In light of the recent discoveries during my n=1 experiment with nutritional ketosis regarding my cholesterol (Part 1, Part 2, Part 3), thyroid hormone (Part 1), and skin rash, I decided to take a break from nutritional ketosis to see what would happen.
We’ve already seen that the addition of carbs back into my diet made my rash go away (it’s been a few months out and still no rash, yay!).
I took another blood test to see if my thyroid hormone levels would change. … Read More
One of my readers, Doctor Timothe, was kind enough to write a very thoughtful response and analysis of my first post on prurigo pigmentosa, and while I was in the middle of typing a response in the comments section, I thought it’d probably be more helpful to write it as a full post.
… Read MoreI am a surgical ER Doctor thats been following you for a while, but I am no Dermotologist. I have been in ketosis for almost 2 years, and i maintain High cardio exercise, and have never had such a problem, nor hear of it.
During my most recent cholesterol blood work, I also checked my thyroid hormone levels in an effort to figure out why my cholesterol has gotten so high while I’ve been in nutritional ketosis.
One of the possible explanations was that:
Chronic low carb -> Hypothyroidism (low T3) -> Decreased expression of LDL receptors in the liver -> Higher serum cholesterol
Background – Here is an oversimplified explanation of thyroid physiology
As you can see with my cholesterol numbers, despite cutting back on my saturated fats for 3 weeks by restricting the amount of coconut oil and grassfed butter that I typically eat, my LDL-C and Total Cholesterol have continued to go up!
Here is a brief summary of potential explanation as to why LDL and total cholesterol can be elevated in people who are in ketosis from Part 2:
So it looks like I’ve eliminated #1 as a potential explanation. … Read More
After 90 days of nutritional ketosis, I managed to reach a new low in weight, only to see it bounce back up. I’m now only 1.6 lbs down from my starting weight of 180.0 lbs. Seeing a graph like this really shows how variable daily weights can be!
In the past 30 days, I spent 21 days over the minimal cut off of 0.5 mmol which I’m happy with. This is a little worse compared to days 31-60 where I was in ketosis for 25 days. … Read More
Here are my cholesterol tests from the past couple of years along with my most recent results. My initial results from 2010 when I was following the standard american diet actually look remarkably ideal, despite the diet, however I was running almost 3 miles a day during this period AND I was carrying around more weight and a greater body fat percentage. So while my blood work looked ideal, my outside appearance didn’t really reflect it… and I was exhausted from all the running I was doing.… Read More