Geoff's Miscellany

Miscellaneous Musings

Health

My GERD Experiment

by 3 Comments

I’ve mentioned before that I have a genetic bone disorder and have utilized my interpretation of scientific publications to self-experiment.

This self-experimentation has had positive health results. Other times I have merely yielded knowledge about what does not help. For instance, I’ve had pretty bad acid reflux for the past few years. I recently discovered from my mother that I also had terrible reflux as a baby. I might even have a weak LES muscle. I don’t know, I haven’t been to the doctor for it for years because they just prescribe proton pump inhibitors or histamine blockers. I can buy those and as far as I can tell, they have long term deleterious effects on the human body. 

  1. Gregory L Austin et al., “A Very Low-Carbohydrate Diet Improves Gastroesophageal Reflux and Its Symptoms,” Digestive Diseases and Sciences 51, no. 8 (August 2006): 1307–12, doi:10.1007/s10620-005-9027-7. In this study, a very low carbohydrate diet (consuming less than 20 grams a day) led to improved symptoms in all eight participants. The metric was a probe utilized to determine acid exposure time in the esophagus. There was no blind in this particular study, but the objective measurement is interesting. The measurements were taken before the diet was initiated and then six days later.
  2. WS Yancy Jr., D Provenzale, and Ec Westman, “Case Reports. Improvement of Gastroesophageal Reflux Disease after Initiation of a Low-Carbohydrate Diet: Five Brief Case Reports,” Alternative Therapies in Health & Medicine 7, no. 6 (November 2001): 120.

In this article records the case of five individuals who self-initiated a low-carb diet found themselves without frequent symptoms of heart-burn and indigestion. It is published in an alternative therapy journal, but it’s still peer-reviewed.

The Pay Off

So, I started an extremely low carbohydrate diet about two weeks ago. The main purpose was precisely to decrease symptoms of heartburn that had become more frequent that non-heartburn. My existence had become somewhat miserable because if I happened to even eat a small snack, within minutes I would feel very full and bloated. I would have heartburn (even if I took medicine prior to eating) and the full feeling would last for several hours. If I ate lunch at work, I usually was not able to eat dinner or go to the gym at night. The only way to get food in prior to the gym was to eat around 10 am, then just be full and miserable all day at work. This started around March, but the heart burn goes back to my early twenties.

Anyhow, I started the diet, eschewing the conventional wisdom that fatty foods lead to heartburn. For the first two days, I ate less than 20 grams of carbohydrates, continued drinking coffee, and obtained most of my carbohydrates from sauerkraut, spinach, and mushrooms. My protein and fat came from butter and meat. I expected my digestion to remain slow, but to at least experience less heartburn. Within two days, I had my first day with no heartburn and no medication. Upon increasing my carbs to about 50 grams per day, and allowing myself one “cheat day a week,” I have had only one serious experience of heartburn and 7 light flare-ups that went away as soon as I took an antacid or dissipated by the time I walked to the medicine cabinet. My digestion has sped up as well. Just Tuesday I ate a rather large lunch and was able to hit the gym by 3:45 without losing my food after deadlift.

So, despite conventional wisdom to the contrary, a high-fat, low-carb diet may assist with the relief of symptoms related to GERD and indigestion.

Update: Carnivorous Diet

I tried the carnivorous diet to contribute data for N Equals Many. During it I had no heartburn at all. This makes sense.

Update: More Research on the Same Topic

  1. The effect of dietary carbohydrate on gastroesophageal reflux disease “More acid reflux symptoms are found after high carbohydrate diet. High carbohydrate diet could induce more acid reflux in low esophagus and more reflux symptoms in patients with gastroesophageal reflux disease.”
  2. Dietary carbohydrate intake, insulin resistance and gastro‐oesophageal reflux disease: a pilot study in European‐ and African‐American obese women “GERD symptoms and medication usage was more prevalent in European‐American women, for whom the relationships between dietary carbohydrate intake, insulin resistance and GERD were most significant. Nevertheless, high‐fat/low‐carbohydrate diet benefited all women with regard to reducing GERD symptoms and frequency of medication use.”

Bad News for Weight Gain: There is a point of no return

by 3 Comments

Researchers have found that under the typical conditions of care for obese and overweight individuals that:

“current nonsurgical obesity treatment strategies are failing to achieve sustained weight loss for the majority of obese patients. For patients with a BMI of 30 or greater kilograms per meters squared, maintaining weight loss was rare and the probability of achieving normal weight was extremely low. Research to develop new and more effective approaches to obesity management is urgently required.(58)”

The article isn’t entirely pessimistic and it ends on a positive note, I recommend reading it.

The point I wish to highlight is that once a certain threshold of weight gain is reached, it can be difficult or impossible to reverse.

I do not mean to take away hope from people who have overfatted themselves. The data reviewed was from the UK primary care database. That means, it doesn’t include people who see dietitians, personal trainers, or who take personal ownership of their own well-being through research and hard work. That means it doesn’t include you. Why? Because if you read this blog you aren’t the kind of person who lets a statistic enslave you.

My doctor friends tell me that it is rare for patients to respond positively to non-surgical and non-prescription intervention recommendations. And there is some evidence that doctors often don’t tell patients that they are over-weight. The same article linked in the previous sentence indicates that many doctors to not feel competent to help patients lose weight and keep it off.

As the Fildes article states, “the greatest opportunity for tackling the current obesity epidemic may be found outside primary care (58).” While your doctor may not be able to help you lose weight or prevent you from gaining it, you can choose to do it. You can lift weights, you can base your diet on meat, eggs, and veggies. You can throw away all of your junk food. You can walk every day. You can lift 3 days a week. You can make food your fuel rather than your fun. You can do these things. And if you finished reading this post, you will.

References

Alison Fildes et al., “Probability of an Obese Person Attaining Normal Body Weight: Cohort Study Using Electronic Health Records,” American Journal of Public Health 105, no. 9 (July 16, 2015): 54–59.

Science Fact of the Day: Pregnancy and Strength Training

by Leave a Comment

When I was a personal trainer I had always hypothesized that strength training would lead to positive outcomes for pregnant women and the child, particularly if they had been training prior to the conception of their child.

Since I’m not a research center and such training could be high risk, I just wouldn’t train a pregnant woman. The wisdom in the early 2000s was, “don’t engage in strength training if you’re pregnant.” Among trainers the wisdom was, “that doesn’t make any sense, but don’t do it to avoid a lawsuit.”

Recently (2015) the American College of Obstetrians and Gynecologists said that it was safe to initiate/continue strength training during uncomplicated pregnancies.*

Anyway, strength training is getting closer and closer to being a scientifically verified panacea. In the case of pregnancy, strength training:

  1. Does not increase the risk of pre-term birth.
  2. May improve fetal heart function (circuit style training)
  3. Improves maternal energy levels
  4. Decreases risk of preeclampsia.
  5. Lowers risk of unhealthy weight gain (this one should have been obvious)
  6. Lowers risk of gestational diabetes
  7. Decreases incontinence by strengthening pelvic floor musculature
  8. Potentially decreases risk factors to the child caused by the mother being overweight
  9. Makes the mother feel healthier
  10. Decreases risk for post birth depression (exercise in general)
  11. Decreased back pain

Now, I’m no doctor and I’m not making any recommendations. But hopefully this information helps you do some of your own research.

*American College of Obstetrians and Gynecologists. Physical activity and exercise during pregnancy and the postpartum period. Committee Opinion Number 650 2015.

Mark Rippetoe on High School and College Strength Training Programs

by Leave a Comment

Mark Rippetoe has a way with words, he’s particularly good at expressing well known, but unstated truths in the most devastating way possible:

In fact, since there exist so few examples of correctly-instructed cleans and snatches in any high school, college, university, or professional strength program, and since it seems to be impossible to convince you that 1.) doing them wrong is a bad idea and that 2.) you’re doing them wrong, I really think you guys should just stop using them in your programs altogether and just focus your attention on getting everybody’s squat below parallel, and getting everybody’s deadlift up over 500 with a flat back. Maybe stop them from bouncing their bench presses off their chests like trampolines, too, and give their spotters a different way to work their traps. Given several months, perhaps this can actually be accomplished.

He’s just exactly right. I would add chin-ups, but that’s just me.

Money Mindset

by Leave a Comment

The Bible seems to say two things about money. That it’s all good or it’s all bad. Of course, what it really says is that money, like all good things, can be worshiped as an idol. Samson worships a woman as an idol (he tells her how to released him from his vow to God), Israel worships the Torah as an idol (see the New Testament), and Adam and Eve treat food as an idol, trusting it for wisdom rather than God. Yet none of these is bad. I suspect that Christians are more suspicious of money because theologians, who are notoriously bad at being creative, industrious, and good with people (all skills that help one make money), then to teach that money (which they cannot make easily) is almost entirely bad, rather than hitting the balance appropriately.

Here’s my attempt at a brief mindset shift to help Christians deal with money in a fashion that is neither idolatrous or irresponsible. Here’s the mindset shift:

Money is a metric.

What do I mean:

  1. Money is a measure of positive spiritual health
    1. If you have a positive bank balance and observe that you feel joy because it is a result of virtues you would choose to obtain even without money (industriousness, creativity, charisma, frugality, and generosity) is a sign of spiritual health. In other words, you know how to make money and be rich or to lose it all and be poor without anxiety because Christ gives you strength (Phil 4:11-13).
    2. If you have nice things that you can use to care for your family, this may be a sign of wisdom (Proverbs 21:20).
  2. Money is a measure of negative spiritual health
    1. Having a negative bank balance, severe anxiety, an obsession with financial status, or a resentment of those more successful than you is a sign that you may need to repent of your laziness, pay off your debts, learn some new skills, and manage your own life rather than hating everybody else.
    2. Having a large bank balance because you never give alms, help the church, show hospitality, take breaks for family, or choose health over work is a sign that you worship money.

Learning to view money as a metric, one tool among many for assessing my spiritual health has been very useful. I hope that it is helpful to you as well.

How much can you know about yourself if you’ve never been in a fight?

by Leave a Comment

So asks Tyler Durden in, Fight Club.

I think it’s a serious question.

And even for men to prefer gymnastic exercises by far to the baths, is perchance not bad, since they are in some respects conducive to the health of young men, and produce exertion—emulation to aim at not only a healthy habit of but courageousness of soul…But let not such athletic contests, as we have allowed, be undertaken for the sake of vainglory, but for the exuding of manly sweat. Nor are we to struggle with cunning and showiness, but in a stand-up wrestling bout, by disentangling of neck, hands, and sides. For such a struggle with graceful strength is more becoming and manly, being undertaken for the sake of serviceable and profitable health.[1]

Clement of Alexandria

Clement of Alexandria is under the impression that the gymnasium, including wrestling/boxing can train a boy/man is courageousness of soul as well as physical health.

Reference

[1] Clement of Alexandria, “The Instructor,” in Fathers of the Second Century: Hermas, Tatian, Athenagoras, Theophilus, and Clement of Alexandria (Entire), ed. Alexander Roberts, James Donaldson, and A. Cleveland Coxe, vol. 2, The Ante-Nicene Fathers (Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Company, 1885), 284.