Blog Marathon Called Off Due Extreme Temperatures, Diuresis, Ketosis, Loss of Appetite
Post #7 of my 12th Anniversary Blogging Marathon, post #4,265 of my dozen years of daily blogging.
This will count for my last post touted as a “blog marathon.” Seven posts in three days is way above average, but nothing at all like the 12 posts I did the first time, or 20 posts the last time.
I’ve been defeated, so no feats for me!
Bye-bye “blog marathon”
Last week I did a laudatory post on chronic but mild cold exposure, which we really just happened upon. It’s not by any design; it’s simply a tradeoff. But, we were looking at the forecast for this week and saw that temperatures were going to go from mid-40s in the mornings to mid and low-30s. For example, this morning, 5th day in a row like this:
So let me tell you the story of how I failed at this blog marathon. I’ve been trying to work it out in my malfunctioning brain since like 2 am this morning when I had a few hours of sleeplessness. It’s still all a muddle, but I’ll try to tell the story and organize my take on the n=1 data, sloppily filtered through my malfunctioning brain.
It occurs to me that it’s serendipity and happenstance that I took on the challenge of doing quantity and quality both, over a day or two. Links here to my previous performance. Those two events were very intense. It’s really damn tough to pump out posts of reasonable quality six to a dozen times in the space of 24 hours, and you have no team behind you. One man show.
It was beyond my ability this time. I managed three posts on Thanksgiving day, three posts yesterday, and there are only two of the six that I truly care for (the fist and the last).
After chewing on my symptoms, I think I have a very mild instance of sub-clinical hypothermia. I mean, most conditions of environmental origin exist on a spectrum. It’s not like one minute you don’t have a condition and the next, you do.
My brain is really muddled right now, so perhaps it’s easiest if I just put it in bullets.
- It’s not lack of motivation, not really lack of ability (though that’s individual), but rather singular focus, as best I can describe it. I am currently unable to go very far & wide to find candidates for the next post, chew on them, pick one, and go write it. I’m just cold, and all that interests me is talking about how cold I am.
- I understand I can stop this any time I want, bring the temperature in the trailer from 30s and 40s to at least 60. But I remain enamored of what I’m learning. This is nothing like the extreme, acute exposures I used to do, then go back to a warm environment. This is temperatures near freezing, no added heat, chronically 24/7 for nearly a week; and prior to that, temps in the 40s and 50s for nearly a month, now.
There are two pronounced biological symptoms, one I found an explanation for, the other, I haven’t. I’ve had pretty pronounced diuresis and thirst over the last 4-5 days. Classic signs of diabetes, right? Well, wait. The other symptom I have is loss of appetite and loss of hunger.
Combine that with chronic cold right at the edge, and maybe it all makes sense. Because my brain is a real fucking mess right now, let me just shoot ideas. Please feel free to explore it all in comments.
The diuresis has clinical support.
Cold-induced diuresis, or cold diuresis, is a phenomenon that occurs in humans after exposure to a hypothermic environment, usually during mild to moderate hypothermia.[15] It is currently thought to be caused by the redirection of blood from the extremities to the core due to peripheral vasoconstriction, which increases the fluid volume in the core. Overall, acute exposure to cold is thought to induce a diuretic response due to an increase mean arterial pressure.[16] The arterial cells of the kidneys sense the increase in blood pressure and signal the kidneys to excrete superfluous fluid in an attempt to stabilize the pressure. The kidneys increase urine production and fill the bladder; when the bladder fills, the individual may then feel the urge to urinate. This phenomenon usually occurs after mental function has decreased to a level significantly below normal. Cold diuresis has been observed in cases of accidental hypothermia as well as a side effect of therapeutic hypothermia, specifically during the induction phase.[17][18]
So, when I thought of this yesterday, I did a little test. Drove down to a local market (car heater turned to 78, but it was very short lived) and got a bottle of Mexican Dr. Pepper that’s made with sugar, not HFCS. Downed it. Within minutes, I feel snappy, and for the next few hours, no thirst combined with no urge to pee.
Go figure. A few hours later, and everything is back to normal. Constant thirst, sips of my Soda Stream, home made club soda, and peeing. Then, in the evening, while bundled up and watching the new Netflix series Jessica Jones with Hunter—the beagle hound by my side—I eat about a half to 2/3 pint of Häagen-Dazs Rocky Road ice cream and same thing happens. Energetic, thirst gone, no urges to pee every half hour. Until hours later, then the return.
But, that’s not all. Since Beatrice left for the Holiday down south Monday morning, just when the cold snap hit, I have had a profound loss of appetite, and non-existent hunger. When she left, knowing cold was coming, I went shopping and loaded the fridge. I made a whole gallon of beef bone and oxtail stock/broth combo. Most of it all still sits there, 5 days later.
Amongst the stuff I got was a tub of mixed nuts, and it’s been at arm’s reach from where I’m typing now, for five days.
Does that substantiate my claim, or what? I’ve eaten less than a quarter of the tub, over five days, and they’ve been right here, all the time. I love mixed nuts. Don’t you?
Two days ago, I ate a sandwich and a half, and a cup of soup, over the entire day, and I had to down the half sandwich at 8pm (Lebanon bologna and swiss cheese) with no hunger or real appetite, just caution, really.
Finally, after just a handful equivalent of those nuts all day yesterday, I finally felt something and went to work.
Ground Beef patty with a cheddar & horseradish cheese slice, reduced beef bone & oxtail broth combo, over mashed potatoes.
And yes…
Perfect medium for 80/20 ground beef inside.
But to me, it’s counter-intuitive that I’m not experiencing crazy hunger in the face of the chronic cold exposure. You’d think one would be naturally ravenous to stoke the metabolic fire. It’s 11:30 am right now and I have not the slightest desire to eat a thing. That pic above was the last thing I ate, 16 hours ago.
So here’s my damn muddled brain take. Feel free to critique.
I think I’m in a sort of quasi-hibernaton funk. After all, some mammals do it and its onset is likely keyed by ambient and body temperature, combined. The diuresis and thirst is easily explained, but not the loss of hunger and appetite, so far as I can tell…but muddled brain, I’ve not really been digging.
I’m likely in deep ketosis. All my test gear is packed away, but I’m pretty sure that if I got it all out, I’d have substantial BP, high blood glucose (120-140), and would be peeing purple.
We should all know about physiological insulin resistance, by now. So what I believe has happened is that I’ve entered a state of profound insulin resistance in order to both manufacture and preserve glucose for my brain. Complete survival mechanism, but not optimal performance.
What’s interesting to me is that this comes not from an LC or ketogenic diet, but rather chronic cold combined with profound caloric deficit, to access the metabolic pathways those dietary regimes attempt to tap, but from the direction in which those pathways evolved.
…But I still can’t figure the loss of hunger and appetite.
Update: I’ve put most of this in various comments, but as Beatrice returned yesterday in the evening I went out in the afternoon to get a hose and 4.5 gallon propane tank for my Mr. Heater Buddy, a great value. It runs on the 5-lb propane bottles but only lasts a few hours on low. This tank & hose hookup should last a week with morning and evening use.
So, since about 3pm yesterday I had heat in the trailer, no battery usage. Diuresis terminated after a couple of hours inside, with temp in mid-50s, and so did hunger by about 7. Everything back to normal today. So, conclusion, for me, is sustained temps in the 40s with adequate clothing is very doable, but 30s and low 30s with the same level of clothing is just a bit over the edge without a source of heat, such as even a campfire. I imagine it could be done with true arctic or mountaineering clothing, but then you tradeoff mobility. Hard to do anything, especially banging around in the trailer.
So, another way of looking at it is that I was already at max clothing I want to have and can function with, even cooking. That’s jeans, two sweatshirts, and my lightweight North Face Rain Jacket that preserves heat, but breathes. So, to do that when temps get low, I’ll need to have some sources of external heat.
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Hope you get well.
I’ve been keeping my thermostat at 50F (Michigan) as an experiment to see how much money I would save on the gas bill. Definitely makes it hard to get motivated to do anything other than lay around. Might end up raising it to 60 when I’m home and save 50 for when I’m on business trips.
Yea, Alex, I was telling Bea this morning how I never had a problem with 45 degree mornings (which is average here, this dip into low 30s being rare), since usually it’s going to be 50s and 60s outside. And with radiant heat when sunny, which it usually is this part of CA.
The problem being inside is that it’s insulated and once it get’s cold it tends to stay there. Provided there’s no wind it’s way prefereable to spend most time outside, which is exacly what I did.
Richard, are you moving around or just sitting? Ya gotta jump around and stuff to get the circulation going. Isn’t that what people do when they are freezing cold?
There’s a very interesting thing that Tibetan buddhist monks learn how to do which is visualize something hot and fiery. For some reason it changes the balance between sympathetic and parasympathetic resulting in hot feet and hands. If you are shivering, then that’s sympathetic nervous system functioning but these guys can over ride it. Then once the feet and hands are burning hot, they can get moving and do whatever it is they need to get done.
I move around quite a bit, actually. Inside, to outside. Nope can’t really just sit or lay around unless I bundle up. When writing at the computer I’m usually up and about every 15 minutes or so.
Interestingly, no ahivering. A little tremble every now & then. I think I’m pretty well adaptes, and that came from weeks in the 40s in the morning. Once temps during the day reach that level, I’m pretty good to go. It’s just hours in morning and evening in the 30s that took the toll, I suspect.
Huh. Interesting. Can you dig out your testers?
I must tell you. My 80 year old father insists on sleeping without a shirt, and with the blanket off…because he says, if he sleeps “cold” it bring his blood sugar down.
It would be funny if it was the cold temp, that was the impact and not the so called “low” carb eating.
I read an article a few years ago that said that it used to be that mothers in the UK and some N.Euro countries would put their babies OUTSIDE in the COLD for their afternoon nap. The mothers insisted that the cold air was good for their health. Now of course, no one does this….and kids are fat and sick…
N.
Too much bother to dip stuff out of temp storage.
At any rate, since Bea and the doggies got back yesterday and I don’t want to subject her to this extreme, I rigged heat from propane, no fan, so no sucking 8.5 amps from my solar charged batteries.
On low, it brings the temp into high 50’s low 60’s, and that will be plenty for the day. Off when it’s bedtime. Just using it yesterday afternoon and evening, and the diuresis has gone away, no abnormal thirst.
You’re great. You’re the good kind of crazy. Don’t give a shit crazy. Actually, not really crazy in any way whatsoever. Anyway, keep on.
The urination and lack of hunger sound like the effects of adrenaline. Whenever we experience mental or physical stress, the body releases adrenaline to help us survive until the danger passes. I seem to remember hearing something about adrenaline spikes followed by some other counter process (meant to return the body to balance) that can cause some serious fog-brain and fatigue. Interesting experiment.
That makes a lot of sense James, though I don’t know the mechanisms of it, but inuitively, I figured it had to be some sort of survival mechanism kicking in. Not a state one wants to be in forever. Five days was enough.
Now with heat rigged that uses no electricity, I can easily keep it in the high 50s and that’s perfect. Diuresis gone, hunger returned last night. Bea had brought back a buttermilk buscuit with chicken on it. Popped it on the burner to toast, good pat of butter on each side, downed it. Then I ate the slice of apple strudle, then a half pint of haagen-dazs rocky road. Not perfect Paleo food but at that point, didn’t matter.
‘Diuresis’ in the cold has become a familiar experience these days since sometimes I end up waiting a total of 25 minutes for buses. The other day I was standing at the bus shelter negotiating with my bladder if I should just squat behind the shelter (leaves are gone from bushes so drivers at gas station may get a view of…), or risk missing a bus by going across the very wide (4 lanes plus wide grassy bit in the middle) road to the chain store restaurant or maybe hold until I got home. Opted for the latter and managed to not piss my pants. I used to drive everywhere before so reminding myself to go pee before leaving to get on the bus is something I have to do especially since for the next several months it ain’t gonna get any warmer.
However, despite having made sure I’d emptied said bladder before a 3 hour long walk in the cold and rain, it didn’t matter. I got off the elevator at home and nothing stopped the bladder doing it’s own thang as I walked as fast as possible all the way down the hall to my place. Uh uh. Damn.
Back when I used to do the cold plunges in the gym, 45f water for 12-15 minutes depending on tolerance on any given day, it was after an intense 30-minute workout, then 10 minutes in the sauna, 5 in the steam room, and another 5 in the hot tub, so lots of sweating.
Jump in the cold plunge and within a minute, huge urge to pee, every time. Around the same time, Mike Eades happened to mention the mechanism in a blog post of his, so I was aware of it. Had experienced it before, but only as an acute response, not chronic over 5 days.
Why don’t you go to the local Library during the day to do your writing? AT least for a few hours to warm up.
dad, your son enjoys self experimentation so he can write about it (as usual). You raised an interesting kid. Practical doesn’t come into it sometimes. LOL!
We’ve got heat now, dad. Little radiant deal I got on Amazon that uses the 5-lb propane bottles. But only lasts a few hours per $4 bottle, even on lowest setting. So, went to OSH yesterday and bought a hose and a 4.5 gal tank, and we’re good.
Still cold enough in the morning that the water supply line from the tanks on the hill lightly freezes until the sun comes out, but flipping on the pump gives water from the inside tank.
All going well now. Glad I did it, though.
me too!
I’d be trying to figure out how to get some major calories in. Obviously your need would have been dramatically increased recently, and probably the period of low eating has been an accelerated hypocaloric state.
I’d get a large pizza and eat the whole thing, then figure out how to eat again before the temporary recharge wore off. Sounds like you’re running on empty and losing fuel faster than you’re taking it in for too long.
Read my reply to James right above, John. Rigging heat yesterday resolved everything and my apetite has returned. Plan to eat damn well today too.
Richard, do you think this is nature’s way of making death less bothersome? I mean taken to the extreme it would result in death eventually. Isn’t this why severe hypothermia makes people fall asleep and die. In your case you just were getting brain fog but it’s all on a continuum.
Meh, that sounds to purposeful for my tastes. Given the vastness of the universe, biology is the tiny little exception and it’s analagous to a fire. Biology is a kind of wrap around control mechanism of the chemistry of chain reaction oxidation.
Fires don’t just suddently stop, they slowly die out as one or more of the three necessary elements (fuel, oxidizer, and heat) dwindle. So, in terms of biological organisms, once the control capacity has been exausted, then the entropic forces of pure chemical expenditure take over and the “fire goes out”
I tried all the ‘cold thermogenesis’ stuff really hard a couple years ago. My conclusion is that you need a very functional thyroid and tons of calories to actually turn on the “heat” and probably also to convert white fat to brown. I am 100% positive that we all possess some ability to adapt to cooler and cooler temps as the Winter wears on, but taking it to extremes requires lots of thyroid hormones coursing through your body.
When they find people in Alaska who have died of hypothermia, they are often found naked in the bushes, leading investigators to think ‘foul play.’ But, this is an actual ‘thing’ called “terminal burrowing” and “paradoxical undressing.”
Lots and lots of homeless chronic inebriates found frozen stiff with a bottle in their hand as they just drift off and die. And these are people who live outdoors year round, in very cold temps, in homeless camps or doorways downtown.
Those Artctic explorers you read about who need to eat sticks of butter for energy are prime examples of people with exceptional thyroids and physical stature.
Hm, Tim, but I wonder if mild cold stress could actually help kick up sluggish thyroid.
I was trying to think the last time I had true hypo symptoms of acheing cold hands and I do believe it was prior to carbing up with your tater hack, beans, and of course targeting the gut.
In this case, I did not have cold hands, just truly cold-induced cold fingers, from middle knuckle to tip, which is perfctly normal in those conditions.
Doesn’t matter, hot or cold, you always do better when Bea is near.
Meatza or potato hack: always better with Bea. :)
Sweet. Good that you have Bea to share life with. I’m sure it’s mutual.
So there.
Mild cold to kick up thyroid function was often suggested to patients with chronic fatigue some years back in New Zealand. I never heard of it working for any of them and then the doctor would suggest the problem “must” therefore be psychological – never understood their reasoning.
One thing which did kick up my thyroid functioning a notch was inositol to reduce cortisol levels.
What I would like to know is why my cortisol levels are so high. My doctor has no idea. My functional medicine doc suggested inositol, B6 to help – which they do. But what makes them go up so high in the morning (above the reference range but not high enough to suggest any of the nasties eg Ca) when I’m not particularly stressed at all? My biggest stress is playing bridge which is not a good enough reason to drive huge adrenaline responses in the immediate situation and cortisol over the longer term.
My only thought is that if gut bugs impact on male’s testosterone levels, and on thyroid function, perhaps the strep infection I have impacts on the cortisol?
Loss of apettite may just mean a lot of stress hormones, like cortisol.
But maybe it is more – a partial shutdown of a digestive system? Thus no appetite for difficult to digest foods like nuts, but still the ability to eat easy to digest mashed potatoes?
Those climbing high mountains, in the death zone suffer from the beginning process of slow, distributed-in-time death: digestive and reproductive systems get shutdown first, the rest of the body still functions for some time – if they manage to return home it the time window the main part the body still functions, their other systems turn on.
Hibernating animals also have their digestive systems shut down a the beginning of hibernation, and then turn on after hibernation.
Yea, that’s why I called it mild and sub-clinical. I had no provlem digesting what I did eat, just I was like meh to the thought of food most of the time when I should have been hungry.
Amazing how quicly I recovered. Had another strudel this morning with coffee, an enormous rotisserie chicken sandwich for lunch, an downed a pint of chocolate milk just a bit ago.
Leftover turkey, ham, mashed potatoes, stuffing from down south that Bea brought back, later, and looking forward to it.
If I remember correctly, you mentioned quite some time ago reading the book, “Lights Out: Sleep, Sugar and Survival”.
That book has some pertinent information about the same thing you’re experiencing with cold adaptation and the influence of seasons on sleep, diet and ketosis/fat adaptation as a seasonal adaptation to winter and availability of food. This also improves the ability to adapt to cold and food scarcity in wintertime according to the books hypothesis.
Just curious if you think this ties in.
No, haven’t read that book. Perhaps I’ll have to put it on the list, though I think I know from experience pretty much what I need to know.
Can you check your mobile site ad settings? I’ve been trying to read the site on my iPhone and after a page loads, a pop up says I’ve won an iPhone. There is no way I can see to get around it, so I hit okay and am taken to best-iphone6s.com. An advertiser that is directing people away from your site with no ability for them to say no is one you should drop. My $0.02 anyway.
Ah, ha! I often wondered who gave me adware!
Oh, that again. It’s not adware. It’s some glitch in the Java code that serves up one of the ads, and does a redirect. Was happening a lot way back, first I’ve heard of it in months.
I’ll check. Hasn’t happened on my own iPhone or iPad yet.
I can’t seem to duplicate it on my iPhone. What I recall from last time is that if I let the page load fully before touching anything, I don’t get it.
You also might try clearing your browsing data, cookies. Because of cookies you might be having something served up that others don’t get. Sometimes based on what you’ve shopped for. So, for instance, guys might see ads for power tools and gals, sex toys. That sort of thing. :)
Try not ejaculating for 30 days. Have sex, just don’t ejaculate. It will restore your bodies energy. This is not a joke.
I must stress that you try this Richard. Mrs Nikoley will loveit as you will always be primed and ready to go anytime at a moments notice. You will also learn to go for hours on end.
Very interesting. Hope the temps warm up for you there soon!
We normally keep the house at about 62 degrees in the winter to save on the heating bill. Normally, I’m in multi-layers and socks. This year (since adding back in starch from beans and potatoes) I’m running around the house barefoot and warm as toast. Hope it continues!
36 right now this morning, first morning after four days the water supply isn’t frozen (it thaws soon as sun comes up, we have gravity feed from storage tanks up the hill).
Tomorrow supposed to be 39 and then it’s back to mid-40s…a veritable heat wave.
I’m changing the subject to an earlier blog post, but I watched the Genku Kimura video and it was excellent. As I’m listening, I’ m thinking this sounds like Japanese Zen.
I just Googled him and I see he used to be a Zen monk. I’m always looking for people like him that convey thoughts clearly…..thanks for the link.
I was first exposed to him in 1991 through a mutual fried (now passed away). Had some email correspondence with him about 8 years ago or so.
He is unique in that in addition to his Eastern mysticism, he’s wholly versed in Western philosophical thought. He even has a deep appreciation for Ayn Rand.
Sounds like a good and WISE friend.
Is your back still doing O.K., post – surgery?
Most of the time, except a bit of numb in my left toes. Every now & then I get a little something in terms of left calf pain same place as before, but always pretty mild and goes away.
Highly tolerable, I guess.
This is truly interesting. I’m a little curious about your update as to the amount of clothing you wear. Double sweaters, but what materials are they? I spend a lot of time outdoors, especially in the cold season, and to me there is nothing that beats wool in the game of keeping warm below freezing temp.
Yea, I’d have to agree. I have a fleece jacket, not sure if that’s wool or not, but the sweatshirt and hoodie layers I wear are typical cotton/poly blends, mostly cotton.
I’ve never had use of wool here in sunny CA until now, except for a wonderful Tyrol wool overcoat I have and will keep forever.