Lighter fare...

...and totally irrelevant blogging:

For the past six months or so, I have been perpetually exhausted.

I'm not precisely sure what was causing it.  There are a myriad number of possibilities; I drink in excess of two liters of diet soda a day, and can hit six without trying, as my thirst is legendary.  (I also sometimes drink that in coffee.  The caffeine keeps me going, either way.)  This could have been provoking an insulin response, or it could have been depleting my iodide/iodine levels.  (My blood sugar levels tend to stay at "low."  67 has been a normal figure for me for months now.) [Ed: I haven't found good studies suggesting either thing, so emphasis on the -could-.]

I also went on several zinc binges to combat colds and flus which had poor timing (middle of an important business trip, for instance).  As I learned after doing some research, this can result in a copper deficiency.  (I wasn't even aware I needed copper.)  A calorie-focused diet has further cut all the good sources of copper from my daily nutrition. So that could be it.

It could -be- the calorie focused diet, except every time I went off it (which tends to involve a certain Chinese buffet and lots of Hot and Sour soup), I felt worse.

It could have been the caffeine binges, or something else.

At any rate, made several changes, and am feeling significantly better.  First, reduced my diet cola intake to less than a liter a day.  (Still more than most people drink.)  And second, started taking a multivitamin that focuses on the major nutritional reasons for tiredness; copper, iodide, selenium, and some other stuff that I know I get enough of already, like vitamin B.  (Having too much vitamin B in your system has a positive side effect of making you unpalatable to mosquitos, incidentally.)  And finally, cut back on foods which flood my body with insulin, such as rice and noodles.


[Ed: It was almost certainly an iodine deficiency; my blood sugar levels have evened out now, which suggests thyroid, which suggests iodine.  Which anybody who knows me will agree this is crazy; I consume absurd quantities of salt (a necessity to offset the absurd quantities of fluids I ingest) the overwhelming majority of which is iodized.]