The Permanent Supplement Regime

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Re: The Permanent Supplement Regime

Post by MachineGhost » Wed Jun 01, 2016 5:19 pm

Kbg wrote:Does anyone have a succinct and simple summary of what is good/not good for one's daily diet? I've given up all hope of trying to find Bottom line: I'd just like to eat healthy
Avoid fructose, fatty land meats/fluids (trim or lean), trans fats/Omega-6 oils and processed/fiberless carbs. Everything else is fair game.

An example meal plate would be approximately 1/4th full of lean meat, 1/4th full of a cabohydrate and 1/2 full of two servings of vegetables or one serving of vegetables and one serving of a low-fructose fruit like berries or one with a lot of fiber like apples. An optimal serving of lean meat to induce muscle anabolism in an elderly 70ish year old (worst case!) is 4.3 ounces (30 grams) cooked weight (any more will be oxidized as theres a hard limit to how much the gut can absorb), a serving of fruit or vegetables is 3.03 ounces (85 grams) and the carbohydrate should be 50 grams of net carbs (weight varies depending on what you measure, for instance its 7.1 oz of cooked parboiled white rice which has resistant starch (fiber), 10.60 oz of raw potatos before being peeled or 1 cup of raw oatmeal).
Last edited by MachineGhost on Wed Jun 08, 2016 4:58 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: The Permanent Supplement Regime

Post by MachineGhost » Wed Jun 08, 2016 4:57 pm

Followup. The optimal protein intake to maximize muscle anabolism is thusly:

Avg 22 years of age: .24 grams of protein per kilogram of bodyweight per meal.
Avg 71 years of age: .40 grams of protein per kilogram of bodyweight per meal.

So logically, the in-between point for an average age is 46.5 years, so you need .325 grams of protein per kilogram of bodyweight per meal. Someone could probably come up with a linear extrapolation for all ages if they wanted to be really geeky. The gut has a limited capability of taking in protein at any one time; so if you eat above this level you're just oxidizing the protein and consuming what is increasingly expensive calories.

The important thing to take away from this is that you need to INCREASE your protein intake as you get older to offset sarcopenia.

Now, the other side of the coin is leucine, the muscle anabolism initator. People above 65 years of age have an inverse correlation with leucine, i.e. the less leucine they eat, the more muscle mass they will lose. And the magical amount for no muscle mass loss at all was 7.12 grams of leucine per day, which works out to be requiring 1.25 grams of protein per kilogram of bodyweight per day or .4167 grams of protein per kilogram of bodyweight per meal.

So this is why I recommend the rule of thumb of assuming each ounce of cooked protein has 7 grams of protein and to always eat 4 oz per meal. Some meats like chicken have slightly more grams protein per ounce, whereas others like lean meat have slightly less protein grams per ounce. Not sure about soy and other "low quality" proteins that are typically leucine deficit. The most leucine-dense protein currently known is whey protein isolate.

You could certainly use a leucine or BCAA supplement in place of eating so much expensive protein to make sure you get the absolute bare minimum of at least 2.5 grams of leucine per meal, but you'd need to make up for the loss of calories elsewhere. Now that I got BCAA in capsules, I plan on experimenting with my regular protein intake to see what happens.
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Re: The Permanent Supplement Regime

Post by MachineGhost » Fri Jun 10, 2016 1:45 am

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"All generous minds have a horror of what are commonly called 'Facts'. They are the brute beasts of the intellectual domain." -- Thomas Hobbes

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Re: The Permanent Supplement Regime

Post by MachineGhost » Sun Jun 26, 2016 12:47 am

Very surprising! K seems severely underrated by everyone. A "high" intake would be at least the average intake of K1 (626.4 mcg/day) and K2 (57.5 mcg/day), i.e. a proper K complex supplement will be double those values (as they are).

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Dietary intake of vitamin K is inversely associated with mortality risk.

Vitamin K has been related to cardiovascular disease and cancer risk. However, data on total mortality are scarce. The aim of the present study was to assess the association between the dietary intake of different types of vitamin K and mortality in a Mediterranean population at high cardiovascular disease risk. A prospective cohort analysis was conducted in 7216 participants from the PREDIMED (Prevención con Dieta Mediterránea) study (median follow-up of 4.8 y). Energy and nutrient intakes were evaluated using a validated 137-item food frequency questionnaire. Dietary vitamin K intake was calculated annually using the USDA food composition database and other published sources. Deaths were ascertained by an end-point adjudication committee unaware of the dietary habits of participants after they had reviewed medical records and linked up to the National Death Index. Cox proportional hazard models were fitted to assess the RR of mortality. Energy-adjusted baseline dietary phylloquinone intake was inversely associated with a significantly reduced risk of cancer and all-cause mortality after controlling for potential confounders (HR: 0.54; 95% CI: 0.30, 0.96; and HR: 0.64; 95% CI: 0.45, 0.90, respectively). In longitudinal assessments, individuals who increased their intake of phylloquinone or menaquinone during follow-up had a lower risk of cancer (HR: 0.64; 95% CI: 0.43, 0.95; and HR: 0.41; 95% CI: 0.26, 0.64, respectively) and all-cause mortality (HR: 0.57; 95% CI: 0.44, 0.73; and HR: 0.55; 95% CI: 0.42, 0.73, respectively) than individuals who decreased or did not change their intake. Also, individuals who increased their intake of dietary phylloquinone had a lower risk of cardiovascular mortality risk (HR: 0.52; 95% CI: 0.31, 0.86). However, no association between changes in menaquinone intake and cardiovascular mortality was observed (HR: 0.76; 95% CI: 0.44, 1.29). An increase in dietary intake of vitamin K is associated with a reduced risk of cardiovascular, cancer, or all-cause mortality in a Mediterranean population at high cardiovascular disease risk. This trial was registered at http://www.controlled-trials.com as ISRCTN35739639.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24647393
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Re: The Permanent Supplement Regime

Post by Maddy » Sat Jul 09, 2016 6:15 pm

MK et al., would you comment on the idea of using kelp as a one-stop source of dietary minerals?
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Re: The Permanent Supplement Regime

Post by MachineGhost » Sat Jul 09, 2016 7:07 pm

Maddy wrote:MK et al., would you comment on the idea of using kelp as a one-stop source of dietary minerals?
Vegetables don't have much vitamins or minerals per se, i.e. not RDA levels. So I wouldn't count on it. They're only useful for phytonutrients and fiber.

They also have a nasty habit of accumulating toxic minerals like thallium. There was a story a few years ago about that and kelp. Apparantly there's a county in Northern California where people are health nuts and eat way too much kelp in smoothies every day so were devloping symptoms of thallium poisioning.

Personally, I've found my self-grown organic raw kelp to overstimulate me and give me a fatique crash the next day. Don't know if thats a sign of toxicity or there's just something stimulating in it (I'm very sensitive to stimulants though I would get a rebound headache to indeed indicate it was that afterwards). Cooked kelp seemed better but it still kept me up way past my bedtime. It wasn't a wired feeling just lack of being tired.

EDIT: Ooops, my bad! I was thinking of kale not kelp. Sea vegetables are the most concentrated source of minerals so they would work for trace minerals. However, I don't recall seeing any were ever dense enough to meet the RDA, so look into it. Kelp is essentially used for getting a naturally concentrated source of iodine.
"All generous minds have a horror of what are commonly called 'Facts'. They are the brute beasts of the intellectual domain." -- Thomas Hobbes

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Re: The Permanent Supplement Regime

Post by Maddy » Tue Aug 02, 2016 6:32 pm

MG et al., if you were limited to just a few supplements, which ones would you choose if your goal were to bring about a significant increase in energy level?
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Re: The Permanent Supplement Regime

Post by Kriegsspiel » Tue Aug 02, 2016 7:59 pm

Ephedrine.

Take a Bronkaid tablet (20mg ephedrine) and a 200mg caffeine pill and you will be wired.

Not recommended if your heart is prone to exploding.
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Re: The Permanent Supplement Regime

Post by Maddy » Tue Aug 02, 2016 8:36 pm

I wasn't exactly looking for "wired." I'd settle for feeling like 30 again.
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Re: The Permanent Supplement Regime

Post by MachineGhost » Thu Aug 04, 2016 3:10 pm

"All generous minds have a horror of what are commonly called 'Facts'. They are the brute beasts of the intellectual domain." -- Thomas Hobbes

Disclaimer: I am not a broker, dealer, investment advisor, physician, theologian or prophet.  I should not be considered as legally permitted to render such advice!
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Re: The Permanent Supplement Regime

Post by rocketdog » Wed Nov 09, 2016 8:59 am

Assuming you don't suffer from a chronic health condition, the human body does not need supplements in pill form if you eat a healthy, varied diet. That said, I take these supplements:
  • Multi-vitamin - Doctor recommended as a "safety net" just in case I'm missing anything in my vegetarian diet (unlikely).
  • Calcium - I eat very little dairy (mostly a little cheese here and there), so again, just a safety net.
  • Vitamin D3 - Doctor recommended 5000IU daily. Whatever you say, doc.
  • Low-dose aspirin - Twice weekly now that I'm over 50, for the potential protection against heart attacks, strokes, and colon cancer.
I used to also take vitamin C thinking that it warded off colds, but I eat fresh fruits and vegetables every day so I already intake a good quantity of natural vitamin C and I have not noticed an increase in illness since I stopped taking it in pill form. Leaves me with more money to invest in the Permanent Portfolio. ;)
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Re: The Permanent Supplement Regime

Post by Maddy » Fri Aug 17, 2018 2:18 pm

I tend to be pretty skeptical when it comes to alternative remedies that purport to do earth-shattering things, but after a good deal of experimenting, I have the following earth-shattering anecdote to offer about an herbal by the name of Ashwaganda root. It's touted as being an "adaptogen" which supposedly helps with stress and which has a number of other supposed attributes, including the ability to boost thyroid function.

I can't really speak to those issues, but I've found Ashwaganda to be as effective a sleep aid as Ambien. I buy the root in powdered form and fill Size 00 gelatin capsules, then take two capsules a half hour before bedtime. Now, I'm one of those people who frequently lies in bed watching the clock for four or five hours, and sometimes gets up twice during the night, before actually falling asleep. And I'm generally wrung out the next day. But since taking a dose of Ashwaganda at bedtime, I sleep like a log. I also notice that I'm a whole lot calmer during the day, something upon which a neutral third party spontaneously commented.

Maybe my experience will help some other folks here.
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Re: The Permanent Supplement Regime

Post by barrett » Sat Aug 18, 2018 6:40 am

Chronic insomniac here, Maddy. Thanks for posting that. Will report back!
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Re: The Permanent Supplement Regime

Post by ochotona » Sat Aug 18, 2018 7:23 am

My gastroenterologist says to take calcium, selenium, a probiotic, and a low dose aspirin. I'm at elevated risk of colon cancer.
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Re: The Permanent Supplement Regime

Post by Kriegsspiel » Sat Aug 18, 2018 11:22 am

I've been taking zinc, magnesium, B6, fish oil, and D3 before going to sleep, and I've been sleeping even more like a stone than usual, with the added bonus of insane technicolor LSD dreams.
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Re: The Permanent Supplement Regime

Post by Kbg » Wed Aug 29, 2018 12:51 pm

rocketdog wrote:
Wed Nov 09, 2016 8:59 am
Assuming you don't suffer from a chronic health condition, the human body does not need supplements in pill form if you eat a healthy, varied diet. That said, I take these supplements:
  • Multi-vitamin - Doctor recommended as a "safety net" just in case I'm missing anything in my vegetarian diet (unlikely).
  • Calcium - I eat very little dairy (mostly a little cheese here and there), so again, just a safety net.
  • Vitamin D3 - Doctor recommended 5000IU daily. Whatever you say, doc.
  • Low-dose aspirin - Twice weekly now that I'm over 50, for the potential protection against heart attacks, strokes, and colon cancer.
I used to also take vitamin C thinking that it warded off colds, but I eat fresh fruits and vegetables every day so I already intake a good quantity of natural vitamin C and I have not noticed an increase in illness since I stopped taking it in pill form. Leaves me with more money to invest in the Permanent Portfolio. ;)
Apparently a new study (financed by Bayer) indicates aspirin and fish oil supplements have no real benefits for heart health and increase gastro problems. Probably not the drones Bayer was looking for.
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Re: The Permanent Supplement Regime

Post by WiseOne » Thu Aug 30, 2018 11:58 am

Anyone else try the Ashwaganda? That's an interesting observation Maddy!

There's too many excellent questions about the benefits of vitamins & supplements. I think the evidence in their favor is mostly based on association studies, which is a deeply flawed way of selecting interventions. I cut way down on calcium supplements after some reports that they may exacerbate or trigger heart disease (arterial calcium buildup). At my next dexascan my bone density actually increased - so much for that!

So I started focusing instead in eating locally grown produce, reasoning that most produce in supermarkets is nutritionally subpar - organic or no. This is easy in the summer with farmer's markets everywhere, and I really do feel the difference. For the other three seasons, I've been experimenting with indoor/home hydroponics, first with an Aerogarden, then decided to go whole hog with a DIY ebb and flow system. Obviously my time is very limited (the tenured professor gig has been getting seriously demanding) so I've been putting it together slowly. Fun little project. Does anyone else do this?? I am puzzling over all kinds of silly little things like how much space to allow between shelves.
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Re: The Permanent Supplement Regime

Post by Maddy » Thu Aug 30, 2018 12:13 pm

WiseOne, if you have time, would you post pictures? Our winter is VERY long, so I'm interested in anything relating to indoor growing. Could your system be used on a scale that could provide a meaningful yield through the winter? With what types of vegetables are you having the greatest success?
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Re: The Permanent Supplement Regime

Post by WiseOne » Sat Sep 01, 2018 11:57 pm

Hooray Maddy, hope you get to try building your own hydroponics system this winter! DIY is absolutely the way to go. Kits and complete systems are available, but the markup is absolutely astounding and in the end you get an unflexible system that may or may not work for you.

I'm growing mainly leafy greens like lettuce, kale, chard, beet greens, arugula, mizuna, and herbs. You could do tomatoes, peppers, and strawberries also. Will post pictures when I'm done, but right now there's a lot of trial and error. Unfortunately there are no guides I could find online that offer useful help with specifics, like how do you set up the system to be absolutely leakproof, make it easy to rinse and refill the reservoir, and can be left alone for a week while you're away without disaster striking. Most guides provide only high level overviews, and the rest are people growing pot in large tents.
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Re: The Permanent Supplement Regime

Post by Kriegsspiel » Wed Jan 30, 2019 6:23 pm

Kbg wrote:
Wed Aug 29, 2018 12:51 pm
rocketdog wrote:
Wed Nov 09, 2016 8:59 am
Assuming you don't suffer from a chronic health condition, the human body does not need supplements in pill form if you eat a healthy, varied diet. That said, I take these supplements:
  • Multi-vitamin - Doctor recommended as a "safety net" just in case I'm missing anything in my vegetarian diet (unlikely).
  • Calcium - I eat very little dairy (mostly a little cheese here and there), so again, just a safety net.
  • Vitamin D3 - Doctor recommended 5000IU daily. Whatever you say, doc.
  • Low-dose aspirin - Twice weekly now that I'm over 50, for the potential protection against heart attacks, strokes, and colon cancer.
I used to also take vitamin C thinking that it warded off colds, but I eat fresh fruits and vegetables every day so I already intake a good quantity of natural vitamin C and I have not noticed an increase in illness since I stopped taking it in pill form. Leaves me with more money to invest in the Permanent Portfolio. ;)
Apparently a new study (financed by Bayer) indicates aspirin and fish oil supplements have no real benefits for heart health and increase gastro problems. Probably not the drones Bayer was looking for.
There’s an ­unspoken rule in the pharmaceutical industry that half of all academic biomedical research will ultimately prove false, and in 2011 a group of researchers at Bayer decided to test it. Looking at sixty-seven recent drug discovery projects based on preclinical cancer biology research, they found that in more than 75 percent of cases the published data did not match up with their in-house attempts to replicate. These were not studies published in fly-by-night oncology journals, but blockbuster research featured in Science, Nature, Cell, and the like. The Bayer researchers were drowning in bad studies, and it was to this, in part, that they attributed the mysteriously declining yields of drug pipelines. Perhaps so many of these new drugs fail to have an effect because the basic research on which their development was based isn’t valid.

- William Wilson, Scientific Regress
I wonder which one was wrong, this new study from Bayer, or all the ones that show benefits from fish oil, for instance these older ones?
You there, Ephialtes. May you live forever.
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Re: The Permanent Supplement Regime

Post by Mark Leavy » Wed Jan 30, 2019 10:08 pm

Who knows, these days?

My current supplement/nutrition regimen is:

After morning shower...
1 ) A full pot of coffee while reading the news.
2 ) Serious weight lifting

After gym...
3 ) 6 egg yolks stirred into a half a cup of Orange Juice.
4 ) 50 grams of Hydrolyzed Collagen and 4 grams of salt mixed with 400ml of hot water.
5 ) 3000 mg of NAC - spread throughout the day.

Mid day...
6 ) Many miles of walking up and down hills with lots of sunshine on my torso.

Late day...
7 ) A big ass steak and a bottle of wine.
8 ) Some sort of sex.
9 ) 8 to 10 hours of sleep.
10 ) Repeat

Not a lot of science that will vouch for me, but it seems to be working. And I've experimented with everything for a long time...
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Re: The Permanent Supplement Regime

Post by Kriegsspiel » Thu Jan 31, 2019 6:54 am

MangoMan wrote:
Wed Jan 30, 2019 7:45 pm
Apparently, there is also a vague link to increased incidence of prostate cancer in men who take fish oil capsules. You just don't know who to believe anymore. :'(
What, with an N of 8? ::)

I say go for common sense. Fish is good for you. Fish oil probably is too.

Mark, we're on the same page. If I didn't know any better, I'd think your last name was Sisson. But I have to ask, WTF is up with that eggs and orange juice combo?
You there, Ephialtes. May you live forever.
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Re: The Permanent Supplement Regime

Post by Kbg » Thu Jan 31, 2019 9:08 am

It's incredibly hard if not impossible to find nutrition data you can use...it sucks. I get it that as new studies come out things change, but a "here is the current consensus on X" kinda website would be awesome.
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Re: The Permanent Supplement Regime

Post by Don » Thu Jan 31, 2019 10:10 am

Mark Leavy wrote:
Wed Jan 30, 2019 10:08 pm
Who knows, these days?

My current supplement/nutrition regimen is:

After morning shower...
1 ) A full pot of coffee while reading the news.
2 ) Serious weight lifting

After gym...
3 ) 6 egg yolks stirred into a half a cup of Orange Juice.
4 ) 50 grams of Hydrolyzed Collagen and 4 grams of salt mixed with 400ml of hot water.
5 ) 3000 mg of NAC - spread throughout the day.

Mid day...
6 ) Many miles of walking up and down hills with lots of sunshine on my torso.

Late day...
7 ) A big ass steak and a bottle of wine.
8 ) Some sort of sex.
9 ) 8 to 10 hours of sleep.
10 ) Repeat

Not a lot of science that will vouch for me, but it seems to be working. And I've experimented with everything for a long time...
Where do you go for #8?
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Re: The Permanent Supplement Regime

Post by jacksonM » Thu Jan 31, 2019 10:23 am

Kbg wrote:
Thu Jan 31, 2019 9:08 am
It's incredibly hard if not impossible to find nutrition data you can use...it sucks. I get it that as new studies come out things change, but a "here is the current consensus on X" kinda website would be awesome.
Given that the "current consensus" on nutrition led to the obesity epidemic I don't think I would put much stock in a website like that. One of my go to guys for nutritional information is Dr. Ken Berry. He's the author of a book called "Lies my doctor told me".

I've gotten to the point where I put more stock in anecdotal evidence than I do so-called "studies" because they have so often been shown to have hidden agendas. And also the actual findings of the study don't always line up with the click-bait headline version upon further investigation.

I'm currently following the ketogenic diet with daily fasting. I've dropped 50 lbs from my peak weight and I'm feeling great @ almost 70.
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