Hey everyone, sorry for the delay!
Jordan’s Zero-Carb Update:
Anyway, like I said last week, Dad started the carnivore diet. I told him I thought it could take up to a month for the doom-y mornings to get better. I don’t say “doom-y” lightly. I mean waking up and having all your worries flood in plus more, feeling overwhelmed, wanting to hide your head under the covers and go back to sleep. This doesn’t even describe it well enough. doom-y like there’s something deeply wrong and there’s no way to fix it.
For those of you who don’t know, Dad and I had extremely severe depression/anxiety. We managed to get most of it under control with the extremely strict original diet. No cheating. AT ALL. I would say it worked better for me than for dad mood-wise. It fixed his autoimmune symptoms, he lost 50 pounds, got rid of his snoring and GERD, so it helped, but it wasn’t good enough to completely remove the anxiety-ridden mornings. And anxiety-ridden is putting it mildly. He was experiencing a doom-y feeling in the mornings that would slowly fade by the evenings. No way to live really.
Anyway he went from eating meat and greens to only eating meat and felt better in TWO days. TWO. DAYS.
What’s only eating meat mean? It means chicken, beef, salt, and water or sparkling water. That’s it. I stick to beef because I think it makes me feel better, but he’s doing chicken too.
Now he’s not all the way better. He’s waking up doom free, at about a 7/10 according to him. But that’s an incredible improvement. Doom is not a nice feeling to wake up to. And it’s only been eleven days. He saw improvement in 2. Even I’m surprised at how fast it was. I’m assuming it was this quick because he had already cut 99% of the problem foods.
He’s shocked. He keeps saying, “Can that REALLY have been carbs? Like.. REALLY?” And yep folks, somehow it’s the carbs. So that’s fantastic news. I’m over the moon. He did improve mentally with the old diet. He went off meds, and stopped napping, and is much clearer in his thinking. But the anxiety didn’t go away. It’s been so stressful watching him improve physically but not all the way mentally for the last 3 years. Plus then he shot to fame and there’s been extra stress so it’s been hard to tell what’s life and what’s diet. Turns out the anxiety was diet! So that’s great.
Here’s a video. Couldn’t upload it here, too big.
I was over there Tuesday and he was smiling, playing with the baby, and happier than I’ve seen him in years. Thank GOD. I’ve been torturing him with my diet for almost 3 years and it’s helped but that stupid horrible anxiety was so hard to get rid of. And it seems to be fading out extremely quickly! Success. FUCK YOU WORLD – WE WON.
Anyway. I’m pretty stoked.
Mikhaila,
You might find this video interesting. Google “hydrotone cross training video”, it’s about 8 min long. I have this set and it is a great way to get in shape in the pool, especially if you have inflammation problems. The company stopped making the product but I am always seeing this product being sold on Ebay. The boots go for about $170 and the bells for about $90. It is expensive but they do last a very long time. A fellow exerciser said his set lasted over 20yrs for him. There are many different methods to use with this system, not just that video.
Starting my day with tears of happiness. I’m so happy for your father and your family. I am a 49 year old male. Your father’s videos are slowly bringing back from a Chaos, brought about by a hard life, my daughter’s 5 year old battle with Leukemia, My 8 year old son’s diabetes diagnosis and a divorce, due to my inability to cope with stress and pain. I also found out my wife had a sexual affair in 2015, twice with the same man. Your father is a beacon of hope for those of us who have no access to psychological support. I live in Helsinki Finland. Where psychiatric support is only offered when you’ve reached a psychotic state and you’re found running shirtless on the road, without a shirt, in freezing temperatures. I have been prescribed 6 different types of anti depressants in the past 10 years and none of them help. I wake up every morning in dread and often crying.
I went on an almost 100% Keto diet about 3 months ago. I went from 80 to 70 kilos and sleep better. The cravings for sugar are gone and I feel more energetic. With this update, I feel I have the courage to try a carnivore diet. Thank you and your father for sharing your experience. Thank you for helping so many of us.
I extend my utmost respect to you and Dr. Peterson.
The “doomy” mornings you describe are exactly what I experience, and it certainly is not way to live and I’m fed up with it. Not only that, but I just deal with debilitating depression, anxiety, and ADD in general. It’s largely diet related for me. I’m still trying to figure out what diet works for me though, and what foods cause issues for me. Also, I was wondering, why exactly did your dad become a psychologist if he has suffered from severe mood issues himself?
Sorry to butt in here but I have combatted my own miserable mornings with a highly restrictive diet, but also high quality 5-HTP (serotonin pre-cursor, natural supplement) take it 3 times a day, the first dose AS SOON AS YOU WAKE UP at 100mg dose. Also L-theanine and PharmaGABA specifically target anxiety.
Hi, thanks for “butting in”! I appreciate the suggestions. I took 5-HTP a few years ago, and didn’t notice any results and it seemed to give me some weird tingling sensation on my skin. I suppose I could try it again and see how it goes. I feel that my issues are not related to serotonin though, they seem to be related to dopamine, as I respond well to medication and supplements that increase dopamine levels. So that could be why I didn’t respond to the 5-HTP. But also, I recently had a realization why I have these “doomy” mornings – I believe it is an adrenal fatigue issue. It makes a lot of sense, because it’s EXTREMELY hard for me to get out of bed (indicating low cortisol levels), and depression in the morning is also typical of adrenal fatigue. I recently began taking an adaptogen supplement which has helped my fatigue & has balanced my mood a lot. I also suspect this is an adrenal issue as I have blood sugar dysregulation, and I have most likely been taxing my adrenals and causing my blood sugar problems to worsen by not eating regularly, not eating breakfast and having caffeine on an empty stomach. I also used to see a chinese medicine doctor who also diagnosed me with adrenal fatigue and gave me supplements which worked great for me. So I’ve decided I am going to be diligent with eating breakfast and eating regularly and reducing my caffeine intake and see if this helps with my “doomy” mornings. Sorry this ended up being so long! What kind of diet do you follow Molly?
I forgot to mention that I have also tried L-theanine and GABA which didn’t seem to do anything for me. I just looked up pharma gaba which sounds good, so I think I may try it and maybe it would work better for me than the other GABA supplement I took.
Mikhaila, check this out:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=erfnl9NgnsQ
19:50
He mentions your blog!
Hi Mikhaila,
Your father is one of the most intelligent people I’ve ever heard. 🙂
His interview with Ben Shapiro made me feel like an imbecile.
Question:
Is White Albacore Tuna bad on your diet?
Thanks.
Scott
If your Dad still experiences anxiety and/or low mood particularly in the mornings, and found that antidepressants helped him (indication of being undermethylated) he would probably benefit from taking very high quality 5-HTP (serotonin pre-curser, natural supplement) 3 x daily, 100mg each dose. Also L-Theanine and PharmaGABA for anxiety. Look them up, they’re been game changers for my own bleak mornings.
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