Kale eating experiment

[IowaDavid]

Hello David,

Have you had any reduction in rosacea or flushing at all as a consequence of dietary modifications?

There was one poster here who claimed her mild rosacea disappeared after 6 months of GAPS.

And of course there are a few others who improve their condition with the elimination of grains, refined carbs etc. From my perspective I tend to see those with P&P type rosacea gain the most benefits from strict dietary changes.

Have you noticed when browsing the paleo communites that there are a number of cases where normal people begin the diet mostly as they have decided that is the way to eat, then find that several months down the track, they develop idiopathic flushing!!??
It is very concerning.

I have had a few discussions about this with scientists who are active in the nutritional field and they have offered a couple of opinions.

1) Very low carb diets sustained for a long time can allow oportunistic fungal infections to flourish and perhaps these might trigger flushing.

OR: having a predominantly meat/fat only diet for a sustained period of time, starves good bacteria, allowing pathogenic kinds to proliferate.

2) Some of those dieters really over do the oils, particular omega 3's and that can lower immunity and disrupt gut tolerance.

3) The low carbing can disrupt thyroid function somehow.
Perhaps this lowers immunity, or is directly involved in flushing.

This last point is of interest to me, given there are a number of thyroid patients on this forum. But the odd thing is, they appear to be women. I can't think of any men, off hand. Or perhaps they don't mention it.

Personally, I believe the gut plays a large role in this beastly syndrome. Many people report a connection. I can reduce my symptoms, but not eliminate them with dietary management.
But, all of the healing foods such as bone broths, barley grass juices etc, and particularly fermented foods, make me flush like crazy. It isn't a passing phase as my body readjusts, with me, my face can get to the point it engorges and stays that way.

I have improved with Rifaximin. Vancomycin is difficult to tolerate and I have not taken the entire course. I probably have too much vascular damage for my symptoms to completely resolve through drugs and diet alone anyway. Plus, my specialist tends to think my history of long term broad spectrum antibiotics has likely wrecked my gut based immunity.
He has an interest in clostridial infections and has found the patients who have these, tend not to recover without powerful antimicrobials and perhaps a fecal transplant.

I also have other health issues.
AND, I am still of the belief that Cpn plays a role in some cases, mine included.

Anyway, you have had a long battle now and I wondered what your antibiotic history is, and what impact the dietary changes have had on your facial symptoms?

No, I haven't noticed any flushing increase. If anything, I have noticed a decrease that I primarily chalk up to avoiding insulin spikes from too many carbs/sugars.

I don't understand how a low-carb diet could encourage fungal growth. Especially when (Wahls) the diet emphasizes vitamin D supplementation to assist immunity, as well as several other nutritional modifications to bolster immune function.

Thyroid function can be disrupted if you eat too many raw cruciferous vegetables (as mentioned above) but you can supplement with iodine-containing foods (kelp, for instance).

I don't understand what is in bone broth that would cause flushing. From what I understand, you would start a very restricted diet (no dairy, no gluten, only approved carbs such as squash, some fruit, etc.) and have your bone broth everyday as well as a range of veggies while using probiotic foods (or supplementation if you can't handle basic probiotic kraut) and do that for several weeks to allow your gut to heal. Of course, if you're taking antibiotics concurrently with this, that throws everything off.

I don't understand how fermented foods (for instance, cabbage soaked in salt water for 7 days in an anaerobic state) would cause flushing. Obviously, I don't know your specific health concerns and there may be very good reasons for why these are triggers for you.

I haven't heard of people developing idiopathic flushing from following the Wahls protocol, but then again, I haven't been looking for examples of this--I've just been trying to adhere to it as closely as I can. And I feel better for doing it.

Not sure that this helps much, but for what it's worth.

Best,

David

[Mistica]

Hi David,

I am glad to hear you have had benefits from the diet.

I found my nose flushing decreased, in particularly when going to a reduced carb diet. No grains, also.
Elimination of dairy was of great benefit too.

As for fermented foods and flushing. I react badly to all histamine producing foods.
When I attempted to include them in my diet, I was off the antibiotics.

I am pretty sure my reactions to other foods have more than one component, but I have noticed that anything which triggers nitric oxide release, ( such as barley grass, L-arginine in gelatin, for example) produce horrendous flushing in me. Oh, olive oil, coconut oil, are others.

The worse of all, is fish oil, or any other kind of omega 3 supplement, and iodine. They cause massive inflammation. Really, really bad. I can't emphasize how bad it becomes. And rapidly.

I have tried cod liver oil too, and vitamin A to try and balance out my high dose vitamin D, and again, HORRENDOUS flushing and inflammation.
I am not unique in this respect, but no doubt fall at the extreme end of the scale, alas.

Regarding the low carb diet and connection with fungal infections. All, I know is, when I went really low carb, I developed fungal infections of my toes. I have never had this before.
When I began exploring the subject, I found quite a lot of posters on Paul Jaminet's blog (including him), who had experienced the same. Paul suggested that a deficiency of glucose can impair mucosal repair and the demand for glucose is greater in those with chronic infections. (Which includes me). But at the end of the day, it is educated speculation.

As for iodine. My latest disaster. I took a few very lose dose drops, around 150mcg and less. My face just about exploded, and actually went purple. My flushing was so extreme, I have still not recovered two months down the track. Plus it set off a host of other problems for which I am still undergoing tests.

We are all an odd bunch, it seems. And triggers vary widely for different people, despite the facial symptoms being so similar.

Yet, I am sure, the gut plays a large role in most chronic diseases.

I am very glad to hear you have improved

[IowaDavid]

Wow. That really, really sucks that you have so many triggers to juggle.

Obviously you have done plenty of research trying to tease out various problems and ways to handle them. I didn't know that homemade probiotic kraut was a histamine producer.

I do agree with you that our gut is an important center for overall health. There is a lot going on there, a lot of skin surface area and a lot of exchange.

I'd just add that I posted this in response to Judworth: http://www.rosaceagroup.org/The_Rosa...disorder/page3 .

As you say, we are an odd bunch, I can't speak to much of what you have to consider for your case, but localized treatment of the rosacea component with a non-irritating modality (RLT) might be of help.

Do you think the iodine screwed with your thyroid function, or how do you think it caused the flushing in your case?

Stay tough!

Best,

David

[antwantsclear]

Mistica - have you tried out different probiotics to see if any of these help you address any possible post-antibiotics issues? Some doctors now routinely prescribe probiotics after antibiotics to help improve bacteria balance. I use Solgar acidophilus 40+, but I have to say that several other high quality probiotics I've tried seemed to make matters worse with the rosacea or have no impact. By contrast the particular one I use does help improve my rosacea flushing symptoms. Indeed I had a problem even with another Solgar probiotic. For me, for whatever reason, the one listed above works particularly well. So I think it's worth trying more than one to see if any have a positive impact - obviously one at a time.