So, life with atrial fibrillation is not as scary as was the prospect of life with “congestive heart failure.” But it has had an impact. I’m more paranoid about getting out of breath, and the heart racing. I’ve only worked out a couple of times since I got the clearance to do so. My eating is better, and I’m researching the heck out of nutritional options, but in practice it’s not yet much better. The hardest thing is having that voice in your head saying “is it safe?” that may be doing more harm than good.
After more than a month of tests, drugs, and follow ups, I went to the hospital for an electro-cardioversion (“Clear!” *zap*). It worked…for forty seconds or so. Then back to irregular beats. It may have had some effect; my average heart rate seems lower, and the variance is, more often than not, narrower. But I can definitely feel, or think I feel, those moments when the ticker is less than optimal. it is intimidating.
I’ve learned that a-fib is increasingly common among people my age and older, and “nobody ever dies from a-fib.” It’s a warning sign, but treatable. One of the treatments: lose some damn weight. The more the better.
We’re leaning toward going with something along the LCHFMP lines (low carb, high fat, moderate protein). Vinnie Tortorich pushes a variation called NSNG (no sugar, no grains). Abel James pushes a variation called the Wild Diet (a form of paleo that’s also low carb and low/no sugar, but pushing hard on the quality of everything – grass fed, organic, non-GMO, etc. – low on simple carbs, but plenty of healthy veggies.) Abel’s podcast tends to be fairly upbeat, but his book’s first chapter is a bleak, lengthy diatribe against Big Food’s various ingredients of evil. I’ve also been subscribing to Nutrition to the Edge by Karl Pilz, who advocates extremely high-fat, moderate protein, nearly no carb for a regular state of ketosis. Vinnie notes that ketosis doesn’t automatically equal weight/fat loss, and fat loss doesn’t require ketosis.
Bottom line is that a lot of what we’ve been reading and listening to comports with our own experiences when we’ve lost successfully: when we’re not giving in to sugar and simple carb cravings, we tend to do pretty well.
I’m about to hit another birthday. I’m still in my early fifties, but I’m not getting any younger. But you wouldn’t necessarily know it by viewing my food choices. Those need to grow up. I also read/hear that for the “hunter type” (ADHD) the lower consumption of simple carbs and sugars should help a lot with concentration and focus.