the key thing is realizing that your body stores choline, both in the liver and in cell membranes. they've done studies on people not eating for days or weeks and their choline levels stay constant because your body gets it by killing it's own cells off. humans need choline and you should try to stay on it, but not by eating a lot of meat, which is high in saturated fats and carcinogens. but you're not going to run out of it. your body will reclaim it via weight loss if it needs to.
choline can be converted to betaine, which is then used to convert homocysteine, which is dangerous to your heart, to cysteine, which is a useful amino acid. or, if you get a lot of betaine in your diet, your body can use that directly and use the choline it has for neurotransmitters and lipid transport, instead. betaine is not stored but it's not cleared, either. your body will metabolize virtually all of the betaine you give it, to no clear limit. so, it's a good idea to take a whole lot of betaine, which is mostly found in plant sources like beets, spinach, kale and wheat bran, and to not go crazy on the choline by eating piles of meat. rather, as your body stores choline, you can get a bunch of it later and not worry so much about it day-to-day, so long as you actually keep up on it.
eggs are good for you. eat eggs. i just don't want eggs in my minimal meal plan. eggs are a meal.
i also think i'm actually underestimating the amount of choline in the soy-based salad dressing i use and the soy milk i drink.
but the soy lecithin gives me what i want in a predictable form that i can add to salads and meals more broadly and is going to be added to my diet more generally, so this is my update.
========
i've updated the previous post and i'm going to repost it:
- the b and c are being cut in 4 and taken every six hours instead of all at once.
- the a is being cut in 1/2 and 1/2 is being taken at 18:00 daily. this is 2500 iu daily. this is between the rdis for women and men, and probably right for me.
- 1000 iu d at 12:00
- 100 iu e at 0:00 every second day
- the k hasn't come in but is being taken at 6:00
- i am going to take 2 tums after each full meal as a calcium supplement for now on (800 mg elemental calcium)
- i'm going to take a tbsp of flax dissolved in a glass of water daily at 15:00 for omega-3s. i should meet the rdi of them, at 1.7 g of ala, if i do that.
- i'm going to note that i drink at least 250 ml of soy and 4 mini cups of coffee a day and usually closer to twice that
- i have devised a daily minimum meal made up of:
a bowl with:
- 3 tbsp of raw, unroasted, unsalted, hulled sunflower seeds
- 3 tbsp of hulled hemp seeds
- 3 tbsp of hulled chia seeds
- 3 tbsp of wheat bran
- 3 tbsp of soy lecithin
- 30 g of all bran
- 1 tbsp of paprika
- 1 tbsp of ground cumin
- 1 tbsp of dried oregano
- 2 cloves of garlic
- 1 beet
- 1 avocado
- 50 g broccoli
- dried dill, caesar, hot sauce, nutritional yeast for flavour (yeast does have some b vitamins still)
with
- one banana
- one orange
- two pieces of untoasted quinoa-flax bread with unclear spread
- one tum
that has
- in total, 12+ g of omega-3s
- 23+ g of omega-6s
- 55+ g of mostly complete protein, which is about right on the rdi for my weight, maybe a little more. i would prefer to barely meet the rdi or just miss it for protein. excess protein is hard on your body and stored inefficiently as fat. high protein diets are stupid.
- minimal saturated fat for absorption (some in the dressing, avocado, soy lecithin)
- some carbs. whatever. carbs aren't worth measuring.
- it's all stored the same way. your body uses less energy to process carbs and more energy to process protein but it does the same thing with excess amounts of them, which is store it as fat. what i'm more interested in is the fact that flax, hemp, chia, soy, quinoa and in fact also sunflower are all complete proteins and have all 9 essential amino acids, although the sunflower seeds are low in lysine (and high in vitamin e, selenium, omega-6s). i'm not aiming for a protein salad, but this would be pretty effective if i was.
- 180%+ rdi for magnesium
- 160%+ rdi for phosphorus
- 110%+ of the rdi for potassium
- 120%+ rdi for calcium
- 210%+ of rdi for manganese
- 30+ mg of iron (elemental) (300% of a 10 mg amount but i have absorption issues and need it)
- 195%+ of rdi for copper
- 125%+ of rdi for zinc
- 125%+ rdi for selenium
- 110%+ rdi for molybdenum (not including the high amount in soy milk that isn't bioavailable)
- 175%+ of the rdi for choline (960 mg) & an additional 100% in the form of betaine (550 mg).
- some sulfur in the garlic
- some inositol and salicylic acid in the orange
- extra food-based vitamins (carotenoids, b vitamins, a little c, some d, a fair amount of e and some k)
- around 950-1000 mg of sodium. ish. which is a decent minimum meal amount.
this will be taken at 3:00 am or 9:00 am on days where i didn't eat a full meal the previous day and will be intended to ensure i'm meeting daily rdis while i continue to lose weight. this may mean i go longer between meals. but this isn't a meal, and is not intended as one. it is not high in calories but is very high in nutrients.
the bread is still pretty fortified and the flax-quinoa bread has a fair amount of ala. the soy has lost a lot of vitamins but is still worthwhile. the all bran in canada has been stripped to almost nothing, like the yeast, but it's still a good source of betaine. i'd like to get some better caesar dressing as i eat a lot of it.
not measured:
- chloride (i should get enough in the city water in windsor)
- iodine (i don't know if the sodium in the bread, hot sauce, all bran and caesar, the four sources in this mini meal, is iodized. it probably is and is probably sufficient. i'm going to email each of them. i should measure this.)
- chromium
- boron
- fluoride (windsor's water is back to being fluoridated, that should be fine)
- nickel
- carbs (who cares?)
- glucose (this should be low)
- calories (calories are irrelevant to human health)