Reversing a fatty liver while on medications that makes you fat?

[BuddhaBar]

So today I found out I have mild fatty liver. My liver is not enlarged or anything so it's not a severe case and the doctor said it's reversible with some lifestyle changes.
The problem is that a year ago I hit the wall due to stress. I got diagnosed with burnout syndrome and was prescribed Mirtazapine for my sleeping issues. I've been on it before for depression, but in much higher doses. The medicine has been a life saver. On the other hand Mirtazapine is quite known for making you eat more and therefore making you fat. I'm not obese, but I'm overweight. My BMI is 29 so a little more weight gain and I will be obese. I've been overweight before, but lost weight after celiac diagnosis and because I ate healthier, but Mirtazapine made me gain even more and now I'm at my fattest ever.
Mirtazapine also changes your metabolism so even if you are strict, you will still gain some weight. 

I still need my pills. I've used them for a year and I'm only taking 7.5mg per day. That's half the lowest dose and that's all you need for the sleeping effect. Everything above that is antidepressant. I have a gym membership that I've used quite a lot, but all the gyms are closed now and the weather is really cold, snowy and just bad. The streets are icy, you can barely walk. Running is impossible and I don't know how to ski. I'm not making up excuses. I really enjoyed going to the gym and becoming more active, but the current situation just makes it really difficult.

One positive thing is that my heart, arteries, blood pressure and all that is flawless. It's just the liver that needs some attention. I rarely drink alcohol. Maybe once or twice a year. 

Has anyone else here had a case of fatty liver and reversed it and how? What did you eat and what did you not eat?
 

[Scott Adams]

From the studies we've summarized, if your liver issue is caused by celiac disease and is due to eating gluten, then much of it could be reversible after a long-term gluten-free diet. How long have you been gluten-free? Are you sure your diet is 100% gluten-free? I know that others on this board have corrected liver issues after being gluten-free for a time.

Here are our site's articles on this topic:

https://www.celiac.com/celiac-disease/celiac-disease-amp-related-diseases-and-disorders/liver-disease-and-celiac-disease/

And here are some specific articles of interest:

 

 

[BuddhaBar]

I was a celiac long before I got my diagnosis. Previous ultrasounds (before going gluten free) showed no signs of a fatty liver. I'm pretty sure this is lifestyle related and I'm not even surprised. Suffering from Burnout syndrome my energy levels were drained for many months. Didn't move around very much. Ate a lot of crappy foods, gained weight due to medications and overeating. We're talking 30 lbs in a year here so it's a lot. Even if I've been overweight for many years I've always been active. Dancing, walking, weight lifting, whatever and I guess that's why my arteries and all that is flawless (sumo wrestlers have a flawless health because of all the workout 😀) But during the last year I've spent most of my time sitting or laying down recovering from Burnout. Pretty sure I'm gluten free because I always get nerve symptoms when glutened and I haven't had those symptoms in over a year since the last glutening. 

I'll try a low fat, low sugar diet for a while. Cutting down on the gluten free stuff too and try to eat only naturally gluten free foods. Lots of fruit. We'll see what I can accomplish with the exercise. I'll have to be creative. Running up and down the stairs maybe? Waiting for the blood work results. As long as my liver is not enlarged or inflamed I'm positive I can turn this around. 

[charks]

I had a fatty liver when I got diagnosed with celiac and diabetes type 2. I decided to give intermittent fasting a go and corrected it within 2 months. I found the idea of intermittent fasting a bit daunting but it was really easy. Basically the idea is to have a period of time during the day when you don't eat anything and just drink water. The rest of the time you can eat normally. Which is really nice, it's like a reward for being good. I started off with a 12 hour period. It sounds a long time but sleep periods count. So if you stop eating at 8 pm you can't eat anything until 8 in the morning. But for 8 hours you should be asleep so it's not as bad as it sounds. I gradually extended the non eating period to 16 hours. Which means I can't eat until midday. At first it was tough because if I don't eat I get bad hunger pains but after a couple of weeks it got better and now it is a way of life. 

And, as an added bonus, my blood sugar level level went from 14 down to 6 in six months and I take no medication.  So for me it's a win win situation. 

  

   

[BuddhaBar]

Thanks charks for your reply. I did some intermittent fasting, but as I'm trying to get more physically active I felt my body needed some energy.
It's been 2 weeks now and I've replaced most of my foods with alternatives. I found some gluten free crispbread mostly made from various seeds and nuts. No rice flour or anything like that. Found some cornflakes too that's made from pure corn. Nothing else added than just a little sugar and salt. Both are from small Scandinavian brands so I don't think they're for sale in other countries. 
Only low or non-fat dairy with no added sugar. No meat, just fish. No rice or gluten free pasta. Only potatoes. 3 meals a day, a normal amount of food and I'm only eating sweets and unhealthy fats on Saturdays. 
Lost 4.8 lbs without being hungry! I'm planning on losing 20 lbs which is 10% of my original body weight and I will do another ultrasound of the liver in May. 

I got the results from my blood work last week too. Thankfully my liver panel was fine, my cholesterol is normal and so is all my vitamins and all that. I can do this 😃

[charks]

4.8 lb in two weeks!! That's great. It sounds like you've worked out what works for you. 

I have an addictive personality. If food's in front of me I will eat it. If I open a jumbo packet of crisps I will eat the lot without even realizing it, it's like I'm on auto. My brother is the same. He's putting on weight and blames his wife for buying the treats he's eating. His wife has the will power to ration herself.

I think in order to lose weight you have to be completely honest with yourself about your failings. I have acknowledged that I have no self control once I start eating and that is why the intermittent fasting works for me. As long as I have the will power to fast for 16 hours. Once my fasting period is over I can pretty much eat what I want as long it's gluten free. It doesn't matter if I eat a whole packet of biscuits because it's in my eating window.

  

[BuddhaBar]

I was surprised how much I actually lost just from changing my diet and generally becoming more active. I'm not exercising in a traditional way at the moment because like I said in my first post it's difficult right now. I'm just more active. Cleaning my apartment more often, doing the more physical tasks at work, walking 1/3 of the distant to work before I take the bus and taking the stairs instead of the elevator up to my apartment. From what I understand, the more overweight you are the easier you lose weight because it takes more energy to maintain a bigger body than a smaller one so I guess my weightloss will slow down soon, but my goal is just losing 10% so I guess it won't be that hard. I will be less strict when I reach my goal, but I will definitely stick to only eating junk on Saturdays. It does taste so much better if you eat it less often.

Yup, I have that addictive personality too. Heavy nicotine user. Smokeless tobacco (it's common here) so it's not so damaging. Diet coke, chocolate. Staying away from alcohol because I fear I will get addicted to that too. Father was an alcoholic. My doctor subscribed benzos when I had my Burnout because I had panic attacks, but I never took them because of the same fear. I didn't want any traditional sleeping pills either. I wanted Mirtazapine because you don't get addicted to them and you don't develop any increased tolerance. So yeah, that's me too. The problem with food addiction though is that you have to eat to survive. You can't stay away from food. An alcoholic can't get sober if he have to drink 3 beers a day. 

[charks]

I used to drink a lot before giving up gluten. Wine. I never got drunk. I think my body saw it as a way to get food without being glutened. I hardly drink now. Just a glass of wine before my main meal in the evening. I had the same thing going on with salt. I would carry a bag of rock salt crystals ( for some reason I don't like table salt ) and eat it like sweets. My partner always nagged me to give it up saying it was killing me. But my blood pressure has always been perfect and my sodium levels good. Maybe the old saying ' listen to your body, it knows what it wants' is true.  

[charks]

And 

5 hours ago, charks said:

I used to drink a lot before giving up gluten. Wine. I never got drunk. I think my body saw it as a way to get food without being glutened. I hardly drink now. Just a glass of wine before my main meal in the evening. I had the same thing going on with salt. I would carry a bag of rock salt crystals ( for some reason I don't like table salt ) and eat it like sweets. My partner always nagged me to give it up saying it was killing me. But my blood pressure has always been perfect and my sodium levels good. Maybe the old saying ' listen to your body, it knows what it wants' is true.  

And my grandfather was an alcoholic as well. My father never drank because he had such bad memories of his dad lying drunk in the road. He was so ashamed of him. My grandmother divorced him. At the time ( 1930 ) it was quite scandalous. There were only 1.7 divorces per 1000 marriages. I was always proud of the fact that she wouldn't bow to social pressures.   

[BuddhaBar]

Update:

It's been a while now and as I suspected my weight loss would slow down, but I didn't expect it would slow down so soon. I've lost a total of 11 lbs, my BMI is now 28. I want to get it down to 27.5 which means I have to lose an additional 7 lbs, but the scale won't move. There's been some cheat days, but I can count them on one hand and it's not like I've binged. Some sugary stuff is actually too sweet for me now because I'm not so used to eating sugar anymore. Found a new sugar free chocolate bar with no traces of gluten and that was a hallelujah moment, but overconsuming it causes stomach cramps and D from the artificial sweeteners so I'm not really eating too much of those either. 
I guess I'm stuck at this weight at least for the moment. It's really frustrating when you're so close to your goal weight. There are morbidly obese people losing 60 lbs in a year without surgery and I'm stuck after losing 11 🤣

[knitty kitty]

I corrected my NAFLD by taking high dose thiamine.

I corrected my Type Two Diabetes by taking high dose thiamine (benfotiamine).

My insomnia went away with high dose thiamine. 

My panic attacks went away with high dose thiamine.  

High dose Thiamine is safe and nontoxic.

"High-dose vitamin B1 therapy prevents the development of experimental fatty liver driven by overnutrition"

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33608323/

Full article here....

https://dmm.biologists.org/content/14/3/dmm048355

And...

"The potential role of thiamine (vitamin B1) in diabetic complications"

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/18220605/

And...

https://ods.od.nih.gov/factsheets/Thiamin-HealthProfessional/

And....

"Neurological, Psychiatric, and Biochemical Aspects of Thiamine Deficiency in Children and Adults"

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6459027/

😺

[BuddhaBar]

@knitty kitty
I did actually supplement with Thiamine (and Magnesium) while having Burnout, but it didn't help with the insomnia and panic attacks. Insomnia and panic attacks while being burnout is due to the adrenaline and cortisol going bananas. Lifestyle changes, changing your mindset and a lot of time is the only thing that helps in the long run because your hormonal system is so malfuctioning it might take years to correct. Ever gotten palpitations, sweating and shortness of breath after the dentist injected anesthetic with adrenaline? I woke up with an adrenaline rush like that every night 😐
But, I do have a couple of boxes left so I'm willing to supplement again if it might help the liver. 😃

[knitty kitty]

7 hours ago, BuddhaBar said:

@knitty kitty
I did actually supplement with Thiamine (and Magnesium) while having Burnout, but it didn't help with the insomnia and panic attacks. Insomnia and panic attacks while being burnout is due to the adrenaline and cortisol going bananas. Lifestyle changes, changing your mindset and a lot of time is the only thing that helps in the long run because your hormonal system is so malfuctioning it might take years to correct. Ever gotten palpitations, sweating and shortness of breath after the dentist injected anesthetic with adrenaline? I woke up with an adrenaline rush like that every night 😐
But, I do have a couple of boxes left so I'm willing to supplement again if it might help the liver. 😃

Yes, I've had reactions to dental anesthesia.  Thiamine regulates the adrenal glands and the fight or flight reaction.  

How much thiamine were you taking previously?  What type of thiamine did you take? Was it in high enough doses as the research suggests? 

[BuddhaBar]

The box says "Thiamine NAF". Don't know what NAF means. It's 3mg and I took the highest recommended dose according to the box which is 4 x 3mg/day. 

[knitty kitty]

7 hours ago, BuddhaBar said:

The box says "Thiamine NAF". Don't know what NAF means. It's 3mg and I took the highest recommended dose according to the box which is 4 x 3mg/day. 

 

High dose Thiamine is a minimum of 300mg or more a day.  

I took 100mg thiamine HCl at each meal.  Some people take more than a gram a day. 

I also tried Allithiamine and Benfotiamine.  Allithiamine is fat based so it easily crosses the blood brain barrier.  Very helpful in dispersing that brain fog.  Benfotiamine is helpful with diabetes, improving glucose levels, and neuropathy.  

You can have insufficient thiamine before it shows up in blood tests.  When there's not enough thiamine, the transporters that let thiamine into the cells quit working, so you have to saturate the system with high doses so thiamine can get into the cells passively. 

It worked for me. I lost weight, got off medications for type two diabetes and high blood pressure.  I took a B Complex because all the B vitamins work together and magnesium.  The B vitamins are absorbed in the small intestine where damage from Celiac occurs.  Supplementing helped me while I was healing.  

 

[BuddhaBar]

Found some capsules with 100mg. I can try those and see if it makes a difference. With the tablets I have I would have to take 100 a day 🤣

[Scott Adams]

I think you mean 3 per day, and not 100...3x 100mg = 300mg, right?

[BuddhaBar]

2 hours ago, Scott Adams said:

I think you mean 3 per day, and not 100...3x 100mg = 300mg, right?

The pills I've got at home are only 3mg. I would have to take 100 of those to get 300mg. I will buy capsules with 100mg instead

[BuddhaBar]

I'm about to give up this liver project. The scale still won't move. I will continue to eat healthier and hopefully the gyms will open soon, but chasing numbers on the scale, that part is over.