Quote from lil chick on October 2, 2019, 6:58 am

In reading about acanthosis nigricans I read the word velvety and it kind of rang a bell somehow.  Not that my rosacea is always velvety really (pustules happen) but there is a texture to it, a thickening of the skin.  And a darkening.  I'm gonna try to capture it with the camera and post it in "lil chick's log".  It follows a line around my eye socket.   I actually think this thickening is lessening, and I've mentioned that on my log.

Quote from tim on October 5, 2019, 7:07 pm

Quote from Sarabeth on August 13, 2019, 11:47 pm

I guess I forgot to mention what we're eating. As per Garrett Smith, our particular diet includes the following (we've been gluten-free for ten years (!!), but I sure am thinking about trialing homemade wheat sourdough bread someday soon...)

Beef, chicken, turkey, lamb

White rice, Brown rice (only in homemade sourdough), tapioca, arrowroot, white peeled potatoes (this is only as of three days ago - we hadn't eaten any nightshades for the last two years)

Egg whites

Cauliflower, celery, cucumber (peeled), white onion, white garlic, green cabbage, mushrooms of all kinds, iceberg lettuce, green/globe/French artichoke

Parsnips, turnips, radishes, horseradish, rutabagas

Dates, apples, pears, grapes, bananas, lemons, limes, black fig, cherries, elderberry, raspberry, blackberry, black current, prickly pear fruit, blueberry, strawberry, pomegranates, white peaches, white nectarines.

Brazil nuts, pecans, walnuts, macadamias, pine nuts, chestnuts

lighter honey

Butter and ghee in small amounts

Refined coconut and avocado oils, and white tallow when we can get it

Peppercorns, rosemary, mustard, turmeric, dill, peppermint, celery seed, Ceylon cinnamon, coriander seed, cumin, ginger, vanilla, miso, tamari, capers

--What I keep wondering: where are we getting calcium?? I have made broths etc. from bones for the past ten years, but never felt like this was a good source of calcium, and now we aren't even eating leafy greens. What will happen to our bones and teeth?!

Thanks again for reading,

Sarabeth

Cauliflower, cabbage, turnip, radish, horseradish and rutabagas are all crucifers and all contain cyanogenic glycosides making them all goitrogenic.

I personally restrict my consumption of this plant family to small amounts of sauerkraut and some mustard once in a while.

I believe that dairy consumption may have been an adaptation made by humans to prevent goiter in inland areas due to it being a source of iodine. I avoid all dairy so I ensure I consume regular seafood in my diet, some seafood is low VA anyway. Seafood supplies DHA, selenium and other trace minerals too. Butterfat contains high levels of VA and doesn't belong on a low VA diet IMO, tallow and lard are good though and supply healthy fats and Vitamin K2.

With regard to calcium, phytic acid and oxalic acid will reduce absorption so minimizing whole grains, nuts and greens is possibly going to increase absorption. I'm not sure that calcium is really something to worry about but one can always chew on the ends of chicken bones if one is eating chicken (me) on a low VA diet.

Your diet does not include seafood or eggs so is devoid of iodine and DHA. Even if you are using iodized salt (I really hope you are) you are not getting any DHA. Seafood is the only reliable source of selenium a lot of the time as well. The best seafood for low VA dieters is calamari and scallops, both of which are very low in mercury and VA.

Quote from Sarabeth on October 5, 2019, 9:28 pm

Thank you - these are very thought-provoking thoughts!

Giant diet shifts every two to three years have the effect on my brain of making me first doubt EVERYTHING about how I was eating before, followed by doubting EVERYTHING I'm eating/feeding my family now, followed by me feeling that Now I Must Optimize and Balance Everything Perfectly, followed by...getting into a pattern and just hoping for the best, since by now my intuition has been dislodged from any possible connection with a Cuisine..

Anyway - I'm right now in the slightly paranoid Trying To Balance Everything stage.

I don't totally know what to think about goitrogens, and after reading Chris Kresser's handy thyroid infographic this past summer, I had kind of filed away my concern. After reading your comment, Tim, and realizing that now we're eating a whole lot more crucifers, I went and took another look:

"Steaming crucifers until fully cooked reduces goitrogens by two-thirds.

"Boiling crucifers for 30 minutes destroys 90 percent of the goitrogens.

"While fermenting actually increases the goitrogen content of cabbage, it simultaneously decreases the level of nitriles..."

He seems to say that kale and collards are highest, but I don't know where the cauli/cabbages fall in with this. It also strikes me that if I eliminate all crucifers and high-oxalate vegges, there are almost no plants left on the low A list anymore. Which makes things feel pretty darn restrictive, especially for growing kids...so I don't know what to think.

We used to eat a lot of fish and seaweed, so as of today I put iodized salt on my shopping list. Selenium is tricky because, as you mentioned, so many soils are deficient (as are many Brazil nuts, depending on where they are grown, I've read!).

It's tricky to understand what's important. Calcium is one of those nutrients that I USED to think we need in large amounts. Maybe it's not. Selenium I take as part of my Walsh protocol, and so do three of my kids. But I'm worried about taking too much! And am not sure what to do once we wean off the supps, if we are successful at doing so.

I thought that dairy was only a good source of iodine because iodine is used to clean the milking equipment? If this is true, then it still doesn't make sense why people eat it...except that it tastes so good! 🙂

I'm confused why Garrett Smith says that butter is okay, up to 2 tbsp per day. And I've heard some chatter about other compounds in butter helping the body to detoxify A. I'm also confused because I understood lard to be the issue, according to Grant's logic, with the original 1920s "Vitamin A Free" rat diets that weren't actually low-vitamin-a at all. Doesn't lard/pork have vitamin A?

My kids in general do NOT prefer seafood, even if I could find anywhere to buy calamari and scallops that didn't have TSP etc. in them. I have this crazy hope that someday, I can trust that their taste preferences are ACTUALLY to be trusted! When my four-year-old skips her meat but wants an apple, and my 15-year-old refuses to eat liver, and my 12-year-old does NOT want fish but can eat a half-pound of hamburger in a sitting, and my 7-year-old would like a snack in between meals...maybe it's because their bodies know what they need? I just don't know.

I have many times in the past experimented with "free choice" eating for months at a time, to see if my kids would gravitate toward a balanced diet. They never have (within the GAPS diet, nor a more starchy Jaminet-style diet, nor with a low-Lectin high-veggie diet a la Gundry), and indeed we struggled with so many behavioral issues connected with (not) eating (and refusing to eat anything at all). The Vitamin A theory is the first time that something has come along as a theory to connect the dots concerning the eating disorders in my family (even my husband suffers from a "hidden" appetite, that he says makes him feel like his hunger is "masked").

It's tiring to question everything all the time, but I would LOVE to have a list of foods that feels balanced and also to have my kids eating enough so that it's fine to let them choose what they do and don't want to eat at each meal. We're really close. This current diet is the first time that all my kids are happy with our food! My most eating-disordered child is eating a lot at almost every meal now - doesn't love parsnips, but otherwise eating so so so much more. 🙂

Thanks again for sharing thoughts - it really keeps me going to know that others are out there experimenting on the same quest!

Sarabeth

Quote from Sarabeth on October 5, 2019, 9:30 pm

Oops, sorry, the Thyroid Infographic: https://chriskresser.com/heres-what-you-should-know-about-goitrogenic-foods-and-thyroid-health/

Quote from tim on October 5, 2019, 11:47 pm

Hi Sarabeth,

This page has the amounts in different cruciferous vegetables: https://lpi.oregonstate.edu/mic/dietary-factors/phytochemicals/isothiocyanates#food-sources

I think most kids generally hate cruciferous veges? I think some of them became popular in northern europe as a way to prevent scurvy, not much else was available in winter that contained Vitamin C. I won't eat turnips, swedes, brussels sprouts or kale and I don't blame children for refusing to eat these plants as well.

These days there are more acceptable ways of getting Vitamin C in the diet. On a low VA diet, potatoes and apples can supply most of it. It is unlikely we need as much Vitamin C for good health as the RDA outlines anyway.

The only vegetables I usually consume are potato (limited amounts) and small amounts of sauerkraut, iceberg lettuce, onion, sweet corn and pickled gherkins. There is no need to eat servings of vegetables like cooked cabbage in my opinion. If Vitamin K1 is a concern then herbs (and some vege oils) supply plenty.

Quote from tim on October 6, 2019, 4:22 am

Also, all the measurements I've seen for retinol in tallow and lard are much lower than for butter and are non significant. For example: https://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/pork-products/7358/2

Chicken fat has more, I still eat chicken wings etc and am still low VA however I wouldn't use chicken fat to cook with.

As for pig fat being potentially high in retinoic acid, it isn't because raw bacon doesn't contain a lot of retinol to start with. When you heat foods that contain retinol then some of that retinol will likely convert to retinoic acid. This applies to all foods containing retinol meaning that ghee, cooked cheese/butter and cooked liver will contain the most retinoic acid compared with other foods (assuming similar cooking times and temperatures).

 

Quote from Neilky on October 7, 2019, 4:46 am

Quote from tim on October 6, 2019, 4:22 am

Also, all the measurements I've seen for retinol in tallow and lard are much lower than for butter and are non significant. For example: https://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/pork-products/7358/2

Chicken fat has more, I still eat chicken wings etc and am still low VA however I wouldn't use chicken fat to cook with.

As for pig fat being potentially high in retinoic acid, it isn't because raw bacon doesn't contain a lot of retinol to start with. When you heat foods that contain retinol then some of that retinol will likely convert to retinoic acid. This applies to all foods containing retinol meaning that ghee, cooked cheese/butter and cooked liver will contain the most retinoic acid compared with other foods (assuming similar cooking times and temperatures).

 

I'd love to get bacon back into my diet! However, if I were to eat a large helping of pork bellies, within half an hour my vision will become blurry. I wonder if that is retinol being mobilised from the liver because of the fat? You have a good point unless the quoted VA content of bacon is wrong. Pig VA content will probably be affected by what it has eaten and therefore be highly variable.

Quote from tim on October 7, 2019, 3:41 pm

Quote from Neilky on October 7, 2019, 4:46 am

I'd love to get bacon back into my diet! However, if I were to eat a large helping of pork bellies, within half an hour my vision will become blurry. I wonder if that is retinol being mobilised from the liver because of the fat? You have a good point unless the quoted VA content of bacon is wrong. Pig VA content will probably be affected by what it has eaten and therefore be highly variable.

Yeah I certainly enjoy bacon and salami.

VA content of fat doesn't necessarily vary as much as we think it might, for example take Jersey cows eating fresh green grass, their butterfat will contain a lot of VA but their tissue fat won't be that high.

Your blurry vision is likely caused by blood sugar changes. What other symptoms accompany it? Are they Hypervitaminosis A symptoms or low/high blood sugar symptoms?

Quote from Neilky on October 8, 2019, 5:50 am

I had suffered from cracked lips for a long time but that has resolved. I would only have to drink a bullet proof coffee and my lips would peel. I have checked my blood glucose and don't think that is an issue. When I started carnivore for a month I ate a lot of fatty meat and my vision was almost instantly blurry. My eye floaters also became much more noticeable. After ditching carnivore for keto my problems persisted and having ditched Keto my blurry vision has slowly improved. I was eating nearly a full bar of butter a day at times.