another seeker doesn't tolerate meat-only diet

Because of one thing and another, i'm slow in presenting the news -- my husband gave the Strong Medicine protocol the ol' college try, and concluded that it isn't for him.  He faithfully played the game for three days, and got thoroughly bored with it ... AND said he wasn't feeling very well either.

Of course, three days didn't get him past the low-motility phase (i was doing it with him, and nor did i adjust in that fashion).  However, i "allowed" him to quit at the point he did because of his first objection -- if the dietary tedium got to him so quickly, there's no way he can do this long-term.  Sustainability is immensely important when choosing a dietary plan to live with for (essentially) the rest of your life.

I came up with a new way to compromise in our shared dietary future:  he gets an additional side of bagged salad with home-made (low-omega6) dressing to add fat calories and bulk to every lunch and dinner we have at home.  He's much more fond of salad than i am, and tolerates lettuce just fine (while i don't).  Since i learned the stick-blender method of mayonnaise production, it'll be quite simple to churn out plenty of good dressings, especially since my daughter gave me the MDA recipe book of sauces and dressings for my birthday (thanks, L!).

For my part of the food landscape, i'll continue to go meat-heavy while being careful of what vegetable-matter i use by way of garnish.  Realizing that some of my intolerances may be related to my intestinal flora, i recently began a probiotic containing C. Butyricum (and a couple of other "bugs" -- thanks for the inspiration, George!) in hopes of improving diversity of population in there.  I've also been inspired by Kindke's recent post to increase my intake of carnitine, and i just ordered a bottle of a high-potency liquid version....

We'll see how these tweaks succeed!  As Wooo pointed out, there's still a couple of months to profit from summer's seasonal benefits before autumn's fat-encouraging qualities descend on us again.

and HOW can 1972 Atkins induction fail one?

I'll tell you -- and it ain't the lack of healthywholegrainsfruitsandvegetables.  It's LETTUCE.

Vicious stuff.  If you've read this blog for any length of time, you might have noticed my comments about the Salad of Doom; also that Dr. Donaldson of "Strong Medicine" fame says it's one of the hardest things to digest that there are.  As a character reports in a book i love, he sometimes forgets he has asthma but asthma never forgets it has HIM -- it's the same with my digestive apparatus and that green leafy diet staple.

I wondered why i wasn't feeling a lot better and dropping pounds the way i should have.  I was doing my damnedest to get plenty of good fats and calories, an appropriate amount of protein, and even forgoing wine.  I've been sleeping well enough, not outrageously stressed, and although my allergies have been acting up a bit, it hasn't been miserable.  The inflammation hasn't GONE from my left knee, but it's getting better.  I realized early yesterday that one aspect of a healthily-running body wasn't quite what it ought to be ... and it HAS to be due to the lettuce.

That's the primary vegetable matter that Dr. Atkins originally sanctioned for the first week -- SALAD.  I could happily have forgone any vegetable matter AT ALL (save coffee), but i wanted my husband's strict week to be less onerous.  He's used to more variety in his meals than i had become accustomed to, and i wanted to indulge him as best one can, within the limits of induction rules.  I can handle a leaf here and a leaf there, but a salad or two every day is too much for me.

Well, yesterday and today i topped off my morning coffee consumption with a cuppa that included a good chunk of grassfed beef tallow -- that trick has never let me down yet.  I'm hoping that when the traffic jam disperses, the fat loss that HAS to have happened will become more apparent!

back to "normal" -- whatever that is

:-)  At least, i'm back to an Atkins-level carb intake.  Yesterday, black coffee for breakfast, lunch a "Cuban chicken melt" with mushrooms on the side and decaf to drink, then a couple of glasses of red wine with the dish our family calls "fake stroganoff," a "paleo biscuit" and generously-buttered broccoli.  Today's menu will resemble the classic Strong Medicine regimen.

I still have more subcutaneous fat on my belly than i've had for months.  :-(  Tomorrow i MAY have guts enough to get on the bathroom scale, but i'm not promising anything.

What with all the vegetable matter i've been consuming this past week, i have less-happy intestines and gut-bugs than usual.  My allergies are much worse, too.  The vague aches in some muscle groups are back.  2012 has been eye-opening for me in how i've observed my body to perform on different foodstuffs!  The only things that don't have ANY downside are fatty ruminant meat and water ... just as Dr. Donaldson wrote half a century ago.

It's fun to break the rules for a short time -- a change is as good as a rest, you know -- but once you discover what your body will put up with to maintain a decent quality-of-living, to stray from it very long is just plain DUMB.  ... And for the record, i did NOT run out and try to buy a final box of Twinkies.  Those things are NASTY.

potty mouth

The scale is down a LITTLE from yesterday, but more progress is to come.  Right now, i'm here to talk shit about vegetables!

;-)

Just like with the Salad of Doom a few months ago, the increased "good" vegetable fiber i had over the last week is STILL making me feel weighted-down.  The paleo world is inclined to damn the insoluble fiber from grains -- it's like taking a wood-rasp to your villi, they say -- but to praise in very CW-like fashion the soluble stuff in fruits and vegetables.  My colon begs to differ.

Just like Donaldson said, when i'm eating a diet of meat and fat i don't have a retention problem -- my gastrointestinal system is like a greased chute.  I would be tempted to say that it IS a greased chute, except for the fact the fats are ABSORBED, not just sent straight through.  But although i'm eating my usual healthy quantity of nutritious satfats and omega-3s, they're not able to do ONE of their jobs ... because of the interference of the foods that Mark claims should be the major part of my diet.

If i ate "mostly plants" as ALMOST EVERYONE says, i'd be utterly miserable.  There's no excuse for needing additions of magnesium or probiotics or such aids to push out the waste-products!  Thank god i finished the soup last night, which was merely flavored with a small quantity of carrots, onions, celery and mushrooms -- today will be solid meat, fat and coffee, just what has a track-record of making me feel good!

what is it about plant foods?

This is Day Two of dealing with one of those annoying little upticks of the scale....

On Wednesday, i had to go out into the world, and i thought it was about time for the mini-binge which customarily does good things for me.  I lunched at a certain restaurant which offers a very good taco salad, and included some guacamole and sour cream instead of a commercial dressing.  I didn't get anything so wicked as a sweet-sour-laden margarita -- oh, no!  I had ONE glass of a pleasant, civilized red wine.  Next morning, i wasn't surprised that the scale had stagnated, and just hit the half-caf hard, thinking that would run the water out of my body.  I finished the take-home box of salad-and-guac; no 'rita, no chips.  Supper was a tin of sardines and a glass of wine.

The scale should have been down this morning.  It was up.  Two days in a row, i had a significant quantity of lettuce, a small amount of other salad vegetables, moderate animal protein and maybe an ounce of cheese (just on Wednesday).  I didn't exceed 1350 calories (estimated, since i didn't compile the recipes) the second day, or 1600 the first.

I swear, if i had lettuce in the fridge, i'd do a day of nothing else, and i bet the scale would be up again tomorrow.  What is it about plant foods that makes my body misbehave so?

In "Strong Medicine," Donaldson says, "Green vegetables can contain unknown irritants, aside from additive sprays, that bother some of us a great deal. Annoying intestinal gases or joint pains or sudden elevations of blood pressure may all stop when such patients are deprived of green vegetables. I have one family who love asparagus and have a big patch of it to feast on during the season. The whole family run elevated blood pressures at that time."  Now, the intestinal gases we can explain very easily, but the other symptoms he mentions are a little more mysterious in their etiology.*

He goes on to say, "No one knows why the yellow vegetables seem better tolerated by children who have a background of eczema. Onions and beets and celery can sometimes be used with no apparent ill effect, but yellow vegetables always seem to be safer, perhaps because they aren't sprayed."  Unfortunately, he doesn't list the items he characterizes as "yellow" but by inference he seems to include carrots, corn, winter squash and turnips.  He praises real sweet potatoes and the better varieties of white ones.  You'll notice that most of these foodstuffs either grow underground, or have some kind of protective "casing".

Dare i take a leap of intuition and suggest that above-ground plants (green ones) produce more self-protective toxins than edible portions which, being underground, don't need to conduct chemical warfare as much?

Amongst zero-carb enthusiasts, it's postulated that there are enough plant toxins in vegetables to make them poor choices for those of us who are sensitive.  In fact, the antioxidant chemicals, ironically labeled "protective," seem to be the ones that irritate us most.  Proponents of hormesis say these substances do us good BECAUSE they irritate us; although some people may benefit from it, i'm not sure we all do.

When doing my research on what foods are goitrogenic, a staggering array of "healthy" foods become distinctly deleterious.  As a hypothyroid, i should avoid most of the "green leafy" things that every health-fiend from vegan to paleo can agree to ... agree to.  ;-)  Broccoli, kale, apples -- kiss 'em goodbye!  Oh, they're okay if i boil the hell out of them, though....

I believe that plant toxins are a big reason why Atkins and Paleo/Primal only give outstanding results when people come to them from the SAD.  Getting the virulent poisons out of your diet only gets you part of the way.  The chronic trace poisoning that people love so much is what stands between some of us and real health.

__________

*  i have my suspicions....  more on that later.