When I first switched from a conventional “healthy diet” to a paleo diet, pretty much every aspect of my health improved dramatically.
I very rapidly saw improvements in body composition, athletic performance, energy levels, digestion and my resistance to illness.
One strange thing did happen however, in that I started to find that when it got cold, my fingers, and sometimes even my toes would get extremely cold and turn completely white.
At first I thought it might be to do with the fact that I now had lower body fat, and less insulation, or perhaps just that I was spending more time out in the cold and my body was adapting accordingly! The issue was fairly irritating, but at the time I never really looking into it too deeply, and dealt with the problem by ensuring I wrapped up warm and wore gloves.
Over the years, however, I have tinkered with my diet considerably, moving from a strict, low-carb, dairy free paleo diet, to a higher carb paleo + raw dairy diet, with plenty of fermented foods and the inclusion of some “properly prepared grains” a few days per week.
Initially, I hadn’t really noticed any real change physically from these dietary changes aside from some further improvement in my digestion (the standard Western diet had really taken its toll on my guts, with IBS being the main motivator that led me to the paleo diet in the first place).
The main reasons for changing the diet were to increase food choices – I’ve always loved dairy and starch carbs, so wanted to experiment with reintroducing them, as all the evidence seemed to point to the fact that there was no real need to exclude them.
It wasn’t until this Winter that I discovered two things –
1) Dead Finger Syndrome (or Raynaud’s as I came to find it is properly know) seems to be quite common among paleo dieters, with two of my friends suffering from it and numerous reports on the internet.
2) My Raynaud’s had completely cleared up.
This prompted me to do a little research (typical that when a condition is affecting me, I only get around to reading up on it after it has passed!), which led me to discover that Raynaud’s could have a number of dietary causes, all of which could still be encountered by someone following a strict paleo diet.
It just so happened that I had already made all of these dietary changes (+ one lifestyle change) for altogether different reasons over the previous year.
Of course this is all just N=1 experimentation, and it could be pure coincidence. Perhaps my dead finger would have just gone away anyhow, but if you are suffering from this highly irritating condition, I’d urge you to give these changes a go and would be very interested to hear the results. As I say, I’d actually made all these changes already for altogether different reasons, so even if this doesn’t bring your chilly fingers back to life, you may well find benefit elsewhere!
1) Add safe starches
It’s possible that going too low carb can be a contributing factor to cold hands/feet.
I’ve not experienced the “dead man’s finger” since I added in more sweet potatoes, white potatoes, rice and even the occasional bowl of “properly prepared porridge” and sourdough 100% rye bread.
Here are a couple of other testimonials: http://perfecthealthdiet.com/?p=2921
2) Add iodine rich foods
A few sources link iodine deficiency causing a drop in thyroid function leading to cold hands and feet.
I’d also recently started making a concerted effort to make sure I get iodine rich foods, as this can easily be missed on a paleo diet, particularly if you’re eating a lot of raw spinach which can deplete iodine (most people on a standard processed diet get loads of iodine from iodine enriched salt). Perhaps this could have been another factor?
http://www.iodine4health.com/special/weston_price.htm
(Hence Sushi solution – Good combo of seaweed, seafood and safe starches!)
3) Gut health/Gut Brain Axis/Auto-Immunity
I’m sure that http://chriskresser.com/ Has talked about this on his podcast at some point – It seems there can be an auto-immune component to Reynaud’s, therefore restoring gut health very important.
In short, fermented vegetables and raw dairy, bone broths and avoiding wheat and excessive sugar. I’ve been on the case with the fermented foods massively over the past year in an attempt to fully heal my gut, so again, perhaps this was also a contributing factor?
4) Stop over training/reduce stress
Another possible cause is stress/over training.
I’ve been doing a much lower volume of high intensity metabolic workouts, sleeping better and longer, and generally had a lot less to worry about since the closure of gym, so perhaps this could also be another factor? http://180degreehealth.com/2011/11/cold-hands-and-feet
So all in all, I’ve made 4 major changes to my diet and lifestyle – Increased carb intake in the form of safe starches, increased iodine intake through eating more seafood and seaweed/avoiding raw spinach, added more live fermented foods to my diet, and reduced my training volume and stress levels.
Of course, it could just be complete coincidence, but I’d say they are all definitely worth a try particularly as I’d actually made all 4 changes for completely different reasons (all can have multiple benefits), and the disappearance of my randomly dead fingers was simply a happy potential by product!
Hope you all have a great Christmas and New Year, with warm and toasty toes and fingers throughout!
The stress hormones are the cause of this, causing the sympathetic nervous system to be overactive and the blood to rush from the extremities (tip of the nose, fingers, and toes) towards the vital organs. And it’s not just stress, lack of sleep, or overtraining that causes this. Carbohydrate restriction, fat restriction, calorie restriction – this can cause it as well.
Interestingly, a higher production of catecholamines is precisely what causes the positive changes in mood, digestion, body composition, and energy levels that people experience when switching to a low-carb or even moderate carb “Paleo” diet. But this “catecholamine honeymoon” as I call it, is short lived before several health problems emerge – usually at the 6 month mark if not sooner. Read my post entitled Catecholamine Honeymoon.
Interesting post. I’ve long been a fan of cyclical dieting, be it carb cycling, re/over feeding or IF, for a number of different reasons – Maintaining Insulin Sensitivity, managing leptin levels, and maintaining lean mass and metabolism, plus of course the psychological benefits of having less restrictive days. Your post adds yet another benefit to this list!
What I have also found however, that each cyclical approach on its own has its limitations – I now tend to use a “cyclical cyclical” approach, using a combination of variations of all three to best effect.
Hi,
I no longer suffer with Raynaud’s since I started doing the Perfect Health Diet and taking their recommended supplements, which includes Iodine, and eating more fat, fermented foods and safe starches such as sweet potatoes and more Omega 3 fats (so my Omega 3/Omega 6 ratio is much better). Before, I’d suffer just going to the grocery store and briefly handling the cold foods when I was doing low carb and low fat.
Thanks for your post! Merry Christmas and warm wishes of toasty toes & fingers to you too!
I know this if off topic but I’m looking into starting my own blog and was wondering what all is required to get setup? I’m assuming having a blog like yours would cost a pretty penny?
I’m not very internet smart so I’m not 100% sure.
Any tips or advice would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks
No, this is a wordpress blog just like the one you’ve just created.
Checkout this book for an easy guide on how to master wordpress: http://amzn.to/16OWFdr
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Raynaud’s is no fun! I searched for answer for 15 years and included paleo eating in that time. For women, paleo can complicate things rather than resolve them. I urge anyone who wants a dietary solution to Raynaud’s to investigate Ray Peat:
http://www.functionalps.com/blog/2011/09/12/master-list-ray-peat-phd-interviews/
My Raynaud’s has resolved! Don’t give up looking for answers for yourself.
Glad to hear that you resolved your Raynauds.
I’d extend “For women, paleo can complicate things” to “For all humans, pseudoscientific ‘diets’ can complicate things”.
Be wary of lone diet gurus who have “the answer”. Of course keep searching, but do so with a skeptical eye. 🙂
Very glad you “resolved ” Raynauds. It seems others have done so, too, only to find later, not so much!
I’m trying very hard as new Raynauds victim to get this “resolved”
I am on iodine supplements for a while, after finding out that as vegan, I should be very concerned with getting enough! It was there in Dr Greger’s web site, but I did not notice that, and it was not highlighted generally. Over and over he spoke of the few supplements vegans should take, but in those general discussions, sadly, iodine was omitted. It’s there, however, if you pay attention in stand alone videos.
I also increase exercise, use sauna and steam room to boost core heat repeatedly. I have no idea if this will work. So far, so good, for he “bad” attacks. But then, the weather had improved. I can easily live with this present level of inconvenience , but the “bad” attacks are painful and even frightening to think you will face that for the rest of your life, or worse!
BY the way, it seems very likely my Raynauds came from obeying my MD to take beta blockers the past few years. I did not want to, I was spotty about taking the meds, but he was clearly upset at me, and kinda scared me into taking it, even though my BP was coming down substantially on my vegan nutrition. I had NO idea this could be — and is well known to be — a cause of Raynaud’s.
That’s funny, because since I’ve gone low-carb a year and a half ago, my Raynaud’s has completely halted! I didn’t realize it until one day when I ate 6 cookies in one sitting, and the next morning, my fingers and toes were all frozen and tingly! Does Paleo include a lot of fat? Because the key to my current diet is lots and lots of fat. That must be how the Eskimos kept all their digits!
I went on a low carb high fat diet and my raynauds vanished. But then i got gout so i went back to my normal diet and back to raynauds
Hi BT,
Sorry to hear you’ve not been having much luck!
Perhaps the answer lies somewhere inbetween the low carb, low fat diet, and your “normal” diet – whatever that might be?
A diet high in vegetables, low in refined carbs and sugars, with moderate amounts of high quality animal products (pastured meat and dairy, fish and seafood etc) is usually a safe bet in my experience. Though not a panacea!
Which diet gives you ample iodine? I know that vegan you can easily get iodine deficient, especially the “low salt” vegans, some of us avoided ALL salt we could, believing that we got enough as it was. But in that salt we avoided was the iodine, an important (but not only) source of iodine.
And iodine that effects your thyroid, which effects your core temperature. Get low on iodine and you can have all kinds of problems. It’s probably a mixture of things, low iodine, rx pills, various triggers. No one seems to know.
Regardless, iodine is absolutely necessary. And while we assume this plant has X amount of iodine, that’s not nearly as true necessarily as people think!
When did “they” test all these plants for things like iodine? Who tested it? When did they repeat the test? How many samples? From where?
Plants do not make iodine, of course, nor any element at all. Yet to read popular know it all experts, this plant has this much, that plant has that much. I have a hunch that’s basically unreliable, maybe even nonsense.
Plants bring it up from the ground. So if it’s in the ground, they may bring it up. But what about years and years of growing food on that ground, replenishing only some minerals, how many decades before plants bring up less of that mineral?
All new, and anyway, I decided to take it for a time in supplement, modest amount.
Hi Mark,
Thanks for the comments, I’m sorry to hear you’re suffering from Raynaud’s.
I can’t speak for Tanya, but mine certainly appears to be “Resolved” – It hasn’t returned since I wrote the original article in 2012. Could it come back in the future? Who knows? But 6 years without any sign of it seems pretty good.
I’ve not followed any “Diet” in the past 4 years. I just eat an omnivorous diet with plenty of veg, whole grains, fish, seafood and some pastured meat and dairy.
In terms of “which diet gives you ample iodine” it would be the latter. I’d agree that relying on plant sources for iodine is very unreliable, as the level of iodine is dependent upon the soil, so can vary wildly, therefore if you choose to omit animal products a supplement is certainly wise (as you say, regardless of its potential role in Raynaud’s, it is most certainly essential).
Plenty of info in this study here about the prevalence of iodine deficiency, and best sources: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3074887/
In your case, I’d agree that the beta blockers have a high probability of being a major factor. Hopefully over time yours also will resolve.
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I went extremely low carb five years ago to lose extra post-pregnancy weight. Reynaud’s appeared around the same time. Eventually the carbs crept back in to my diet but the Reynaud’s went away. A few weeks ago I went low carb again to drop five pounds. I dropped the weight but the Reynaud’s is back. I will try and add in some sweet potatoes and rice and see what happens.
I am SO glad to read this.
Actually I got Reynauds, I am pretty sure, because I went on a diet stupidly low on iodine — in fact, no iodine at all added to anything, for two years or so. No added salt, no processed food,
I see now I WAS WARNED by the people I respected, the whole food low salt, no processed food folks like Dr. Greger, Yes, I see that now, they did say and caution me to get other sources of iodine. But that was not shouted out from the rooftops, while other things were shouted out — like get B12, like do the “daily dozen”. – 12 good things you should do every day.
It’s possible that if Greger made it the daily 13, I would not have heard of Raynauds — I never did until 7 weeks ago,.
That is if the daily 13th was iodine doses somewhere.
But I also was doing beta blockers, which I see now from National Institute of heath can cause — in an unlucky few (like me) Raynauds.
I am thrilled to see this discussion. I lost over 60lbs the last few years, most of it since I went whole food plant based. few doses of iodine several times a month might have made all the difference in the world.