THE BEST Of TIMES, THE WORST Of TIMES

[Peata]

This is the best news I've read on the site in a good while. Congrats to you for figuring things out and being well on the road to recovery.

When you used garlic, how much did you take, how many times per day, for how long?

I don't think the bacteria is my problem (or at least to the same degree), but it would be interesting to have the protocol laid out just in case or for others who wander by here.

 

[thebigpeatowski]

Thanks Peata....I was desperate and so was willing to try ANYTHING. My diarrhea would go away for a bit and just when I thought I was done with it, it would start all over again. It got progressively worse with each passing month and I was feeling so defeated and depleted, I knew I had to take severe measures. Given my personal history of antibiotic use, I suspected that what ever sort of microbes I was hosting might be antibiotic resistant. The raw garlic was an easy and cheap way to test my theory. I took several cloves of raw organic garlic (close to 5 grams per dose) and pressed them with a garlic press into a small drinking glass, added a couple oz. of cold water and let it sit for a minimum of 15 minutes to let the enzymes develop. I drank this concoction (including eating the clove bits) three times a day for a week. It was brutal and I don't recommend it unless you are at your wits end. I had gut churning nausea, headaches, swollen lymph glands, itchy ears and fatigue for 4 days. I felt like I was coming down with the flu and thought that surely I had poisoned myself....TMI alert: What came out of me on day four was unlike any diarrhea I had previously experienced...and with that I suddenly felt better than I had in years. My depression lifted, my guts were calm and my stomach was flat. I had a mental clarity that I had not felt in as many years and I KNEW I was cured. Since then my energy has become steadily better with each passing day. No doubt due to my ability to ACTUALLY digest and assimilate nutrients from my food now.

My situation was extreme. I have scoured this website and others looking for someone who has actually had a ruptured appendix AND a long history of antibiotic use, I could find not find any fellow Peatians with similar gut issues. I understand that what I did was not part of a Peat type protocol, which is precisely why I am not recommending it. However, if it can help someone with SIBO or some sort of gut dysbiosis then I certainly want to pay it forward and share my personal experiment/experience.

I truly believe that anyone who struggles with a sluggish thyroid, has used antibiotics, birth control pills or other pharmaceuticals, experienced long term unrelenting stress or poor diet might suffer from a microbial imbalance.....just my two cents :2cents

 

[Katty]

Congratulations! That's great you're feeling better and figured it out.

So Day 4 is when you had the great elimination, but then you kept taking the garlic concoction for 3 more days?

I wonder if flowers of sulfur would have worked too, since garlic has sulfur. Did you ever try flowers of sulfur?

 

[thebigpeatowski]

Thanks Katty! I read about the flowers of sulfur and wanted to try it, but in the end it was easier for me to find raw garlic. I took it three times a day for a week and yes, the turning point was day 4. I guess the enzymes in raw garlic are actually able to dissolve bacterial biofilms and kill pathogenic yeast as well. It was the longest smelliest week of my life and COMPLETELY worth it.

 

[SQu]

Wonderful! So happy for you. Those are such big things!
I was toying with the idea of finishing some leftover antibiotics as I am indeed desperate, though my digestive system is fine. Other things not so much. restless legs, night aches, insomnia, fat gain, mood plummet make me wonder about gut connection.

 

[thebigpeatowski]

Thanks sueq... I wish I had better answers for you, I just don't know enough about gut flora to be absolutely certain of any connection with your specific concerns. I do recall trying soil based probiotics a while back and those seemed to contribute to my insomnia. Also, for me, mood issues are almost always gut related. I guess you could give the antibiotics a try and if you see an improvement then you'll know there is an imbalance of some sort? I was going to try some minocycline, but then my concern was resistant bacteria which is why I ended up choosing something totally different than anything I had ever tried before. Let us know if you decide to try the antibiotics!

 

[thebigpeatowski]

So I have been eating like an absolute pig lately, for weeks actually. My body and brain felt so depleted after the whole chronic diarrhea thing that I have been eating more than usual and especially eating stuff that I wouldn't normally eat or have not had in years.

Things I have noticed from my food escapades:
1) Pork fat from uncured Italian dry salame (you know that giant chub from Costco) makes my skin break out. I ate a bunch of duck liver pate too (with more pork fat), which also made my skin break out. I know I know, it's loaded with PUFA. I haven't had PUFA in any substantial amount for nearly eight months, so then I went on this PUFA bender of sorts and voila! My perfectly clear skin was bumpy and congested. I learnt my lesson and shall not be repeating the pork fat extravaganza.

2) I also noticed that increasing my dietary fat intake (drastically) has brought with it some very mild estrogen symptoms. They aren't extreme, but since they had been absent for months I did take notice and also broke out some Progest-E for the first time since May.

3) I can drink wine again! How bizarre is that? I haven't been able to drink wine in well over a year with out severe migraine-type headaches, like a serious histamine reaction..er something. Used to be even one small glass would trigger it, now I can drink several glasses with no problem whatsoever. I find that truly amazing.

4) Despite all of my crazy food and alcohol shenanigans I have not gained one ounce. This was a worry for me because I think yo-yoing up and down is not healthy at all. First there was the terrifying out of control weight gain followed by crazy life draining diarrhea, I felt like I was on a roller coaster from hell.

Anyways, it's just so nice to finally feel normal and be stable, really for the first time since I started Peating. Life is really good and so I think I might start exercising...well, I can think about it.

 

[Peata]

Thanks for update. Were you tracking your food intakes? If so, I was curious how much fat do you average now that you're eating more?

 

[thebigpeatowski]

Yes, I track the intakes. I am averaging 60 grams of fat per day, some days it is over 100 g. (I ate an ENTIRE wheel of Brie in three days....oops). I just love love love Brie and fresh fruit in the summer. You may recall though I had been trying to keep my fat intake to around 20 grams, so it has tripled. I must say though my hormones definitely feel better when I eat less fat.

I had already added the cheese back in before the pork fat fest, so I knew it was the pork fat specifically causing the skin issues and not the cheese *drops to knees and weeps in profound gratitude to the Dairy Gods*. I also drink whole raw milk because I find the skimmed stuff to be highly unpalatable.

 

[thebigpeatowski]

Time for an update: I experimented with my diet all summer long, spending several weeks at a time eating NO fat, like none at all. Then spending a week eating full fat dairy, then back to no fat for several weeks and finally a few poignant and memorable occasions where I binged on PUFA laden foods.

The results are in: PUFA is really bad sh*t....but you all already knew that. Every single time I ate it without fail, my skin would become instantly greasy and break out, also got oily hair and would experience pronounced estrogen symptoms. Never gonnna do that again.

I feel like posting some pics as a way of documenting progress....which kinda horrifies me actually, because I have been withdrawn for so many years. Things are changing big time for bigpeat and what I am experiencing are permanent health improvements, so I'm hoping that if there is just one person out there struggling with the concept of eating sugar to get healthy, well maybe these will help you along.

Has the internet Low-Carb Dogma put the Fear of Fructose into you? These first two pics were taken when I was about 5 months into Peating, when everyone around me was doubting my new diet plan and are absolute "proof" that sugar is EVIL.....except that pic 3 is the LONG-TERM result of adding massive carbohydrates into my diet along with severe PUFA restriction.

The first and second pics were taken at the height of my weight gain/acne/depression. I was NOT handling sugar at all. It was hard for me to take this pics, even harder to post them. The final pic is me, taken a week ago with my girlfriend. I just got back from Mexico and so I'm the tan one! Feeling MUCH MUCH MUCH better....words cannot describe how much better I feel. Did I mention that I'm feeling better than EVER?

 

[charlie]

Wow freaking wow! Incredible!

 

[charlie]

Hey guys, imagine if all the females of the world were doing the Peatian ways.

 

[Blossom]

Thanks BP for sharing that! You are truly glowing with health and it's so awesome and inspiring to see your progression visually. I admire your willingness to share.

 

[thebigpeatowski]

Thanks you guys...I am continually blown away by the concept of eating sugar to achieve health, truly blows my mind still. My step-father is a diabetic and he and my mother were chiding me the other day for drinking so much orange juice, saying that they had heard that fructose and OJ in particular was the worst thing for blood sugar control. Hmmm, I beg to differ. If they had any idea how much sugar I eat they would be horrified.


I recently attended my 30th high school reunion and it became very apparent that not all my school pals were aging gracefully and several (too many) have died....DIED.

Some folks still looked awesome, unchanged by time. However there were many that I did not recognize at all and it was sort of embarrassing trying to read their name tag on the sly cuz I had NO idea who was talking to me.

My list of health improvements is long and growing with each passing day, but taking pictures, while very difficult for me to do, was important so that I could try to spot the changes. I can see in the first pic, that my eyebrows are thin, the outer third was nearly missing back then. Those have since filled in like cra cra crazy! Yeah I have to practice brow management now, lol. Obviously my skin is waaaay better. I think I look less puffy too, holding much less water, edema, er whatever. My teeth are no longer sensitive and my gums never bleed. I am consistently warmer, it feels so good to be nice and toasty. But perhaps one of the most important improvements is that I am far more social, have much less anxiety and am not so scared of new situations, that's cool.

I'm liking the idea of being able to roll back the hands of time, I fully expect to be an infant in four years.... I'm certainly immature enough.

 

[Blossom]

I love the phrase 'roll back the hands of time'! That's exactly what I feel this approach has done for me as well. I used to have this thin, sagging, loose skin that was especially noticeable to me in the bend of my arm. Early on it started improving but just last night I realized it is completely better. No matter what position my arm is in the skin is firm and elastic. Now when I pinch my skin it immediately pops back with no delay. It may seem small or unimportant to many people but to me it's a major indicator of healing. Most people don't think it's possible to turn back the hands of time but for me personally (and it seems for you too!) it most certainly has happened. Congratulations again, maybe I'll post a photographic healing journey too! You've inspired me.

 

[thebigpeatowski]

Yes yes yes....I know exactly what you're talking about Blossom, I have the much dreaded loose arm skin. It'll be interesting to see if that corrects itself too, especially because I have been so overweight....running to take a picture of my arms for next year's Progress Pics.

Stay tuned for Part Two of: Rollback & Renewal with Ray Peat

Bushy eyebrows are a sign of youthful vigor, no really.

 

[Jennifer]

Awe...I had bushyish eyebrows when I was younger, but I plucked those suckers. And if the hands of time even thinks about filling them in, she's losing her hands.

So tbigp., it looks like you have the Benjamin Button gene too, huh? Be careful now! You know what happens after the infancy stage.

On a serious note, do you think the raw garlic really set things in motion or did you see the most improvement from doing the fat-free high sugar experiment? Or both?

 

[thebigpeatowski]

I HAD to do the raw garlic thing, I really had no choice. My gut dysbiosis was getting progressively worse and not being able to digest food properly meant I was becoming increasingly malnourished. I was caught in a vicious downward spiral: if you can't get nutrients you can't improve metabolism. If you can't improve metabolism you can't fight gut imbalance. I was forced to take desperate measures for sure, but once things stabilized I knew I could eat really dense nutrition and ONLY then did I attempt to get some fat off of my body.

The excess body fat was certainly adding to my misery, but I had NO idea how profound the difference would be. I had no clue that going totally fat free with massive amounts of sugar would bring about the radical change in body composition. It was a total experiment on my part, but I was friggin diabetic at that point and utterly a mess....physically, emotionally, hormonally, a true mess.

Looking back, I can't believe actually did it. I mean who eats mountains of sugar and fruit juice when they are diabetic? Overweight? And massively insulin resistant? Well, I knew Low-carbing wasn't gonna work cuz that is precisely what got me into that mess. I read and re-read everything Peat said about sugar and metabolism and diabetes and dove in...a leap of faith for sure, but a delicious one too. I have always had a sweet tooth and loved fruit since I was very small. People who shun fruit and fructose are NUTS, I say...I was one of them.

So to answer your question, I could not have done one without the other. I had tried "dieting" with gut dysbiosis, it doesn't work at all. My temps would plummet every single time. I had to have the gut functioning first in order to be able have the nutrients and ability burn sugar. I had to be able to eat TONS of sugar to raise metabolism and counter any stress from dieting. I will never forget the first time I pulled the glucose meter out after having shoved it into a drawer in disgust months earlier. I tested my blood an hour or so after a HUGE amount of OJ and was shocked. Retested again the next day fasting, my numbers were perfect. Huh, I guess RP knows what he's talking about.

PLEASE UNDERSTAND THIS: I am NOT recommending that people take risks with their health like I did. This was carried out due to my own uniquely twisted set of circumstances AND I also happen to enjoy pushing RP's theories to the limit, cuz I'm weird that way.

And you Jennifer AT 110 lbs, are not carrying any extra weight AT ALL, so please please please don't go low/no fat. I mean, how much PUFA could you possibly have? You are young too, so prolly not much has accumulated.

My extreme experiments would only be appropriate for people with severe gut flora problems AND lots of excess body fat and who are also suffering from hormonal imbalance due to these issues....and even then it may not be a good idea, although I have no regrets at all.

 

[Jennifer]

Oh no, no! I'm sorry, tbigp.! I wasn't asking so I could lose weight, but I really appreciate your kind words of concern for my health. I actually wasn't thinking about your weight at all when I said "improvement." Sorry, I should have been more specific.

I was thinking how you've mentioned being able to have dairy and formerly intolerable foods again and how your skin improved after doing raw garlic. I wanted to know if you felt it was still the raw garlic that helped the most or if it was your diet that gives you good digestive function, which like you noted, improves the rest of the bodies functions.

I'm suffering with my gut and this weird itchy rash/hives that I haven't been able to get rid of ever since coming of the fruitarian diet. That's over 6 years now of dealing with this. My lower intestines are in pain day and night now and the brain fog is so unnerving. And of course, because of the gut problems, I can't get my progesterone level to stay up without progest-e supplementation.

like I've mentioned before, I've contemplated doing the raw garlic like you did. I was told last week by my doctor that she's now positive that I have a fungal infection based on my reaction to antibiotic treatment. I've tried every other natural therapy in an attempt to kill the infection, except for the raw garlic. The others didn't work and so my doctor prescribed me anti-fungal drugs, but I'm scared to take them and make things worse. Right now, all I can have is dairy and white sugar or else I get major diarrhea, acid reflux and the lower intestinal pain gets even worse.

Again, sorry for the confusion and thanks for your concern. :)

 

[thebigpeatowski]

Oh, okay...LOL...I didn't think you wanted to lose weight, but just wanted to be sure. My next thought was that you were asking about the no fat experiment in regards to it lowering stored PUFA and perhaps were considering it for that. Thank goodness you aren't!!! Alright, so nevermind.

I think the No Fat Experiment helped me raise my metabolism faster than I was previously able to accomplish. Perhaps by depleting PUFA or perhaps by reducing estrogen...or both, who knows? It seemed like I was fighting a cyclical battle every month with estrogen. Even tho I no longer had the awful periods and murderous PMS, I still felt like estrogen was causing me brain issues, serious liver issues and hampering my metabolism for sure. I was doing all the things to lower my estrogen and the only thing left was to try to get the fat cells down.

Both the garlic (by reducing the bacterial/fungal load) and the no fat diet (by reducing bile maybe? I dunno) helped my liver TREMENDOUSLY. While I used to eat tons of fat in my previous diet, giving my body a break from digesting it seemed almost intuitive....eating too much fat was making me feel lethargic and generally sh*tty. Eating A LOT more protein and sugar made me feel energized. All of this combined made the liver pain go away and then I think my poor old estrogen soaked liver was able to do it's MANY jobs better. There were days when I was ravenous and craving fat so went with it and ate A LOT more (like a whole wheel of Brie). Then I would return to the no fat diet and felt better every time, I really don't know WHY. I'm just guessing at all of this. It was a fun an experiment and I would do it again because I felt better almost immediately. The few times that I binged on PUFA the hormonal/metabolic/skin/mood effects were quickly noticeable...much more pronounced in a severely fat restricted diet.

Poor digestion makes everything more difficult, that seems to be universal. How to improve digestion is uniquely individual. If you know that you have a fungal infection and tried anti-fungals with no luck, then I say go for the garlic. It is not pleasant at all, but it won't hurt your liver. If you choose to do it, please don't quit early, give it the full week...and eat plenty of it. The enzymes in raw organic garlic can break up the protective biofilms, something antibiotics and anti-fungals can't do.

I went through multiple rounds of Diflucan with my doctor, that particular drug is VERY hard on the liver, prolly not the smartest thing I've done. I haven't found my doctors to be helpful in this area at all. And I HATE to give non-Peatish advice, but I know how you feel so try the effin garlic....and give it your all...and report back!!!

BOTH of my slightly unPeatish experiments contributed to better digestion and ultimately better metabolism, each in their own way. Hopefully things will keep rolling along as we move into Fall and Winter....busting out the Red Light TODAY.