Short & Sweet: Curing Autoimmune Disease & To D or not to D?

Short answer: Don't D. Longer but still comparatively short answer: see below

Whether we like it or not destruction is a necessary part of a cycle of renewal whether societally or bodily.

Executive Summary

Why does your body attack itself in autoimmune disease? Because it's "confused"?

No. I'll tell you why, but first let's discuss what causes it in the first place: stress (bear with me).

Chronic stress is destructive.

Perhaps the biggest most pervasive stressor that's been with you from day one, and every day since, is one most people never even consider: artificial light at night.

Light triggers cortisol which is the stress hormone. Cortisol inhibits immune system function (and raises insulin, BP, body fat, etc). Obviously we need some cortisol, but like very good thing there is a Goldilocks sweet spot. Too much or too little are harmful, we need it just right. Too much light means too much cortisol means not enough immunity means invasion of pathogens means chronic inflammatory diseases, especially autoimmune diseases.

So your body attacks its own tissues to root out the pathogens, not because it's "confused".

But autoimmune disease is usually treated with immunosuppressants. This is like holding back your armed forces from destroying an invader.

Surely your functional/alternative doc knows what's up? Vitamin D to the rescue! Immune booster extraordinaire!

Except supplemental vitamin D in autoimmune disease is immunosuppressive. Again the symptoms get better, because inflammation is your immune system activated, but it's the same fundamental approach as a corticosteroid.

You have to get to the bottom of things to get better, which means diagnosing the rock bottom problem that led to this.

Usually stress and toxic insults lead to weakening of the body and specific tissues, then beneficial microbes may flourish to help the body bind toxins, or metabolize nutrients, and pathogens may also take advantage of the situation. The immune system is activated but either not strong enough, or held in check by successive rounds of suppressive “medications” that lessen symptoms.

Once you understand autoimmune disease the solution is obvious. Fix the underlying causative factors, strengthen the body by correcting the internal and external environment, and assist the immune system in expelling toxins and microbial overgrowth.

The (Compressed) Details, Especially re: Vit D

Research by Marshall and others shows that Autoimmune disease is actually due to overgrowth of our own microbiome as well as pathogenic bacteria which can invade our own tissues and even take up residence inside our own cells. So our immune system only attacks our own tissues and cells because they are harboring an infection. Suppressing immune function as in the mainstream paradigm will improve symptoms initially but data shows the disease comes back stronger 5, 10 or even 20 years later.

The alternative medicine approach of giving vitamin D is based on finding low levels of 25-D, which is the precursor to the hormonally active form 1,25-D, and it’s presumed that their levels are closely correlated. 1,25-D is not usually directly checked because it is much more expensive. It is assumed that low 25-D levels in inflammatory diseases mean there is a deficiency of vitamin D in the body contributing to the problem.

What Marshall and colleagues have shown repeatedly over the last 15+ years is that 1,25-D is actually more often than not very high in autoimmune and other chronic inflammatory diseases, even while 25-D is low.

One key to understanding what is going on is to realize that vitamin D is a misnomer. Vitamins are necessary micronutrients. “Vitamin” D is actually a hormone used by the body to send signals between cells. Hormone levels are tightly controlled by environmental inputs like light-dark cycles, stress, food, activity, emotions, and physiological inputs like other hormonal levels, the microbiome, and pathogens. Hormones have extremely complex and intricate feedback loops and vitamin D is no exception.

Another key is that Marshall and colleagues have shown with modeling studies that 25-D is as hormonally active as its metabolite 1,25-D, it just has an opposite effect - it blocks the activation of the vitamin D receptor (VDR), whereas 1,25-D activates it. So the level of VDR activation depends on the balance between the levels of both versions of vitamin D in the body. This is the opposite of the consensus view which considers 25-D as physiologically inert, not even meriting mention in one of the 1000 page vitamin D textbooks I consulted.

The final key to understanding how vitamin D levels relate to autoimmune disease is understanding the activating the VDR leads to the immune system being mobilized to fight off invasive and pathogenic bacteria. So the body raises 1,25-D levels and lowers 25-D levels in order to activate the VDR. The 1,25-D levels often rise very high and can’t go higher due to feedback loops - the VDR can only be so turned on. Turning the dial any further is useless.

In this situation when supplemental vitamin D is given it is converted into 25-D, but cannot be further converted into 1,25-D since the body doesn’t want any more and is suppressing that conversion step. However by driving 25-D levels higher you are deactivating the VDR and lowering immunity.

Now it seems this approach works in the short to medium term because an immune attack on tissues to root out bacteria is itself what leads to the inflammatory symptoms of autoimmune disease. Patients feel like they get better, the same way they get better when taking steroids or other immunosuppressants from their rheumatologist. The difference in that case being patients know they are just masking symptoms, whereas in the case of vitamin D they are misled to believe they are fixing the root cause issue.

However in both cases, underneath the surface, the bacteria continue to multiply out of control since the immune system is being held back.

Diagnose, Then Treat

Let the body do what it’s trying to do, and help it out. At the same time make sure you dig until you hit rock bottom, i.e. you have to ask: why did this happen in the first place?

Usually stress and toxic insults lead to weakening of the body and specific tissues, then beneficial microbes may flourish to help the body bind toxins, or metabolize nutrients, and pathogens may also take advantage of the situation. The immune system is activated but either not strong enough, or held in check by successive rounds of suppressive “medications” that lessen symptoms.

Perhaps the biggest stressor is one most people never even consider: artificial light at night (ALAN).

The death of night

Light triggers cortisol which is the stress hormone. Cortisol inhibits immune system function (and raises insulin, BP, body fat, etc).

Obviously we need some cortisol, but like very good thing there is a Goldilocks sweet spot. Too much or too little are harmful, we need it just right.

Too much light means too much cortisol means not enough immunity means invasion of pathogens means autoimmune disease (and a whole host of other modern disease states developing, often waiting in the wings to spring on you as you get older).

Anyone who is any good at fixing anything in the real world will tell you that the only way to go about it is to first diagnose the problem.

This is not the way mainstream physicians go about it, despite tossing around the word “diagnose” all the time. They will be the first to tell you 99% of the time that they don’t know what caused your illness no matter how common it is or how many decades or centuries it’s been studied or how many expensive tests they order. Yet people still allow them to “practice” their craft on their sick bodies.

Once you understand autoimmune disease the solution is obvious. Fix the underlying causative factors, strengthen the body by correcting the internal and external environment, and assist the immune system in expelling toxins and microbial overgrowth.

For much more detail on all of this and a lot of things that didn’t fit here see the full post where I discuss corrupted Hegelian dialectics, orthogonal thinking, VDR disruptors, the Marshall protocol, super-organisms, supplementing in general, eating fish, and some of the many wonders of sunlight.