The Resistant Starch Challenge: Is It The Key We've Been Looking For?

[Ripley]

Thanks @Ripley , i might give the A-FNG a go. Like you, there are many things that on paper should be helpful for me, but just end up making me feel worse. That said, the PHD is definitely making me feel better.

I think you are on to something here. I have probably not put enough emphasis on diet before. I have believed I ate quite healthily, but after reading the PHD I can see I have done many things wrong. I used to think that eating for example gluten free buns and mayonaise couldn't be that bad, but I probably have eaten way too nauch omega 6 and grains. I've also eaten lots of chicken which apparently is quite full of omega-6. I guess all the small things add up.

The worst problems for me has been "adrenal fatigue" and orthostatic intolerance, and those are improving. I do not seem to get the severe crashes I had before where I felt like I was going to die. I can stand and walk longer. I am cautiously hopefull about the future

A-FNG is almost impossible to get a hold of, unless you get it from a practitioner who deals with Byron White directly. You can call the company directly and ask them for the name of a practitioner in your area. It's very strong stuff, but very safe to take. But, they have a whole line for different conditions and that's why you need a practitioner who knows the products well. Some of their products are quite effective at treating lyme from what I understand. So, it's not wimpy stuff by any means.

Anyway, I wouldn't stress about the small details of the PHD. Just because chicken or pork is mediocre, doesn't mean you can't eat them a few times a week. They are perfectly fine in moderation. He just doesn't want people favoring chicken/pork as their main staple meats. If you just cut out grains and industrial seed oils, you'll be way ahead of the game.

 

[MeSci]

Tiger nuts are a great snack. Just be sure to rehydrate them overnight if you're going to eat more than a handful or two, since they come dried.

I've just been doing some searches on tiger nuts. They are sold as fishing bait for carp in the UK, and the bait ones are a lot cheaper than the ones for humans! Some appear to be completely untreated, so I guess they would be safe...?

 

[Ripley]

I've just been doing some searches on tiger nuts. They are sold as fishing bait for carp in the UK, and the bait ones are a lot cheaper than the ones for humans! Some appear to be completely untreated, so I guess they would be safe...?

Not sure. I'd call the supplier and see what they say. My understanding is that they can collect molds and mycotoxins in storage, so I'd imagine that the carp bait might not be stored in the best conditions. The best tiger nuts are from Valencia and they at least make an effort to dry them to a certain standard for human consumption. If you are sensitive to molds/mycotoxins then you might want to be cautious with them.

 

[Gestalt]

They only sell through a practitioner who knows how to use it — it's just too powerful to sell directly to people. The doc had me use something similar to this protocol and it gradually increases your doses till you get herx reactions and then backs off and you work up to 20 drops 2x/day. Doc wanted me low carb but since I had gotten sick from low carb I went with the PHD and he was fine with that. It worked wonders, but it was just one piece of the puzzle.

Just two or three drops of the A-FNG formula started to lift my brain fog within a day. It was like someone turned on a light switch in side of me. The whole point of trying A-FNG is to see if you get herx reactions or improvements. If you get either, it's a good sign that you have a fungal infection (otherwise it shouldn't do anything).

Wow this is remarkably similar to my experience with Candex. I had to start at 1/16 of a capsule and gradually increase the dose over several months, always testing the limits of how comfortable I felt with the herx reaction. I managed to increase the dose to two capsules a day (it took me 3 months to get there), but every day I had a slight but bearable case of herx/nausea often lasting for hours. Every time the dose was increased though, I felt marginally better. I even did a stint of Lufenuron + 4 week Diflucan on the 4th month, and it seemingly made no difference in terms of symptoms or nausea. The herx was still there every time I took candex.

I was stuck at a plateau of two capsules a day until I started taking RS. Since I started RS I experience no herx making me think it has eradicated the fungal infection. Now it seems as if the Candex is unnecessary. However I take it daily just in case...

Before all this the first thing I tried was a ketogenic diet for 3 weeks, with zero improvement in symptoms or herx/nausea. In fact it felt like I had regressed. Then I stumbled across the PHD info on candida feeding on ketones and promptly quit it.

To be honest I am still rather skeptical of the PHD, in terms of its primary source of calories namely fat. I have a brutal time digesting fat and feel that maybe those who are metabolically more PNS dominant do better on the PHD and those that are SNS dominant do better with more carbs. I am very skeptical of a catch-all "perfect" diet for everyone and feel individual body and metabolic variance plays a more important role akin to the Ayurvedic type system and the metabolic type diet.Those are the guidelines I try to follow in terms of diet and feel best doing so.

 

[adreno]

I couldn't eat more carbs even if I wanted to. I feel like I'm stuffing myself with carbs on the PHD.

The PNS/SNS dominance theory sounds like hokum to me.

 

[Ripley]

Wow this is remarkably similar to my experience with Candex. I had to start at 1/16 of a capsule and gradually increase the dose over several months, always testing the limits of how comfortable I felt with the herx reaction. I managed to increase the dose to two capsules a day (it took me 3 months to get there), but every day I had a slight but bearable case of herx/nausea often lasting for hours. Every time the dose was increased though, I felt marginally better.

Yes! Very similar. Perhaps that's why we responded to RS — we only added RS after the yeast/candida was mostly diminished or deactivated.

To be honest I am still rather skeptical of the PHD, in terms of its primary source of calories namely fat. I have a brutal time digesting fat and feel that maybe those who are metabolically more PNS dominant do better on the PHD and those that are SNS dominant do better with more carbs. I am very skeptical of a catch-all "perfect" diet for everyone and feel individual body and metabolic variance plays a more important role akin to the Ayurvedic type system and the metabolic type diet.Those are the guidelines I try to follow in terms of diet and feel best doing so.

I think as long as you are eating sufficient "safe starches", and low toxins, it's all good. In fact, you can just hit your protein target and eat as much or as little fat as you like. The PHD was revolutionary because, at the time everyone was on the very low carb paleo bandwagon and people were getting sick — including Jaminet and his wife. So, the Jaminet's turned that paleo train wreck around. They made a formula that works pretty well. But, you're right. Everyone is a bit different. On the other hand, if you have trouble digesting fat, that can also be a sign that something in your body needs a little support (acid production or bile, perhaps).

Chris Kresser was a big supporter of the PHD when it came out. Kresser is a practitioner and Jaminet (the author of the PHD) was just a scientist who figured out the nutrition. So, Kresser incorporated Jaminet's work into his practice and had very good results.

But, now Kresser just published his own book that takes the PHD a step further and customizes it for people have trouble with certain foods or certain macronutrients. He walks you through how to diagnose the health issues you discover and how to solve them. It's pretty cool.

Jaminet could have never written that kind of customized book, because he's not a practitioner. In fact, he and his wife both used this one-sized-fits-all approach for their own healing regimen, and friends and relatives just asked them about it. So, they started writing it all down and virtually everyone who tried it got great results and people encouraged them to publish it as a book. So that's how it came about. I think Kresser's book is probably a better choice for people who want to customize the PHD to suit their needs. But, the PHD is great knowledge in terms of explaining the importance of starches in the diet.

 

[knackers323]

Is resistant starch a food that would grow soil based probiotics?

Is there anything else SBO feed on?

 

[Ripley]

Is resistant starch a food that would grow soil based probiotics?

Is there anything else SBO feed on?

I suspect SBOs feed on RS and other prebiotic fibers. But, the reason why prebiotics, like RS, work is because they can bloom far more bifido and other important populations than a probiotic could ever hope to generate. Taking a bifido probiotic is like trying to take a piss in the ocean hoping it will raise the tide). So, it's just a numbers game. The SBOs are relatively small in comparison, and they are harder to come by these days. So, it helps to get them in a pill form since you can actually make a difference in the SBO populations with a pill.

SBOs are just a portion of your flora. But a pill of SBO will have a bigger effect on SBO populations than a pill of bifido will on the enormous bifido populations that can be generated by RS and prebiotics. The goal is to build a diversity of flora and SBOs are usually lacking but can be influenced by probiotic pills.

 

[knackers323]

I suspect SBOs feed on RS and other prebiotic fibers. But, the reason why prebiotics, like RS, work is because they can bloom far more bifido and other important populations than a probiotic could ever hope to generate. Taking a bifido probiotic is like trying to take a piss in the ocean hoping it will raise the tide). So, it's just a numbers game. The SBOs are relatively small in comparison, and they are harder to come by these days. So, it helps to get them in a pill form since you can actually make a difference in the SBO populations with a pill.

SBOs are just a portion of your flora. But a pill of SBO will have a bigger effect on SBO populations than a pill of bifido will on the enormous bifido populations that can be generated by RS and prebiotics. The goal is to build a diversity of flora and SBOs are usually lacking but can be influenced by probiotic pills.

Hi thanks for the reply. Why is there such a push to build Bifido species? In the fecal test I had it says that Bifido should only account for 5 to 10 percent of total bacteria in healthy people. ? Thanks

 

[Ripley]

Hi thanks for the reply. Why is there such a push to build Bifido species? In the fecal test I had it says that Bifido should only account for 5 to 10 percent of total bacteria in healthy people. ? Thanks

They are just a class of good guys.

http://microbewiki.kenyon.edu/index.php/Bifidobacterium

A good rundown on this, and how it relates to RS, is given here. It sounds like you haven't read through many of the RS articles yet on freetheanimal. Just a suggestion, but it would probably be best for you to read through them all first, if you are interested in learning more about RS.

http://freetheanimal.com/tag/resistant-starch

 

[knackers323]

They are just a class of good guys.

http://microbewiki.kenyon.edu/index.php/Bifidobacterium

A good rundown on this, and how it relates to RS, is given here. It sounds like you haven't read through many of the RS articles yet on freetheanimal. Just a suggestion, but it would probably be best for you to read through them all first, if you are interested in learning more about RS.

http://freetheanimal.com/tag/resistant-starch

No I haven't read all of it, though I have read a lot of it. I understand that baby's have predominately bifidus in their gut and it is accepted that as we age that changes. But maybe that is meant to happen?

My lab suggested that the level is only up to ten percent in normal adults.

Mine was 34 percent.

So I'm just trying to work out the difference in ideas.
I have found other people saying that high bifidus may not necessarily be a good thing.

Is it not yet fully understood and just a matter of opinion or are some strains of Bifido good and some bad?

 

[Sasha]

Jaminet could have never written that kind of customized book, because he's not a practitioner. In fact, he and his wife both used this one-sized-fits-all approach for their own healing regimen, and friends and relatives just asked them about it. So, they started writing it all down and virtually everyone who tried it got great results and people encouraged them to publish it as a book. So that's how it came about. I think Kresser's book is probably a better choice for people who want to customize the PHD to suit their needs. But, the PHD is great knowledge in terms of explaining the importance of starches in the diet.

I bought the PHD book and was struggling to get through the science - not because it's not well-written or clear, because it is, but because there's so much of it (the whole book is over 400pp) and I find myself constantly questioning the evidence (not to criticise the basis of the PHD but if someone presents scientific evidence, my default approach is to then try to appraise it and that makes for a slower read). I've just bought the Kresser book - which in the UK is called 'Your Personal Paleo Diet', not 'Your Personal Paleo Code', confusingly. I'm finding it a much easier read because he gets stuck straight in with what to do. At this point, I'm willing to take the basis of the diet on trust and want to just implement a strategy to get started and then refine it, which is what he offers.

I was impressed by Kresser's attitude to evidence and his willingness to adjust his views in the light of new evidence, as shown in this interview that I found on YouTube:

It's nearly an hour long but it's very interesting, and gave me sufficient confidence in Kresser to get his book and start his programme.

I see he doesn't want you eating white potatoes during the first 30 days of the programme but having got this far on my RS experiment I don't want to stop using potato starch unless there's another viable source that I can obtain here in the UK. I'm hoping the starch is so denatured that there's no potato-ness left in it.

 

[MeSci]

Not sure. I'd call the supplier and see what they say. My understanding is that they can collect molds and mycotoxins in storage, so I'd imagine that the carp bait might not be stored in the best conditions. The best tiger nuts are from Valencia and they at least make an effort to dry them to a certain standard for human consumption. If you are sensitive to molds/mycotoxins then you might want to be cautious with them.

I've decided against tiger nuts as per Goodness Direct they are rather high in sugar:

Per 100g: Energy, 2076kj/496kcal. Fat, 25.6g - of which saturates. Carbohydrates, 57.7g - of which sugars- 21.6g. Protein, 5.1g. Salt, under 0.1g.

 

[Christopher]

No I haven't read all of it, though I have read a lot of it. I understand that baby's have predominately bifidus in their gut and it is accepted that as we age that changes. But maybe that is meant to happen?

My lab suggested that the level is only up to ten percent in normal adults.

Mine was 34 percent.

So I'm just trying to work out the difference in ideas.
I have found other people saying that high bifidus may not necessarily be a good thing.

Is it not yet fully understood and just a matter of opinion or are some strains of Bifido good and some bad?

I'm not sure you'll ever know for sure. You might have pathogenic strains of bifido that do not confer the benefits that "good" strains do? I have no idea - I am just talking out of my butt.

 

[Crux]

Thanks @Sasha ;

I really enjoy listening and reading Chris Kresser, he's reasonable and flexible.( such an organized mind!) It was great to watch him speak...engaging. I agree that we will do best with finding what works best as individuals.

OK, just one more book to buy...

 

[Ripley]

I see he doesn't want you eating white potatoes during the first 30 days of the programme but having got this far on my RS experiment I don't want to stop using potato starch unless there's another viable source that I can obtain here in the UK. I'm hoping the starch is so denatured that there's no potato-ness left in it.

Kresser is great. If you think about it, the PHD was really just a template of highly nourishing, low-toxin foods that provided a very balanced ration of macronutrients (and it pointed out that you have to eat a lot of "safe starches" to accomplish that feat). Kresser has incorporated that PHD knowledge and has applied it in his practice to create a customizable template based on the foundations of the PHD with his new book.

The PHD's template is overly strict because the diet purports to be the lowest-toxin diet to fit those required daily nutrition and macronutrient requirements. And by doing so, the hypothesis is that such a diet can help virtually everyone's health improve. Whereas Kresser just gives you the tools to experiment.

So, for instance, even though Jaminet is well aware that Buckwheat is neither a wheat nor a grain — and is a very safe for the majority of people — it has been shown to have a few nasty allergens in it, so it can't be considered "safe" enough to be on the PHD. Jaminet believes that the PHD should be "safe" enough for anyone to tolerate.

So, it's easy to knock the PHD when you compare it to Kresser's new book that builds upon the PHD. But, the PHD is still the gold standard for those with really challenging and mysterious health issues. The PHD is basically a really nourishing elimination diet that one could stay on indefinitely and do very, very well. Not everyone needs an elimination diet of that magnitude, and for those people, they will enjoy Kresser's diet much better.

 

[adreno]

Well, since everyone here is sick, the PHD sounds as a good place to start. Anyways, people should be careful not to interpret customization as anything goes (because I'm special). Although there is certainly some variations in people's needs, I doubt that those variations are huge, such as prescribing a vegan diet to one person, and a red meat diet to another.

 

[Sasha]

So, it's easy to knock the PHD when you compare it to Kresser's new book that builds upon the PHD. But, the PHD is still the gold standard for those with really challenging and mysterious health issues. The PHD is basically a really nourishing elimination diet that one could stay on indefinitely. Not everyone needs an elimination diet of that magnitude, and for those people, they will enjoy Kresser's diet much better.

I hope I didn't seem to be knocking the PHD - my point was only that I'm finding Kressner's book much easier going in terms of getting straight to putting things into practice.

I just watched a very interesting video of Dr Terry Wahls being interviewed by Abel James:

In it, she says that for the clinical trial of her diet, she had to have it assessed by a dietician to make sure that it was ethical to put people onto it. She said the dietician said it was the most nutritious diet she'd ever assessed and that the same dietician went on to assess Mark Sisson's diet and somebody else's (forgotten who!) and said that even those diets were below RDAs on several things.

I'm a bit suspicious of RDAs because I gather that some of them are based on animal studies that might not apply to people but still, it's interesting. It perhaps indicates a bit of margin for error in those diets rather than that there's anything wrong with them - Dr Wahls's diet is pretty specfic in terms of amounts. She's got a new book coming out in mid-March (The Wahls Protocol) - her original one, which I read, was a bit inconsistent and self-contradictory on some of the specifics so hopefully that's all ironed out.

 

[knackers323]

I'm not sure you'll ever know for sure. You might have pathogenic strains of bifido that do not confer the benefits that "good" strains do? I have no idea - I am just talking out of my butt.

Are there any known pathogenic strains of Bifido?

 

[Ripley]

She said the dietician said it was the most nutritious diet she'd ever assessed...It perhaps indicates a bit of margin for error in those diets rather than that there's anything wrong with them

I'm sure the Wahls diet helps some people, but it seems to avoid sources of glucose, fermentable carbs and RS — and most dietitians are pretty clueless about the role those play in overall long term gut health, thyroid health and mucus production for immune response. Her diet seems unrelated to this whole discussion about RS-rich diets.