Inflammation, oxidation - anti-inflammation, and diet:

[JohnBoy2000]

This argument and piece of "knowledge" is about as widely circulated as possible.

But actually engaging in it is new to me.

Diet is related to emotional issues (they say, I agree with), and recently due to a turnaround the latter, my diet has done the same.

I literally couldn't stomach decent food before, in fact it was difficult to stomach food, period.

But my diet has dramatically improved over the last couple months, with the focus now being Mediterranean style cuisine, ultra heavy on anti-inflammatories.

Basically everything being "clean" or anti-inflammatory based.

Salads of all kinds, fruit/berry smoothies every morning, whole oats, raw honey, etc etc.

Protein and carbs accompany the anti-inflammatory component of my diet now (i.e. some protein and adequate carbs on the side, but the focus is always fresh fruit/vegetables).

And my "sweet tooth" has diminished significantly. I would consume a huge amount of processed carbs and refined sugars before, that has reduced dramatically, to almost nothing.

Some changes I've began to notice:

- tinnitus in my right ear has become less bothersome. Some feel this is the result of inflammation, I don't know how I got it, could have been a covid shot, could have been stress.

- my hair is growing in thicker. It has been getting horribly thin and grey. I haven't checked the grey too much as I've coloured it since, but thinning areas are slightly filling out; I hope for a full thick lushes mane.

- my skin has improved dramatically. I used to have rough texture, sometimes peeling, unhealthy looking. Now it looks bright, beginning to even out.

- before I would become easily psychotic on stimulants, panicked, paranoid (this wasn't the case years ago when I still had a healthy diet). I haven't tried this to see if it has changed, but I hope it will.

- I developed averse responses to all types of meds and chemicals the same time as this (melanotan being one). I don't know if this has resolved, I hope it has or will in time.

........

It just makes me really question the emphasis on the role of inflammation, stress, oxidation, toxins etc., their role on health, even the aging process, long term neural health etc. I know these things aren't a secret, it's well promoted, but personally I haven't appreciated it until quite recently.

 

[fairnymph]

Have you heard the term inflammaging? I think it’s very apropos.

I’ve luckily always eaten a very good diet, being health obsessed,but from observing others who haven’t, the difference is stark. Especially over time as one ages.

How much fat and protein do you get and from what sources? I am big on red meat and saturated fats. Monounsaturated to a slightly lesser extent.

Are you aware that a new essential (saturated) fatty acid has been discovered, C15?

 

[Skorpio]

I came across this paper in Cell today (open access) which seems relevant. A diet was designed to drive the microbiome to a “pre-industrial” status, as there are microbial species in modern humans but not in ancient samples, which contribute to cardiovascular disease, and inflammatory signaling.

They fed people an either high fiber diet (image below shows diet contents. The presence of Jerusalem artichokes in multiple meals is likely due to the high levels of the soluble fiber insulin, which is good for gut microbes) or a regular diet for three weeks and measured both physiology of the subjects and aspects of their microbiomes. Half of each group also got a dose of an extremely rare bacteria found in preindustrial microbiota to measure which diet helped it colonize and persist better.

Cell is one of the most rigorous biological journals, and their papers are both dense and thorough, this paper is no exception.The microbiome studies go beyond population analysis (the Restore diet actually seems to decrease the number of species in the gut, but it causes them to populate at levels similar to one another). With the identities of the gut microbes, they use some machine learning voodoo to perform pathway analysis to elucidate the relationships between the different microbes to provide evidence that the diet is actually driving these changes, rather than some secondary effects.

Now that analysis is all good and rigorous and cool, but what does this alteration in the microbiome do?

They measured levels of bacterial metabolites in the gut and blood to find that the restore diet increases the presence of short chain fatty acids. When short chain fatty acids are oxidized in the mitochondria to make energy they induce changes in gene expression. This has a few major effects; firstly, it causes the mitochondria to unregulated fatty acid oxidation, which leads to more fat being burned by the body. This also improves glucose tolerance. Short chain fatty acids also stimulate mitochondrial biogenesis which tends to be correlated with decreasing inflammatory signaling.

Finally the short chain fatty acids can activate a protein called AMP kinase (AMPK), which can put the breaks on a master regulator of cell metabolism called mTOR. mTOR senses the amount of nutrients in the cell (by sensing amino acid levels) and controls cell growth. The longevity and health enhancing benefits of fasting are due to inhibiting mTOR, as are those same benefits from the drug rapamycin. Short chain fatty acids inhibit it more mildly, but mTOR inhibition is necessary for their benefits.

The conclusion of this paper is that the high fiber (and likely high in soluble fiber) pre-industrial, restore diet improves cardiometabolic health via the microbial production of short chain fatty acids.

https://www.cell.com/cell/fulltext/S0092-8674(24)01477-6

(I added the paper link here because the hyperlink up top is really hard to see with my current color scheme)

 

[JohnBoy2000]

Have you heard the term inflammaging? I think it’s very apropos.

I’ve luckily always eaten a very good diet, being health obsessed,but from observing others who haven’t, the difference is stark. Especially over time as one ages.

How much fat and protein do you get and from what sources? I am big on red meat and saturated fats. Monounsaturated to a slightly lesser extent.

Are you aware that a new essential (saturated) fatty acid has been discovered, C15?

Inflamm-aging, makes senses. I had a glance at the wiki page.

This dudes videos inspired the hell out me:



As for fats/proteins, I know I get an adequate amount of clean proteins from some meats/fish/chicken, I kind of let me body tell me what it craves (if I go without adequate carbs, I absolutely feel it, protein same etc).

What's almost bizarre is, in my local supermarket, a bunch of college girls come in each day and of course they're super young and it used to be depressing (I'm late 30's).

With my new diet, my skin and hair improving etc., that level of depression is actually easing, cause I'm confident the outcome of this approach will put me "back in that playing field", as it were.

 

[fairnymph]

That’s awesome! People seem to think that the mind in the body are separate but we are holistic organisms. Healthy body, healthy mind.

I got into (extreme) intermittent fasting in 2007 and it’s amazing what that can do for inflammation aging and general well-being. Longer fasting is also powerful, especially 3+ days plus. Dry fasting can be even more powerful but I’m not able to do that, alas.

 

[JohnBoy2000]

Interesting thread on apparent beneficial food categories:



Starting with Liver.

Tastes horrible but maybe I can find a good recipe.

Surprised to see pickles in there (fermented food). I never imagined pickled cucumbers could have proven health benefits, for gut diversity in this case apparently.