Sunday, November 1, 2015

the latest in poop....

One of the refreshing things about our community here and in our blog-lists is, nobody thinks it's "gross" or weird to talk about poo.  Naturally, when we were kids, it was considered a not-nice subject, but when we grow up it should be just looked on as another aspect of life, without an "ewww factor" ... however, to many adults it still has that.  Television advertisements for products wanting to cash in on the "elimination problem" market tend to talk about it in coy terms that remind me a bit of "Keeping Up Appearances"....  [evil grin]

Wooo's recent blog-resurrection, interestingly enough, mentions her trial of a new probiotic product at just the time i was looking into what i can do about that famous side-effect of magnesium supplementation.  When one has loose stools long enough, one's microbiome becomes depleted, so i wanted to do a little replenishing of my supplies.  The last brand i tried, featuring a popular-in-Japan variety of clostridium, just didn't impress me, so i started reading about her experience with Elixa, and other stars in the market.

Inspired by her historic experiences, Wooo has some interesting hypotheses concerning gut-bugs -- she finds that she has less bloating and discomfort when using substances which "sanitize" her innards, like vinegar, bleach, coconut oil, antiparasitics, and metformin.  This is directly in opposition to the claims of many in the ancestral-health world.  She IS a fan of fibrous vegetables, so it's not like she is a ZCer who doesn't need bacteria that break down cellulose.  The probiotic she recently tried caused increased bloating for her, and it touts itself on containing huge quantities of an unusually-broad range of "beneficial" microorganisms.

She has some good points.  If "germ-free" mice are lean and healthy, why are we in a rush to populate our colons with a microbiome which our own lean and healthy great-grandparents did not have?  And we should not forget about our small intestines, either -- a diet higher in starchy vegetables, which the carb-apologists love, also feeds SIBO, which is not a fun thing.

I believe that the paleo blogosphere jumped into this microbiome thing before enough data was even available.  The best sources say that we just don't know enough yet to be claiming some of the things we hear as truth, when it comes to intestinal bacteria.  I've said for years, myself, that just because the last hunter-gatherer tribes of Africa have certain gut-bugs we don't, does NOT mean we should rush out and try to procure them -- our lifestyles and food environments are just too different.  And just because our healthy friend has other things we don't, doesn't mean we should ask THEM for a specimen, either.

Very often in the health-sphere, more is not better.  Having "more" can make things tricky -- more variety means more potential complications, and more quantity can take "hormetic" to "toxic" pretty fast.  Other adages i like are "start low and go slow," and "less is more."

I picked up a probiotic four days ago with only a few bifidobacteria varieties in it, and my poop quality is improving nicely.  Gone is the early-morning urgency i was experiencing even before increasing magnesium.  I still have more bloat going on than i like, but ... hey, i eat in restaurants a lot, and you just don't know what goes into a lot of dishes....

***

There's "poop" of the figurative kind to report, too -- my one-year anniversary of putting a tablespoon of gelatin (or collagen hydrolysate) in my coffee passed without comment last month.  Yes, i'm still using it, and yes, i'm still delighted with what it has done for me.  As promised in "Nourishing Broth" and many other sources, my hair and nails are very strong and fast-growing.  As promised NOWHERE, i swear it's diminishing my grey!  In other busy-and-stressful periods of my life, i used to see fountains of silver hairs sprouting from my crown;  despite this last year's craziness ... i HAVEN'T.  Many causes are proposed for hair-greying, and both carnitine and copper in the diet are included;  for years i've been consuming significant quantities of the former, though, with no apparent progress.  Over the last year I've admittedly increased the latter through my love-affair with oysters.  Do I credit gelatin or oysters, then -- or maybe it's both...?

Skin:  i'm not sure.  I don't really perceive much difference, if any.  Maybe a little less wrinkling?  I abstain from expressing an opinion.

When I started gelatin, I noticed right away that my meat-craving was diminished.  I've come to believe pretty firmly that our ideal diets should include MUCH more glycine than most of us currently get.  For a few years I've had the ambition of simply increasing the frequency of bone-broth-based soups in our menu plans, but I rarely get around to it.  Taking that tablespoon of collagen-hydrolysate in my first cup of coffee every morning is something that's MUCH easier to do!  I don't have to dissolve it in cold water first, as I did with gelatin.  The big green canister from Great Lakes sits beside the coffee-maker with a measuring spoon on top, and the coffee-spoons are right there too.  I sometimes put even more in an evening beverage, or in my evening vitamin drink.  We've been buying the two-pack from Amazon;  maybe buying it by the case, like I do coconut milk, would be better?  Hmmm....  ;-)

17 comments:

  1. Love this post. It's so good to get the GI system running well. I used to think that the gas, bloating, and major amounts of undigested food were normal.

    Now that I've gotten my food template squared away for weight maintenance, my GI system is happy. Adequate fat, non-starchy veggies, drink to thirst, bone broth, some beef bones but not too many, natural calm magnesium have been my best tools. Combine the right for me foods and a squatty potty, well, that's a good combo.

    Gluten, dairy and legumes are my worst gut health offenders.

    I can't wait to find out some of the mechanisms. The C. Diff patient who got her fecal transplant from her obese daughter, then became overweight. Yeah, there's something to that.

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    1. i believe so, too! the RIGHT microorganisms are obviously important, but which ARE right? :-) thank you for "loving" my poop-talk, by the way! being aware of what comes out is as important as what we ingest, IMHO!

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  2. My stomach, acne and heart palpitations have improved immensely since starting probiotics. As you might recall, I had three courses of antibiotics last spring for a dental infection. I've seen some articles saying that bio is necessary for absorbing iron; maybe it's also necessary for absorbing magnesium and potassium. This would explain why I got so deficient after dental work--it wasn't so much the epinephrine as the antibiotics.

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    1. very likely! my reading indicated that a huge range of factors influences how much Mg we absorb, retain, use up, and excrete, and you've had a lot of stressors lately!

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  3. Talking of bone broth - this is good http://thelowcarbdiabetic.blogspot.co.uk/2015/06/a-meat-bone-broth-is-so-healthy.html

    All the best Jan

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    1. it certainly is! i love home-made broth -- tastes so much better than commercial stuff! :-) my problem is not getting around to making SOUP of all the batches i've saved in the freezer.

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    2. What am I doing wrong? I seem to be the only one who can't stand bone broth, I dry-retched at the smell and taste of my ill-fated attempts at home-made bone broth.Mixed in soups it's OK but these people ie Jimmy and Dr Fung's commenters who sip it on fasts..ugh.... Is the Great Lakes gel brand palatable?

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    3. I think that BONE broth isn't nearly as appealing as bone BROTH. :-) I've tried making it with pretty clean bones, which gives one a mineral-rich liquid with little flavor, but have evolved to using very flavorful, meaty bones with lots of connective tissue, like chicken feet and oxtail ... and THAT is what's good!

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    4. Actually, I don't like the taste of a long-cooked bone broth itself too, that is why I use it for soups, or put a lot of herbs and a fresh garlic before eating such broth. When I make a meat jello from pig feet (I guess your family has the same culinary tradition ), I also put shredded garlic and chopped celery there and eat it with a horseradish souse or a mustard. You can add a pack of gelatin and crashed herbs/garlic/ chopped meat into your broth and let it set into something like a head cheese.

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    5. Oh yes childhood memories; are you talking about "zimne nogi" ie cold feet or potted meat? Boiled pigs hocks set in a jelly mould eaten with a sprinkling of vinegar. Good idea! So much better than my bone broth. http://easteuropeanfood.about.com/od/polishmaincourses/r/Jellied-Pigs-Feet-Recipe.htm

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    6. Yes, it is exactly that - "choledets" in my language. I see a lot of possibilities in a meat-testing jellies for a LCarber, and pig feet is not the only source. Many good tasting deli-like foods could be created and eaten with a splash of vinegar or a pat of a mustard.

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  4. I guess it could be a good idea to try to supplement magnesium transdermally with magnesium oil or something like that .

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    1. I bought some magnesium oil, but I don't like the way it makes my skin feel -- all sticky. It IS better sprayed on the bottom of my feet, as is suggested, but it really bothers me in other spots.

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    2. I have not tried it yet, but there are several ideas about trans-dermal magnesium applications , for example here http://blog.radiantlifecatalog.com/bid/65084/DIY-Whipped-Coconut-Oil-Body-Butter-with-Magnesium-Oil.

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    3. If you try it out, please give us a report! :-)

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  5. I have an Instapot to unwrap tonight. I got tired of the smell of bone broth in the crock pot long term. I find mostly chicken bones with one or two grass fed beef bones helps me a lot- GI and hair. Too many beef bones and I'm in the bathroom a lot.... :0

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    1. interesting -- i wonder what it is about the beef bones that does that to you....

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