investment since I get more done if I feel better.

Agreed. I often use "not enough time to take a bath" as an excuse, but now I realize it's probably a mandatory part of my recovery and like you said, when you feel better, you get more things done in the long run anyway.

It all boils down to stress. Anything you can do to crush stress levels is critical during recovery.

I think avoiding this forum and avoiding TV shows and video games before bed is critical also. I was good last night and shut everything down at 8 pm, earlier than normal.

 

[opson123]

Cirion, how do you make your jello? Or is it store bought?

How much potatoes do you eat? Do you peel them by hand? I remember when I used to eat potatoes a few years ago, peeling them was such a chore. I really hated it. It was eventually the reason I switched to rice. Now, if I could, I would probably bake the potatoes in the oven, halve them, eat with a spoon and then ditch the remaining skins.

 

[Cirion]

Cirion, how do you make your jello? Or is it store bought?

How much potatoes do you eat? Do you peel them by hand? I remember when I used to eat potatoes a few years ago, peeling them was such a chore. I really hated it. It was eventually the reason I switched to rice. Now, if I could, I would probably bake the potatoes in the oven, halve them, eat with a spoon and then ditch the reminding skins.

I rarely trust store bought foods. Home made, always for jello. At a minimum needs two ingredients - juice and gelatin. I also like to add either honey, or maple syrup.

I understand the annoyance behind potatoes. I found a solution though. Watch TV while peeling potatoes, it makes it far less mind numbingly boring haha.

Rice is good and I eat white rice every day, but I wouldn't use it as the only starch source, white rice is lacking in nutrition so I just use it as a calorie filler not the main course. It's almost like just pure white sugar, not a bad food, but I wouldn't recommend using it as a bulk calorie source.

 

[YourUniverse]

Your data indicate starch gives lower pulse and temperature though, no?

 

[Cirion]

Your data indicate starch gives lower pulse and temperature though, no?

Ah, yes, a good observation. I was also surprised when I learned that starch is actually helpful.

You are probably referring to I think it was this plot or one like it, a 14 or 28 day average plot.

Unfortunately, a 14/28 day plot sometimes can wash out meaningful information or in some cases even be misleading, if not enough data is collected. So now I look at all my plots (single day, 2/3 day avg, 7,14,28 day avg plots) before coming to conclusions. The 2-3 day avg plots are more meaningful for figuring out how to get the marker to 100%, as I don't have any full 7 day or longer streaks with ideal temps and pulses yet, so the 7+ day plots aren't necessarily extremely informative on that front for now.

Also when I plot vs. Metabolic Marker (combined temps and pulses), it's a lot less conclusive.

When I narrow the timeframe down to 2 days, this paints a totally different picture:

However, I've found that choice of food really matters. Most starches DO indeed lower the metabolism. The only two helpful starches I have found are rice and potatoes. I've tried pasta, bread etc and most of that seems unhelpful.

So these plots imply just increase starch to a given # and profit... Well, that's only half true (and that's one of the reason for all the scatter).

 

[Cirion]

Got my pH strips in... and have to confess the results were not quite what I was expecting. Got a pH of like 8+, which says that at least at the moment of testing, my bicarbonate stores are fine. But also, maybe not. On the website it also says this:

However, a urine-pH of 8,0 may be present from other pathological causes. In cirrhosis of the liver or in urinary tract infections with urea-splitting bacteria the alkalinizing agent is Ammonia. Therefore, in all cases where a urine-pH of 8,0 CANNOT be attributed to the ingestion of bicarbonate the medical diagnosis (and therapy) of its cause and origin is required.

It's quite possibly that I have ammonia, given that ammonia is a by-product of excess protein, and I'm not sure how to determine if that is (or not) the case.

All I know is that protein is definitely troublesome for me, except gelatin, and the only explanation is acidity. At the very least, intaking bicarbonate is not problematic unless you go completely crazy with it, so I still plan to continue that experimentation. But I'll also take some more pH tests at other points of the day to see if it ever dips below 7.5.

I have to keep in mind too that I haven't had animal products in two days.

 

[Cirion]

Starting to feel the hunger crop back up from dropping animal meat and fats, but this time I'm gonna tough it out at least a week to get some solid data, rather than succumb and bring the meat back like I have historically done right away. Already I obtained a new 3-day average near 100% metabolism mark, but I want more data so I need at least 4 more days up there. Today my 3-day averaged metabolism is 98.8%, almost the holy grail 100% # I've been shooting for, hoping tomorrow I can push it to 100%...

I measured my pH after waking up at 5 to use the restroom, and this time it was 7.5 or maybe less so I took a small glass of OJ and put a tsp of baking soda and chugged away. Once again, when I finally got up in the morning, after using the restroom, had 98.6F temp and 90 bpm pulse. Also pH strips measured 8.0, which indicates sufficient bicarbonate--so clearly the tsp of bicarbonate I had earlier did its job. FWIW, I felt an instant surge of libido from that glass of OJ+baking soda at 5, and also had NSFW dreams, so I am confident bicarbonate is helping me. Also, feeling better than yesterday. I am back to using some amino-pro though to keep my concerns of protein deficiency at bay. If all goes well for a week, I'll probably introduce a small (4 oz) amount of meat and see what happens. Even 8 oz seems too much for me, so I won't be doing that yet. I'm thinking if even 4 oz meat doesn't work, my next experiment after THAT would be to try a SMALL amount of milk instead of meat, like say a cup or two, and work my way up from that. Historically when I've had milk in my diet it was a lot, so maybe I can tolerate small portions of it. At the end of the day Ray has been right about almost everything, so I think Milk has gotta be in my optimal diet eventually, just a matter of making it work slowly rather than suddenly drink 8 cups a day.

 

[tankasnowgod]

Got my pH strips in... and have to confess the results were not quite what I was expecting. Got a pH of like 8+, which says that at least at the moment of testing, my bicarbonate stores are fine. But also, maybe not. On the website it also says this:



It's quite possibly that I have ammonia, given that ammonia is a by-product of excess protein, and I'm not sure how to determine if that is (or not) the case.

All I know is that protein is definitely troublesome for me, except gelatin, and the only explanation is acidity. At the very least, intaking bicarbonate is not problematic unless you go completely crazy with it, so I still plan to continue that experimentation. But I'll also take some more pH tests at other points of the day to see if it ever dips below 7.5.

I have to keep in mind too that I haven't had animal products in two days.

For all your fear of "acidosis," you might want to keep in mind that alkalosis can be problematic, too. Especially since your first actual measurement was alkaline.

Milk-Alkali Syndrome

 

[Cirion]

For all your fear of "acidosis," you might want to keep in mind that alkalosis can be problematic, too. Especially since your first actual measurement was alkaline.

Milk-Alkali Syndrome

Not really worried about it tbh. The body is very good at eliminating excess bicarbonate and the range recommended by KOPP is 7.5-8, so even 8 is within the range of acceptability.

The paper you linked involved calcium carbonate, not sodium bicarbonate. Also, my mom anecdotally said calcium carbonate caused her some problems also. Sodium bicarbonate, on the other hand, seems very safe, as long as you don't go completely crazy with the dosage, as the body can clear any excess pretty easily. I was taking calcium carbonate briefly, but glad I have since stopped it.

 

[andrei]

@Cirion hello! Ive been reading your thread here and i must say i relate to so many things.
I believe im in a fairly good state (very lean, quite energetic) but have suffered a downfall in health two years ago as well. Im in my mid twenties.

I am spot on with you on animal foods and veganism. I am a vegan and eat mostly potatoes because they have good protein. Some fruits and honey on top of that and almost no fat. Such eating gives me mental clarity and good vibes/mood. If i try some meat, i sleep poorly and all day is trash.

I tried bcaa with meat and it did not help. However I want to mention that this is happening now during the summer. I.e. durring summer (aroubd 35 degrees celsius) i cannot tolerate meat; nor do i have the appetite for it. Can you think of an explanation for that?

 

[Cirion]

Just for fun. Made up yet another new parameter. It's not only a function of temps, pulses, but also weight loss. 100% is defined at 98.6F temp, 85 BPM pulse rate, AND either weight neutral or weight lost. I have dubbed it "Metabolic Wt. Marker". To ensure the resulting numbers are sensible, and knowing that temps and pulses range from 70-100%, I made it so weight gain = 70% and weight loss = 100%.

Example: 98.3F temp, 70 bpm pulse and some weight gain = 90%*82%*70% = 52%

Adding in the weight loss/weight gain really didn't change anything, which is always nice to see and helps me build further confidence in my approach.

 

[Cirion]

@Cirion hello! Ive been reading your thread here and i must say i relate to so many things.
I believe im in a fairly good state (very lean, quite energetic) but have suffered a downfall in health two years ago as well. Im in my mid twenties.

I am spot on with you on animal foods and veganism. I am a vegan and eat mostly potatoes because they have good protein. Some fruits and honey on top of that and almost no fat. Such eating gives me mental clarity and good vibes/mood. If i try some meat, i sleep poorly and all day is trash.

I tried bcaa with meat and it did not help. However I want to mention that this is happening now during the summer. I.e. durring summer (aroubd 35 degrees celsius) i cannot tolerate meat; nor do i have the appetite for it. Can you think of an explanation for that?

Yeah potatoes seem to hold some magical properties. They are one of the constantly re-occurring foods on days I do well.

I also have tried bcaa, amino pro etc with meat and it doesn't seem to really help in the long run for me either. No idea why I have seemingly low protein tolerance. I haven't tried raw meat yet though. And it's been a while since I tried milk, so I plan to experiment with one or both in a few days once I've proved I can stabilize my temps/pulses using my current foods for more than just 2-3 days in a row (Will be nice to have a fallback diet that works).

Fruit & Sunlight (summer) is probably a good combo, they are probably synergestic and so higher carb/sugar/fruit is likely even more beneficial then.

The only protein I can tolerate at all currently is gelatin. If I don't do well with even just 4 oz of meat or even just 1-2 glass of milk, my only remaining option is probably to increase gelatin intake further, while still supplementing with amino pro.

I suspect though if I finally normalize the temps/pulses that things will slowly start to work better and as long as I slowly introduce milk or meat back in, it just might work. Like just 1 glass of milk for a week, if temps and pulses still good -> Try 2 cups, and so on.