Modern Holy Grail! Eat Carbs, Lower Stress, Lose Fat!
I had to write this up because many of my friends and family are now interested in this Brain Energy book which will be out shortly: Brain Energy.
I totally appreciate where the guy is going and strongly agree overall with his unifying disease model, he just doesn’t seem from videos and the blurb, to have the better alternative to a keto diet in awareness. He like so many seem to think PUFs are fine while glucose and fructose are the culprits of insulin resistance. I suspect his references will support the combined disease model but not his full dietary recommendations.
Moving away from the standard American diet is so amazing that everyone trying a diet that gets away from it a reasonable amount feels better get super excited (partly from the adrenaline), and then feel like they have arrived. I get it, I’ve been there.
I still need to add on some pro-dopamine hacks that is why this is v1. If you want to see those let me know.
Don’t do Keto...better alternatives exist
Many people are demonizing sugar and promoting Keto these days, so I suggest keeping some of their helpful ideas and reject others. Unfortunately we are still strategically deceived. The pharmaco-medical complex simply does not want to give us readily available inexpensive compounds that will promote health nor address the underlying food issues accelerating mortality.
Most MDs, even the ones really trying, are inadvertent accomplices.
Focus on macros is not insufficient and likely unhelpful.
If you eat only potatoes you will lose weight. This is not the only way, but it counters the Keto oversimplification immediately.
Partly because it’s boring, but primarily because potatoes are full of potassium, gaba and other nutrients that aid the food in getting into cells in the brain which promotes satiety.
Fructose in the context of fruit is wildly, yep wildly different from high fructose corn syrup...which has no paired potassium and no other nutrients or signaling molecules
People seem to get so angry when you point this out IDK...maybe because they are not eating sugar ; )
If you increase Omega-6 while on keto you are dramatically working in opposition to health promotion as if the stress hormones were not enough.
Short fasting and short term pulses of stress hormones from exercise are likely beneficial, but it rapidly goes against us when we already have loads of other stressors.
Catabolic hormones - cause diabetes, stress not fructose is the culprit
Stress hormones: glucagon, cortisol, adrenaline, norepinephrine
“Experimental evidence suggests that sympathetic hyperactivity may be a pathogenic factor for type 2 diabetes as well as for the occurrence of diabetic complications. Interestingly, dopamine agonists, which exert multiple actions including a decrease in sympathetic activation, have recently been found to be of benefit in the treatment of type 2 diabetes.”
“Glucagon produces insulin resistance. Glucagon-induced insulin resistance promotes type 2 diabetes and diabetes associated with glucagonoma. Further, glucagon-induced insulin resistance aggravates the metabolic consequences of the insulin-deficient state. A major metabolic effect of insulin is the accumulation of glucose as glycogen in the liver. Glucagon opposes hepatic insulin action and enhances the rate of gluconeogenesis, increasing hepatic glucose output. In order to support gluconeogenesis, glucagon promotes skeletal muscle wasting to supply amino acids as gluconeogenic precursors. Glucagon promotes hepatic fatty acid oxidation to supply energy required to sustain gluconeogenesis. Hepatic fatty acid oxidation generates β-hydroxybutyrate and acetoacetate (ketogenesis).”
“Chronic glucocorticoid (GC) exposure in humans is well known to result in whole-body insulin resistance and obesity.”
Natural Anabolic hormones, hormones that promote healing: testosterone, insulin, growth hormone, DHEA etc.
A note on Insulin, Glucagon & Gaba: Insulin does not cause insulin resistance - Glucagon does. Almost everyone’s base model is wrong and has been for 40 years. Pharma companies know this and after getting as much money from insulin as possible, have switched to supplying GLP-1 inhibitors, so soon enough we should see MDs catch up.
See: Robert Unger, Glucagon receptor inhibition normalizes blood glucose in severe insulin-resistant mice
Insulin racket: Diabetes patients sue insulin makers for ‘pricing fraud’ - The Washington Post - what they don’t say is that the science was also distorted for 5 decades to promote insulin sales!
GABA (gamma aminobutyric acid) - An OTC non-pharma inhibitor of glucagon
“Our data show that GABA is rapidly absorbed and tolerated in human beings; its endocrine effects, exemplified by increasing islet hormonal secretion, suggest potential therapeutic benefits for diabetes.”
“Oral gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA) supplementation increases growth hormone (GH) serum levels and protein synthesis.”
“Besides, various pharmaceutical properties of Gaba on non-neuronal peripheral tissues and organs were also reported due to anti-hypertension, anti-diabetes, anti-cancer, antioxidant, anti-inflammation, anti-microbial, anti-allergy, hepato-protection, reno-protection, and intestinal protection. Therefore, Gaba may be considered as potential alternative therapeutics for prevention and treatment of various diseases.”
DHEA
“DHEA therapy compared with placebo induced significant decreases in visceral fat area (–13 cm2 vs +3 cm2, respectively; P = .001) and subcutaneous fat (–13 cm2 vs +2 cm2, P = .003). The insulin area under the curve (AUC) during the OGTT was significantly reduced after 6 months of DHEA therapy”
“DHEA reduces adipose tissue mass and inhibits the proliferation and differentiation of adipocytes”
HGH
“In summary, the predominant effect of GH in the adipose tissue is the stimulation of lipolysis....Unlike in the adipose tissue, GH induces free fatty acid (FFA) uptake into skeletal muscle”
Testosterone
“Low testosterone concentrations at baseline predicted higher insulin resistance at follow-up, but high insulin resistance at baseline could not predict low testosterone at follow-up.”
Active Thyroid (triiodothyronine): Thyroid hormone is catabolic to fat while being healthfully anabolic (restorative) to the heart
Thyroid hormone stimulates hepatic lipid catabolism via activation of autophagy
“Thyroidectomy alone led to cardiac atrophy, severe cardiac dysfunction, and a dramatic loss of arterioles”
Thyroid hormone and "cardiac metamorphosis": potential therapeutic implications
Thyroid hormones and cardiac remodeling
Thyroid hormone and cardiac repair/regeneration: from Prometheus myth to reality?
“TH can induce cardiac repair and (or) regeneration by reactivating developmental gene programming”
“T3 directly stimulates mitochondrial respiration and the synthesis of adenosine 5'-triphosphate (ATP)”
Thyroid hormone at supra-physiological dose ... improves cardiac function
“TH treatment partially reverses cardiac dysfunction in rats with old myocardial infarction by favorably changing cardiac chamber geometry and expression of myosin isoforms. Thyroid hormone, unlike current treatments, appears to be a paradigm of therapeutic intervention which aims at restoring cardiac geometry and may prove new effective treatment for heart failure.”
Various:
Regeneration of Pancreatic β-Islet Cells in a Type-II Diabetic