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lil chick's log
Thank you Tim and Ian. The point that vitamin A isn't the only bad thing out there makes a lot of sense.
I know people who used to run a fish and chip in the 1970's and they used tallow. They had a system of reuse that was stringently followed, with the tallow quickly marching through the system and then out. The family ate it all the time and grew up strong and healthy.
Why do things have to change lol?
I have occasionally rendered farm tallow for my hubs to deep fry things, and between uses he freezes it. When he gets that thing going, he will deep fry anything. I'm pretty sure he once deep fried an old shoe.
I'm about 7 weeks into the diet and have had my first real hankering for vitamin A foods.
One hankering was for cheese, the other was for a deviled egg.
I've made a lot of pie crusts in these weeks, given that it is BBQ season. I never thought I would say this but gee, coconut oil actually is just as good as butter in my pie crust recipe and lots EASIER
My troubles with VA have come about because most of the foods I love have lots of the stuff - I dearly miss many things, and occasionally try stuff that has given me trouble in the past. A bunch of activated charcoal helps me through these journeys of stupidity.
I also suspect (hope) there will come a time when I will be able to occasionally eat eggs benedict and quiche like I used to - my IBS reactions are getting less severe. Of course, Grant's notion that it's taken a long time to get into the shape I'm in means it'll take a long time to recover, so I will have to be patient - which isn't my strong suit.
As for coconut oil - it is the bomb! (For people who can stomach it - I suspect my dad has a mild allergy to the stuff, as he can detect it in anything.) I use it in deep fryer and it makes the best fries (yes, better than tallow IMO). As far as the cholesterol in tallow is concerned, I completely overlooked that side of things. I'll shift towards all coconut oil in the future....
One: fats (and cheat foods)! Ian, coconut oil IS the bomb, LOL!!! However, I'm not a fan of the idea that cholesterol is bad for us. I just don't find that notion logical. I like to have lots of fats in my diet. This is what I've decided to do with my sudden desire for A foods: I'm considering adding back an egg yolk a day into hubs and I's egg-white omelette. Just an intuition, that if I'm going to have A in my diet, I might as well have some very good A, and my chicken's yolks are right up there, world class.
I personally think that tallow might be better for northern Europeans than coconut oil. Someone here once talked about the disappointment he experienced with coconut oil. Coconut oil became so famous a while back with all these health claims, but then sort of fizzled in real life. My guess is that it is a bit more magical for people with tropical genes! I still find it useful, though!
Two: nose! Sometimes I find that little problems are fixing themselves that I didn't even put on my list of vitamin A problems in my original post. So I add them there when they fix. Today I added "Constantly Running Nose". I find myself spending long hours in the daytime without a tissue! It's liberating!
Three: WAPF! I have something to express here about WAPF. The thread on WAPF details their strengths and weaknesses, so I won't review. I just wanted to say that for me, I think I arrived to WAPF (over a decade ago) already A toxic for years--with Rosacea as the most telling symptom. The WAPF notion of "plenty of VA foods" made my rosacea slowly worse and new mysterious problems were added. Somewhere along the way I lapsed with WAPF because I knew SOMETHING about the WAPF notions were wrong (for me). But I never really knew WHAT was wrong until a few weeks into Grant's ideas.
This is my plea to the WAPF: If you are reading this! You are a great foundation and vitamin A is your Achilles Heel.
I am 2 momths in. I was not trying to loose weight, but my arms, legs, waist and face have slimmed. I have only lost 4 pounds, but was very surprised when I compared today's pic with a pic from just before going low vitamin A. There is always some weight loss for me as summer progresses, but not this rapid or obvious.
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here is a close up view of my eye (the one with surfer's eye) and a bit of my rosacea.
Taken one month ago in june, and today. (I began at the end of May)
If there is progress here is is SLOW. If anything the lesson here is: No use looking in the mirror for progress every 5 seconds. Or, as they say, Patience is a Virgin. 🙂
I suppose I can see that the rosacea is a bit less papular/angry. A bit less of an allergic shiner under the eye. I think that my eye whites went whiter very early on, which would have been good to catch on film, but I didn't take good early pics.
edited to add, I wonder if my eye is deeper into my skull than it was. Less bulging... Now... bulging eyes IS a thing (hyperthyroid, right?) I am a person with high metabolism...
I have lost weight in the face (don't know if bloating or fat).
Edited again to add: I think that would totally explain mood changes... if going lower VA was modulating the thyroid. I've been super lazy! 🙂 pic of thyroid eye disease http://thyroidnosurgery.com/hyperthyroidism/graves-disease-new-hope-for-ted-thyroid-eye-disease/
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So, the left pic is from February, before I ever heard of lowering VA. In February my face should NOT be tan, here in New England. My face SHOULD be tan today in July (right picture). My face was colored orange. I do think my eyes were bulging more then. My face is asymmetrical anyways, but especially the right eye is bulging. Is this related to head pressure? Probably. My head pressure is much better, I would say 80% better.
Edited to add that I feel my rosacea stands out more NOW against the whiter skin. Frustrating!
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I decided to share with you the very worst my face has looked in this process. This was the week I was actually going around and putting towels over mirrors.
Different organs can be affected by vitamin A. The healing crisis is real. Mine just happened to be as clear as the nose on my face.
Early in the process, I went through a lot of itching, but that calmed quite quickly. Then this happened about 5-6 weeks in. Note the swelling. I think swelling is part of healing quite often.
pic 1: detox face in early July
pic 2: face in January before learning about vit A
pic 3: face this week in late July
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You can definitely see the improvement in that last photo! Not nice for you for your face to be affected but useful to have a visible sign of improvement if you know what I mean. It must be encouraging to see the progress.
Thanks for sharing.