Freaking Out about Blood Sugar

kettlebell said:

I have to say (again), I could read Peatarians posts again and again.

You are awesome.

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What a joy it would be to get to the top of the mountain.

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JDW said:

So do you think that while balancing these things, I shouldn't be overtly worries about such high sugar levels? It's hard to get the numbers out of my head.

•I've removed the unsaturated fat but I'm sure it'll take a LONG time to get the PUFA's out of me...
Try to use 500mg of aspirin a day, it will keep the PUFA out of your blood stream.

•Iron - not sure about yet
Donate blood. That's the easiest way to get rid of iron. (You can of course exclude your donation from being used to be on the safe side.)

•Lactic Acid - not sure about
You can have your prolactin tested. After reading your post I would say: Safe yourself the trouble, its high. Bagbreathing, gelatin and progesterone will lower it.

•Estrogen - I'm taking Progest-E
Great! When did you start and how much are you using?

•Seratonin - not sure about
You can eat potato juice (recipe is in the serotonin-removal-thread). Carrot salad will help, too.

•Light deficiency - I live in SW Florida so I doubt that's a problem although I could probably stand to get my whole body in the sun since my vitamin D levels are chronically low... low to the point of deficiency NOT just insufficiency
That might be because you don't have enough calcium and vitamin A. You should supplement vitamin D for a while. Egg shell powder for calcium might be a good idea, too.

•The sugar/calcium/protein - That's what I'm actively working on but it's sending my sugar levels into the 300s so I'm second guessing everything.

Any tricks for getting this under control more quickly?
Baking soda, aspirin, vitamin K, calcium

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peatarian said:

Dear JDW,

I have to admit that I've never come across anyone who had all your symptoms but since they are so closely related it's not surprising.

Exactly. My point to the docs has always been, there has to be some underlying cause. These conditions are all so related and the aren't created in a vacuum. I want someone to "put the pieces" together but no one was ever able. I've done my best but it's a hard road and with three small kids and work, I just haven't had time. Although, I'm leaving my job next month so my number one priority will be getting healthy.

What really worried me was that you should feel shame because you're sick. I've heard so many women bashfully whisper they had a disease 'down there' - usually referring to some kind of cancer. It always makes me want to cry. Katharina Dalton (whose books I highly recommend wrote in "Once A Month" - a must read for women - that she hoped one day every girl and every woman would know about the actions of the different hormones in her body and how to react to certain symptoms, so all the pain and fear and uncertainty would be abolished. That was 1978. You have nothing to be ashamed of, JDW. Reading what you've been through you should be proud that you made it through all that, that you're still here and even climbing a mountain ... I hope you'll find some climbing irons here.

Thank you for that. I think I've been labeled the "sick one" so long by family members that it started to make me feel shamed. Some of these conditions are not obvious to the outside world and I don't always "look" sick, so when I can't attend a function or such because I'm in pain, no one gets that but my husband. Plus, I really believe I have the power to heal myself AND I believe that a lot of my illness has to do with poor choices in life so I think I feel a bit like a failure. Funny enough, the female stuff has never caused me shame... I think because I had my first colonoscopy at 15 and then with my cycle being so integral to my health, or lack thereof, I just let it all fly on that end. I talk to other women, even men sometimes, about cervical fluid, menses, clotting, etc. etc. They usually think I'm crazy!

* stage IV endometriosis with a frozen pelvis: I have known a woman who had endometriosis and PMS with strong migraines. She started using progest-e-complex a year ago. The first three weeks nothing happened so we thought it might not work. She was using a drop three times a day then. She still had trouble sleeping, was losing hair, felt cold ... I found that sometimes using too little progesterone is worse (in the beginning) than using none. It seems to bring out the symptoms of estrogen dominance more strongly. This woman has been using one bottle in one day once when the PMS symptoms started. After that she was fine. She used less the next day and her menstruation started but since she was still using about half a bottle, the symptoms were not severe. After that she used enough progest-e-complex to suppress her period (The menstruation starts when the progesterone level drops.) for about 4 months. I think it was 1 bottle in a week. After that she reduced the dosage to one bottle in two weeks and used less during the first two weeks of her cycle. She's been to her doctor three months ago. Her endometriosis is gone, so are the uterine myoma she had had since puberty. I think after years and years of estrogen dominance you should use a large dosage of progest-e-complex orally for a while.

Yeah. I'm taking about 6-10 drops a day but I could probably go higher. I used to use A LOT of progesterone cream but it didn't really do much for the endo since so much scar tissue was involved (the first doc who ever opened me up, closed me right back up and said, "I'm really not qualified to handle this... you need a specialist" Thank God he did because he could have made it much worse but I did travel across the country to see a specialist for that one and I'm glad I did. It kept my issues at bay for a good 10 years which is much more than I can say for a lot of other endo women. That said, I bet Progest-E is a lot better and might offer more relief.

How is your thyroid gland? Are you using thyroid hormones? Have you measured your temperature in the morning after waking up? Or your resting pulse?

I'm not using Thyroid hormones although I probably should be. Quite a few years ago a doc put me on T3 and it made me feel like crap. She wasn't really specific and it was a pretty big dose if I remember correctly. I use natural family planning so I take my basal temp every morning up until about 4 days after ovulation (thankfully I still ovulate). The temps range from the high 96s to the mid 97s after ovulation. My pulse has been around 72-73 over the past few days.

* pudendal neuralgia: I had never heard about that and doing some research now I wonder if this is a disease usually found in big foot and the loch ness monster. First it says the disease means the pudendal nerve is entrapped and this causes chronic pain. Then it says you can have pudendal neuralgia even when the pudendal nerve is not entrapped or compressed.
It's enough to experience genital numbness, fecal and urinary incontinence.
There are no specific clinical signs or complementary test results for this condition. The typical symptoms are seen in male competitive cyclists and the most reliable diagnostic parameter would be pain relieve by standing or sitting on a toilet seat. The same is true for hemorrhoids and obstipation. The other symptoms are similar to chronic prostatitis, chronic pelvic pain syndrome and interstitial cystitis.
I am not sure what to make of that. I think this diagnosis is closely related to the 'frozen pelvis' and the 'partial bowel obstruction'.
You've probably been collecting different diagnoses from different doctors - like me. Just try not to identify yourself with these diagnoses and diseases. They seem to divide people into sections and that lets us forget that everything's connected and that we are one.

poor bigfoot and his spasming rectum. This sucker is actually one of the worst ones for me. I'm used to other pains but the first time this came about, I thought I would die. It's like a charlie horse that wraps across the pirineum and into the rectum and then into the buttucks and thighs but its way worse than a charlie horse. Sitting on the toilet is one of the only things that alleviates the pain but barely. I would guess that somehow the pudendal nerve has been damaged or entrapped from the endometriosis.

* partial bowel obstruction: I have heard of this from several people. It usually turned out to be something else. Can you tell me how you've been diagnosed and what the symptoms are? Have you been using different kinds of narcotics and/or pain killers over a long period of time or have you had surgery? Have you tried cascara powder (see supplement section)?

In my major surgery for endometriosis, I actually had two surgeries. A major one to remove the massive endo and the a "second-look" surgery a week later to knock down the newly formed adhesions. On the second surgery, with the pelvis a lot cleaner, they found a large implant in the bowel (basically a tumor) that was growing into the bowel wall. It's bigger than a golf ball, smaller than a baseball. There was no bowel surgeon on the second-look surgery so it was left. It's partially in the intestines but partially in the pelvic cavity so thankfully, it's not causing massive discomfort with "blockage." During menses, I get horrible bowel pain but it subsides the rest of the month. I was on heavy narcotics for IBS when I was a teenager but they would mess me up so I stopped taking them. I have not tried cascara powder... I've never heard of it but will certainly look it up.

*intestinal polyps: I have a friend who's been diagnosed with colon polyps a few years back. The doctors told her she was both the youngest patient ever to have had colon polyps (she was in her 20s) and the one with the biggest polyps. She had been using the pill for many years and switched to a hormone spiral later. Of course it's still estrogen. She was also drinking a lot of alcohol and smoking. Once I asked Ray Peat about PAP testing and what could be done if the PAP test came back with a bad result. He told me this was a way to threaten women into unnecessary procedures. If you used vitamin A, vitamin E and progesterone and thyroid, both orally and topically - you would be fine within a month. He'd given this advice to many women over the last 50 years and it always worked. He'd thought about it when he had pre-cancerous and cancerous lesions in his mouth and used vitamin A and E and pregnenolone and thyroid to heal them (which they did). He realized that the mucous of the mouth was similar to that of the vagina. I have given this advice to many women during the last couple of years. It always worked.
I remembered that when my friend told me about the polyps. She had a colonoskopy and the biggest polyps were removed but afterwards the doctors told her that the tissue had been pre-cancerous. They have stages, too and she was the one before it was 'real cancer'. So I told her about the vitamins and hormones. She was afraid to try the hormones since she was using the hormone spiral and was afraid of becoming pregnant. So she only used vitamin A and E. Half a year later she had another colonoscopy and the polyps were gone and stayed gone.

To be honest, I've been too scared to have another colonoscopy. I was diagnosed at 15, via colonoscopy, with Familial adenomatous polyposis (FAP). I remember being half awake and the doctor showing me a tv monitor and pointing out 100's of small polyps. I have not had a colonoscopy since. I've been too afraid of what they'd find because apparently there is a strong correlation to cancer later in life. I know I won't want to do anything about it so I've not gone. Maybe after a year or so of Peat-Eating I'll go in just to take the worry away. I have ordered vitamin E but not vitamin A. Does that need supplementation or will I get enough with the milk and OJ? I have fermented cod liver oil but I haven't taken it in a long while.

* multi-nodular thyroid goiter: I've known many people with a goiter. It usually gets smaller when you use T3 and progesterone. You should be careful with both. In the tissue a goiter consists of there is usually lots of T4 stored. The progesterone can convert it to T3 and produce a thyroid storm. You'd have palpitations and sweat a lot and have trouble breathing. This would happen pretty soon after using a large dosage of progest-e-complex. So I recommend having some L-Carnitin at home or cabbage juice. The thyroid storm is rare but I've known a woman who experienced it and it's no fun. So if you have these symptoms after a large dosage of progest-e-complex, drink cabbage juice or L-Carnitin and lots of sugared milk.

Duly noted. I actually had heart palps this afternoon but no sweating. Lot of random anxiety though. Thoughts?I will be careful. Now, I know Peat is anti-iodine but while I was taking high doses of iodine (100mg) a day, the goiter shrunk noticeably. It also shrunk my breast lump. I really feel like iodine is a good thing but apparently it's not?

*large breast lump: I know of a woman who was diagnosed with breast cancer. She refused treatment and went home. Since she hasn't changed anything since the diagnosis the lump was growing slowly. So when it becomes too big for her taste, she will go to an alternative clinic and have hyperthermia treatment. After that, the lump shrinks and stays small for a year or two.
A good friend of mine had a lump in her breast after the birth of her first child. It grew bigger during breast feeding. After 4 months it was the size of a marble. I gave her progest-e-complex which she never dared to use orally but rubbed on the lump. It shrank over the next 3 months until it was the size of a big pinhead - you could hardly feel it. But at that time she was done breastfeeding and had it surgically removed. I never quite understood it but it was her choice.

I had it biopsied many year ago and its a fibroadenoma. The doc wanted it removed but I simply didn't want a surgery and its benign so why put myself through it? Maybe I will rub some Progest-E on it just to shrink it more.

* PCOS: I have known many women who've been diagnosed with PCOS. Usually they developed uterine myoma later. When you use enough progesterone, the syndrome disappears and will not occur again. It's just that too much estrogen triggers too many oocytes to enlarge. Nothing serious and when the estrogen is opposed, it doesn't occur anymore.

* diabetes: How have you been diagnosed? Do you have 'sweet urine' or too much glucose in your blood? How long have you had 'diabetes'? It's one of the few diseases even doctors know can be influenced by nutrition. If you do the opposite of what they tell you, you'll be fine soon.

A reproductive endocrinologist did a 2 hour glucose tolerance test. Then, over time as it became worse, it was obvious I had diabetes (in the terms of conventional medicine... maybe not be Peat). My blood sugars are hard to control these days. I was diagnosed in 2001 so 11 years. I actually saw Dr. Richard Bernstein (high profile author) as a patient and he recommends like 20 carbs a day. It did keep my sugars in control and under 100 but it was hard to maintain and I felt absolutely deprived. Maybe that's immature but since food was such a major part of my childhood, it was hard to keep on his eating plan. This whole foray into sugar and fruit has been terrifying BUT liberating and it fills me with hope that I won't be chained to a diet of meat and not much else for the rest of my life. I can have egg nog this Christmas... WHAT?!?! That's pure joy.

* decades long dysthymia: I think that's not exactly surprising reading what you've been through. I have some trouble with the word 'depression' and even more with 'dysthymia' -- It's probably connected with your low thyroid and high estrogen which will trigger high serotonin. But then it's also possible that you were sad because your life wasn't exactly beautiful at times. Probably all together.

Yeah. I often wonder what factors contribute to this. I can list the two or three years that I felt "happy" and other than that... not so much. I guess that it's an underlying medical issue that is compounded by my childhood. I have brothers that are happy and upbeat but I did not fare so well.

* fibromyalgia: You should start using D3 supplement and thyroid. The aspirin will help, too. I have known many women (mostly) during the last years who'd been diagnosed with fibromyalgia. It meant something else with everyone. I think fibromyalgia is a very comfortable diagnoses for doctors because it covers all kinds of symptoms and they can tell you you have disease which is unknown when it comes to causes and treatments. Most symptoms disappeared with progesterone, thyroid, aspirin, vitamin D3, vitamin A and gelatin. Also very important: To eat protein and sugar throughout the day, to not eat or drink nothing for hours. Usually the symptoms get worse during winter. Heat bulbs and thyroid supplement and the D3 will improve the condition a lot.

Yeah. That's why I put it in quotes because it feels like a catch-all diagnosis. Vitamin D is a huge issue, I know. I think I was at a level of 19 when it was checked 4 years ago. I just became so frustrated that I didn't bother following up. As for thyroid, do I need a script? I don't want to go to a doc... it's exhausting and it will be a fight. Does peat have general guidelines for thyroid supplementation? Should I be worried about adrenal function? I know they are shot... but I also know that Peat says they heal quickly, right?

* female hair loss: Usually stops as soon as you use enough thyroid and progesterone. As long as you don't use estrogen and alcohol or smoke.

From your lips to God's ears. I used to love my hair, now at 38 I'm trying to cover bald patches. sigh. I don't use estrogen or smoke but I do like a glass of red wine at night... do I need to give up my beloved vino?

* sexual dysfunction: Meaning? No libido? No wonder with a 'frozen pelvis', endometriosis, a partial bowel blockage and a lump in your breast. I guess you don't feel exactly sexy. Don't worry, that will change.

It's varied. I've had orgasmic dysfunction for a decade. If I think back, I'm pretty sure it correlates to my pelvic surgery. I'm worried that they nicked something or possibly nerves are impacted from adhesions. I also have no libido but I feel "normal" as a size 4 and these days I'm a 16 so to say I'm self-conscious is a grotesque understatement. My DH is very kind and loves me as I am but I can't get over my size. That was a major worry about eating this way, the weight gain. I'm trying to think of the big picture but I will admit its hard.

* "probable MS": I know two women who've been diagnosed with MS. I asked Ray Peat for advice and he told me that the last women who've come to him for help after having been diagnosed with MS turned out to have been hypothyroid. After they used thyroid hormones containing T4 and T3 the symptoms disappeared and the MS with them.
There have been lots of studies about MS and Low Dose Naltrexone. I have used it and can only recommend it. It will reduce the stress hormones and give your body time to recover. I am not saying I think you have MS (I don't) but naltrexone might be worth a try anyway. I have written about it here: viewtopic.php?f=10&t=249&start=50
One of the women I know is using progest-e-complex and naltrexone and is feeling better with every day. She doesn't see doctors anymore so I can't tell you what this would have done to her diagnosis.

In my search, low-dose naltrexone is one thing I've come across. I actually have some in my fridge (from India) but have been hesitating jumping in. I feel like I need to do a little more research but I will definitely read your thoughts on it!! I don't believe I have MS and I told my husband I was confident I could "cure it" on my own but I haven't been actively working as I've been so darn worn out lately... worse than normal. I do feel a touch better the past few days... wishful thinking? I don't know but I'm sooooo very hopeful. I still can't drink "grocery store" milk and so I've been drinking small amounts of milk from the co-op that I joined but I actually contacted our local health food store and grocery store about needing at least 10 gallons of milk a week and if they could bring in an organic, non-homogenized, low-temp pasteurized brand like Natural by Nature or Kalona Supernatural. It blows my mind that I'm looking to bring in that much milk for my family! I haven't had milk in years and my kids have been drinking coconut milk for the past year. They are so confused because suddenly I'm like, "here, drink this." And they say, "it's cow milk... isn't cow milk bad for us." Oy... I may have taught them the wrong thing!

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j. said:

I don't think you should eat large amounts of sugar if your thyroid isn't working well yet and if doing so provokes a bad reaction in your body.

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peatarian said:

Great post, nwo2012! I always love (and hate) your stories from the front.
I have been experimenting with T3 for a while now and I think my worries were unnecessary. I think I haven't been using enough. You know Ray Peat said you should nibble on one pill throughout the day? I have been using 10 cynomel pills in one day twice now. My temperature rises for about half an hour after I used one. That's all there is to it. Ray Peat says he's heard that European T3 is not potent. But it wasn't European, it was from Thailand and then from Mexico. So I would recommend to first slowly increase coconut fat (for goiter treatment) until it's at least 5 table spoons extra. Always monitor temp and pulse. And then slowly start with T3 and increase it just as the coconut fat is slightly decreased. I think everybody will have to find out their own need for T3 but I don't think overdosing is such a big problem. If you have cabbage juice or L-Carnitin as emergency treatment. But yes, I think in some ways T3 is safer than T4. Too much T4 can cause problems. Just start with low dose and don't skip the T4 completely.

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peatarian said:

RAY PEAT:

“But in the organism, the
hyperglycemia is compensating for a sensed
deficiency of glucose, a need for more energy.
If diabetes means that cells can't absorb or
metabolize glucose, then any cellular function that
requires glucose will be impaired, despite the
presence of glucose in the blood. It is the intracellular
absence of glucose which is problematic,
rather than its extracellular excess.

“During the healing of a wound in a diabetic
individual, the local concentration of glucose
decreases and then entirely disappears, as healing
stops. Applying glucose and insulin topically to
the wound, it heals quickly. The very old practice
of treating deep wounds with honey or granulated
sugar has been studied in controlled situations,
including the treatment of diabetic ulcers, infected
deep wounds following heart surgery, and wounds
of lepers. The treatment eradicates bacterial infections
better than some antiseptics, and accelerates
healing without scarring, or with minimal
scarring. The sugar regulates the communication
between cells, and optimizes the synthesis of
collagen and extracellular matrix.

"The supplements that most often help to
correct diabetes-like conditions are niacinamide,
thiamine, thyroid, and progesterone or pregnenolone.
Vitamins D and K are clearly protective
against developing diabetes, and their effects on
many regulatory processes suggest that they
would also help to correct existing hyperglycemia.
Drinking coffee seems to be very protective
against developing diabetes. Its niacin and magne-
sium are clearly important, but it is also a rich
source of antioxidants, and it helps to maintain
normal thyroid and progesterone production.
Chocolate is probably protective too, and it is a
good source ofmagnesium and antioxidants."

"Aspirin has a very broad spectrum of anti-
inflammatory actions, and is increasingly being
recommended for preventing complications of
diabetes. One of the consequences of inflammation
is hyperglycemia, and aspirin helps to correct
that (Yuan, et aI., 2001), while protecting proteins
against oxidative damage (Jafarnejad, et ai, 2001).
If Dr Budd's thinking (and results) had been
more widely accepted when his publications
appeared, thinking about "diabetes" might have
led to earlier investigation of the syndromes of
stress and tissue wasting, with insulin being
identified as just one of many regulatory
substances, and a large amount of useless and
harmful activity treating hyperglycemia as the
enemy, rather than part of an adaptive reaction,
might have been avoided."

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