Quote from Hermes on January 25, 2022, 2:49 pm

@wavygravygadzooks

Well, I've had the experience in the past when I was still doing mainly a pretty strict Ray Peat diet aka lots of orange juice, coffee and so on, that I'd run into low iron symptoms when supplementing with thiamine HCL which strangely I was tolerating much better than the allithiamine now. I eventually tested iron, it confirmed my suspicion which is why I'm wary to supplement too much of B1. The symptoms were restless legs and none-refreshing sleep. That's how I concluded that there must be an association with it. I think I've also read somewhere that B1 chelates iron.

That you experience rather conflicting or even bad effects from TTFD might be related to your low carb intake? It's my suspicion when you mention how you rather stick to meat cuts, and you eat basically a low-carb diet, right? So it might actually be a stress response to the B1 which expresses itself as general malaise. Why do you avoid carbs, don't you feel crappy without them? I've done an only-meat diet once and could only do it for one month. I was feeling pretty good only that I started to have a hard time to stick to the diet, and I started to eat eventually ice cream, because the craving was so strong.

Interesting that you mention cherry angiomas. I think I've read somewhere they were involved with bromide detox when you start to supplement iodine. But I wasn't aware that they might appear with added B1. It's probably some detox reaction too?! Not sure about it.

Hahaha, yeah, the RDA is for shit. I'm thinking about the RDA for vitamin A here, obviously. Probably more thiamine is required when your vA toxic. Anyway, I stopped supplementing allithiamine which I was taking last week for roughly seven days. It felt good on my brain but my stomach didn't like it. I think the sulphur is problematic for me because I have SIBO. It's really too bad that I can't benefit from the extra thiamine in my body. But my sleep got really crappy, and I also felt a loss of energy, my God, I already don't have enough of it to share that one. 🙂 This week I started to increase my nutritional yeast consumption, instead of 15 g I take around 30 g, and that's how I obtain around 5 mg thiamine, still not a lot but certainly more. Can't say much right now how this new intervention is affecting me.

I recently got my vA serum tested, and it's still way too high, it's actually higher than the last time. And I'm almost three years on a low vA diet. That was such a frustrating moment when I learnt about my blood work. Really, where is all this vA stored in my body? I think, once vA is on the low side, thiamine and other vitamins won't make much of a difference anymore to your well-being. I assume the common culprit is vA toxcity.

Quote from Hermes on January 25, 2022, 2:50 pm

Quote from Jenny on January 23, 2022, 9:14 am

@orion @christian I’ll start a thread on sulphate with links I think or it will go too far off topic on this one. 

Hey @jaj, I took notice, thanks for bringing this topic to the forefront.

Quote from wavygravygadzooks on January 27, 2022, 7:58 pm

@christian

My choice to go low-carb came at the tail of a long history of IBS-D when I realized that starches and possibly carbs in general were contributing to IBS/SIBO/dysbiosis.  I got way better when I went low carb, then better again when I removed virtually all plant foods and went mostly carnivore.  However, I went carnivore at the same time as starting low Vitamin A, which created some new disaster with my GI system...still not sure if it's bile acid malabsorption, or fat malabsorption, or both.  I've reintroduced white rice a couple times and am back to eating it again now and reducing my fat intake once more to see if I can get my gut happier.  I've tried fiber a few times and have been very resistant to including much of it, but I'm starting to think that it may be necessary in this particular situation to remedy gut problems associated with bile issues that are resulting from Vitamin A detox.

So, in short, I initially went low-carb to fix my gut, and then was convinced that it was the most natural way for humans to eat.  I've been super high carb my entire life, so I'm plenty familiar with how eating that way feels...  I think high protein and moderate carb is probably how my body feels best at the moment, but I hope to eventually go back to getting most calories from fat and eating carbs more sparingly.

Quote from Jenny on January 28, 2022, 5:08 am

Just a thought @wavygravygadzooks and probably not relevant to you. People with a tendency for porphyria do really badly on low carb diets. I have a theory that I’ve probably mentioned before that vA toxicity/rapid detox could increase  porphyrin production in those genetically or epigenetically vulnerable to it. 

When the body is required to upregulate a particular CYP450 enzyme to remove an exceptional load of a particular toxin, the body also has to upregulate the heme pathway, as CYP450 enzymes are heme based enzymes. This is well known. Therefore any toxin that induces cyp450s can  induce increased porphyrin production in those with a slowed/blocked heme pathway. There are 8 enzymes in this pathway and any can be genetically slow but also blocked by heavy metals (lead and mercury) and infections. 

Anyone who got some worsening symptoms when they went low vA may be interested in this. I improved massively in most ways but some symptoms, in particular my anxiety, got worse. Some of the porphyrins cause anxiety. People with this tendency need to take everything slow. They need to lead a low toxin/low stress lifestyle. Then they don’t induce the CYP450 enzymes too much and don’t upregulate the aberrant heme pathway (that produces porphyrins) too much. Also helping heavy metal detox with Epsom salt baths should help the heme pathway flow better. 

Quote from Hermes on January 28, 2022, 8:11 am

@wavygravygadzooks

 

SIBO and gut dysbiosis are challenging to treat. I've had gut-issues for almost ten years now. For me, starches make me feel tired, i.e. rice, potatoes. White bread is the least offensive starch. I've read about how Tim solved his gut-issues with natural antibiotics, they're called FC-Cidal and CandiBactin AR, both of them can be purchased off Amazon.ca (it's the Canadian version). I haven't had a chance to get my hands on them, but plan to buy some to test if they affect me in any good way. 

 

With what fiber have you had most success with? Probably they're essential to bind to the toxic bile which carries retinoic acid. Three years after going super lowish with vA, I'm still vA toxic, probably b/c I don't do too well with most fibers, certainly not with beans. It's like a catch 22, you need fiber to excrete the vA, but you can't digest it well, so you avoid it. Argh.

 

In the thread about sulfate Jenny writes about Epsom salt baths to replenish sulfate levels in the body. Some author she mentions argues that SIBO is an adaptive response to the missing sulfate in the body. Anyway, so I'm hopeful that salty baths might be beneficial for me too. I tried it last night for the first time: one hour, 400 g of Epsom salt dissolved in the hot water. I felt pretty good afterwards, really tired but in a good way. I couldn't fall asleep later, which was unfortunate, but that's another thing that happens to me regularly, so time will tell if sleep quality will improve too on this bathing regimen. Supposedly, the body is replenished with sulfate after ten consecutive days. Afterwards, one can bath in Epsom salt two to three times a week to keep the level of sulphate in the body even. Maybe Epsom salt baths might be something for you too?

Quote from tim on January 28, 2022, 9:59 am

Yep it's important to treat SIBO with either herbs or antibiotics. Chronic SIBO can contribute to heart disease, it's not something you want to leave untreated hoping it goes away. It's likely that Hypervitaminosis A contributes to SIBO, it may be necessary to take herbs or antibiotics multiple times while depleting vitamin A.

Like you say @christian you don't want to be avoiding whole grains/legumes/fruit especially when depleting vitamin A.

With SIBO and in general it's important to be eating a balanced diet that is adequate in all vitamins and minerals except A (but avoiding supplements). Everybody should also be consuming some gelatin in the diet. Hypervitaminosis A (I must emphasize not vitamin A but Hypervitaminosis A, elevated levels of retinoic acid) causes increased collagen breakdown, basically accelerated aging. That's a big reason why it makes bones weak. Consuming vitamin C rich fruit + a source of gelatin helps to counter increased collagen breakdown including in the gut.

Quote from Ourania on March 24, 2022, 3:19 am

@jaj Something new I have learnt : Some thiamine deficient people cannot produce goose bumps. This problem disappears when they go on heavy thiamine supplementation. I think goose bumps are a way the body expels vA, so there would be another link between thiamine and vA. Thiamine deficiency would ensure a progressive accumulation of vA?

I have started reading again this very interesting website of Dr Lonsdale's. I had stopped for a while and there is much more information now, fantastic indeed and well worth a read from our point of view :

https://www.hormonesmatter.com

Quote from grapes on March 25, 2022, 12:44 pm

Quote from Ourania on March 24, 2022, 3:19 am

@jaj Something new I have learnt : Some thiamine deficient people cannot produce goose bumps. This problem disappears when they go on heavy thiamine supplementation. I think goose bumps are a way the body expels vA, so there would be another link between thiamine and vA.

Interesting, I think I don't recall last time I had goosebumps, while as a kid it was something common to happen.

Quote from Jiří on March 25, 2022, 1:58 pm

Quote from grapes on March 25, 2022, 12:44 pm

Quote from Ourania on March 24, 2022, 3:19 am

@jaj Something new I have learnt : Some thiamine deficient people cannot produce goose bumps. This problem disappears when they go on heavy thiamine supplementation. I think goose bumps are a way the body expels vA, so there would be another link between thiamine and vA.

Interesting, I think I don't recall last time I had goosebumps, while as a kid it was something common to happen.

I have almost always goosebumps when I watch videos of this guy 🙂 https://www.youtube.com/c/MrBallen/videos