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DiscussionLet's talk about it: The science of itcachexia...wasting

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cachexia...wasting

#1 · September 16, 2025, 4:19 am

One of the Joe's talked about this and I had to look it up. I think it would be a good thing to have a topic about. (wasting due to chronic (mysterious?)) disease. I suppose it is like an adult "failure to thrive"?

I'm in a bit of a hurry, and I can't remember which Joe it was, but if you are reading this Joe, if you would post a bit about your experience with it (perhaps you can cut and paste it from whatever other thread it was, or just summarize) I'd be VERY grateful.

And of course anyone else that would like to contribute their experiences with it.

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#2 · September 16, 2025, 4:26 am

I think weight loss has been mentioned on some VA-overload lists. I can imagine that if your digestion falters and you need the protein to make Retinol Binding Protein to detox from VA overload... and you can't get it properly from digestion... that you will start to utilize your own muscle.

I wonder if this is one of the reasons I've always had a huge appetite for protein. And did HORRIBLY with so-called beneficial fasting.

I don't think I ever had much problem with digesting protein, luckily. The only times I probably had trouble with cachexia was during sickness, fasting or experiments with lower-protein diets such as vegetarianism or veganism.

I wonder if the 95-year old lady on whey protein going 95-miles per hour with her walker (which I talked about on the whey thread) is due to this... I don't thing many people get to age 95 without high levels of VA to deal with... and you deal with it with Protein...

As the Star Man says: Take your protein pills and put your helmet on...

I recently went off of egg for breakfast and I'm starting to feel a bit weaker. Just yesterday I added back an egg per day.

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#3 · September 17, 2025, 12:26 pm

Quote from Joe2 on September 17, 2025, 12:26 pm
What do you eat @lil-chick ?

I ate standard American diet my first 20 years. My Dad had a hamburger joint 2 of those years where I ate 4 hamburgers daily and little else. Those were the least symptomatic and strongest years I can remember. When I went to college that diet turned into high vA standard American diet. Dorm food daily eggs, dairy, pork, salads, and on. Got home from college pretty sick and slammed with poison ivy rashes. In years past before college I landscaped. Waded through poison ivy patches with string trimmer spraying it in all directions with zero symptoms. At college and after I had what I thought were urushiol rashes just walking by poison ivy. Sometimes those rashes hit with 2' of snow.

After college I tried lacto ovo vegetarian. Did it high calorie with plenty fat, protein and carbs for 14 years with a year of vegan sprinkled in. Did well except for problems like horrific boils and infections. Infections put me on antibiotic treadmill. Was raised in a pharma family so was already too antibiotic oriented. At 33 after a year on antibiotics, they stopped working. I was on 3 different oral antibiotics. Infections continued and worsened. Docs at my clinic felt more was better. Knew from family that more meant intravenous antibiotics. Met with Department Chair of Immunology at the university hospital my family attended. He gave me a lesson on allergy, addiction, infection and iatrogenic disease. Got me reading Stuart Levy's "Antibiotic Paradox." He also got me to screen, hire and fire docs the same way we treat contractors in construction industry.

While I was dependent on antibiotics and sleeping 22 hours daily and still infected, one of his students held my hand while I weaned off them for 6 months. When he offered Prozac or Centrum as the next step on my journey, I fired him and sifted through 40 docs. Most did not even bother to try for my business. I found one who had been a ninternist and surgeon at my Mom's hospital. When the Nobel Prize winner discovered correlation between heliobacter and ulcers, she slammed the antibiotics and killed her heliobacter. Ulcers disappeared. Life was good. For six months. Then her digestion stopped. No matter how much nor how high quality, whatever she ate came out the same state it went in. She lost weight fast. Became allergic to everything. Got crazy infections. Went down about a year before she started recovering.

I had similar experience. I was still sleeping 22 hours and went another 6 months like that before my sleep schedule was more normal. I was also eating a ton of food still lacto ovo vegetarian. It stopped digesting and cachexia kicked in. I went through the same as my doc did about 2 years after her. That was why I hired her. That is why we still talk regularly 30 years later. She is intrigued by what I am finding out these last 3 years. Paradigm shift is a bear.

Her most powerful tool has been to experiment and engage me. Whatever either of us run across we read. Until concepts make sense to both of us it is all hype. When I found her I was still lacto ovo vegetarian and supplementing plenty along Weston A Price Foundation lines. My first guess was to blame vegetarian diet. I started eating meat. 3 meals a day with plenty of variety and high quality meat. Lost weight more. Was also reading into and working with Orthomolecular Nutrition. I was trying to micro manage every nutrient to find a deficiency and repair it.

Where we made our first best return on investment is when she analogized my approach to trying to fly a 747 with no previous flight experience. I was wildly flipping switches, pressing buttons, reading instruments and studying aircraft manuals and flight manuals. She knew I flew in college. At some point she repeated my instructors' coaching. Quite often when things go wrong it is best to let go - let the aircraft do what it was designed to do. Let it fly itself. About that time we found books on POWs rescued after war. After WWII many were killed by their docs letting them eat at will. Learned fast to trickle feed. Like giving tiny amounts of water to a man straight out of the desert. If he drinks all he wants, he will die. Trickle the water in. So I started taking a tiny amount of meat in a meat broth a few times a day.

Theory runs that whatever nutrient the pancreas makes enzymes for, the pancreas needs that nutrient to make the enzyme. Proteolytic enzymes require protein to make the enzyme. Prolonged periods without protein eliminates protease production by pancreas. It can not restart proteolytic enzyme production instantly and out of thin air. It need protein to make the enzymes and can only barely handle a tiny amount of protein. Yep, it usually takes protein from tissue to make the needed protein to make the enzyme until enough protein is coming in. So after weeks of trickle feeding protein in broths, volume of protein tolerated gradually increases to where a few ounces of meat feels good again.

Noteworthy that through all these various transitions, symptoms vary wildly and get extreme. Plenty of examples of detox, retox and intox causing problems. Took a few years to regain the 30% of my weight that I lost in those months at 33. After that did 15 years of Zone Diet. 40% carbohydrates, 30% protein, 30% fat. And just enough 3 to 5 times a day. Worked out to be a form of trickle feed. Barry Sears came across the idea researching how aspirin works. Noted that it works through hormone system, mostly with insulin. So he found ways to work insulin systems better through diet with quantities, qualities and timing. After doing well for 15 years with that diet, I improved even more with 12 years of paleo / keto and one meal a day.

I bet I would have gotten worse had I started keto one meal a day during my cachexic year. As it stands I did amazingly better with keto all 12 years until I crashed. Doubt I would have crashed if not for eating WAPF nose to tail all those years.

What do you eat @lil-chick ?

I ate standard American diet my first 20 years. My Dad had a hamburger joint 2 of those years where I ate 4 hamburgers daily and little else. Those were the least symptomatic and strongest years I can remember. When I went to college that diet turned into high vA standard American diet. Dorm food daily eggs, dairy, pork, salads, and on. Got home from college pretty sick and slammed with poison ivy rashes. In years past before college I landscaped. Waded through poison ivy patches with string trimmer spraying it in all directions with zero symptoms. At college and after I had what I thought were urushiol rashes just walking by poison ivy. Sometimes those rashes hit with 2' of snow.

After college I tried lacto ovo vegetarian. Did it high calorie with plenty fat, protein and carbs for 14 years with a year of vegan sprinkled in. Did well except for problems like horrific boils and infections. Infections put me on antibiotic treadmill. Was raised in a pharma family so was already too antibiotic oriented. At 33 after a year on antibiotics, they stopped working. I was on 3 different oral antibiotics. Infections continued and worsened. Docs at my clinic felt more was better. Knew from family that more meant intravenous antibiotics. Met with Department Chair of Immunology at the university hospital my family attended. He gave me a lesson on allergy, addiction, infection and iatrogenic disease. Got me reading Stuart Levy's "Antibiotic Paradox." He also got me to screen, hire and fire docs the same way we treat contractors in construction industry.

While I was dependent on antibiotics and sleeping 22 hours daily and still infected, one of his students held my hand while I weaned off them for 6 months. When he offered Prozac or Centrum as the next step on my journey, I fired him and sifted through 40 docs. Most did not even bother to try for my business. I found one who had been a ninternist and surgeon at my Mom's hospital. When the Nobel Prize winner discovered correlation between heliobacter and ulcers, she slammed the antibiotics and killed her heliobacter. Ulcers disappeared. Life was good. For six months. Then her digestion stopped. No matter how much nor how high quality, whatever she ate came out the same state it went in. She lost weight fast. Became allergic to everything. Got crazy infections. Went down about a year before she started recovering.

I had similar experience. I was still sleeping 22 hours and went another 6 months like that before my sleep schedule was more normal. I was also eating a ton of food still lacto ovo vegetarian. It stopped digesting and cachexia kicked in. I went through the same as my doc did about 2 years after her. That was why I hired her. That is why we still talk regularly 30 years later. She is intrigued by what I am finding out these last 3 years. Paradigm shift is a bear.

Her most powerful tool has been to experiment and engage me. Whatever either of us run across we read. Until concepts make sense to both of us it is all hype. When I found her I was still lacto ovo vegetarian and supplementing plenty along Weston A Price Foundation lines. My first guess was to blame vegetarian diet. I started eating meat. 3 meals a day with plenty of variety and high quality meat. Lost weight more. Was also reading into and working with Orthomolecular Nutrition. I was trying to micro manage every nutrient to find a deficiency and repair it.

Where we made our first best return on investment is when she analogized my approach to trying to fly a 747 with no previous flight experience. I was wildly flipping switches, pressing buttons, reading instruments and studying aircraft manuals and flight manuals. She knew I flew in college. At some point she repeated my instructors' coaching. Quite often when things go wrong it is best to let go - let the aircraft do what it was designed to do. Let it fly itself. About that time we found books on POWs rescued after war. After WWII many were killed by their docs letting them eat at will. Learned fast to trickle feed. Like giving tiny amounts of water to a man straight out of the desert. If he drinks all he wants, he will die. Trickle the water in. So I started taking a tiny amount of meat in a meat broth a few times a day.

Theory runs that whatever nutrient the pancreas makes enzymes for, the pancreas needs that nutrient to make the enzyme. Proteolytic enzymes require protein to make the enzyme. Prolonged periods without protein eliminates protease production by pancreas. It can not restart proteolytic enzyme production instantly and out of thin air. It need protein to make the enzymes and can only barely handle a tiny amount of protein. Yep, it usually takes protein from tissue to make the needed protein to make the enzyme until enough protein is coming in. So after weeks of trickle feeding protein in broths, volume of protein tolerated gradually increases to where a few ounces of meat feels good again.

Noteworthy that through all these various transitions, symptoms vary wildly and get extreme. Plenty of examples of detox, retox and intox causing problems. Took a few years to regain the 30% of my weight that I lost in those months at 33. After that did 15 years of Zone Diet. 40% carbohydrates, 30% protein, 30% fat. And just enough 3 to 5 times a day. Worked out to be a form of trickle feed. Barry Sears came across the idea researching how aspirin works. Noted that it works through hormone system, mostly with insulin. So he found ways to work insulin systems better through diet with quantities, qualities and timing. After doing well for 15 years with that diet, I improved even more with 12 years of paleo / keto and one meal a day.

I bet I would have gotten worse had I started keto one meal a day during my cachexic year. As it stands I did amazingly better with keto all 12 years until I crashed. Doubt I would have crashed if not for eating WAPF nose to tail all those years.

#4 · September 18, 2025, 5:19 am

Thanks @Joe2 for your detailed explanation, I like the idea of trickle re-feeding. It makes a lot of sense.

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#5 · September 18, 2025, 8:01 am

@itsme

Exactly. Where we are coming from it first order of figuring where we can go and how best to get there. And no two people are coming from the same place. So approaches need to differ. Sure there are similarities. There are so many variables and such a broad range of variation that similarities only get us so far. Usually they get us as far as the variable is universal. Like it is a safe bet that we all need to eat. That is a good starting point.

cachexia...wasting

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