OT - Thanks to Janknitz and DreamStalker (diabetes/diet)

[BlackSpinner]

A less extreme way to train your autonomic system is through autogenics. I and my sister learned this back in the 80's and it has helped us a great deal. I can bring my blood pressure down with it without difficulty, I can freak out health professionals with a few deep breathes "WTF you have no pulse!!!!!"
Caveat! You need to practice it daily at least 30 minutes a day for the first while! You MUST practice it. In order for this kind of technique to work it must become as automatic a response as keeping your balance while walking (something a toddler learns, right? except this is less painful then falling a few dozen times a day)

[lilly747]

lilly747 wrote:
... So that leaves cortisol. Considering I had high cortisol problems a year ago, stress, I would say it's the cortisol.


One other possibility is that you are severely insulin resistant. You can also try adding an exercise program to your lifestyle though you don't want to over-do it while in ketosis either. Try a high intensity exercise approach where you give it your all out effort for just 10 to 15 minutes ... 1 to 2 minutes peddle to the metal effort followed by 30 to 60 seconds rest in between for a period of 10 to 15 minutes total.

This is what I thought at first too, but I just got my Insulin test back and I am at 9, opt range is 5 to 15. I do walk 1 hr every day...that's killing it...

My suggestion would be resistance/weight training (yes, even for women ... you will not end up looking like Arnold the Terminator unless that is your genetic expression -- highly unlikely) and do the exercises in slow motion but with maximal effort.

I think you nailed it here. I don't have much in the way of muscle, Ugh, 5'2 and at 133lb I'm just about all fat...

For elevated cortisol, find ways to deal with stress, like yoga, meditation, visualization, massage therapy, acupuncture, water tank flotation therapy, sex, whatever you can find to de-stress ... or you can even try a more advanced technique like the Wim Hof Method to learn to control your autonomic nervous system

Well I checked Wim Hof, If I was a Navy Seal I am sure I would be all over that....but where I am setting, you and him are both crazy......

However the other suggestions sound good........now just to get my butt moving with some of these things....

A less extreme way to train your autonomic system is through autogenics. I and my sister learned this back in the 80's and it has helped us a great deal. I can bring my blood pressure down with it without difficulty, I can freak out health professionals with a few deep breathes "WTF you have no pulse!!!!!"

BS this sounds like a keeper too....going to give this a try.

Well you guys have loaded me down with a to do list that should keep me busy for the summer and beyond, and get the cortisol under control....thank you for your great advice and much needed encouragement

[DreamStalker]

Many friends and family all think I'm crazy too and I have no problem being perceived as crazy as I'm quite comfortable with my state of mind/being.

In actuality, the Wim Hof Method is similar to the autogenics as described in Spinner's link but IMO goes beyond the breathing exercises and self-hypnosis like mental-meditation aspects. The Wim Hof approach consists of a three pillar system that also has the breathing exercises and adds to the mental-meditation aspect which he calls “Commitment”, the cold therapy exercises. Although I've only just begun to attempt learning his method based on Internet research I've gathered, and without buying his program because it seems fairly straight forward, I think it has great potential for biohacking my state of health an additional level higher than ketogenic diet/therapy and high intensity exercise.

I suspect the cold therapy is what scares most people away from Wim Hof's Method, but from what I have gleaned – it's not that bad. You begin incrementally with short periods under a cold shower and you work yourself towards longer periods. Some use cold packs strategically placed over brown adipose tissue locations. There are even cryotherapy clinics popping up all over the place where you can pay anywhere from $10 to $40 per session. Wim Hof's 3-tiered approach is supposed to work synergystically in a way similar to ketosis – by epi-genetically changing the cellular response to your hormones in such a way that you can control your autonomic nervous system.

Now think of that possibility for a moment. The autonomic nervous system is what allows us to breath, maintain blood pressure, heart rate, and experience various feelings without really thinking about it (it's the hormones stupid!). So I asked myself ... why do I not have apnea when I'm conscious and aware? The first and easy answer is that when I go to sleep, the muscles in my throat relax and gravity does its deed to narrow the airspace and cause apneas. Well ok, then why does our diaphragm muscle or heart muscle not relax and stop when we fall asleep? And some around here have restless leg and those leg muscles obviously are not still and relaxed and I sometimes get painful cramps while asleep and I can assure you that my calf muscles are not relaxed when that happens. And when I first began CPAP therapy, I used to mouth leak …. but I trained myself not to by holding my tongue to the roof of my mouth and for some strange reason it now stays there even when I'm asleep. So if I can lay down while awake and not have apneas, and I can train myself to keep my tongue planted on the roof of my mouth to prevent mouth leaks while asleep … I should be able to lay down and sleep without apneas. And so I began thinking ... like a crazy guy – that maybe, just maybe, I can learn to control my autonomic nervous system in order to train myself to sleep without having apneas? Yeah, I know. It's a long shot but what else is a crazy biohacking guy to do except give it a try? If nothing else, controlling my autonomic nervous system will give me super human power to fly over buildings with a single leap, dodge bullets, and stop speeding locomotives with one foot.

[jnk...]

It seems the revolution has begun to be covered by mass media:

A rebellion against NHS guidelines has seen thousands of type 2 diabetes patients control their condition with a diet low in carbohydrates. More than 120,000 people signed up to a ‘low-carb’ diet plan launched by the forum diabetes.co.uk in a backlash against official advice. More than 80,000 of those who ditched a low-fat high-carbohydrate diet found their blood glucose level drop after ten weeks. By rejecting official guidelines . . . more than 80 per cent of the patients said they had lost weight. One in ten lost around 20lb (9kg) and 70 per cent experienced improvements to their blood sugar levels. A fifth said that at the end of the ten weeks they no longer needed drugs to regulate their blood glucose. . . . A report by Britain’s National Obesity Forum urged people last week to ignore public health advice and ‘eat fat to get thin’. Arjun Panesar, of diabetes.co.uk, told The Times: ‘The results from the low-carb plan have been impressive and this is a solution that is clearly working for people with type 2 diabetes.’ . . . David Unwin, a family doctor and clinical expert in diabetes, also treats his patients with a low-carbohydrate diet along with psychological help so they stick to it. Since adopting the approach, his practice now spends £45,000 less each year on drugs for diabetes than is average for his area. And in a study he carried out on 18 of his patients, he found they lost an average of 1st 4lbs (8kg) after cutting out carbohydrates. The majority also saw their blood sugar levels return to normal. He continued: ‘Many diabetics know not to put sugar in their tea but very few are aware that the toast they have at breakfast or rice at dinner may be wreaking havoc with their blood glucose. This is because when starchy carbohydrates like potato or pasta are broken down in the body by digestion the starch turns to sugar.’ . . . Scientists think weight loss can help because removing fat from the pancreas allows insulin production to return to normal, eradicating the root problem. -- http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... rates.html

[lilly747]

It seems the revolution has begun to be covered by mass media:

It's about time........

[Janknitz]

It's about time........

+1

[jnk...]

After intermittent fasting and keto for only 40 days, my A1C has dropped from 6.7 to 6.2. Can't wait to see what it is three months from now.