Let’s talk about adipose tissue….

Good morning test subjects,

We’ve covered this before, but I’m going to get a little more in depth here on the bodyhacking side of the work. It may get a bit ranty. Bear with me. References available upon request.

As you all are aware, we want to remove as much Vitamin A1 from the system as possible. Really scrub out the pipes so we don’t have any unwanted metabolic activity. A1 is stored in the liver and in the adipose tissue. Now, as there is no magical detox formula that clears the liver (there isn’t, I’m sorry, you in the back with the lemon juice and cayenne, sit down), we need to focus on reducing the amount of adipose tissue in the body. The fat.

We will be using the Accu Measure Personal Body-fat Tester calipers as our measuring tools of choice. This is due to two reasons. Electronic measurement of body fat through impedance is largely based on water content. If you measure when you are dehydrated, very hydrated, just took a nap, skipped lunch, are a bit bloaty, then the results will vary. While you could average these out over time and see a solid trend, skin fold caliper measurement is much more consistent. The model that we are using is based on the research done which states that this may be the only model that a non trained professional can use on themselves to measure with.

Now, getting yourself into the single digit body fat is no mean feat. Here’s the thing. Your body likes fat. Needs it. Won’t work without it. Your cells are wrapped in phospholipids. Lipids! Now, to be fair, most of us have more than single digit percentages of fat on our body. The average American male has around 25% bodyfat and the female has around 35-40%. Just so we are clear, the ideal is half that for both…

So, step one, reduce those carbohydrates. But, carbs give me energy you say. This is very true. So what? Fat is energy as well. This is why we store it. Now, work through the logic with me. If you are eating fats and carbohydrates, you will use the carbohydrates first, it’s quick fuel. The fat gets stored. Burning fat is a slow process, metabolically. When you run out of carbohydrates, your body will crave more energy. Sure, it is starting up the fat burning process, but it isn’t fast enough right away. You get cranky, and hungry. So you eat a cookie. Ahhh, relief. Fat burn turns off, store supplies build… you know where this is going. Ten years and 30,000 big gulps later, you’re sticking yourself every 6 hours to make sure your insulin response isn’t broke.

Conventionally, people have decided to deal with this by reducing the fat in foods. Issues: One, fat tastes good, so low fat foods mean added processed sugar, which is linked to making people obese and is now being linked to increased cancer rates in mice. Two, the body needs fat, remember? Vitamin uptake and processing, cell structure, the works. Get your fat intake too low and you start messing with your metabolism in bad way.

So, our subjects will be on a ketogenic diet. For those not ready to run off to Google, this means a diet where most of your energy is fat, 50g of carbohydrates or less. High in protein, high in fats, high in vegetables. Not only are the reports of a ketogenic diet liked to decreased hunger and weight loss,  but there are new studies linking low carbohydrate diets to increased neural plasticity in mice. Pretty cool, right? After an awkward few days where ones body is switching energy source metabolism methods, the decreases are often quite marked.

Step two, water. Drink more of it. You are probably dehydrated right now. Most of us are. You need water. Go drink a half litre of water right now. I can wait. Obviously, no alcohols, caffeine, or other diuretics / metabolism altering substances are allowed.

Step three, exercise. I’m not going to even get into this. We all know that moving around is necessary for muscle building, fat reduction, and health. Go play outside when you are done reading this. Moving on.

Step four, bodyhacking. This is where it get’s interesting. Just being keto will get you into the healthy ranges just fine. But for our purposes, we really want to get below the standard. We need to hack the preexisting metabolic system to utilize and burn even more of our stored energy.  For this we will be exploring cold thermogenisis. It’s pretty cool! Basically, there are studies showing that exposure to cold increases metabolic activity in humans and triggers a fat burning process by activating thermogenin in brown adipose tissue. Thermogenin is used by hibernating mammals and infants to slowly burn fat for heat, even without moving. This makes fairly good sense. Your body gets cold, it needs to be warmer, it burns fuel to maintain temperature. Fat is fuel. Res ipsa loquitur.

Now, cold exposure doesn’t mean turning your thermostat down. We are talking about metabolically significant levels of cold exposure. The final stages include immersing yourself in a bathtub filled with cold water and ice. However, one does not simply walk into a bath full of ice. There is a protocol for this. You need to build up to it. Failure to follow protocol, like in so many things, results in bad stuff happening. Did you know you can get first degree burns from ice cubes? It’s a thing.

To recap: Diet, Hydration, Exercise, Metabolic Hacking. By following these steps, we will be getting our body fat percentages into the single digits. This will in turn, reduce the stores of A1 in the body to levels where the supplemented A2 is able to out compete A1. 

Backers to the projects will be receiving all that that sweet, sweet biometric data on a regular basis. After the study is complete, all the data and results will be accessible here, for others to use and work with.

Everyone following along, any questions? Drop us a comment and let us know what you think.

4 thoughts on “Let’s talk about adipose tissue….”

    1. I found that a couple days of cold acclimatization help a lot.
      So, for the first few days, just use a large bowl of cold water around 15degC. This may sound a bit warm, but trust me, water gets cold… Alternate putting your face and hands past the wrists into the water. After a few days of this, it’s cold bath time.
      Run a bath with just cold water only. I suggest getting in as fast as you can. Take lots of slow deep breathes. If you can’t control your breathing, you need to back off. If you feel light headed when you first start the bath, maybe it’s too soon. Go back to dunking your face and hands for a while.
      I had a spotter. Basically someone to tell me if I was acting strange. There was intense pupil dilation and a little bit of panicky euphoria, so I was glad someone told me to get out.
      Start with 5 min if you can handle it and then work your way up. Never stay longer than 45 min. Try to get your water temp to around 15degC. This may mean having ice added at some point.
      The key is to go slow.
      Don’t push it. It’s not a competition. You can really hurt yourself if you force it.

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