Just thought I'd scribble out some of my progress on the cave wall here.

I've been on Paleo for 10 weeks now. I'm a 47 y/o Caucasian male, 6'1" and I started at 270 lbs. I have chronic health issues such as chronic fatigue and chronic pain (aka Fibromyalgia), high cholesterol, and hypertension. I've already told the reason why I started Paleo in other threads but in a nutshell I started this diet to control my blood pressure after every medication known to man for treating hypertension failed me. Even the ones that worked, while they didn't work well, came with a host of side effects.

Eating Paleo has allowed me to eliminate almost all of my BP medication (my goal is to eliminate ALL of them eventually) and maintain a healthy BP. Yesterday I saw one of my doctors and, again, my BP was as good as it's ever been (123/83). But I also lost 26 lbs. in those 10 weeks! I've lost two sizes around my waist and I'm wearing clothes I haven't been able to wear for at least four years.

I was having a migraine issue (also discussed in another thread) that seems to have resolved itself but I'm still having vision issues. Other than that, everything related to this way of eating is great. I had a full blood panel done the day before I started the diet and will have one done again in August. I suspect my cholesterol will be down at least some, but more importantly, my triglycerides should be way down. That leaves me to deal with my lifelong pain and fatigue issues, which are not getting better and never have no matter what I eat. But that is a discussion for another forum. For now I'm happy with the BP and weight loss, and will continue towards my target weight of 215 to 220.

Cheers!

Jay

WIth your knowledge, I thought you have been doing this much longer than 10 weeks! I am going to share your story with my coworkers who are much older but have blood pressure issues.

Quote from: ayami on June 17, 2011, 08:41:32 AM

WIth your knowledge, I thought you have been doing this much longer than 10 weeks! I am going to share your story with my coworkers who are much older but have blood pressure issues.

Ayami,

I had a head start since I had been on an "Atkins-like" low carb diet for many, many years before going Paleo. The transition from that to Paleo was more of a small step than a quantum leap like it is for most people. I had already been eating a lot of good meat and eggs, of the grains I did eat, they were strictly whole. I didn't eat any sugar at all. I was already eating a lot of vegetables but not much fruit. I was already eating some raw nuts. Giving up grains and artificial sweeteners was easy for me. It was giving up dairy, specifically butter and cheese, that I thought was going to be the hardest part for me. I am of Northern European descent after all. But surprisingly, I haven't had a single piece of cheese or an ounce of butter since I started. It's been easier than I thought.

When I read about Paleo a light went off since something about the low carb diet always seems a bit off to me. I was looking for something more like our ancestral diet than what I was on so Paleo was a natural progression for me.

Feel free to share my story with anyone. If it helps even one person with their BP, it'll be worth it.

Jay

But was atkins effective for you? Did you lose while on it or was it more to maintain? You are strictly paleo with no cheats?? You have some will power! I still cannot get rid of the urge to eat frozen yogurt or snow ice once in a while. I need to do better.

Quote from: ayami on June 17, 2011, 10:03:07 AM

But was atkins effective for you? Did you lose while on it or was it more to maintain? You are strictly paleo with no cheats?? You have some will power! I still cannot get rid of the urge to eat frozen yogurt or snow ice once in a while. I need to do better.

The low carb diet (Sugar Busters to be precise, similar to Atkins) I was on did help in the beginning with weight loss, but I plateaued pretty quickly. I stuck with it because it was the only thing up to that point that made a dent in my cholesterol levels and ratio.

Part of the problem is that my Fibromyalgia got so bad the past few years that I've become more sedentary. I used to be a very active and fit person but the pain and fatigue of Fibro basically got so bad a few years ago that it kicked my legs out from under me and prohibited me from exercising very much. It all started with injuries every time I exercised and eventually exercise of any kind simply wiped me out. I had to choose between going to work or exercising because by the end of every day I was completely wiped out even if I only did one or the other. It's a terrible way to live and I suspect the lack of energy way down to the mitochondrial level is also the underlying reason for the other metabolic issues I have. Energy is everything and if your body can't make enough of it, everything eventually goes haywire. Unfortunately, I start every day with a energy deficit so I never get ahead of the curve. Fibromylagia is a mitochondrial disorder and its very complicated. I've battled it all my life, even as a child, but it wasn't until a few years ago that it finally took over my life.

Anyway, the whole onset of the Fibro thing made it impossible to really understand the effect of the diet I was on. Things are more stable now, but when my BP recently went haywire I decided to examine my diet again since the low carb diet provided some clues as to what I should and should not be eating. That lead me to Paleo and, so far, so good.

As far as cheats, I've mentioned them in other posts but its basically limited to coffee (black), bacon, a little olive oil, and an occasional small piece of 85% dark chocolate. That's it. As long as I consume enough good fat, I don't crave all the starches and sugars like I used to. I suspect that if you were able to eat more meat and more animal fat, it would be easier for you too although I understand your issues with that.

Everything you had/have sounds terrible   Were these diagnosed by specific tests? Or do they usually figure it out during a physical? I kind of have the same issues? Waking up with no energy and the only thing that helps me is coffee.

I am learning so much about health issues on this forum that I've never even heard about.

This is all pretty scary stuff and I am glad this new life style is helping. Hopefully things will get better and better!

I've reached the 4-month mark since starting Paleo. This has been the easiest thing I've ever done. I love this WOE, and rarely miss the "neo junk" I used to eat. As I said above, I was already a "low carber" so the transition to Paleo for me was more of a small step than a quantum leap like it is for most people. When I first read about Paleo, everything "clicked". It made perfect sense to me, extremely logical. It was a very easy move for me.

My original goals with Paleo were mainly to try to get my uncontrolled hypertension down to a reasonable level, and improve my cholesterol ratios. I wasn't counting on weight loss, since I planned to eat as many calories as ever, but I've lost a decent amount of weight anyway.

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Here's a summary in case you don't want to read the long version.

Blood pressure: down
Cholesterol: down and ratios improved
Weight: down

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One other issue I've had, which was mentioned above and discussed in another thread, was migraines. Turns out there were three related symptoms, migraines, narrowing field-of-focus in my vision, and severe lower back pains. I finally connected all of these to the blood pressure medication I had started taking a few weeks before starting Paleo, Losartan Potassium. Not long after I stopped taking it, the migraines went away, as did the back pain, and my vision, while not yet back to normal, has improved. After this go-around with yet another BP med failure (this has been going on for over 20 years), I was determined to stop taking ALL my BP meds come hell or high water. See below.

Weight:
I've shed a total of 32 pounds so far, most of that in the first 10 weeks of the program. I started at 270 lbs. and I'm now down to 238. I still eat quite a bit of fruit (2 to 3 pieces a day), so if my weight loss really stalls out, I will cut back on the fruit. For now, I'm still losing at a respectable rate so I'm not going to concern myself with it.

Blood pressure:
As mentioned above, while on the Losartan Potassium, and after 10 weeks on Paleo, my BP went down to "normal". Understand that this is huge for me since chronic hypertension has been a issue for me since my early-20s. My normal, unmedicated BP while on any other diet plan I've ever tried has always been around 200/120, which is high enough that several times in my life I've had doctors express shock that I was even still alive.

As I said though, this was while taking the Losartan Potassium, which I had just started a few weeks earlier after my last medication suddenly stopped working after several years. Losartan was one of the last BP meds I hadn't yet tried over the years. I've been on every class of BP medication (including calcium channel blockers, alpha blockers, beta blockers, A/B blockers, vasodilators, ACE inhibitors, ARBs, diuretics, etc.) plus various combinations and cocktails of these. I've also tried alternative therapies (like Chinese medicine and acupuncture). I've been poked and prodded and MRI'd to death. Nothing made any significant difference though, and I had some amazing side effects from many of the meds, whether they worked or not. I was sick and tired of the pharma treadmill, and after the side effects good old Losartan inflicted on me as mentioned above, I decided it was time to get off this ride.

So I did. I dropped the meds cold turkey. And guess what? My BP now is about 149/82, so my systolic has increased a bit without the meds, but my diastolic has remained the same. For me, this is a small price to pay for not having to take any more toxic medications that either don't work at all, or cause horrendous side effects (or both). I will continue to work towards getting the systolic down even further, which I suspect will only take more physical activity, which was once part of my daily life (before the chronic pain and fatigue from Fibromyalgia, and kids). I'll get there eventually.

Cholesterol:
On to the lipid panel, something that has been a source of frustration all my adult life, and something the medical and scientific community clearly has no clue about. Once you start digging into the science of cholesterol, you discover that there is very little actual science and very little is known about it. There is a lot of contradictory research, and doctors today (at least in the U.S.) are totally lost, continually repeating a "low cholesterol" mantra based on very weak science, and relentless pressure from Big Pharma to sell more statins. It seems quite clear to me that the science of lipids is still in its infancy, and it clouded by controversy, junk science, huge pharmaceutical revenues, and politics. As they say, if you want to get to the bottom of something, "Follow the money".

Frankly, I'm sick of my doctor trying to ram statins down my throat. I have horrific side effects on these things, every one of them, plus they have never done much to improve my total cholesterol numbers. So I've been trying to figure out some way to improve the numbers and get him off my back and quit obsessing about the cholesterol so I can get him to focus on other problems I have, like chronic pain.

So the day before I started Paleo, I had a blood draw for a lipid panel. Remember, I was already eating "low carb". These were the numbers:

Total cholesterol: 304

HDL: 55

LDL: 222

Triglycerides: 135

Obviously, the most alarming number here is the triglyceride level. The next day, after deflecting yet another "statin rant" from my well meaning but clueless doctor (one in a long line of many, I might add), I started Paleo. That was March 29th.

Last week I had another blood draw, and here are the results:

Total cholesterol: 276

HDL: 50

LDL: 211

Triglycerides: 76

That's right, my triglycerides were lowered almost by half. Yay! 

Here are the before and after ratios:

                                                 Before Paleo            After 4-months on Paleo

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Total Cholesterol/HDL ratio:            5.53                                 5.50

HDL/LDL ratio:                               0.25                                 0.23

Triglycerides/HDL ratio:                  2.46                                 1.52

Do these look great? Well, no. But remember, LDL is not physically measured, it is calculated using what is called the Freidewald equation, which again, is weak science at best. If your Triglycerides are above 400 mg/dl, or below 100 mg/dl (which is the case for almost anyone eating a real low carb diet), this metric for calculating LDL is inaccurate, and usually yields a very inflated number. See this article from Dr. Eades here for more on this:

http://www.proteinpower.com/drmike/weight-loss/low-carbohydrate-diets-increase-ldl-debunking-the-myth/

and here:

http://www.archivesofpathology.org/doi/full/10.1043/0003-9985%282001%29125%3C0404%3ALTLACO%3E2.0.CO%3B2

Since my lab won't test actual LDL levels, all I can do is disregard this number and focus on the important number, which is the Triglycerides. I also asked for a "Real LDL Size Pattern" test to see if my LDL is the small, dangerous type, or more towards the large, harmless, buoyant type. I don't know if they tested this, it was not in the test result summary I was able to view online, and I haven't had a call from my doctor yet, which I'm dreading since I'm sure he won't look at the good numbers, and will instead focus on the total being "too high", and the LDL being off the charts. Whatever.

Is there room for improvement? Definitely. Even though 50 is considered "normal", I probably need to get my HDL level up a bit. I suspect that over time, with a better consumption of Omega 3, through supplements and through O3 rich foods, this will improve on its own. Comments?

On a little side note, pre-Paleo my vitamin D levels were pretty low at 15.2 ng/ml. I have since been supplementing and also trying to get out more to get some sun. It's summer time here so that hasn't been too difficult and I've brought the level up to 35.2 ng/ml.

Overall, I'm very pleased with these results. I still have a ways to go, but it's only been 4 months so I wasn't even expecting this much change. Nothing I have ever done in the past, no diet, no medication regimen, no amount of exercise, has EVER made this much difference in these three areas of my life than eating Paleo. I'm sticking with this for the foreseeable future.

This is a great forum, with a lot of very well informed members. It has been a HUGE help in this process for me and I want to thank those who have offered guidance to me for their time and insight.

Cheers!

Jay

It's my impression that HDL levels respond primarily to exercise.  With more exercise and physical activity, I'd expect them to come up a bit.

That said, I don't think your lipids are really a problem, given how your triglycerides have come down.

Thanks Warren.

Yes, good old exercise. I miss it. I used to work out a minimum of 5 times per week, then I started getting injuries for no apparent reason. Then that turned into not being able to recover for weeks at a time. Then the fatigue got horrible, and a few years later I got the Fibro diagnosis. Pretty soon I had to quit working full time, and then I basically melted down. My chronic pain and fatigue are like nothing I could have ever imagined before this hit me.

I now have what is called "exercise intolerance". It's not a cop out, I really do enjoy working out...or I did. I just have a very finite amount of energy due to the chronic fatigue part of Fibro, and just doing the day's basic tasks pretty much uses that energy up. Before Fibro kicked my ass, exercise used to energize me. Now it just sucks the life out of me and makes my pain worse. I feel like an old clapped-out car that runs out of gas every day. Exercising, like driving with a heavy foot, only speeds up the process of draining the tank. It sucks.

I'm convinced Fibromyalgia is the same thing as Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS) when it's accompanied with chronic pain. I'm also convinced that it is some sort of mitochondrial disorder. Exactly what kind of disorder, I don't know. But there seems to be something at the cellular level that is disrupting the mitochondria (our cellular power plants) from producing sufficient energy from ATP. Most of those cells in the body are in muscle tissue, which also happens to be where my pain is...all of it. Not my joints, my muscles.

Anyway, for now, running my business, taking care of my twin babies, taking care of the house and my dogs, takes more energy than I have since I'm always at a deficit. But yes, maybe after I shed another 15 pounds or so, I'll be able to start exercising again. That is what I'm hoping for anyway. My upper body has become very weak since I stopped lifting.

This has been a long and frustrating journey that has been full of disappointments so while I hope for the best, I have to plan for the possibility that I will never be able to afford to expend the energy that is required by serious exercise. But I know it would do me and my lipid panel some good if I can pull it off. My fingers are crossed.

Things seem to be moving along on the right trajectory for once in my life.

They certainly do!  Great work!

Out of curiosity, are you following an autoimmune version of paleo (eliminating eggs, nightshades, or nuts, peeling anything with a substantial peel on it, etc.)?

No, I eat eggs. However, I do not eat nightshades. The only nuts I eat are macadamias. I don't know how one wound define a "substantial peel".

I think that refers to veggies like cucumbers or fruits like kiwis that people don't always peel.