the "metabolic advantage" everybody has looked for?

...Well, except for the CICO-apologists.  ;-)

One of my link-following adventures led me to THIS paper, which led to THIS magazine article, which i can't read in its entirety for less than thirty bucks....  :-P  Aw well, such is life.  The abstract probably says the important stuff.  (It's got enough acronyms in it -- Kindke might find it worth interpreting for me if he gets bored sometime!)

Bile acids induce energy expenditure by promoting intracellular thyroid hormone activation.

Watanabe M, Houten SM, Mataki C, Christoffolete MA, Kim BW, Sato H, Messaddeq N, Harney JW, Ezaki O, Kodama T, Schoonjans K, Bianco AC, Auwerx J.

Source

Institut de Génétique et Biologie Moléculaire et Cellulaire, CNRS/INSERM/ULP, 1 Rue Laurent Fries, 67404 Illkirch, France.

Abstract

While bile acids (BAs) have long been known to be essential in dietary lipid absorption and cholesterol catabolism, in recent years an important role for BAs as signalling molecules has emerged. ...  Here we show that the administration of BAs to mice increases energy expenditure in brown adipose tissue, preventing obesity and resistance to insulin. This novel metabolic effect of BAs is critically dependent on induction of the cyclic-AMP-dependent thyroid hormone activating enzyme type 2 iodothyronine deiodinase (D2) because it is lost in D2-/- mice. Treatment of brown adipocytes and human skeletal myocytes with BA increases D2 activity and oxygen consumption.  ...  In both rodents and humans, the most thermogenically important tissues are specifically targeted by this mechanism because they coexpress D2 and TGR5. The BA-TGR5-cAMP-D2 signalling pathway is therefore a crucial mechanism for fine-tuning energy homeostasis that can be targeted to improve metabolic control.

It looks to me as though this may be the secret of the success of Dr. Donaldson's fatty-meat diet, and possibly the Shangri-La (oil-bibbing branch) as well -- it's all about fats which prompt a squirt of bile for our bodies to process.  I was "promised" a boost from coconut oil which i never observed to benefit me (although i love the stuff and intend to keep using it generously); this could be the big secret.  Coconut oil doesn't require bile for digestion.

It turns out, then, that the fat IN THE MEAT of the Strong Medicine regimen is the trick -- and modern science tells us why.  Donaldson clearly stated that dietary fat was important, as he had learned from Vilhjalmur Stefansson (all-lean-meat diet = BAD).  As a matter of fact, his suggestion was that if you choose to eat a leaner kind of meat than his recommendations, you should buy extra SUET and chop/grind it into your choice to make it appropriately balanced.  As an interesting aside, he observed that most of his patients adapted to a fat-burning metabolism in about five days.  Also, his only recommended exercise (except for special stretching for certain conditions) was a daily half-hour walk.

So forget the low-fat diet (as if we haven't already)!  Put the coconut oil on the back burner!  We've already forgotten heavy exercise and calorie-counting.  To lose fat weight and increase our energy, what we need is enough fuel to convince our bodies they can afford to rev up a bit ... and the best fuel of all is good old-fashioned animal fat.

Sure sounds like a LCHF metabolic advantage to me.

when is a fast not a fast?

Hint -- this is like when Peter asked "when is a high-fat diet not a high-fat diet."

When Dr. Atkins prescribed a "fat fast" for people who are extremely resistant to losing weight, it was incredibly low in calories, and he only recommended doing it for a few days at a time.  It had enough fat to suppress the appetite, and it forced the burning of body-fat for fuel, because it certainly didn't supply enough protein to convert to a LOT of glucose.  I feel sorry for those on it who didn't have the metabolic flexibility or gut-bugs to get ENERGY from fat, and yet had to go about their daily business....

I assumed that the fat-fast was all about getting into ketosis ... until recently.  There are a few blogs where isolated posts give hints on why eating like this may promote weight loss by other pathways, too. 

In one of Peter's posts, he speaks of intestinal biota which prompt the brain to eat "fiber" and store fat, or to release stored fat for energy (so the host can go out hunting) ... and fat ingestion signals the latter.  The use of fatty foods during an intermittent fast (like drinking coffee with cream) is suggested by the Drs. Jaminet as "not counting" as food....

Here, too, is an explanation for the benefit of oil-swilling in the Shangri-La regimen!

Now we have this discovery that eating fat-with-no-carb spurs glp-1 production, which in turn turns off appetite and turns on spontaneous movement.  I find this very exciting.  In the average human, excessive energy "wasting" -- i.e., going to the gym -- is discouraged by our very beings (see Naturally Engineered); as a result, forcing yourself to exercise when you don't want to is more stressful and less effective.  But by this pathway, the urge to move is instinctive rather than a choice.  One gets the benefits of movement on the tissues and the mood-enhancing aspect of exercise in the brain -- all with no hunger or nasty cascades of BG and insulin.

So, yeah -- i now see the fat-fast as being a LOT more powerful than i believed possible, just reading Atkins.  ...I'll be sure to eat MORE CALORIES of it than he recommended, though!

back on track

Yesterday i indulged in a fat-fast, to rid my body of the poor effects of my weekend intake.  I consumed a full can of coconut milk, divided between three or four cups of coffee, and a couple of tablespoons of butter (i bought two "new" brands at the import grocery, and needed to taste them for preference).  I wasn't hungry at all.

I'm a half-pound up from where i was on Friday, but i imagine it was because of drinking too little water yesterday.  I also woke up this morning with a stuffier head than usual -- support for the suspicion that i have a minor sensitivity to nuts.  Thank heaven for neti-pots!  :-) 

Having overslept a bit, i didn't get the walk done before breakfast, but Spenser doesn't care if we do it later in the day, so long as we do it.  I had my half-pound of ground lamb for breakfast with a cup of coffee, and i'm well into my morning jug of water.  The last of the pot-roast will be dinner, and supper will be a liver dish (with onions AND bacon) that i found in an old Scottish cookery book.  ...I'm DETERMINED to find a way to enjoy liver, in addition to foie gras!

I spent much of yesterday reading the archives of Pal Jabekk's blog, Ramblings of a Carnivore; Sunday i did the same on Lucas Tafur's.  The latter often stretches my understanding, when it's not completely over my head.  The former is very accessible.  Both have taught me a great deal about physiology which my body can corroborate!  THAT is the important bit -- over the last year or two, i've read a huge amount that SOUNDS plausible, but which doesn't pan out in practice.

Conscious intermittent-fasting and carb refeeding, conscious hormesis-inducing behaviors had the ring of truth, but like the failed low-fat hypothesis, seem not to make much of an impact on my body.  The Shangri-La oil-guzzling technique, on the other hand, works WITH the Strong Medicine protocol THROUGH Peter Dobromylskyj's description of FIAF (fasting induced adipose factor).

WOW.  Makes ya feel like you know what "42" means....

synthesis (or lack of it)

I took "The Shangri-La Diet" on the plane with me yesterday; i thought i might be able to soak in and muse upon "the science behind the diet" in the enforced environment of low distraction.  It didn't work very well.

The philosophy seems to be based upon three unrelated research themes plus a generous helping of n=1 experience, and i'm darned if i can get any sense out of the stew.  Most of what Roberts put in the book is more of a "story" than an explanation.  ...So why the hell does it WORK???  I guess i need to find a better "explainer" online to approach the idea from a different perspective.

Also puzzling -- he described the use of the unflavored source of calories as a means of resetting the weight setpoint, but clearly warned that if one ceases to employ the technique, one will regain weight (i applaud him for telling the whole truth, as well as giving credit for improvements to those of his followers who tweaked and shared).  To me, this is not really RESETTING the "fat thermostat" -- it's more like the constant re-entering of the desired "temperature" on a thermostat which has lost its ability to store the programming which has already been entered.

I compare that to the results of the Strong Medicine technique, in which the long period of time that the patient has been eating the prescribed food list automatically makes him/her resistant to weight gain, once the ideal weight has been achieved.   Now, THAT is a reset.

While waiting for the shuttle at the San Francisco airport i started formulating my own version of the setpoint theory -- then the damn train arrived.  If this hotel has a hot-tub (i do my best mental work in water), i'll work on that line of thought again, from this starting point: 

Lean individuals have a very strong system in place which keeps their body composition remarkably balanced.  Many overweight individuals do too, at a higher number of pounds.  What they have in common is TIME SPENT AT THAT WEIGHT.  Most dieters are different because their weight is constantly on the move.  Perhaps homeostatic systems REQUIRE stability for awhile, to really function appropriately?  And the more one has dieted, the more this system is damaged, and it takes longer to make the body "confident" that this weight is the one it should be maintaining?  hmmmm....

I'm going to have to develop this theme more in a second post -- this one is getting a bit long already!  I was about to start speculating on the "magic resetting" aspect of the SMD regimen, and there's a lot of material there!

another challenge

Oh, i was BAAAD last night -- too much sake, which led me to get into the cashews.  BAAAAAD tess!!!

So now i'm going out of town for a week again, this time with no scale to help keep me honest....  I vow i shall stick to Donaldson's program when i'm "in" and Kresser's when i'm "out," with a little Roberts thrown in for insurance.  I would HATE to waste all the great progress i made last week because of carelessness.

California, here i come -- wish me luck!

hungry today!

I woke up with an appetite this morning, pretty much for the first time in MONTHS.  Drat.

Two possible reasons leap to mind, and i'm praying it's not this one:  my fat cells may be producing less leptin, and leptin (as we know) is the body's own appetite suppressant, the most important signal of energy repleteness.  I didn't think this reaction set in till much later in the weight-loss war....   :-(  When one loses fat weight, the cells get smaller and they secrete less of this precious hormone (because the fat mass is not inert flesh, as was the theory until very recently -- it is, in fact, your largest endocrine gland).  Producing lots of leptin tells the brain that there's enough energy storage on board, thank you very much, and we don't need more.

When the quantity produced by the fat cells significantly decreases, the brain gets the notion that something may be wrong with the food supply; if there's going to be a shortage, we'd better ramp up appetite and store more if possible.  THIS IS USUALLY WHY PEOPLE CAN'T KEEP DIETING INDEFINITELY -- they get unmanageably hungry, and the brain causes them to fixate on food.  It has nothing to do with willpower -- this is how animals are hard-wired.  In starvation (dieting), metabolic and brain changes are triggered, whose purpose in the world is Survival.  This is NONCONTROVERSIAL -- how do you think the better research scientists have kept themselves busy recently?  ;-)

The other most likely reason for my hunger this morning is the quality of my meals yesterday.  There are plenty of animal studies which show that what you eat today influences what you want to eat tomorrow.  I'm wondering now if the seafood chowder i had last night might have contained enough carbohydrates to start the blood-glucose-insulin-hypoglycemia-hunger roller-coaster.  If so, i'll have to be more careful with that dish in future, which would be a pity because it was REALLY GOOD.

Although i was still in ketosis when i checked first thing today, i'm hoping it's the latter, because that's easily fixed:  i eat plenty of good fats and moderate protein today and go light on the carbs, and my body happily continues burning fat and ketones as its main fuels.

Just in case, i'll knock back a couple of ounces of coconut oil later -- doesn't hurt to have the heavy-artillery of the weight-loss war on alert....

forward again, and backward in a different way

Still being "perfect", and my weight is down from the original number by 2.4# -- yes!  :-)  After dinner last night, though, i had my first craving;  i REALLY  wanted to put cream in a cup of  decaf for dessert.  I settled for a big spoonful of coconut butter instead.  It was the fat my body wanted, more than the lovely, creamy, sweet dairy product, i'm sure -- filet mignon is just too darned lean, but that's what my appetite called for.  I cooked the parsnip as i would Carrots Vichy, but without the added sweetener, and ALMOST added some ghee, but restrained myself.  Yum.

I may start following the recommendation of the author of "The Shangri-La Diet," and take a couple of tablespoons of bland-flavored oil a day, in place of my beloved cream.  I'm STILL deeply doubtful of his rationale, and i'm thoroughly convinced that some of his reasoning is flawed, but it seems to work for a lot of people. 

Often, tried-and-true techniques work for reasons that we don't understand yet.  Much as modern science "knows," there are a few glitches in how it filters down to everyday life, and it has also gotten to the point that there's SO MUCH known, that a lot of good stuff has been forgotten in favor of the latest discovery or refinement.

One of my favorite bloggers, Chris Masterjohn, presented us with a stunning article yesterday, discussing how the body can manufacture glucose from fatty acids, that mainstream textbooks declare this to be impossible, and that this information has been around for more than half a CENTURY and is absolutely undeniable -- and largely disregarded.  This has impact on low-carb eaters and the compromises they make.  Mind you, most of the scientific world is convinced that what's in a textbook HAS to be true....

 (Chris Kresser also dug up some sound, old information on choline, http://chriskresser.com/why-you-should-eat-more-not-less-cholesterol that's going to affect diet in my household!) 

I have an OLD diet book that belonged to my grandmother, and in my younger days of fighting weight gain i read it and tried it.  Apparently, it was one of the earliest low-carbohydrate diets to achieve a good deal of popularity, spread through a radio show in the 1930s.  Dr. Victor Lindlahr, "Eat and Reduce"!  :-)  He had some interesting tricks (like a recommendation to hang around your house naked, to speed metabolism), but it was principally a very low calorie, low fat diet, and therefore unsustainable.  He mentions the actual first low-carb diet book author, William Banting, but gets the "facts" wrong.

So when i get on an everything-old-is-new-again kick -- and i can almost promise that i will -- there's a reason for it.  Besides, i'm a reenactor and living-historian, too.