"If we look at the factors that govern how many LDL recpetors our cells make, we immediately begin to suspect that thyroid hormone may play a central role in providing immunity to heart disease."

http://blog.cholesterol-and-health....759878029371286

Greg, I read something recently and it made me think about you: article.

There is a genetic profile that gets very high LDL while on a LC diet. They have the Apo E4 gene. Although I wonder if T3 might be a reasonable treatment for it.

I don't know if you can get it done where you are but I got my genes analyzed at 23andme.com. You can run the raw data through Promethease and get even more information.

Nancy, do you have any of those Neanderthal genes that I read most people have?

I didn't see any mention of Neanderthal genes in my report.

Nancy,

Very interesting link. It appears that people with this Apo E4 gene can't metabolize fat. Maybe that leads to getting stuck in rT3 dominance mode in which case T3 supplementation may be the only way out - or cutting the fat!

I'd love to test. Sadly 23andme.com doesn't deal with Thailand. I might try and have them send me the kit when I go to Australia next.

My guest post on Paul Jaminet's Perfect Health Diet site:

http://perfecthealthdiet.com/?p=4457

But I do agree, T4 conversion to T3 gets messed up for some of us on low carb. I'm not sure the answer is eating more carbs though. I just end up putting on weight very quickly.

I wonder if supplemental T3 helps people with APO E4 clear excess cholesterol?

I hope you get tested for APO E4 sometime. I'd be willing to bet you've got that gene, perhaps even 2 of them.

I find a mere 2 oz of rice raises my BG to 140. That's only 15 carbs.

Excellent article, very interesting. I never did Atkins Induction; I went to 50 carbs a day and stayed there. Over the last couple of years, I probably lowered my average to 30 or so; going gluten free, eliminating "cheats" and becoming more Primal all served to lower my average carbs.

That's why this interested me:



Well, that's great... except when it isn't. I tried the Perfect Health diet; and got cravings and weight gain. This made me pull the plug after a couple of weeks.

I can understand how lower carbs give some people trouble. But what if higher carbs do? Why do I have to "find a better way to tolerate carbs"? And what the heck might that be?

Jaminet believes that there really is such a thing as "glucose insufficiency", so that's the context of that claim. I'm not convinced that he has adequate documentation for that, and certainly for most people here it's a lowcarb dogma that there is no such thing as an "essential" level of carb intake.

Those, such as Jack Kruse, who believe that leptin is the key player, come at this from a different angle.

From Kruse's blog:



(Your = you're; LR = leptin resistant; LS = leptin sensitive)

I'm still trying to wrap my head around the whole leptin issue, but at least putting it into practice has allowed me to resume losing body fat, after a stall of six or more months. I don't think I'm completely LS now, and maybe I'll never be, but I find that eating carbs no longer causes me to add body fat almost instantaneously, as it used to. They don't trigger binge cravings the same way they used to, either. A month or so ago, if I had a potato with dinner, I'd be restlessly wanting something else within a couple of hours. Now I can have that potato and be done eating until morning. I don't know exactly what has changed, but something has.

That's fascinating, and you are showing some results; which I rarely argue with.

I've been reading up on Dr. Kruse's blog and trying to glean a policy to follow; I've been successfully IF'ing for months now by skipping breakfast, and that's already breaking his rules.

Nancy, thanks for reminding me. I might ask 23andme.com to make an exception and ship to thailand. Then I'll take you up on the bet. I prefer to think it's not the fat that triggered the surge, rather insulin resistance and cutting carbs too much. Both of these claims can be tested when I stop the cynomel.

To answer your second question, if I do have the Apo4 gene, then the answer is "yes", since T3 has cleared my LDL away nicely. Today's TC result was 179 (205 last week).

Good question. I guess so you can avoid taking cynomel

That's the crux of his conclusion. I have heard of glucose deficiency in the few weeks before one's metabolism switches to ketosis. But after that, the brain and most of the body can supposedly burn fat and use ketones.

He also claims that taking T3 would aggravate the glucose deficiency. I asked him to explain this as it was not apparent what aggravating glucose deficiency would do in practical terms. Unfortunately constraints of publishing precluded an answer.

There may be bans on importing saliva, who knows? Is it possible you can get just the APOE4 done in Thailand?

Do you have a history of alzheimer's in your family? I think that's also one of the genes involved in it (50+% likely).

Remember we learned from GCBC that it takes only 70lbs/year/20 years for diabetes to appear in a population. That's at the population level. This means at the individual level, it could be more and less than that. 70lbs/year is about 86g/day. 86g/day is awfully close to 60g/day.