25 Comments

Great article thanks Robyn, I came across this piece of info I found interesting in realation to blood pressure,

Ultraviolet-A Radiation (UVA) – Nitric Oxide + More

UVA (315-380nm) exists at a wavelength between UVB and visible light, and is able to reach deeper than UVB light but still only a few millimetres. UVA leads to the release of nitric oxide into the bloodstream which in turn benefits the cardiovascular and metabolic systems, and may offer other immunological benefits beyond those offered by nitric oxide. This vasodilatory effect enhances blood flow, lowers blood pressure and improves circulation.

https://tristanhealth.substack.com/p/why-you-can-never-replace-full-spectrum

Expand full comment
author
Feb 26·edited Feb 26Author

Yet another benefit of going outdoors and letting the sun shine on our skin!

Expand full comment

Wow, this is fascinating.

30 G of flaxseed is a lot, but I mixed it into a salad with some quinoa, and it worked. Normally I would get that much in a week, so now I am doing this in a day. Fortunately I had quite a bit of flaxseed in the house.

Same for hibiscus tea, I have quite a bit in the house, always thinking it must be healthy, but I never started drinking it, so now I will. Thank you for all this excellent stuff!!!

Expand full comment
author

Feel free to share your BP results after you've implemented these strategies for a month or so.

Expand full comment

Ok, will try to do that, meanwhile, I've just tried to add the ground flax seed to my favorite natto breakfast...

https://starlingaveplantbased.blogspot.com/2023/11/my-favorite-natto-breakfast.html

see here the result - with jalapeño and serrano it is almost edible, will have to experiment some more:

https://substack.com/profile/14829884-rogier-van-vlissingen/note/c-49895710?utm_source=notes-share-action&r=8tut8

Expand full comment
author

I've never tried natto, but I've heard that it is - ahem - an acquired taste.

Expand full comment

I took to it instantly, but it was a bit bland, and I got in the habit of making it as you see in the recipe, with a cut-up (de-seeded) jalapeño and serrano. That is my Jap-Tex innnovation. Now, the flax seed was a bit much (30 grams was about 5 tbsp), so I think what I can do is about 3 tablespoons in my natto and another 2 table spoons in a salad later in the day.

Expand full comment

I've had success with many of the above steps...except for #2, which almost ruined my health. I was a vegetarian, even vegan for years at a time, for decades. Except for the occasional meal out, I ate whole foods cooked from scratch - lots of veggies and fruits, grains, beans. However, eating a low-fat, high-carb diet made me gain weight and eventually I became type 2 diabetic.

Despite my best efforts, along with taking all sorts of supplements, including B12, I simply didn't thrive. It wasn't until I switched to a keto diet, including resuming eating meat and fish, that I was able to get my blood sugar levels back within normal range without resorting to medication. Once my blood sugar levels went down, so did my blood pressure. The most fascinating thing was that I lost a lot of weight without eating fewer calories. Now the majority of my calories come from fat, a moderate amount comes from protein, and I strive to eat no more than 20 to 50g of carbs a day. I generally only eat two meals a day, no snacks. I also fast between three to seven days every couple of months.

I don't restrict my salt intake, but my blood tests always show that my sodium levels are within range. However, I do go for a walk every day and get enough sleep.

Expand full comment
author

Also, your blood sodium level has almost nothing to do with your sodium intake. Your kidneys will excrete excess sodium in order to maintain a steady plasma concentration, however the excretion of sodium decreases calcium reabsorption, so people who overeat sodium lose more calcium in their urine (e.g. see https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/18410231/).

Expand full comment

Sorry, I should have clarified: I usually consume high amounts of sodium, but no longer have high blood pressure since switching to keto. For me, keeping my blood sugar levels within normal range without medication results in normal blood pressure, regardless of my sodium intake.

Expand full comment
author

It's great that you've got your blood pressure down, but unfortunately excessive sodium intake causes arterial damage even in the absence of hypertension, e.g. see https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10063371/.

Expand full comment

Well, the researchers themselves say "the association seemed mainly mediated by blood pressure." They ended up excluding almost two-thirds of the participants for various reasons, ending up studying only 10,778 participants, more than half of them former or current smokers (I've never been a smoker), something the study doesn't address in terms of impact on heart health. (I would be more inclined to accept the findings of this study if the current and former smokers had been excluded, bringing the total number of participants to a mere 5173.)

The researchers also admit the following: "As we observed an association in individuals with normal blood pressure, one possible explanation for these findings is that the detrimental pathological processes begin already prior to the development of hypertension. However, due to the observational, cross-sectional design of the study, no causal relationships can be established."

All in all, I don't find this particular study as persuasive as you do.

Expand full comment
author

I agree this is not a particularly strong study; it's just one that popped up in a quick search that I did whilst I was travelling and did not have access to my citation library.

An excellent book detailing the multitude of harms done to humans who eat sodium in excess of evolutionary adaptation, is Salt, diet and health : Neptune's poisoned chalice, which you can read online for free here: https://archive.org/details/saltdiethealthne0000macg/mode/2up

Expand full comment
Feb 27Liked by Robyn Chuter

Thanks for the link, I will check it out!

Expand full comment

Instead of saying "I'd be more inclined to accept the accept the results," I should have said "I'd be less inclined to dismiss this study entirely" because smokers are known to be at higher risk of cardiac disease.

Expand full comment

At 5:30 am my time, without having any coffee yet, I'll leave it there. I appreciate you taking the time to respond. I really appreciate the open-mindedness. Incidentally, when I told my previous doctor how I'd managed to get my A1c down without medication, she told me that she'd witnessed a significant number of her patients have success with the keto and that she was going to try it herself in order to lose weight (we didn't discuss whether she needed medication to control any health issues, but she looked to be 30 to 40 pounds heavier than recommended). She retired shortly after, so I don't know how she ended up faring on keto. When I told her replacement why I no longer needed meds, my new GP nodded approvingly and told me that's exactly how her father manages his type 2 diabetes. My current GP (I moved to another city, so I had to switch) is a big fan of controlling medical conditions with lifestyle changes whenever possible, so he didn't have any concerns about my diet since my A1c and blood pressure are good and I was otherwise in good health.

Expand full comment
author
Feb 18·edited Feb 18Author

Thanks for sharing your experience. I'm intrigued by people like you, who don't get the results that I see in my clinical practice, and whose experiences run totally counter to what the large-scale studies show. I definitely think there needs to be much more research into these phenomena. I wonder whether there are genetic, epigenetic, or microbiome factors that affect the results that people get from various diets.

I have read and heard many accounts of people who got good results from a ketogenic diet. However, I find such a diet impossible to endorse, because it is so wildly out of step with the evolutionary history of human beings. There is not a single human population that has ever lived on a ketogenic diet - and yes, that includes the Inuit, as I wrote in 'Ketogenic diets: Part 2 - Is ketosis 'natural'?/ (https://robynchuter.substack.com/p/ketogenic-diets-part-2-is-ketosis?). We simply do not know what is going to happen to people who keep themselves in ketosis for years at a stretch, because there are no cohort studies that follow a sufficiently large number of people for a sufficient length of time. Given that ketogenic diets essentially fool the body into 'thinking' that it's starving, I can't help but think that there will be a price to pay for maintaining this trickery over a long period of time.

Expand full comment

I'd very interested in what the results of such research would turn up, but I suspect you're right that it'd be difficult to get funding for.

Given my personal experience, I am a lot more open to believing people who thrive on diets completely different from mine, whether vegan or carnivore. For example, I've seen Jordan Peterson's daughter Mikhaila talk about how switching to a beef-only diet cured her juvenile arthritis and other chronic health issues, and her words ring true to me, even though the diet defies conventional wisdom.

If there is a price to pay for the "trickery" as you put it, it's a worthwhile trade-off for me. I have now been keto for the better part of a decade and, touch wood, I still feel great. Time will tell, I guess.

Expand full comment

found this video on natto. It has become my favorite breakfast ;-)

Expand full comment