My weight was up yet again a bit this morning. I am now 9 lbs above what I was at my lowest point last year! Sheesh! I feel really good though, my focus is better, I have more energy, and my digestion is better too. I had been having some intestinal pain and diarrhea last year, but that has gone away since 1) quitting salt last October, and 2) eating much lower fat starting in April.
I noticed that last summer I also ate high protein, between April and July. And last July I also had a skipped one menses, as I have done this July as well. So that is interesting. Not sure if it is related to high protein, or just it being hot in that month?
Since January of this year, I am at the lowest fat intake since starting the carnivore diet over three years ago. Maybe that has something to do with my weight gain? But I feel so good eating the lower fat, and no longer have the intestinal cramping and diarrhea, that I am going to stick with it. I think with my Crohn's disease, I just can't really tolerate the high fat.
I am still just 16% bodyfat and 18 BMI, which is "athlete" range and "underweight" for a female my age. So that's fine. I was actually probably not eating enough calories last year.
I am trying to address my low T3 blood level by eating wild-caught oysters, shrimp, and mussels at least a few times a week.They are low in mercury, so that's good! Oysters are also high in copper, which can help for repigmenting vitiligo. So that's a good food to eat regularly! (I also need to eat lamb liver and squid for copper too!)
I am checking with my local farmers to see if they supplement their animals with iodine in their mineral supplements. One of them already responded that they do. So I am surprised that my T3 was low. But I guess maybe I just need more? Hopefully the clams and mussels will help with that. Maybe I can retest after a few months. I've been using some iodine swab skin tests, for what that's worth, and they are still being totally absorbed in less than 12 hours. So maybe I really do need iodine.
In other news, I have been trying to stain my gray hair patches with ochre instead of henna. I had given up chemical dye a few years ago to prevent getting any more vitiligo. But henna also contains naturally occurring phenols (as do most plants). Melanocytes grab those instead of the needed tyrosine to make pigment, so our skin and hair could fail to have pigment. Those dastardly plants, always mucking things up! So I have tried using an iron/manganese oxide ochre instead. It seems to be working! It washes out after a few shampoos, but it stains kind of a blonde which is blending pretty well, I think. We'll see how it goes! I am also using a narrowband-UVB lamp on my scalp and other vitiligo patches. Some of the skin patches are starting to repigment, but I'm not sure if my hair is yet!
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