I did a post about it back then, bragging about how healthy she has managed to get herself over the past 16 months or so ? re-mineralizing/de-arthritisizing her jaw joint, overcoming an autoimmune disease completely without a trace of it ever occurring, re-establishing the regularity of her menstrual cycle, and so forth (including a complete cessation of cold sore outbreaks ? something I previously mentioned as ?herpes outbreaks? without specifying that they were ORAL, not, um ? well, let’s just say she said, ?Oh great, now all your followers think I was like a former prostitute?).
Anyway, her jaw surgery was ?great success. Prior to jaw surgery the surgeon referred to her, in complex medical terminology, as a ?banana head. A little scary looking in this photo perhaps, but you can definitely see the banana head thing going on.
As well as in her initial head scan?
I would’ve loved to put up a photo of her face when it was swollen the size of a large balloon, but didn’t for fear that Nikoley would call her ?carbo face? and recommend she return to running marathons on only eggs, salad, and peanut butter (which is a great way, if anyone is interested, in getting rid of those pesky menstrual cycles, developing autoimmune disease, deadly shellfish allergies, sleep problems, and mood problems, and getting really ?hot? by the health and beauty standards set by the fashion industry).
As an aside for you numbers geeks, it was tough to wrap my head around just how it was possible for her to lose so much weight in such a short period of time. Obviously, losses of water – at least 5 pounds worth, is to be expected. But that still leaves 20 pounds unaccounted for. Considering her BMR is probably around 2,000-2,500 calories per day, and she has been able to consume, on average since day 1, about 800-1,000 calories per day by my guesses, this leaves a calorie deficit of about 30,000 calories (1,500*20). 1 pound, as we’ve all been informed, is 3,500 calories (3,500*20 = 70,000 calories). So there’s something strange about her dropping a supposed 70,000 calories when she couldn’t have possibly dropped that many calories.
Aha, 1 pound of fat is about 3,500 calories, but a pound of lean mass is more like 600 calories – thus a calorie deficit of 3,000 calories is enough to lose 5 pounds of lean mass, but not enough to lose a single pound of fat. All the more reason to be cautious and smart when attempting weight loss. If you’re losing fat and lean mass at the same rate you’re losing nearly 6 pounds of lean mass for every 1 pound of fat! She’s obviously lost a good deal of fat, but the loss of lean body mass has been noticeable too. Not that she could do anything about it. It’s natural to have a small appetite after a big, traumatic surgery.
Sadly, most who do manage to lose 25 pounds in 28 days following a typical low-calorie diet probably lose a ton of lean body mass. 10-15 pounds of fat is the maximum one can expect to lose in such a time frame without superhuman quantities of exercise.
Calculations:
1 pound of lean body mass is 454 grams
LBM is roughly 2/3 water – the remainder is predominantly protein
Thus, lean body mass contains roughly .33 pounds/151 grams protein
151 grams protein X 4 calories per gram = 604 calories per pound of LBM with .66 pounds/302 grams water loss
I would guess that the 25 pounds lost therefore are comprised of about:
7 pounds fat (25,500 calories)
4.5 pounds protein (8,172 calories)
13.5 pounds water
Total calorie deficit estimate based on above calculations = 33,672
Hey Matt,
Hooray for Aurora! Peanut butter is the main evil O666 I really miss. Why is it soooooo bad? I realize you have to just stop it cos if you let a little pass your lips you can't stop. What's in Aurora's milkshakes? And would recommend a liquid diet (and I'm not talking about the milk diet) for any reason/short period of time? Or would it be just a quick fix?
Matt, with a post like this women are going to be flocking to hospitials for jaw surgery in hopes of dropping that much weight so fast. :P
Seriously, though, glad to hear Aurora's recovery is going well. Pre-surgery overfeeding should be mandatory!
Yep. Overfeeding rules. Both her surgeon and her orthodontist agreed that they'd never seen someone recover so quickly – particularly in terms of a reduction in swelling. Overfeeding = massive mitochondrial activity = higher protein turnover, higher red and white blood cell counts for healing, etc.
Matt, it's good to hear that you snookie wookie is doinw well. I would love to lose even 15 pounds in 25 days…tell me what to do. I need help :-(
Glad to hear she's recovering well. Head pain is so tough to deal with. I wonder how much energy is consumed by the body being in a state of trauma after surgery. Metabolically there has to be something going on, right?
It will be interesting to see what happens when she is able to eat again. Will she gain? Will she gain back just enough? Will her ramped up metabolism see this new tiny hiney as her new setpoint?
Prayers and thoughts of healing sent her way!!
Thanks Lisa. She will definitely gain post op if eating to appetite. I've seen many jaw surgery people post op long-term. Tend to balloon up a bit at first while rebuilding lost LBM.
Matt, how long did Aurora overfeed for? And how much weight did she gain? I feel like you've posted it before, but I am too lazy to dig through posts :]
Also- I thought you thought she looked more attractive at a higher weight?
Aurora managed to make it up to 143. She gained about 10 pounds in the last 2 weeks prior to surgery. To give you an idea, she was pounding ice cream and big bags of caramel popcorn the day before surgery. Her normal weight is right around 130 pounds. She's 118 this morning.
Her lowest weight as an adult was 110 pounds. That's when she was totally f'ed up and having all of the above-mentioned health problems. At 110, she has a typical model-type body. I did not say this was "hot," but fit the standard portrayal of "hot" in the modern world.
Cosmo may say that's fat, but I ain't down with that. She looks great at 130 – a great deal of it lean mass and very little added fat from 110.
Matt, excellent Mix-A-Lot quote, LOL!
Thanks Will. She hates rice and beans, so unfortunately red beans and rice DID miss her.
Matt, LOL!
I have to post a quote from my "Douglass Report" newsletter this month. This was part of an article on B12…
"One final note: if you are a vegan (i.e. eschew all animal foods), you are guilty of nutritional self-abuse. Eat pork, bugs, fish, or anything that growls, grunts, cackles, or moos. Get a life-join the human race."
I'm sort of sad to know that Aurora is not a former prostitute. I had a whole back story invented for how she got the herpes and how she found her health Jesus.
Glad to hear she's doin' well.
Ya, I'm glad you cleared up the herpes thing too…
Matt, I have to say, you must have the coolest girlfriend ever. Most women would have murdered you for posting on a public site that the had herpes. I remember reading that and thinking that would be the last post you ever made!
You never know, JT, maybe Aurora did murder Matt and she is now making these posts!
Jenny, good point. I have noticed that "Matt" has been much more sensitive lately.
Curious – what specifically do you think stopped the cold sore outbreaks? I used to get them all the time too and haven't had them in a few years, wonder what I've done to accomplish that… I'll also be interested to see what my cycle is like once it returns. I'm nursing a baby (well, 14 month old) and my cycle is still on hold, but I used to have crazy wacky cycles… to the degree that I baffled the doctors and midwives.
Matt,
Glad to hear Aurora is doing well. I looked at the link you posted to the Doctor who did the work on her jaw. Some amazing transformations!
If you are not doing so you might want to consider adding fresh young coconut water to the mix. Great stuff nutrient/healing wise and will add calories to the mix without increasing satiety (at least it does for me). If the notes/comments/research on the web is accurate fresh young coconut water is near a miracle food.
Here is a post I did on all things coconut.
I wouldn't take much in the way of milk, at least fresh coconut milk. Every time I drink a significant amount I end up living on the toilet.
Forget the herpes thing … she's okay with you calling her a wookie?!!
After a shoulder surgery I lost about 15 lbs in 21 days. Of course, I ate the same post-surgery and pre-surgery–same food, maybe not amounts. I think it was mostly the lack the weightlifting. Does/did Aurora work out?
Good luck with the continued recovery
Yes! Thanks for the x-ray pic– I was hoping to learn more about her surgery. I couldn't tell from the doctor's site if maybe he only REDUCED the lower jaw. Now I see he works on expanding THE WHOLE FACE. I honestly need something like this, as I too have a "banana face" and asymmetries that are "out of this world".
@turbogirl:
Peanut butter is the main evil O666 I really miss.
Yeah, I remember I had an uncontrolable need for peanut butter when I was low carb (and I mean REALLY low carb)– probably because I was dying for the sweetness of the sugars. Now that I've been a starch-kateer, and also eat all the fruit I want, my cravings have drastically faded. But, I'd probably chow down on it, and other foods I'm supposed to avoid, if I let myself. It's tough to stick to, but I've found that I seriously break out whenever I have omega 6. I just recently deduced that not even moderate amounts of sugar will do that to me.
I don't get it though- why would people be attracted to something that's bad for them? I've always loved peanut butter (and always had bad acne). Is it vitamin E I crave? Now that I'm cleared up again, maybe I should re-experiment.
Some people, of course, have no acne. I agree with Matt that abnormal responses to food are a sign that something's off, and ideally people should be able to eat whatever they want, within reason.
One more thing– I bought sunflower butter with the hopes that it would be lower O6, because Matt had posted that high oleic sunflower oil was low O6. But on nutritiondata.com it says the fat in sunflower butter is mostly O6. So, is the "high oleic" oil a modern concoction then, and sunflower seeds are naturally mostly O6? What then of the Eastern Europeans who ate a ton of natural sunflower oil (and probably fructose) and didn't suffer for it? Maybe the refining or heating damages the vitamin E? Maybe the ratio of alpha-delta-gamma vitamin E matters? It's tough to say.
@Jared Bond:
I miss peanut butter because of the convenience. You can't carry a potato in backpack:) So I miss it, don't really crave it–in fact I NEVER ate peanut butter as a kid–I only learned to like it as an adult. Cheese too, I only learned to like cheese a few years ago when I had a tooth abscess and was very sick from the antibiotics and the only thing I could hold down was dairy.
Kefir is what I miss more. Since playing around with HED and going low PUFA/low fructose–it's hard to find full fat kefir and I'm too lazy to make my own.
But maybe your right and I miss the sweetness–other people have told me that as well. They say that I should just sweeten things with non caloric sweeteners, but I've never been into fake sweets very much.
so glad Aurora's healing is going so well. that seems an awful lot of water loss??
Turbogirl: if you want the ultimate convenience food, get some pemican. When I was in college we did canoe trips on nothing but peanut butter since it was cheap, easy to carry and didn't require refrigeration. Can't wait to do canoe trips this summer on pemican power!
@JennytheNipper:
Pemican? Do you make your own? Buy it? The pemican I see at the health food store just looks like a candy bar. I thought real pemican was loaded with fat?
BTW I wanted to contact you since you are into film–I work for a Uni film program. Can you send an email?
Pemican is loaded with fat. That's what makes it such a great survival food. You can buy it pre-made at Grassland Beef. They do mail order.
You can make it yourself as well, but I haven't worked up to that particular undertaking yet…
Hey Matt, this is a bit off topic with the post so I apologize if that causes any inconvenience. I was just wondering one thing, when you used to do the whole dieting thing and could see the veins on your abs yet had all kinds of health problems were you running a calorie deficit on whole natural foods or with protein bars, refined carbs and other junk food?
I would imagine the protein loss would be greater than that. Keep in mind Matt that 58% percent of protein is dissipated in order to convert the other 42% into glucose for fuel. So she likely burned twice as much protein for that reason.
People that lose lots of muscle from surgery can gain it back quickly. She could even possibly be far leaner than she previously was if she works out at a higher bodyweigt of 130-145. Though it's not normal for women to follow a program that facilitates such muscular growth. High Intensity Interval Training is probably the most popular method for people now in days. IMO, a women her height would look incredible at 145-155 pounds of bodyweight. I've seen it before and feel it's far more attractive than these models at 108 pounds of bodyweight. Especially since they're usually over 5'9".
Self made coconut milk and raw milk will bring her lean body mass back up very quickly. I would say having the fermented codliver oil along with the raw milk will greatly aid in strengthening her bones. That or other sources of vitamins a and d but I can't think of any other quality liquid sources. Making bone broth would really help with her health too. Chicken stock broth only takes a day to make. It could be purely liquid so it's doable.
I believe the peanut butter was the primary cause of the cold sore outbreaks. Some believe it's due to the high levels of arginine in peanut butter but I have my doubts.
You can always eat Maranatha macadamia nut butter if you nut butter junkies need something like that. If anything, the reason you're compelled to eat peanut butter probably stems from its calorie density and perfect 77% fat content blended with carbohydrate and protein. Few foods have all of those components in them. Our senses know that's some good stuff.
I used to eat about a cup of nuts a day of various kinds. When I began eating butter, cream, and animal fat again I lost interest in nuts – even while eating very little sugar of any kind.
Rosenfelt-
When I was really lean I was starving myself while doing long-duration/moderate intensity exercise paired with a little bit of resistance exercise. It was a whole foods, extremely low-sugar diet. Grain, whole fish, olive oil, butter – and that's about it.
Aurora reported today that at 125 pounds she fit into her jeans better than she does now at 119. This should give some further clues as to the composition of the fat loss.
Carbohydrate is easy to consume. I don't think she had any deficit there. It's more a matter of getting adequate protein in while in a hypocaloric state. In the early going she was only getting 5-10 grams per day. By week 2, she was up to more like 20 grams. Now she's getting more like 30-40 grams and her weight seems to have stabilized.
And she actually WANTED me to do this post and sent me that picture to put in there. She's proud of her new jaw. I know. Crazy.
As far as training/exercise goes, you guys are seriously underestimating the severity of her jaw surgery. The first 10 days she was so messed up she couldn't even watch television and slept 20 hours a day – much less do some HIIT.
It took 3 weeks just to get her to the point where she could go on a 30 minute walk.
But she is very interested in taking a smart approach to rebuilding herself, and I bet she'll have great success doing so. More weights, less cardio – will certainly help on the exercise front.
But that won't take place for another 3-4 months.
I recommended to a lady on another forum to have 1-2 quarts of raw milk a day. 2 quarts preferably. 1/4 to 1 coconut a day in the form of coconut milk. If only a 1/4th coconut increase the raw milk intake to 3 quarts. Some form of magnesium supplementation. Magnesium Chloride bathing is probably the superior method. Don't know how effect Standard Process magnesium pills are but that may be another alternative. Great for bone density.
As far as running is concerned you should run a strong confortable pace for 3 minutes at the start of a routine. Near the end of the routine add in maybe one all out sprint from 60-200 meters. HIIT includes plyometrics, stretching, yoga, weightlifting, calisthenics, running, martial arts, and sprinting. It's costumizable so you can even add in sports activities like tennis and frisbee. Don't want to influence anybody to kill themselves with exercising if they're in a fatigue state from surgery. But I do believe in HIIT for a person recovering from surgery at some point. P90-X is the most popular HIIT and fitness program: http://www.soundeats.com/2010/03/01/p90x-week-3/
I have personally cut myself down from 300 pounds to an eventual 265 pounds. I am currently 275 pounds. My waist size went down from 44 to 40. When I get down to 265 pounds I will likely be between size 38-40. Hopefully food will be more available to me and I will lean up while maintaining that bodyweight. Though I'm not nearly as strong at this weight than what I was at 19 years old when I weight 175 pounds. I hope to change that quickly. Food availability is the biggest issue for me.
Walking is always a great start for anybody. I had to take it extremely easy on my body when adjusting to 300 pounds of bodyweight.
She's got a great sense of humor and a lot of humility to let you post the comments about bananas, howard the duck, and terminator.
It sounds like you're a powerful supporter with her nutrition. It's amazing whenever anybody is willing to make big changes. It's amazing whenever you have somebody to inform you and help you improve your health.
Everybody born in the last 10,000 years has carbo face. That's when all the problems started. No one has been healthy since then. It's all about gene expression you grain loving fools!
I'm probably like that where I lost 25 pounds in a month. Due to acid reflux, insomnia, and losing my appetite completely. I just ate very little and so I probably lost mostly muscle. I would have rather stayed at 300 pounds and even gotten up to 320. But it'll be much easier to maintain at 265 pounds. I do eventually plan to get a 50-100 pound bodyvest to add more resistance. The muscle will come back easily without putting on any fat. My one inch punch is incredible. I made the room shake and practiced on the metal wall. My fists bones got all mangled up but the beef stock gravy I had fixed it right back up.
Is the Cobra Kai Dojo open for memberships? You don't let people that suck join it do you. Last I heard that dojo doesn't let anybody in if they suck.
Back in the early 90's when I was a Cobra Kai member of one of the dojos we would beat the living hell out of any of the other members if they sucked. I don't know how they run things now in days though.
Sweep the leg
you are exactly right about PB stimulating cold sore/herpes outbreaks.
But when i was slamming coconut oil, i had near constant cold sores. finally it occurred to me…
now i use it less freqently but slather it on my body w/o problem.
oh, and for all of you who commented on the 'genital' herpes thing; one in five peop have it and that is only whats reported. when i was an L/D RN, i was pretty sure it was easily 75%.
back to the PB jar…I do consider it the ultimate convenience food and a spoonful can get me through a crazy workday. but not everyday.
humans eat things that 'are bad for them' all the time. and, really, just because it's high O6 does not make it bad. that is just the current bandwagon.
peanuts/groundnuts are highly accessable since they grow beneath the earth, shallowly, and can be eaten raw. even after they are dehydrated, can be eaten w/o breaking your teeth, unlike other legumes.
anyway, aren't we trying not to be so obsessive?
anyway, Matt, so happy your snookums is healing well.
Thanks for that tidbit Cobra Kai.
I do have a quiz question though…
In Weston A. Price's Nutrition and Physical Degeneration, the fattest, puffiest, roundest 'carbo' faces belong to the natives he found eating a traditional diet with:
a) The most carbs
b) The fewest carbs
If you said B, the Eskimos, you're a winner!
Matt,
Kind of an off topic, but I am curious why you choose oatmeal and cornmeal as your starch source in the "wind river diet"? Was it purely because those are both quick cooking items, and not some nutritional reason?
"Sweep the leg"
LOL! Swede. My thoughts exactly.
Yes, Daniel-san!
Speaking of WAPF, it seems as they show like tha maple syrup, dehydrated cane sugar stuff and honey. Quoting from the Godfather, "The excess of calories over body building minerals is exceedingly high in sweets of various kinds regardless of their special branding and the methods of manufacture and storage. There is very little of the body building minerals in maple syrup, cane syrup from sugar or honey. They can all defeat an otherwise efficient dietary."
heeha' heeha'….
troy
Crikey, must have been MAJOR surgery. I've been under the knife a few times and never had such a tough recovery. Wishing good luck to Aurora and good health too.
In the new free ebook, Matt says expeller pressed refined coconut oil is better than extra virgin coconut oil. Is there any reason for this? Also, is the real danger polyunsaturated fats, or the high omega 6 content? Because flax or chia seed contain 5g of PUFA, but 3.5g of that are omega 3's. Is the omega 3:6 ratio more important. Thanks in advance for any responses.
Hardly anyone sticks to the virgin CO.
It's OK in curries, or desserts, but… most folks don't want coconut-flavored french fries, coconut-flavored omelets, etc.
Expeller-pressed CO is minimally processed, but has a neutral flavor. So instead of getting people trying to "make" themselves eat enough CO like with the virgin stuff, it's easy to fry eggs, fry potatoes, make pastry and baked goods, etc. It's pretty similar to lard or tallow, just sort of neutral-flavored.
As for the o6:03 ratio, seems that there's two ways to go about fixing that, one being to massively increase o3s, but the other being to massively reduce o6s. Since lots of foods contain both, you find some people trying to increase the exact foods others are trying to increase. It gets a bit confusing.
Great answers jpatti. I also think virgin coconut oil can cause more stomach troubles.
There are probably dangers to getting too much omega 3. It's a very unstable fat. Great in reasonable quantity, but like everything, bad news in excess. A more prudent way to deal with cellular o6 to o3 imbalances is cutting omega 6.
Cobra Kai-
I've taken note of that quote no doubt.
I personally perfer extra virgen olive oil to coconut oil for cooking many different types of foods for taste reasons.
Here's a good expeller pressed coconut oil:
http://www.wildernessfamilynaturals.com/mm5/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Store_Code=WFN&Product_Code=COEP1
Were you guys talking about brands of coconut oil that are cheaper than this? It's $38 a gallon.
You should determine the effect that you would like the fake diploma to have on an observer. For example, if you want to make a fool out of others, get a doctorate degree in a field that is similar to the one in which you work.
Matt, Would you be willing to give some input and encouragement for those of us hoping/trying to GAIN weight?
I think there's plenty of encouragement around here for people looking to gain weight :)
I you want to gain weight, as in fat, eat like a sumo wrestler (these all say basically the same thing)…
http://www.diet-blog.com/05/sumo_wrestlers_this_is_how_you_get_fat.php
http://www.intermartialarts.com/article/sumo-wrestler-diet
http://www.cnngo.com/tokyo/none/secrets-sumo-wrestlers-diet-067161
http://www.stefanikaufman.com/blog/?p=28
Thanks Will. They do have the most lean mass of any humans also.
Thanks Will and Matt. No sumo wrestling here ;)
The chankonabe does sound good and healthful, and I'll include it in my HED this month!
I would think these sumo wrestlers would be ahead of their competition if they chose to put on more lean body mass rather than fat as a greater percentage of their bodyweight. They're probably crapping out most of the calories they take in. I did the math and a sumo wrestler carries 600 pounds of lean body mass, not counting all the fat he would carry, would want to consume between 13,000-18,000 calories a day at the most.
My estimates were backwards. 42% of protein is dissipated to metabolize the other 58%.
How did you figure the body would burn 85% fat, 15% muscle protein for her semi fasting state? Could it possibly be lower to the muscle protein being burned at 5-10%?
Or it looks like it's more like 34% protein, 66% fat.
Is that right?
I would like to exchange links with your site http://www.blogger.com
Is this possible?
Great post. I am considering jaw surgery as well. Do you have an after photo with Aurora fully healed?
No after photos yet. She still has braces and some swelling. I guess it can take an entire year for the swelling to completely subside. Her bite and symetry is pretty damn close to perfect though considering how it was prior to surgery.
i don’t understand how you are telling us how to lose weight if you are fat?