I am trying something different…… something a little scary, mostly because it costs so blasted much that there is pressure for it to succeed.
My chiropractor offers metabolic testing for $300 or $350 or so. They test your blood and urine for markers that tell them what you are lacking. Then they sell you the supplements that will fix it. The supplements cost way more than I expected and I am still reeling from price shock, but I did it.
They told me several things. For one, I am not eating enough and have depressed my metabolism.
Unfortunately, even if I were eating enough to get my metabolism out of starvation mode, my body couldn’t use it. I cannot metabolize fats. Any fats I eat are stored as fat. I do not properly metabolize protein. It is sent to the wrong place for processing and not used as energy. I do not even process carbohydrates all that well. I am missing nutrients needed to do these things and I cannot get them from my food because I cannot process what I eat. It’s a vicious circle. This makes my low metabolism problem even worse because there is nothing I can do to boost my metabolism. Eating more and better isn’t going to do it and neither is exercise.
The good news is that they can give me (sell me) mass quantities of supplements which will, in the next few months, correct this problem by supplying my body with the nutrients I need to digest my food and get my body functioning like it should.
(I just thought, if my body cannot metabolize the nutrients in my food, how is it going to metabolize the supplements? I will have to ask.)
In a way it makes me feel better, knowing that there really isn’t much I could have been doing to lose weight. It takes away some guilt. It also makes me frustrated with myself that in the past I apparently ate so poorly that this situation developed. Of course, it wasn’t just eating…. stress enters in…
So, I find myself wanting to talk about it…… wanting to write about it. They tell me I will begin to have more energy in about 2 weeks. In a month I will have less joint pain. They tell me I will begin to get up in the morning and want to do something. It has been a long time since I have gotten up in the morning and really felt like doing something. It takes me a long time to wake up usually, and usually I go back to bed a couple of times before I make it to fully awake. If I push through the sleepiness, which I can do if there is something interesting going on, I can only do it for 2 or 3 days, and then I crash. It will be so nice not to have that. I love to sleep; I really do. But I hate never getting anything done.
Anyway, I am supposed to do this supplement regime for 3 months and then be retested and have them readjusted. Hopefully, at that time I won’t need most of them. They tell me most people don’t need to continue them, that I’ll need omega 3 and Vitamin D and I think there was a third one, but that’s all.
Three months. That’s Thanksgiving. I guess we’ll see.
That is very interesting. So – you’ve just barely been getting by on partial carbs, and little else? Sheesh.
Very interested in what they have to say about how the supplements will do better than the food. And does it have to be their supplements, or do they say you need vitamens A B C E1 and H2a, and you can get them from Shakley or wherever? Or do you specifically need their enzymatically correct and gold plated versions?
Which supplements are they?
And what do you do with your food while you are on these supplements? Are you supposed to eat more? Are you supposed to try to add various protein sources along the way as they think those metabolic process get back online?
Well, there have to be more than carbs. Surely I am getting some other nutrients, but I am not getting the benefit of all I eat. The main problems are fats and proteins.
And yes, I have to use their super-duper supplements because theirs are taken from the right sources, processed in the right way, and contain the micro-nutrients and enzymes I need. However, most people who do this straighten out their system in 3 months. After that I should use theirs because theirs are superior, but I should be getting most of what I need from my food and I can go back to what I already have of other brands. I do have some stuff I need to use up even if i did decide to use their brand.
As for what i am taking, here is the list:
Daily Defense (regenerative antioxidants)
Max GI (Probiotics, enzymes, essential oils)
Max Greens (which are flavored with chocolate and sweetened with stevia and taste horrible, but they don’t make me itch, just give me a bit of a belly ache)
Max Fit (supports metabolism and energy)
Cell Detox
Body Detox
L Glutamine
L-Carnitine
CoQ10
Omega 3
D3
B Complex
Magnesium
Most of them I take multiple times… Omega 3 i am taking 3 times the usual dose. Actually I have yet to take all I am supposed to, but I am getting better. I feel uncomfortably full much the time. I only get hungry when i skip a meal, which I have been doing more than I should – just time passing too quickly. That means I have missed that meal’s supplements. I asked what I should do about that in an email, but she misunderstood my question and sent me a new plan which included 3 meals and a snack. What I needed was 2 meals.
As for eating, I am supposed to change that too. I am supposed to get 10% of my calories from carbs (and eat no grains or processed carbs), 20% from protein, and 70% from fats. I haven’t got a handle on that yet either. I have a book with meal plans and recipes, but, as usual, I am not much for following a plan. And so far I have been too busy and too overwhelmed to do everything. By the end of the second week, I hope to have a pretty good handle on it and by the end of a month I hope to be on track with everything.
They had me buy NOW MCT oil from Amazon which is an interesting oil. It is derived from coconut oil and palm kernel oil and is easier to digest, requiring less enzymes and bile. It is supposed to give me a fast boost in energy level.
I suppose (this is just my thinking) that at first some of these supplements are going to just pass on through and some of the additional fats I am eating (and we are not talking about french fries and salad dressing, we are talking about a Tablespoon of high quality oil added to a protein smoothy) are going to be cycled on through and stored as fat, but the enzymes I am taking are supposed to be there to metabolize everything better and after everything gets replenished for a while, both from the supplements and the better digestion of what I eat, then I should be ok.
I guess it is going to take 3 months, but she said I should start feeling a difference in 2 weeks. I look forward to that.
It’s been a week. I am so bad about taking pills. I am pretty regular with my prescriptions but it took me a long time to get that way and there are times, even now, when i forget. Add to the forgetfulness, that these new pills have to be taken on a pretty tight schedule…. this one on waking, this one 30 min before breakfast, this one 1 hour before bed, etc. I am having a hard time remembering to take them all at the times i am supposed to.
One complication is that I do not live on a regular schedule. Many times, in the morning I wake up and crash an hour later. So do I take these on waking pills when i know there is a good chance i will be going back to bed? On the days when i sleep in the morning I eat 2 meals… breakfast and lunch get combined. But the pills are scheduled around 3 meals. I don’t know whether i should double up on them, dividing the noon pills between breakfast and supper, or if i should make myself eat something in between even though I not hungry and I know that if I eat I am not going to be hungry for supper?
But I am working these things out. I had hoped that by 1 week I could report that I have the schedule down, but I don’t. Actually, yesterday I took my morning pills and then got busy and forgot all the rest of them, including my prescription pills. I didn’t think about it till after I went to bed.
One thing that helps is having the days pills divided into a week pillbox. I have 4 of them so it is possible to put 4 days together at once.
And I hope that one of these days the energy I am supposed to feel will kick in, in spite of the missed pills, and I won’t be so sleepy during the day and I will be able to eat 3 times a day.
Overall, I’d have to give myself a C+ this week. Or maybe a B if you factor in lower expectations because I am trying to get used to the schedule.
Another week. It’s actually been worse than the first week. We were very busy and I was very tired and we went out to eat often and I forgot to take my pills more often than I remembered. I even forgot my prescriptions and I usually remember them. I still have more than usual to do, but the time pressure has eased. I hope I can concentrate on remembering next week. I spent so much on these pills. It would be worse than usual to not follow through.
I worry because my pattern is to buy what i need to do the big thing and then forget or lose interest. That’s why i have so many unfinished projects.
November 9
This is just for the record. I tried to make another comment, but there is no option to comment any more. I wonder if there is a limit of 5 comments or something. If so, that’s not enough.
Back to the subject. There have been problems with this supplement plan. The obvious one is that I am not as good as I should be at taking them, though I am getting them all most days now. The bigger one is that I am supposed to also be changing how I eat and I conveniently forgot about that one. I was only focused on the supplements before. Now that I have them pretty well established, I am working harder on my diet.
Actually the diet I am supposed to be following is so restrictive, anyone would lose weight on it, supplements or not, in my opinion. In a nutshell, I am supposed to be eating, in this order, green leafy vegetables, healthy fats, other vegetables, a dab of protein, and that is about it. No carbs. Not even good ones. Well, I can have a little I guess because I can have small infrequent portions of berries and granny smith apples.
I am going at the diet in much the same way as I did the supplements. I am trying. Right now I am not all that successful. I have cut most carbs, pretty much all the bad ones (though I did splurge on a piece of toast with my eggs this morning). I also had a couple of bites of Luke’s pancakes at IHOP the other day, and a sip of his soft drink a couple of days ago. But, for the most part I am, off carbs. (again – I have been off carbs before. It’s good for me.) The reason I am allowing myself a few here and there is that I am afraid if I don’t allow myself some right at first, I will go crazy and eat more. (We have this giant container of leftover Halloween candy – so tempting.)
The rest of it I am not worrying about so much yet. I eat as much protein as I want, aim for healthy fats, but probably do not have as much as I should (never have liked fats). I will gradually improve.
I talked to the person in charge of this program. We have decided to take a different approach. Monthly talks for a year, gradual changes, and do the lab test again in a year instead of right now. It works for me.
And I think this will be my last entry on the subject, which is why I did not want to make a new post for it.
It was exciting to think I could make changes fast, but I think this more gradual approach is better, has less frustration and more chance of long term improvement. We’ll see how I am next Thanksgiving…..
Yes … your schedule does not lend itself to regular pill taking.
As you say, this particular project is particularly important. Strange to say that it’s more important than your actual medications – but perhaps it is.
It seems to me that it probably doesn’t matter that you have the pills upon fully waking, or at a particular named meal – that it’s just a set of convenient markers. A way to help you remember to take the pills, and to space them out at regular intervals. What’s important is probably the regular intervals – and for some, to be taken with or without food.
So, instead of trying to regularize your sleep/eat cycle, perhaps you could set up regular times for the pills. Just set an alarm for 7:30, and have the ‘waking up’ pills – and then go back to sleep. And at 9, have the “breakfast” pills with a handful of almonds, and grab some actual meal later.
I don’t know what would work best for you to set up a system and keep it going – text message reminders; a star chart on the refrigerator. It’s harder to have to find these routines for yourself, but this is important enough.