Pain, Pain, Go Away!

Have You Been Pwned? If you donated to the Canadian truckers via GiveSendGo, your personal information might have been compromised by hackers who attacked the site. No bank information was apparently compromised, but names, emails and locations were hacked and in some cases publicized. To find out if you were a victim, go to  https://haveibeenpwned.com . If you were pwned, make a complaint to your state's attorney general. To be safe, protect your accounts. One way is to put a freeze on your credit so that nobody can take out a loan in your name (IIRC, this is a free service with the credit reporting agencies). You can also use a fee-based service like LifeLock, which monitors your credit and accounts opened in your name. Ivermectin Study from Malaysia This randomized, controlled study didn't find that ivermectin had any effect in older people with comorbidities who had COVID. In fact, the ivermectin arm did a little worse than the placebo group as far as severe illness (the pr...

I've been taking various adrenal hormones for the past few weeks with mixed results. Overall, it's been positive: they seem to have helped me get over a three-month-long case of bronchitis and I have more energy. Using a dab of hydrocortisone at bedtime has prevented me from grinding my teeth at night. On the downside, the adrenal glandular (containing adrenaline) gives me palpitations if I take too much of it. I've been getting too hot and cold (mostly too hot). Too much hydrocortisone made me puffy and gave me a slight case of acne. Taking adrenal cortex after midday gives me acid reflux and keeps me up at night. (I'm writing this at 4:30 AM.) Your adrenal hormones help with healing, controlling blood sugar, controlling inflammation, and dealing with stress. They make some of your sex hormones. Why is adrenal fatigue apparently becoming more common? Your adrenal hormones are made of cholesterol--including LDL, the "bad" cholesterol. Salt is also importa...

I'd been a die-hard fan of low carb for years when, two years ago, I had complications from an infected tooth and a lot of stress. I had no more appetite for fatty food than someone with seasickness.   For that reason, I started eating higher-carb, lower calorie. Results? I re-developed acid reflux (though not as severe as before) and got a cavity--my first one since starting low-carb. I also had sugar crashes where I could hardly stay awake. There seemed to be a feedback loop where stress caused me to eat badly, which worsened my stress, which caused me to eat badly. I took probiotics, since strong antibiotics for my infected tooth made me queasy in the first place, and gradually ate less and less carb and more fat. It's only been in the past few weeks that I've been able to eat sardines again. Results from lower carb and higher fat? More energy--I mowed my whole lawn in one day last weekend, and yesterday, mowed it all without a break after doing a lot of other yar...

The potato chips, the chocolate, the sweet potato fries--they finally caught up with me. I saw a doctor (!) the other day for a cough I'd had since Memorial Day weekend. We determined it probably wasn't allergies, asthma, or sinus drainage. With a temperature of 97 point something, I didn't have a cold. It was probably silent reflux, since I've had raging reflux before, which I fixed with a low-carb diet . My diet has been off-track for over a year: stress and anxiety over moving across the country (no permanent job waiting for me, buying a house from 1,000 miles away before selling my other house), complications from a root canal (re-infection requiring industrial strength antibiotics that messed up my stomach and skin). I think the only reason I didn't have silent reflux then was that I wasn't eating enough of anything to affect my stomach. Now that things are getting back to normal, my stress level is down and I'm eating more. And now the carbs are giv...

This is the question someone asked me the other day in regards to the good results I've had on low-carb. Beyond just satisfying your curiosity, having a lattice work of mental models, as Charlie Munger puts it, can save you a lot of trouble. Without mental models of (in this case) human digestion, evolution, nutrition research, journalism, medical education, and even politics, all I'd have is just something that works for acid reflux. A little knowledge is a dangerous thing. Something that works might only work in certain situations, could be unpredictable, could have unintended consequences, or could just be a placebo effect. Knowing how something works reduces the danger.  As Munger's partner Warren Buffett put it, "Risk comes from not knowing what you're doing." Yet how often are people overconfident when they only know a thing or two? The web is full of bros who cut down on the beer and pizza, got some exercise and lost 40 pounds--and you can, too! ...

If you can sell a bag of potato chips, why can't you sell 1000mg potassium pills? I've finally found an answer to my cravings and heart palpitations, and unfortunately, it's potato chips. It's not that I've jumped on the safe starch bandwagon, it's just that it suits my current needs: I tend to get low on salt and potassium. The chips have a lot of both, making my heart and energy level feel normal. I'm too wound up about moving to be very hungry. Therefore, I can eat half a bag at a time because I'm not eating much else. I've turned into one of those people who's lost weight eating potatoes. My stomach hasn't been normal since those three courses of antibiotics from my root canal. The chips feel good on my stomach if I don't eat too many. Downsides: Acne, gas, a bit of reflux, and probably a lack of certain nutrients.  Potassium isn't one of those nutrients, though. An eight-ounce bag of potato chips has 3727 mg o...

On the hypothesis that my mineral deficiencies are caused by low stomach acid, today I tried supplementing with vinegar. This morning, I took a tablespoon of apple cider vinegar with some water at breakfast (a Quest bar and coffee) and at lunch sprinkled some red wine vinegar on my salad. The good: I didn't get hungry between meals--that's unusual for me, especially on such a light breakfast. The bad: I got acid reflux and a lot of burping, which is also unusual for me. Sinus congestion, too. Given my very low-carb breakfast, the only reason I could think of for the reflux was FODMAPs. (Quest bars have prebiotic fiber that gives some people FODMAPs problems, but not me.) Apples are one of the worst things for giving me acid reflux, and apple cider vinegar is apparently high in FODMAPs--fermentable carbohydrates that some people don't digest well. When you don't digest a carbohydrate well, it ferments in your intestines. Fermentation requires bacteria. But I haven...

My refrigerator: Ox cheek and homemade mushroom soup in the containers. Bacon and liver sausage in the meat drawer.  My freezer: Black angus beef. My pantry: Note the coffee, jalapeno peppers and full-fat coconut milk--so-called "trigger foods" for acid reflux, which I had until I started a low-carb diet.  My medicine cabinet: All the medicine I own, aside from some Neosporin. I just threw out a bunch of decongestants and Pepto Bismal that expired years ago. The aspirin shown expired nearly two years ago. The toothpaste is for a cavity that started forming last year when I was stressed out and wasn't taking extra-good care of myself. 

Feeling stuffed, gassy or bloated? Got acid reflux? A few tips from someone who suffered from upper GI problems for years: Go for a walk. Don't strain yourself--a leisurely stroll is fine. If your blood sugar is up, a little exercise can help lower it, and walking helps your GI system get things moving.  Take an antacid if you have a sour taste in your mouth. If your throat is burning, mix a half teaspoon of baking soda in a glass of water and drink it. (This is also an antacid.) If this happens to you often, you should probably cut back on the carbs.  If you're gassy, it'll just have to wear off. Again, though, if this happens often, eat fewer carbohydrates. Dietary fat doesn't produce gas, protein produces a little or no gas, but carbohydrates can produce a lot of gas.  Why do so many people feel lousy after Thanksgiving dinner? Partly, it's from eating too much. But as I've written before, Thanksgiving is a carbohydrate orgy . Not everyone is suite...

Nuts seem like the perfect snack: they're portable, they keep well, they don't need to be cooked, and they're tasty. Problem: I don't feel good when I eat too many of them. Recently, I started snacking on macadamia nuts, which are high-fat, so I thought they wouldn't be a problem. But my stomach was upset, I got a bit of acid reflux and nosebleeds, and generally didn't feel up to par. Nuts have phytates, which bind to zinc and other minerals. This might have caused my nosebleeds. And I don't know what it is about macadamia nuts, but they don't seem to digest well for me; they felt like they were sitting in my stomach causing bloating. I've felt pretty much the same way eating more than a little bit of nuts or goodies made with nut flour. It could be that nuts are seeds and don't "want" to be eaten. Like grass seeds, they defend themselves by sickening those who ingest them. 

Years ago, before the Perfect Health Diet came out, I followed a program that involved eating quite a bit "safe starch." It was called Body for Life. It involved eating six small servings of carbohydrate along with six small servings of protein, plus two servings of fibrous vegetables per day. (A serving was the size of your fist or the palm of your hand.) There were six workouts a week (three weightlifting, three cardio) and one free day every week where you ate whatever you wanted and didn't exercise. In all fairness, these two programs are different: BFL allows certain grains, legumes and low-fat dairy and discourages fat. It doesn't call for a wheelbarrow full of vegetation. Nevertheless, my experience eating lots of fruit and lots of starch is relevant to the PHD because the amount and type of digestible carbohydrates are similar, and for the first few years, I didn't eat wheat except on free days. At first on BFL, I felt great. Before, I was continually...

Four More Weeks My orthodontist wants to wait four more weeks to take my braces off so that I can get a new crown. Meantime, my insurance is actually considering paying for some of this expensive dental work. Hot dog. Acid reflux, acne, and upset stomach down to flavored coffee I just tried to expand my food horizons and once again, ended up with problems. It took a few months to figure out it was flavored coffee. It's not the caffeine or the acid, since regular coffee and tea doesn't bother me, or anything I put in it (I take it black). It's not any natural flavors, since nuts, vanilla and cocoa don't bother me. It's the chemicals. According to enotes.com , Flavoring oils are combinations of natural and synthetic flavor chemicals which are compounded by professional flavor chemists. Natural oils used in flavored coffees are extracted from a variety of sources, such as vanilla beans, cocoa beans, and various nuts and berries. Cinnamon, clove, and chicory...

Long-time readers may recall my sinus infection that just wouldn't die. Over six months, I took antibiotics, long naps, a decongestant that gave me an allergic reaction so bad I stopped to wonder if I'd wake up the next morning . It finally ended when I came up with SWAMP and took megadoses of vitamin D, Mucinex and salt. It's February and once again, I've been fighting off a cold for a few weeks. While SWAMP consists of taking 50,000 IU of vitamin D for two days, I've had to take 40,000 IU for the past several days to keep my cough from getting worse. I'm not the only one who's taken large doses like this long term. Jeff T. Bowles, a layman, wrote and self-published a book called THE MIRACULOUS RESULTS OF EXTREMELY HIGH DOSES OF THE SUNSHINE HORMONE VITAMIN D3 MY EXPERIMENT WITH HUGE DOSES OF D3 FROM 25,000 to 50,000 to 100,000 IU A Day OVER A 1 YEAR PERIOD (caps in original) about his research and experiences. Bowles is a little crazy, and his problems...

Ten years ago today (yes, the day before Thanksgiving), I started Body-for-Life. BFL involves eating several small meals per day that balance protein and carbohydrate and minimizes dietary fat. Daily workouts involve intense weightlifting or cardio. One day a week is a free day, where you don't exercise and eat whatever you want. Initially, I lost weight, gained muscle and felt great. Eventually, though, I gained back the weight and developed cavities and upper GI problems. The cardio workouts left me exhausted. Free day foods found their way into the other days. I developed GERD, an esophageal ulcer, chronic sinus congestion and a constantly upset stomach. I've written about the logical fallacies of BFL here , here and here . If only I'd read the book with a more critical eye back then, I 'd have saved myself most, if not all, of the misery. The endpapers of the Body-for-Life book are before and after photos taken 12 weeks apart. Let me share some photos here. F...

An article on the Mental Floss magazine website blamed the stupor people usually feel after a Thanksgiving meal on (what else besides turkey?) the fat--229 grams of it in an "average Thanksgiving meal," according to the article. The urge to snooze is more the fault of the average Thanksgiving meal and all the food and booze that go with it. Here are a few things that play into the nap factor: Fats — That turkey skin is delicious, but fats take a lot of energy to digest, so the body redirects blood to the digestive system. Reduced blood flow in the rest of the body means reduced energy.  My response: Say what? First of all, even if you ate all the skin from half a turkey plus a whole stick of butter, that would be only 190 g of fat. (source: nutritiondata.com ) Thanksgiving is mostly a carbohydrate fest: potatoes, yams, desserts and most snack foods are mainly sugar and starch. Second, I'd like to see the evidence that a high-fat meal "reduces blood flow ...

Readers interested in the raw paleo+supplement diet that I've proposed for fibromyalgia might be wondering how to put this into practice. There's a lot to read--you can skip parts if you want to--but the better you understand how this works, and the more lousy conventional wisdom you dispense with, the more likely you are to stick with it and fine-tune it to your needs. The basic ideas: Fix any leaks in the gut. A strict paleo diet eliminates foods like grains, potatoes and legumes that can cause this problem, allowing the gut to heal. (UPDATE 6/27/2012: Avoid an additive called carrageenan . It's a neolithic food and an inflammatory.) This may also help with autoimmune diseases. Stop ingesting antinutrients that interfere with magnesium absorption. Grains and legumes have antinutrients (search for "phytate" at Google Scholar if you're interested). Antacids keep you from absorbing magnesium (and calcium, zinc and iron) and interfere with protein digest...

Do people forget what it feels like to be well? I think so. While I was sick with a sinus infection, I remembered r unning around with my best friend last year , going dancing two or three times a week , and wondered how I ever had the energy to do all that. This morning, I woke up feeling healthy (even though I'm still coughing a little, and still taking Mucinex since I'm really afraid of a relapse). I got up at 6:30 (can't remember the last time I was up that early on a weekend), did some laundry, cleaned out the refrigerator, loaded and unloaded the dishwasher, changed the sheets, took out the trash, bought some groceries and got to work around 10. Concentrating on my work was so much easier than it was when I was sick. (That it was Saturday helped, too.) I still have some symptoms of vitamin D toxicity. No vomiting, but I've had some momentary but severe acid reflux. I'd forgotten how painful that is. Nevertheless, I'm feeling better than I have in months...

Last month I blogged about my friend's grandson "James," a ten-year-old binge eater who was nearly 40 pounds overweight. James's grandmother is a force to be reckoned with; I've been whispering in her ear. She's been reading books from my health collection, and then some: Why We Get Fat, The New Atkins for a New You, Heartburn Cured, The Vegetarian Myth, and Slow Burn.  I also mentioned Dr. Atkins' advice for binge eating, which he treated: binge on protein and fat. Disabused of the notion that fat is bad and eating less is good, she's gotten James some snacks like Crystal Light (a no-calorie drink), boiled eggs, celery and peanut butter and apples and yogurt, and labeled them with his name. It seems he's caught on to low-carbing: his grandmother saw that when he fixed a plate for himself, he skipped the hamburger bun and just took meat and salad. She said he played outside all day Sunday (he didn't have that energy before) and looks well. He...

A recent message on the elevator TV in the building where I work said that meditation could relieve mild heartburn. A better message would have been that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. I can see how relief from stress (which may or may not result from meditation) could relieve heartburn: if tensing the stomach muscles pushes acid into the esophagus, relaxing them will keep the stomach acid where it belongs.  Problem: people are often in situations where they can't meditate. The larger issue is that if something about your lifestyle requires a lot of maintenance such as meditation, perhaps it's time to re-evaluate the lifestyle. An easy way to prevent heartburn is with a low-carb diet. Try it for a few days and see for yourself. Limit foods like bread, cereal, pastries, cookies, juice, noodles, cake, sweets, potatoes, rice, fruit, and other high-carb food, and see if your symptoms subside. Next post: how to politely turn down holiday food.

Do you like come-from-behind-to-snatch-victory movies? Do you like road trip movies? Buddy movies? Documentaries? If you do, you may like Fat, Sick and Nearly Dead, a movie in which financial entrepreneur Joe Cross seeks to lose weight and cure a rare skin disease through a two-month juice fast. Do you enjoy testing your critical thinking and debunking pseudo-science? If you do, this movie will give you plenty to chew on. My criticism isn't of Joe Cross or his friend Phil Staples--I admire their strength of will and Cross's compassion for Staples, who was just an acquaintance when he called Cross for help from halfway around the world. Nor am I critical of their break with nutritional orthodoxy or the short-term results they achieved: they both lost 90 pounds or more, their hives disappeared, their energy increased, and their blood pressure and cholesterol improved. They either reduced or quit medications (including prescription prednisone for their hives--that's the ...