Ant22 said:
Then my symptoms finally began to improve when I started the iodine protocol (December 2015) and started eating meat again (March 2016).
I finally felt like I got my life back, gosh, after all these years of sleepwalking I just couldn’t believe it!
But then, out of the blue, my symptoms came back in June 2016, six months after I started the iodine protocol. I just couldn’t make them go away, my condition would improve for a couple of days only to return again. It was nowhere near as bad as before iodine but not as good as between March and June 2016 either.
Yeah, looks like there may be some thyroid issues. What is your temperature regulation like? Do you get cold hands and feet? I think Iodine can be amazing to kick start the thyroid again, but I think iodine deficiency is only a piece of the thyroid puzzle.
Just so you know, in the 1940's physicians in the US were accustomed to test for thyroid issues in many patients. The main variables were: internal body temperature, pulse rate, achilles heel reflex, and other symptoms (not limited to the "hypothyroid symptoms" commonly promulgated by mainstream medicine). I think there was one estimate given by perhaps Dr Broda Barnes that up around 40% of the people tested who subclinically/clinically hypothyroid.
Fast forward a couple of year, when the thyroid blood panel became available and was purported to be effective, the 40% figure apparently went down to less than 5%! Because the blood tests appeared "healthy", people were no longer treated for hypothyroidism. According to Dr Ray Peat, blood tests are innaccurate measures for how well thyroid is being utilised by cells, although can provide some insight into the bigger picture if interpreted correctly. There is simply no way of testing this in a lab. Supposedly, the most effect way of testing is tried and true method of symptoms and physical examination.
It might seem strange that 40% of people showed up as hypothyroid, but when we consider that grains, plastics, estrogens, and other thyroid suppressing influences became ubiquitous in the 20th century, it is not surprising. In addition, traditional cultures used to regularly supplement thyroid hormone by consuming brains, blood, and glandular material. Eating purely muscle meat also provides the body with excess tryptophan, methionine, and cysteine - which suppress thyroid. The natural antidote to these inflammatory proteins were the inhibitory amino acids like glycine and proline, found in the collagen and bones of the animal, but people do not consume these parts of the animal any longer.
Another piece of the puzzle was reading your posts about PUFA’s earlier this year in another thread (https://cassiopaea.org/forum/index.php/topic,43449.msg703463/topicseen.html#msg703463). I now suspect PUFA's were actually the main trigger from the beginning: the vegetarian diet obviously relies on vegetable oils and I used them a LOT. When I read your posts I cut them out almost completely - but I was still taking krill oil.
Unfortunately, PUFA has the uncanny ability of hiding in tissues. So even when someone completely cuts out PUFA, it is still probably going to be stored in vast quantities. Any time stress occurs, the PUFA is released (see above post to Oxajil). This perpetuates the problem, and too much released at once can really hamper liver function (among other things), which consequently leads to many other issues. Hence why I think it is important for those who have underlying thyroid problems or stored PUFA to limit the release of PUFA through various means. That way, it may gradually be released over longer periods of time and be more manageable to detoxify.
What prevented me from coming to the above conclusions was the fact that I’ve actually read plenty of reviews and studies proving benefits of krill oil. Heck, even some people on here said they felt better when they were taking it.
Yeah, well its important to remember that omega 3 does have some partial benefits in that it suppresses the metabolism of omega 6s to inflammatory eicosanoids. Although there are other ways to do this, and I don't see omega as the most viable option, simply because it seemingly perpetuates the problem in other, indirect ways.
What makes me wonder is the fact that this thread on Aquatic Ape Hypothesis was quoted earlier as a possible reason why our bodies need iodine. This could potentially also mean that we do in fact need omega 3 in higher amounts?
It's possible. I have stated elsewhere on the forum that I think that unsaturated fats may act as environmental signals which convey specific information to the organism. Namely, that hibernation/a low energy state is approaching. We see this in many species, both plant and animal. The unsaturation of their tissues changes depending on which time of year it is. Hibernation in animals, and TOPOR in plants relies on unsaturated fatty acids, and seems to be the signal for animals to:
1. become insulin resistant (to gain adipose fat to sustain winter hibernation)
2. inhibit thyroid function to lower the metabolism (high metabolism would lead to starvation for an animal with no food)
It would also make sense that ketosis should be coupled with winter, unsaturation, cold temperatures, and low metabolically stressful conditions. In other words a low energy state. It is well known that ketosis produces less free radicals. Free radicals are a major problem with PUFAs in the body, so it makes sense that less should be produced. For more information on this topic, this blog is helpful:
PUFA in evolutionary and environmental context
Perhaps there is a physiological role for PUFAs in humans living in traditional winter conditions, but that has changed now IMO.
My feelings on this are that
we are not living in our traditional environment. Anyone can argue for eating the way that our ancestors evolved to eat, but to me this seems futile. We live in chronically stressful environments, with artificial light 24/7, and insane amounts of environmental toxicity. We are bombarded every single day. Therefore, a different strategy is called for IMO. I tend toward thinking that providing a constant supply of simpler, more readily accessible fuel is the safest way to approach the situation. Controversial yeah, but that's where I'm at at the moment.
But maybe we're better off having them from actual fish? Despite krill oil being a potential issue for me, I haven't noticed a similar reaction to fish (although I don't have it daily). Maybe there are nutrients in fish that protect against side effects of PUFA metabolism?
Yeah thats probably true. There are so many compounds contained within a food, and the information that food holds, the synergistic interaction of all those nutrients probably mitigates any negative effects. However, I don't believe this applies to artificially extracted oils.
