Quote from rockarolla on March 8, 2021, 11:26 am

Pretty much daily:

rice

meat - either beef, chicken, fish, turkey, etc

olive oil

Occasional

apple 

nuts

apple juice

banana

beans

cucumber

celery

green beans

dark chocolate

If you suspect a low immune function I'd drop everything except meat, clean starches and moderate amounts of saturate fats.

also all fish is loaded with: vitamin D (secosteroid hormone) mercury(known toxin = unproductive inflammation) and PUFA(immune suppressant up to inducing cancer: https://ggenereux.blog/discussion/topic/dark-side-of-polyunsaturated-fatty-acids-pufas/).

how can you get along with olive oil - it tastes like trash and its fatty acid composition sucks.

 

 

 

 

Quote from Mattia on March 8, 2021, 12:34 pm

Quote from leap7 on March 8, 2021, 1:56 am

Major update here. 

Hi @leap7 thank you for the update. I also stopped the low VA diet. I have surely detoxed in the beginning and I am happy that I have done this diet but now I eat as much oranges and tomato sauce as I want.

I have been sick and I am still struggling. VA isn't my issue for sure. I would suggest you to take your health very seriously and to contact a biological or functional medicine doctor. I have found one in Switzerland. She has been the only one able to help me. Without her I would probably be dead no kidding.

I also have enlarged lymph nodes and they are caused by two chronic infections in my case.

Suicidal toughts could be caused by metal toxicity.

Let us know how you are dooing.

Btw I am also 21 ;).

Quote from Sussan on March 8, 2021, 3:57 pm

I haven't read through your entire log but I do have a little insight that might help on the jaw tenseness.  I think there is a label for the locking up of the jaw(TMJ).  Some people recommend mouth guards.   I have had a jaw problem for some time.  But it eased up about 7 months ago.  I started doing face exercises.  It really helped.  Now when I accidently yawn without paying attention my jaw doesn't lock up and then I can't close it.  That is really freaky!  I do the exercises daily or else it comes back.  Maybe your jaw problems are different but thought I would share what I did.  I also noticed before I ever did the exercises that my jaw was tense when lying down to try to sleep. 

Quote from Sussan on March 8, 2021, 4:09 pm

I used Carole Maggio book "Facercise".  Just for your information.  There are a bunch of editions. Any will work. 

Quote from leap7 on March 12, 2021, 12:51 am

Thank you all for your replies! I was expecting a lot more criticism but was pleasantly surprised and relieved. There are some lovely people on this forum. 

@rich I have thought PCOS too. I've taken eggshell calcium but started thinking it caused some internal bruising on my hands, maybe because it started to affect my blood pressure? Not sure. I think I am getting adequate salt - I salt my food to taste. 

@sussan I occasionally wear a mouth guard, and I think it helps some. I've also tried facercise in the past and hadn't really noticed anything from it, but now that I actually have TMJ it might be worth trying out. 

Quote from leap7 on March 12, 2021, 1:02 am

So I've been experimenting more with my diet these past two weeks or so. I do have to say that when opening up my diet a bit more, I experience more spaciness in my brain. I kind of lose my ambition and drive to achieve. Maybe this is because I'm running on stress hormones on the low VA diet? Or va is actually affecting my brain/hormones? I'm not sure. 

Things I have been experimenting with:

dairy - milk, butter

orange juice

leafy greens - chard

eggs

watermelon 

I've noticed that when including dairy proteins, my body feels stiffer when exercising, specifically my back. Also, my eyes have actually started to feel uncomfortably dry. This starts very soon after consuming foods high in va. I remember mentioning that my eyes stopped feeling uncomfortable very soon after starting the low va diet. Even when looking at computer screens the whole day my eyes would feel fine. In the past, on the RP diet, my eyes would feel uncomfortable after spending a lot of time on screens - but never to the point that it was debilitating.  However, now that it's back it feels quite annoying. 

I'm a bit scared to go back to the low va detox diet as I was doing it, because of that recent barrage of symptoms that I experienced. However, after opening up my diet a bit, I kind of want to try again. I'm thinking I will try a version with less meat. Perhaps limiting meat consumption to only one portion per day. I think I was consuming more meat than usual when my symptoms appeared. 

Quote from somuch4food on March 12, 2021, 7:19 am

For me, lutein seems to be the killer in terms of drive. Chard, eggs and orange juice are sources of lutein in what you listed. 

You can use this link to look up the lutein content of foods: https://tools.myfooddata.com/nutrient-ranking-tool/Lutein-Zeaxanthin/All/Highest/Household/Common/No

 

Quote from Orion on March 12, 2021, 9:26 am

@leap7  Thanks for keeping us updated.    I think you would be running on stress hormones, only if in low cal, or under a high stress load, and I think you mentioned adequate calories.    Other option would be to test serum VA, it is not a great indicator, but might help you with the decision to continue or keep experiment with a higher VA diet.   Did you test for VA in the past?

Quote from salt on March 12, 2021, 11:51 am

Quote from leap7 on March 12, 2021, 1:02 am

So I've been experimenting more with my diet these past two weeks or so. I do have to say that when opening up my diet a bit more, I experience more spaciness in my brain. I kind of lose my ambition and drive to achieve. Maybe this is because I'm running on stress hormones on the low VA diet? Or va is actually affecting my brain/hormones? I'm not sure. 

Things I have been experimenting with:

dairy - milk, butter

orange juice

leafy greens - chard

eggs

watermelon 

I've noticed that when including dairy proteins, my body feels stiffer when exercising, specifically my back. Also, my eyes have actually started to feel uncomfortably dry. This starts very soon after consuming foods high in va. I remember mentioning that my eyes stopped feeling uncomfortable very soon after starting the low va diet. Even when looking at computer screens the whole day my eyes would feel fine. In the past, on the RP diet, my eyes would feel uncomfortable after spending a lot of time on screens - but never to the point that it was debilitating.  However, now that it's back it feels quite annoying. 

I'm a bit scared to go back to the low va detox diet as I was doing it, because of that recent barrage of symptoms that I experienced. However, after opening up my diet a bit, I kind of want to try again. I'm thinking I will try a version with less meat. Perhaps limiting meat consumption to only one portion per day. I think I was consuming more meat than usual when my symptoms appeared. 

You're poisoning yourself with VA all over again. The symptoms you mentioned are typical VA toxicity symptoms.

Regarding stress hormones, in my experience, VA is the worst dietary stress trigger of them all. It's worse than PUFA, calcium deficiency, being in a state of ketosis, and all the other things Ray Peat talks about (although those concerns are also valid).

Some of the symptoms you described in your post about why you quit the low VA diet, like ridged thin nails, sound like hypothyroidism to me. Some things that might be worth considering, if you chose to go back on a low VA diet, would be to keep a good calcium/phosphate ratio (only low VA food source is eggshells), lowering your heme iron intake, not consuming beans etc.

Some of the symptoms are certainly concerning, like missing periods, but I don't know much about those things. Other rhings, like the warts, and other skin oddities, sound like VA detox symptoms. I've had all kinds of things going on with my skin. I think a lot of VA is detoxified through the lymph system, out with sweat through the skin (just like other toxins). It's a good idea to change bed sheets often. 

Looking more closely at your low VA diet I have some things to say about that as well. Personally, rice makes me feel very depressed and it makes me have mood swings if I eat it as a staple. If I have a meal with rice every now and then, maybe once a week, I feel fine. But if I eat it two meals in a row, or two portions, or something like this, it makes me depressed. Other low VA starches such as potatoes, cassava, white wheat, and white corn, do not have this effect on me. Green beans and celery are not low VA foods, as a general rule everything that is green usually has plenty of carotenoids. Regular beans are totally fine as far as VA goes, but if you have concerns about thyroid function, stress hormones, and such things, they are probably best left out. 

I don't know much about TMJ but I suspect it could be caused by a mineral deficiency, for example, a calcium deficiency.

Is it really VA detox? Who knows, but at least for me VA causes more problems than all other problematic food components, put together. And the longer I stick to avoiding it, the better of I feel, although there are bumps on the road because restricive dieting is problematic and it takes time to figure out what exactly works for you. Personally I think I'm finally done with experimenting with reintroducing VA foods. I reintroduced VA during a ketosis diet experiment and now it's like 3 weeks later of strict no VA and now I'm finally starting to feel like I did before I had all that cheese, at least kind of. I figured that maybe when being in ketosis, retinol would be more resistant to being randomly and improperly oxidized. But that didn't seem to be the case. Or maybe it was the case, because I did seem a little bit more robust than with other exposures, but it was still as much of a horrible toxin as ever.