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What on earth should I eat? 🙂
Male, 31.
I've probably had vitamin A/beta-carotene toxicity for years from eating too much liver, canned cod liver, eggs, dairy, carrots, and other high-carotene vegetables. My initial symptoms were dry skin, fatigue, anxiety, extremely dry eyes, colon inflammation, IBS, then I developed carotenemia (was yellow as a carrot myself). I noticed a marked improvement upon ditching carotene f00ds, but now I seem to be experiencing a relapse - severe fatigue and dizziness.
I first tried to eat more beef/rice/buckwheat, white noodles, potatoes, but then started to feel very bad. It turns out:
- my digestion is so messed up I can't digest too much protein - it starts to ferment in my colon and becomes toxic;
- I have a heterozygous c282y mutation in the HFE gene (my mom is compound heterozygous for c282y/h63d), which causes me to load iron pretty quickly, so any red meat every day is out of the question as my transferrin saturation will spike to 50% and higher and remain so for a good couple of weeks. It goes without saying I feel like crap with such high TS.
So, I need to adjust my diet per the following pre-conditions:
- virtually no Vit A/carotene
- very little protein
- not too much iron, especially heme iron
Should I eat buckwheat/noodles/rice/turkey, some chicken breasts/egg whites/some nuts and seeds with refined oils?
Thanks!
@viktor Protein ferments in your colon? Bro it doesn't work like that.. The only thing what can ferment in your colon are undigested carbs/fibers. You have probably issues with fat in the meat due to cholestasis. How you feel when you add some fats like olive oil? The protein itself is not a problem. You could have problem with sulfur amino acids. Do you have issues eating onions, garlic? That would confirm this theory. You are probably low in molybdenum which is really important mineral that is depleted by vit A... I would be careful with buckwheat it is high in oxalates and also nuts and seeds are by far the worst type of food full of anti nutrients that are hard to digest. Refined oils are also bad. Especially if you have liver issues + they will deplete B2 very fast... Lean meats like turkey,chicken breast are ok. Try even turkey thighs. They have more micronutrients almost like beef but are easier to digest.. Egg whites are also very problematic. You need soluble fiber to detox toxic bile so try oats and legumes like white beans. Mushrooms can be also ok. Try some apples, bananas are ok as well for the most part. Rice, corn pasta for example.. Take some molybdenum like 200mcg every other day and if you will eat only white meat like breasts try some zinc like 15-30mg every other day. Good B complex with active forms for example from Jarrow/ Life extension/ doctors best is also good idea.. Like I said protein is not your problem. It's sulfur and or fermentable fibers and or fats.. You have to try it like I said what is giving you problems..
Protein can be fermented into into isobutyrate, which can be used by the gut for short chain fatty acids. This is a good thing, not a bad thing. From gut expert Lucy Mailing:
Isobutyrate is a metabolite of protein fermentation that is typically produced at lower levels than butyrate. When butyrate is less abundant, isobutyrate can be taken up by from the gut lumen by gut epithelial cells and metabolized for energy. Fecal isobutyrate was found to be elevated in the 2014 study I mentioned above in humans consuming the animal-based ketogenic diet.14
Moreover, isobutyrate can stimulate the same receptors as butyrate in the gut (GPR41, GPR43, and GPR109a) to stimulate mucus secretion, antimicrobial peptide release, and immune regulation.15And while isobutyrate may be produced at lower levels on a moderate-high-protein diet than butyrate would be produced on a high-carbohydrate diet,14 isobutyrate has been shown to be a more potent stimulator of GPR41 (FFAR3), one of the primary receptors for butyrate, than butyrate itself.16 In other words, what isobutyrate lacks in concentration, it may make up for in potency!
https://www.lucymailing.com/is-a-high-fat-or-ketogenic-diet-bad-for-your-gut/
Protein fermentation is called putrefaction. If people digest protein poorly it can cause issues when it gets to the large colon and the microbiome.
‘Incomplete digestion increases colonic microbial protein fermentation(putrefaction), which produces toxic metabolites that can induce inflammation in vitro and have been associated with inflammation in vivo. Individual humans differ in protein digestive capacity based on phenotypes, particularly disease states’
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/labs/pmc/articles/PMC4927412/
Quote from Jenny on February 13, 2022, 2:56 pmProtein fermentation is called putrefaction. If people digest protein poorly it can cause issues when it gets to the large colon and the microbiome.
‘Incomplete digestion increases colonic microbial protein fermentation(putrefaction), which produces toxic metabolites that can induce inflammation in vitro and have been associated with inflammation in vivo. Individual humans differ in protein digestive capacity based on phenotypes, particularly disease states’
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/labs/pmc/articles/PMC4927412/
That's exactly what I'm talking about. My blood urea skyrockets and I feel like crap whenever I decide to increase my protein intake. Vit A overdose has caused my free T3 to drop, so I'm virtually hypothyroid and don't have enough digestive juices for proper protein digestion.
@viktor if that is the case you can try cooked egg whites and also high quality whey isolate protein powder. If you are deficient in amino acids your liver has hard time detoxing, miking systemic proteins, enzymes etc.. Whey protein is better than egg whites. It's much more easily digested, doesn't have antinutrients and have some added benefits like minerals..
You can eat whitefish instead of meat, it has almost no iron. Things like cod, plaice, southern blue whiting etc.
And get on thyroid medicine for you thyroid, it will probably make you able to digest protein much better again. In the meantime you could try eating your protein raw, it will be either easier or harder to digest depending on your own makeup. Egg whites is another zero VA high quality protein. Defatted soy protein products are another alternative, it's full of phytic acid so if anything it will probably lower your iron levels. But it's quite estrogenic so it's not something you want to have as a staple, it's also just as hard to digest as all the animal proteins if not more so
Regarding the iron, is it possible for you to donate blood or have therapeutic phlebotomies? I have genetic haemochromatosis (homozygous for C282Y mutation) and this is how I manage my iron levels.
I eat a lot of beef, over a pound a day due to digestive issues. You can remove far more blood in a single blood donation than the amount you consume from meat. I was advised not to try to control my iron intake by dietary measures because it is all too easy to cause nutritional deficiencies and therapeutic phlebotomy is more effective.
In the past I have attempted to use food to minimise my iron intake and it was effective up to a point. However it caused me a lot of problems because the foods I had to eat instead of meat didn't suit me. I get along much better eating all the meat I need and removing blood when needed to control my iron.