Exercise as Detox

[slayadragon]

Here is a blog entry by "CityChanger," a name being used by a high-profile and well-informed patient in the ME/CFS online community to document his experiences with extreme mold avoidance.

Like a number of other people pursuing extreme mold avoidance, he has found that if he is "clear" enough, he is able to exercise with post-exertional malaise. In this blog entry, he discusses the idea that exercise can be helpful in terms of detoxification.

I am interested in hearing thoughts on this concept. Insofar as ME/CFS patients can figure out a way to exercise without damaging themselves, should this theoretically be helpful to them in terms of promoting detox? How about (per CityChanger's blog) sleep? What are the mechanisms by which exercise and sleep might help with this?

I wrote a couple of my own thoughts in the comments section of the blog entry.

Thanks very much for any thoughts that folks can provide.

Best, Lisa

*

http://ampligen4me.wordpress.com/2011/12/31/exercise-as-detox/


>I didnt sleep well last night and woke up feeling pretty malaised. Not terrible like I felt after 8 hrs of sleep in the past, but compared to when I sleep 9 hours here, I feel more irritable, toxic, and the ME/CFS haze hit my brain & eyes with a vengeance. I dont know what came over me to decide exercising on this day would be a good idea, but it probably had something to do with feeling better after hiking the last few times I did. Still, I havent hiked on a day when I started the day feeling very much like my ME/CFS ghost of christmas past.

>The beginning of the hike was pretty unpleasant, but 20 minutes in, my eyes suddenly cleared up and I started taking in my surroundings again with clarity. In doubt, I waited to celebrate. After another 10 minutes or so, I found my energy picking up and feeling, for lack of a better descrption, good again. Against all ME/CFS logic, I ended up hiking an hour today at a very brisk pace.

>I never really had any inclination how good of a detoxification mechanism exercise was; certainly its great for healthy people, but I never thought itd work for ME/CFS patients. Therefore, I assumed Eriks experience had to be a fluke. After today, Im almost positive its not, and that if Im able to exercise without PEM, thats one of the best things I can do to detoxify.

 

[Calathea]

I've had the experience of exercise getting easier and more pleasant as you get into it, but that doesn't mean I won't crash after it. On the contrary, it usually means that I get seduced into overdoing it in a big way, and having a correspondingly big crash. Pulling on emergency energy reserves never ends well for me.

 

[slayadragon]

From what I've heard of the UK, I would think that it would be extremely difficult for anyone there with severe ME to get clear enough to be able to exercise without a negative effect. So unfortunately this would not seem to be applicable there.

 

[caledonia]

I can't think of the guy's name, but he worked with some firefighters from 911 to detox out chemicals. He was into sweating as a mechanism for detox. So according to his theory, saunas or any exercise that worked up a sweat would cause detox.

I can't imagine any PWC (unless very recovered) could safely do that through exercise.

 

[slayadragon]

Erik Johnson states that if it hadn't been for exercise (sweating out the toxins), he would still be a semi-invalid. I've not done as much exercise as he has, but I think that exercise has been very helpful to me as well.

As discussed in the comments section of Jamie's blog, "CityChanger" is a severely ill ME/CFS patient diagnosed by Dan Peterson, with a wide range of positive results for classic ME/CFS markers (including separate exercise stress tests done by Pacific Fatigue Study Lab and by Dan Peterson).

http://treatingxmrv.blogspot.com/2011/12/tunnel-vision.html

Janis (a frequent contributor to this site) talks about exercise and sweating on her blog.

http://cfsmethylation.blogspot.com/

I realize that most people aren't going to get to the level of avoidance that CityChanger or Erik or Janis or I have. (Our numbers are growing at a rapid clip now, but it's still not a tool for the masses.)

That doesn't mean that it's not important to discuss the issues that CityChanger brings up though, with regard to our understanding of the disease state.

The problem is that this is such a paradigm shift that it's hard for people to get their head around it.

Best, Lisa

 

[Sallysblooms]

I would not work out hard enough to get sick so I doubt I would detox. I use supplements/food for that. I do like exer. for circulation, keeping the muscles pretty strong etc.

Hard exer. and sweating are not indicated for POTS for sure.

 

[Freddd]

I found exercise to be essential for my recovery. I don't know what all it does but one thing that aerobic exercise does it put pressure on the muscles to generate more mitochondria increasing physical capacity. Without the exercise I would never have recovered my pysical capacity. I had to start very low and increase slowly.

 

[Rockt]

I found exercise to be essential for my recovery. I don't know what all it does but one thing that aerobic exercise does it put pressure on the muscles to generate more mitochondria increasing physical capacity. Without the exercise I would never have recovered my pysical capacity. I had to start very low and increase slowly.

Does exercise actually increase the number of mitochondria within a cell, or just enhnace the performance of exisitng mitos?

Also, I have two questions, Freddd:

1. Did you do any resistance exercise with weights or bands when you first started your recovery?
2. Did you experience any "crashing" at first?

 

[Sallysblooms]

Exercise stimululates nerve growth factor so that is really important to me with POTS. I don't mean a hard work out, just what I can do on a given day.

 

[richvank]

Hi, slaya and the group.

One thing exercise will do is to help the lymph system to pump lymph (which carries toxins) from various parts of the body, and dump it into the bloodstream via the thoracic duct in the left side of the chest and its counterpart on the right side. The toxins can then be delivered to the liver for processing and hopefully removal of the toxins, excreting them into the bile, thence to the gut, and hopefully from there into the stools. So exercise should have this type of role in detoxing.

On the other side of the coin, there is the post-exertional malaise/fatigue or crashing. In my hypothesis, this is caused by exercise worsening the state of oxidative stress and damaging the mitochondria. I am concerned that too much exercise over time will cause mutations in the mitochondrial DNA, which are not as readily repaired as in the nuclear DNA. Since new mitochondria are made by fission of existing mitochondria, they inherit mutations in the mito DNA that are present in the existing mitochondria. If exercise is excessive over time, I suspect that the entire mitochondrial pool will be "aged" by this process, which I think also happens as people get older, and accounts for the lack of energy in many older people.

I'm not sure how to draw the line precisely, but I would think that if a level of exercise is causing PEM, it is probably too much.

Best regards,

Rich

 

[citychanger]

Hey Rich and Freddd,

Good to hear you guys chime in on this topic. I have the same thoughts as Rich on why exercise would help detoxification.

Since my latest post which goes into more of my musings on guys vs. girls with regards to exercise, I've heard many different opinions (as expected). Even some that exercised as part of their recovery say they would never recommend that others exercise. In fact, now that I'm exercising after being prone to PEM for the last 6 years, I wouldn't recommend that others exercise either. It's one of those things with no predefined critical threshold where you can say "once you've ____, it's safe to exercise." As one previous ME patient that is now working out and playing full-court basketball daily now said, "exercise aided my recovery, but recovery aided my ability to exercise." Unfortunately that means that even for those patients that are able to exercise, much of our ability to do so comes as a result of experimentation instead of any set guidelines.

Personally, I no longer suffer from PEM, at least the type that I used to have. I got lost in the desert the other day during a 3 or 4 mile hike. I knew my general direction back so I wasn't freaking out, but I had to climb 3 big hills just to find my way back to the track. In the past, there was simply no way I could make a 3 mile hike without being totally non-functional and flu-like the next 2 days (at minimum), let alone climb several hundred feet, several times, during said hike. Instead of PEM, the main issue I am struggling with is oxygen metabolism. My body is still heavily reliant on anaerobic metabolism, catabolism, so at the 3-4 mile point my muscles and joints abruptly begin burning from lactic acidosis. At night, this lactic acidosis can keep me from sleeping well, but my sleep quality is still about 100x better with highly excessive lactic acidosis alone (can sleep without sleep meds and get 9 hours) versus any sleep quality with PEM.

As for what causes PEM them, I'm still unsure. I lost my PEM within 2 weeks of doing extreme avoidance, although I built up slowly by living in a chemical free, mold-free trailer for about 2 months. Due to my personal experience, I'm inclined to say exceeding a critical threshold of inflammation is what causes PEM. The Lights' study that showed inflammatory cytokines being a signature of PEM versus controls also points to this theory. When I got rid of all my old belongings and bought new stuff that my immune system didn't react to, moved into a living space that my immune system didn't react to, and moved to a desert environment that my immune system didn't react to, I effectively nixed the main sources of inflammation for my system, so my cytokines (presumably) came way down at baseline and during exercise.

That leaves me with some oxygen metabolism, organic cardiac dysfunction, and deconditioning (but far less than I thought, because after 4 years of not exercising at all, I am now able to hike 4 miles with no difficulty and do max resistance training, far exceeding my anaerobic threshold (my AT is 130 bpm using healthy person calculation, around 100bpm using Pacific Fatigue Lab's calculation for ME/CFS patients, yet I've been maxing out at 150 bpm so far exceeding both AT calculations). If what Freddd and other patients that recovered with the help of exercise are saying is true, then my oxygen metabolism should become more efficient as I continue exercising. Perhaps the heart will come around that way as well. Time will tell.

The bottom line is after 6 years of daily predisposition to PEM, I have none due purely to biotoxin avoidance, yet the scarcity of responses to this thread and scarcity of interest in my blog tells you everything you need to know about public perception of biotoxin avoidance. Compare that to the viral spread of Kati's blog on Rituximab despite the fact that she hasn't even started it.

If ME/CFS patients don't take this effect seriously, how will anyone else?

 

[citychanger]

A few clarifications:

1. I named my blog "ampligen4me" because I was actually planning on pursuing ampligen. My results from biotoxin avoidance have been so mindblowing I'm 99% sure I won't do ampligen in the near future, but I didn't want to change my blog URL and confuse people.

2. Although the tagline for my blog is "Biotoxin Avoidance & Antivirals As Treatment for Myalgic Encephalomyelitis / CFIDS", my experiment with Biotoxin Avoidance was in fact controlled for. I did not start any antivirals prior to my experimentation to exercise and subsequent success (no PEM). I just began adding famvir and will add valcyte to the mix because I think viruses are a huge piece of the puzzle for me, but don't confuse those for confounding variables with regards to my improvements thus far.

 

[Rockt]

Citychanger, this is really interesting. I'm experiencing a small amount of the same type of success you're experiencing - I'm able to walk upwards of 30 minutes, (previously, could only slowly shuffle around the block), and do some very light resistance exercise, but nowhere near to the aerobic level as you. And I also have the lactic acid build-up, (just walking up the stairs in my house makes my quads burn). I've come about this small, but significant improvement from, I believe, taking B12/folate, etc. It would be really interesitng to combine this with biotoxin avoidance, but then we wouldn't know which was the more effective. But it sounds like biotoxin avoidance has had some very immediate and substantial effects for you.

In the coming weeks, if I continue to do OK without crashing, I'm going to start doing some leg exercises, (weightless squats and/or lunges), to see if I can strengthen them and improve the lactic acid issue. I'll report back.

One thing I'm curious about: how's your head, in terms of brain fog, cognitive difficulties, etc.? Was it bad before your stay in the desert and if so, is it better?

 

[citychanger]

Hey Rockt,

I should mention that I've done the b12/folate for years. I started in '07 with Rich's simplified protocol, then graduated to the full yasko, then back to Rich's simplified, and earlier this year with Freddd's protocol. I really can't say I noticed any improvements from any of the above (no offense to either Rich or Freddd as I really appreciate their work)

The cognitive abilities are still hampered out in the desert, and Lisa has told me that takes time. The neurotoxins are harder to get out, and bugs in the brain are hard to kill as well. However, my mental stamina is miles better (I am working nearly full-time on the computer now, but the quality is still suffering). My vision is also clear all the time now, whereas that used to rarely be the case.

I look forward to hearing more improvements from you. Since detox is essential to maximize results from avoidance, I am actually taking full doses of CSM (with no tolerability issues out here) and continuing to ramp up my methylation dosages per Freddd's suggestions. I think we need to do everything we can to detox. In my opinion, killing the bugs is 10x easier and requires 10x less time overall when the pH or terrain is re-balanced from lowering inflammation and removing toxins. I can take antibiotics and antivirals out here with far less tolerability issues and side effects.

 

[Freddd]

Does exercise actually increase the number of mitochondria within a cell, or just enhnace the performance of exisitng mitos?

Also, I have two questions, Freddd:

1. Did you do any resistance exercise with weights or bands when you first started your recovery?
2. Did you experience any "crashing" at first?

Hi Rockt,

According to the paper(less) research I did it causes the muscles to grow more mitochondria but that wasn't possible until I had the adb12 AND l-carnitine fumarate on board. Those were the limiting facters for me after almost everyhting else was already there.


Did you do any resistance exercise with weights or bands when you first started your recovery

Yes. I started VERY low. First all the moves without weights. Then 1 pound weights and moving up. It took me a year to get to 5 pounds in each hand.

I also walked. It was a suburban area. I increased the distance by going one driveway further at a time.

Did you experience any "crashing" at first

Lots of overdoing and crashing. That stopped as I learned more and after I added the l-carnitne fumarate, the crashes stopped. I also started growing muscle immediately upon adding the carnitine. It changed everything, literally. It was truely a critical cofactor. It enabled exercise, exercise tolerance, easy increase in aerobic level, muscle growth after 20 years of atrophy. It was as miraculous as the mb12.

 

[Freddd]

Hey Rockt,

I should mention that I've done the b12/folate for years. I started in '07 with Rich's simplified protocol, then graduated to the full yasko, then back to Rich's simplified, and earlier this year with Freddd's protocol. I really can't say I noticed any improvements from any of the above (no offense to either Rich or Freddd as I really appreciate their work)

The cognitive abilities are still hampered out in the desert, and Lisa has told me that takes time. The neurotoxins are harder to get out, and bugs in the brain are hard to kill as well. However, my mental stamina is miles better (I am working nearly full-time on the computer now, but the quality is still suffering). My vision is also clear all the time now, whereas that used to rarely be the case.

I look forward to hearing more improvements from you. Since detox is essential to maximize results from avoidance, I am actually taking full doses of CSM (with no tolerability issues out here) and continuing to ramp up my methylation dosages per Freddd's suggestions. I think we need to do everything we can to detox. In my opinion, killing the bugs is 10x easier and requires 10x less time overall when the pH or terrain is re-balanced from lowering inflammation and removing toxins. I can take antibiotics and antivirals out here with far less tolerability issues and side effects.

Hi Citychanger,

I would like to mention that I have found people who did not get any response from the mb12/adb12/metafolin and in almost every situation there was present either folic acid, folinic acid, NAC, glutathione and if those were not present, paradoxical folate deficincy from veggies. Removing those impediments changed everything. Good luck.

 

[citychanger]

Hi Freddd,

Yes, in fact I spoke with you about those issues. I have another username on PR which I keep separate from my "citychanger" moniker. in any case, I followed your instructions on paradoxical folate deficiency to the T. I may have had some cognitive improvements during that same time (although I also moved from a moldy house to a house in the desert so there's that confounding variable), but nothing like the physical improvements I've had from biotoxin avoidance.

 

[citychanger]

Freddd,

Great comment on the l-carnitine fumarate. My opinion on this is that it would really benefit if it's the missing cofactor, as it can be for healthy or borderline healthy people. For people with classic ME/CFS symptoms, it likely wouldn't do much to help with working out.

I've taken multiple forms of l-carnitine in the past. In the moldy house, it was pointless. In the desert house, I think it did aid my strength, didn't help with the crashes. In a trailer in the middle of the desert, I'm only on the jarrows MB12 and metafolin now (life extension brand) -- I keep forgetting to add the ADB12! -- and I'm much stronger out here, without the crashes. I'll definitely add the ADB12 and carn. fumarate, so thanks for the reminder. If we could afford it, adding HGH after getting the viruses in control would probably be ideal.

 

[Freddd]

Freddd,

Great comment on the l-carnitine fumarate. My opinion on this is that it would really benefit if it's the missing cofactor, as it can be for healthy or borderline healthy people. For people with classic ME/CFS symptoms, it likely wouldn't do much to help with working out.

I've taken multiple forms of l-carnitine in the past. In the moldy house, it was pointless. In the desert house, I think it did aid my strength, didn't help with the crashes. In a trailer in the middle of the desert, I'm only on the jarrows MB12 and metafolin now (life extension brand) -- I keep forgetting to add the ADB12! -- and I'm much stronger out here, without the crashes. I'll definitely add the ADB12 and carn. fumarate, so thanks for the reminder. If we could afford it, adding HGH after getting the viruses in control would probably be ideal.

Hi Citychanger,

Biotoxins can be a real problem. We were in a house with mold and it made all of us sick.

 

[Rockt]

adding HGH after getting the viruses in control would probably be ideal.

You know, I was just thinking about this the other day. So many athletes use HGH these days to gain speed, heal injuries. etc. So I was wondering if it would help us, particularly people like me and Cityhanger who are trying to rehab physically?