Reversing Gene Expression back to Normal

General Discussion
#15

No problem at all- thanks for even answering. You’ve been super helpful on this forum.
So if you had to give advice on how to beat pfs, your main mantra is diet correct? I’ve seen you mention complete carnivore as well as ketosis by including some carbs as veggies- which is better? You’ve also mentioned that you were on a tonnnn of supplements while dieting- are of the opinion that they contributed and following just a diet protocol might not be very helpful?

I read an article on Jordan Peterson’s daughter and her recovery and it seems…dubious to say the least. Especially when she mentioned having pepper on her steak brought her symptoms back, as well as the fast that while she can’t tolerate anything besides beef, salt, and water, she can also somehow drink alcohol.
I am really starting to buy into the whole diet fad especially since I’ve been diagnosed with a ton of random food allergies after my pfs started, but this sort of thing makes me confused.

If you could boil down your advice on what we should do, along with a tenuous timetable for expected recovery, what would it look like?

#16

Diet is the main thing, by far. Most supplements I take are vitamins and minerals. I did cut a lot, I should revise that section on my regimen.

Carnivore + ketogenic is the diet I’m doing. That’s carnivore but with an accent on animal fat and no more than maybe 300gr of lean meat. I’m not cutting calories, but after a year or so, I started eating only once a day. A big meal… I’ve been on it for 3+ years so I can now have regular healthy food sometimes and it won’t make a difference. But to begin with, with all the allergies I had, it was carnivore with lots of fat.

Time wise, it took most energy, digestion and neurological symptoms away in the first few weeks. It takes 3-6 months to be fully fat adapted. Sexual symptoms started getting better starting at 9 months and at 2 1/2 years everything was gone except insomnia.

I don’t know your symptoms, and I don’t know what kind of improvement you can expect. Most people who do this diet see at least some improvements. Some, like me, said this diet is what made the most changes in their life.

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#17

That’s been my experience too Holyhead - that being new symptoms added to the old ones. It feels like a losing battle. My vision and joints are the latest casualties.

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#18

My posts are specifically related to gene expression. That’s what epigenetic is. Our DNA did not change, our epigenome did. If it was DNA, it would be pretty much game over but there are things that can be done to fix the epigenome.

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#19

Hi @Ozeph I hope you can offer me views or suggestions as i set out my situation,

Due to worsening pfs and desperation I tried a few things which have often been deemed as quite safe for sufferers. I tried wellbutrin and cailis separately and in small amounts. Both caused an immediate increase in penis weight and awareness of muscles and a partial return in strength negatively my urine became even darker with aggression extreme anxiety and further heightened suicidal ideation so I stopped I ended up on the crisis line and it took close to a full week to return to my shitty baseline. Last May I reluctantly tried T gel on the back of advice from my endo that also caused these symptoms to a greater degree these symptoms were preceded by a wonderful lift in mood and interest in women. In August after my 2nd covid vacc I had a return of strength, lift in mood it lasted a week then dropped off it wasn’t followed by a mini crash or anything negative. I also tried devils claw ‘a natural anti inflamm’. and experienced an upturn for a dew days which was followed by a mini crash. I’m intolernt to most foods and react to a lot of the foods you’ve suggested. Even ghea nails me. I seem to be better with carbs particularly potatoes . I fast one day per week. My urine becomes very dark after eating t gel brought on the permanent worsening of even darker urine. Despite waiting things out for years I simply got worse which is why i tried some stuff “less risky” I’m continuing to lose strength, tissue from everywhere and my organis seem to be losing more functionality with time My skeleton is in global pain I have muscle pain my limbs are painfully thin. I can go 5 days without passing a stool my sight is getting worse and my autonomic system is misfiring. When I’ve had improvements my toilet habits also get back to normal. I was also utilising alcohol 'white wine or gin" as these brought improvements when I started drinking again. A few glasses once per week but these effects have also ebbed with time. I had a couple last night after having a few hellish days. My emotional state has also worsened with time though I’m not in the extremes as often due to cutting out most of the triggers. My intellect, thought processes have also deteriorated. Suicide and anhedonia follow me everywhere. I think my longterm and repeated use of fin is what’s made my pfs resistant and progressive. Your improvements and knowledge of the epigenetics and science wjth natural approaches are what brings me to you for some advice. Some of us simply can’t wait for a treatment which I’m confident will land one day. But each day is like an eternity with the devil himself. I continue to do everything I can but neurosteroids seem to be slowly dropping in numbers ttoo. Thanks for your time Lazarus

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#20

Hi @LazarusRy

I really feel for you. I know how it is to have bad days, wishing it was time to sleep, only to have a horrible night without sleep and then another miserable day. I can’t imagine being years like that. You’re displaying lots of resilience. It’s all to your honor ! I send you by best thoughts.

According to what I read, cyanobacteria, one of the first life form on this planet, developed sirtuin proteins to repair their epigenome when facing survival conditions. those sirtuin proteins were not generated in situation of abundance, reproduction was preferred in those cases.
Most current life forms are descendants of those cyanobacteria and retained this ability to generate sirtuin proteins in situations of survival. I understand the you would rightly consider yourself in a situation of survival, but for human cells, the signals are more primitive: extreme cold, extreme heat, lack of food, lack of carbs, getting out of breath etc…I made a whole list under Tricks to repair the Epigenome

With modern life, with constant influx of carbs, comfortable temperature, enough food, no predators to run out of breath from, our body consider itself in abundance and is reproducing cells and for lots of people it accumulates fat as well.

I stumbled by luck and later understood that a carnivore / ketogenic diet, IMHO was making conditions favorable for the tricks listed above to trigger the production of sirtuin proteins, some of which are responsible of repairing the epigenome. That is, repairing damaged gene expression.

I’m currently experimenting with some phyto-androgen from herbs and I notice that if I overshoot, I get too much androgen and I have anxiety, brain fog etc… I think that’s what’s happening when you use T gel and other chemicals. You are in a fragile state. If it was me, I would avoid chemicals and androgen for the moment.

As you know, I’m not an expert nor a medical practitioner. Under the advise of Axolotl, I started studying the epigenome and came to the conclusion that the body needs to be made ready, in the most natural way possible, to sustain some acute but temporary stress that would trigger the production of sirtuin proteins (maybe I’m wrong. I’m showing improvements but I cannot know for sure it’s due to what I’m doing)

I’m not saying it will work for you, nor am I suggesting you try this. But I’ll tell you what i did as additional ideas of what people have tried.
If you read the articles in the thread above, you’ll see that being in a state of ketosis (aka on a ketogenic diet) produces a lot of BetaHydroButyrate (BHB) which are used as fuel and uses 4 times less Nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide (NAD+) which are used by the cells to burn either glucose or BHB as a source of energy (we can also burn aceto acetate at a zero NAD+ cost). NAD+ are made from the amino acid L-Tryptophan and nicotinamide (Vitamin B3).
Burning ketone bodies uses 5 times less NAD+ than burning carbs, which leaves an excess of NAD+ which, as I understand it, act in synergy with BHB and sirtuin proteins to repair the epigenome if the proper triggers are present to signal the body it’s time to repair, not reproduce.

So I went on a strict carnivore diet at first, eating only fat cuts of beef with butter and salt. (also water of course, but nothing else). The first week is hard so I had to cheat with a few grams of carbs here and there just to make sure I wouldn’t give up. On the second week, my digestion started working again, and I could align thoughts and sentences properly, all of which was pretty disabled before the diet. I later made efforts to trigger repairs with the aforementioned tricks.

That’s how I started to regain strength, being able to climb stairs or drive my car. I did other things, but that’s the main component. I now eat some plant, have most of my fat intake from palm oil and eat only one time a day. If you show interest in the idea, I can detail more. But please read all the post I linked above. It has lots of info and references.

I think there is reasons for hope, but we have to go deep, back to the primitive repair mechanisms from when we were cyanobacteria.

I wish you the best and will send you positive thoughts for recovery in the following days.

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#21

Thanks for getting back to me so quickly and for the detailed response @Ozeph I’ll read through/study what you’ve provided and will come back to you.

Regards
LAZ

#22

I’ll PM you going forward if that’s OK @Ozeph

#23

I sent u a PM @Ozeph

#24

Have you tried NAD+ supplements? Read a thread where someone supposedly recovered on them within days

#25

that guy got worse from NAD+ supplements just recently

#26

Yes, I’m taking NMN everyday and saw improvements in dry lips and burning eyes which are now gone or very little.
@lakehouse Yes, I read that post. It’s not for everyone. I read of a recovery with Tribulus Terretris and another one of a guy who got much worst on it.

#28

I have an update in my situation.

I used to take pine pollen (mildest) tribulus Terrestris (medium) and Horny Goat Weed (strongest). For 1 1/2 year, it didn’t seem to have too much effects but did increase my sex drive. then, I started regaining my body odors which I had lost at the crash. The odors started with Horny Goat Weed only. Then became stronger and started appearing with Tribulus as well.They grew stronger until I had mild odors with Pine pollen as well. And it went like that for a year.

At some point, I found out that those herbs were making me sleep bad. I stopped them and the body odors stopped as well.

Lately, I started again to take some sex herbs, with the idea to increase androgen to force the AR to become less sensitive. I took Tribulus Terrestris, Horny Goat Weed and Tonga Ali (longjack). The first one have been of medium strength, while the latter two were significantly stronger in their androgen effects.
Tribulus immediately brought the body odors back, to a quite high level. However, Horny Goat gave me zero body odors but made me sleep bad. I stopped and the next 2 days, I had body odors which then disappeared. Some of you may know that too much androgen have the same effects as too little so i figured that when I took horny goat, it was too much (no body odors) and when I stopped some was still left in my body so I had body odors. I stayed without sex herbs for 4 days and then I took 1 pill of Tonga Ali. It must be stronger than Horny Goat because it gave me anxiety and also didn’t have body odors. I stopped at once and again, had body odors the next day. I though it would stop, as it did for Horny Goat, but it’s now been 8 days without sex herbs and I still have body odors.

It’s the first time in 3 years and 3 months that I have body odors without any androgen herbs. Either I can produce them on my own, or the herb is still in my system after 8 days, which would surprise me, it’s a water soluble extract and anything water soluble has a shorter stay on our body.
Another effect, I have started having those annoying multiple hour long morning erection accompanied with high glutamate which prevents me from sleeping. after 2-3 hours, the erection stops and I can sleep again, but it means I have to stay in bed 9-10 hours to have 6-8 hours of sleep. It’s unbalancing my daily life.

Still, I believe the long morning erections and the body odors means I may have a persistent increase in androgen and my still hypersensitive AR are reacting with the usual poly-glutamic toxicity which result in elevated glutamate.

Considering I never had body odors without sex herbs, I consider this a progress. Now I have to push harder on the epigenetic repairing trick so that my body realizes that my AR are over-expressed and take action to reduce AR expression. What I read brought me to believe this can be done by producing sirtuin proteins that would then adjust the epigenome (aka gene expression)

I also started to do crouches with increasing weights on my shoulder, which not only gets me out of breath (an epigenetic repair trick) but makes more muscles in the legs, the largest muscles in our body. Creating more muscle create more AR receptors.

So I had those two events happening simultaneously, while experimenting carefully with sex herbs. My own analysis is that if androgen are raised above my comfort zone considering my current level of AR over-expression, it will increase pfs symptoms slightly but with proper diet and tricks, also trigger decreasing expression of AR.

I’m doing this very carefully and the only pfs symptom I got from it is increased insomnia and mild brain fog during the day. I will go on without sex herbs until things get back to normal and then try sex herbs again. I believe this way, little by little, I may be able to reduce AR expression. As you can see, I’m not taking rash actions and I’m very prudent in my approach. However, I don’t consider my slightly increased pfs symptoms as a negative. If I can manage to keep having body odors without herbs, that will be a first and also a proof that after 3 years and 3 months, I’m still making progress.

I just wanted to share the experiment. I think it’s interesting to observe what seems to be increased natural androgen without external source (2-3 hour long erections and body odors) linked to increased pfs symptoms (increased insomnia and brain fog).

I’ll keep you posted. I’ll be very careful and go on experimenting on this path. What if, among all the things that make us feel worst, some things that make us feel worst makes us better on the long run ? Most would have missed it, I know I would, because I ruled out everything that made me worst from the beginning.

Anyway. That won’t be my last post on this topic of reversing gene expression to normal.

P.S.: Take this with a grain of salt and don’t try it. Let me do the experiment. There’s no need having more than one person taking risks.

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#29

Hahaha all in this forum is bad. NAD, vitamin including water

#30

make sure to document your experiences here to add on to 10+ years of people trying and failing on various protocols

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#31

I understand your skepticism. @lacpaz skepticism too (or was it sarcasm ? In that case I agree with you. This forum is rather negative). I won’t hold it against you, this disease makes people like that.

I will document my experiment. It can only be positive. If it’s a protocol that doesn’t work, then it can be ruled out and that’s good. And if something works, it can be added to the things that did work. Plenty of people got rid of this disease. many of them we don’t hear about because people have to be strong to share positive results to people who might just critisize. Many of the success stories starts with “I’ll only post here once and then I’ll be gone,” mentioning somewhere in the text that they can’t read all the negativity. I have a friend getting better and I had to convince him to post. He wants to stay as far away from this forum as possible so I don’t know if he will. Many people with pfs also want to stay positive and stay away from this forum.
As a result, you guys have more representation among the pessimists than the optimists and it creates an echo chamber.

But I won’t give up and I will not take your comments personal. We are all human beings and we all should get information on what made others better, even if there’s no assurance it will work for us.

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#32

So the body odors are staying, without androgen herbs, and my sleep is improving. If I can manage the same relatively good sleep as 3 weeks ago and keep the body odors, I will have crossed a major step. Body odors are kinda all or nothing. First time since I crash 3y+ ago that I can get them naturally ! Hurrah ! I’m really happy !

Insomnia is my last symptom. I said that many times. Looks like I forgot body odors without androgen herbs ! Probably because I never stopped the androgen herbs for 2 years and so I had body odors. It took me to stop to notice they were conditional to the herbs… But now they’re not ! Or anyway that’s what I hope. I didn’t take any herbs for a week and still have strong odors.

I will keep posting as it goes.

I will you all the best and I wish you guys can keep hope !

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#33

Hello @Ozeph.

I am following your story on here because you’re one that is not afraid to experiment.

I am wondering if you ever tried Forskolin? Just asking because I see you still suffer from sleep issues and I believe it was Forskolin that fixed this issue for me. I’m also 99% sure it fixed my dry eyes issue but it seems you already got rid of yours.

What’s interesting is also that even though I stopped using it, I still keep both my sleep and my eye improvements.

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#34

I never tried but that’s interesting. It promotes cAMP which is a second messenger between hypothalamus/pituitary axis. I know This region is under a lot of stress with pfs and that’s where the GABA receptors are (for good sleep and not having anxiety)

Do you have anxiety ?

I’ll put that on my list, but will not do two experiments at the same time.

Thank you !

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#35

Hey guys I just made this account to post about something that happened to me.
I took 1 pill of saw palmetto in early 2019 as well as a cocktail of 5ar inhibiting foods for months and since then I felt it changed me, I no longer would had as bad hair loss but had anxiety and could not tolerate any kind of 5ar inhibitor (used to drink black tea then couldn’t bare it).

Importantly I have been using all kinds of muscle building supplements and recently tried Turkesterone which AFAIK binds mainly to estrogen receptors. Anyway I took 1 tab and immidietly felt very strong and itchy and oily on the scalp which is how I used to feel and had a bad headache (supossedly can lower GAD enzyme activity and GABA), then I thought ok wont touch that again, but for two days since I have still had a “baldy” feeling on my scalp and feel strong stoic and high dht, like how I used to in 2018. So its possible Turkesterone kick started my 5ar in my body or brain again, I’ve been brainstorming ideas based on what I know about 5ar androgens and estrogens.

Took 1 tukesterone pill, 2 days later still feeling high dht, and also feeling way calmer which could indicate increased progesterone metabolites, if my brain 5ar has been activated or upregulated.

Will keep you guys up to date. Had to make this account because If I found something that could work for you guys I have to share, even though my problems were at most a 5/10 I know some of you are way worse.

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