Vegetarian, Vegan and Animal Rights
In reply to the discussion: Human Ancestors Were Nearly All Vegetarians- Scientific American [View all]JustAnotherGen
(31,823 posts)Mainly for recipe ideas. Anything nutrition oriented interests me - as does this article. My beef with it (pardon the pun) - is that it has already been done. Look up Carol Sinclair's The Anti-IBS diet - she wrote her experience down 20 years ago. And the anti inflammatory diet concept stole from that starting about ten years ago.
It's important to note that when I refer to diet - I'm not speaking in terms of weight reduction. I'm in the realm of HEALTH.
Those of us that struggled with Auto Immune Spectrum diseases never have just one. They always come in clusters. Those clusters come with drugs - think Enbrel for my Ankylosing which causes cancer in exchange for stopping the damage to the spine and hips created by the inflammation. Follow that with NSAIDS (make your stomach bleed) and Cyclobenzaprine (which is a muscle relaxer on the market known as Flexerall) and add a bunch of other crap to your cocktail and point blank - you can't get out of your own way.
What the Paleo Diets don't touch on are the organisms in our stomaches that can get out of control. Klebsiella is a good one - or a bad one in my case. And they don't have the reader START with science of allergy and intolerance testing.
When my AS first flared after seven years of undiagnosed IBS and the diagnosis ghetto of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome I was lucky to find a Rheumy who looked at EVERYTHING. And we started with an MRI if the spine and hips and next was allergy testing. Not going to list them all but they start with corn and go all the way to preservatives and gluten intolerance.
I now no longer give myself a shot each week that causes cancer and is made of mice waste . . . I don't take any drugs other Han a Pre Natal vitamin. I treat myself under a GP and Rheumy care with food.
Our ancestors did not sit down and have a roasted grass fed non antibiotic and steroid filled roasted chicken for dinner every night! No one is saying they did in the Paleo books. But they also didn't survive on hummus and bread.
A beans, bean sprouts diet will make me inflame to the point of not being able to move my head beyond a 45 degree angle and up. They are protein - but they are also starch. Rice is pure starch - as is wheat. I can eat those things - once a week at most.
But they are staples in a vegetarian diet.
If I don't eat grass fed meats - ditto beans. A steady week of that and I ache.
There is nothing wrong with lean grass fed bison steak, spinach, and broccoli being on the dinner plate. It's hard to get people to understand that. I don't expect anyone who has not struggled with the severe effects of an auto immune disease to understand that vegetables and protein are my religion - along with home made yogurt. Or cooking from scratch. Because it is the only way to know what is truly in your food.
But I think whether one is a Carnivore or Vegetarian - we can all agree that regardless of what ancient era in the human history we select our ancestors did not die from NOT eating things like:
Hamburger Helper
Donuts
Hostess fruit pies
Yoplait yogurt with fake fruit jelly and twenty preservatives
Cheetos, corn chips, pretzels
Kraft Mac and cheese
McDonalds, Burger King, Taco Bell
Cake, cookies, brownies
Fish sticks in breading
Chik- Fil-A (never heard of it prior to this week and was disgusted by the so-called nutritional content of that garbage)
Hot pockets
Bread - show me this oven they had in any eras - didn't exist.
Add to the list! I don't think Robb Wolf is the guru of all gurus - nor do I think Carol Sinclair is. But if you go to an A.S. support group - you'll find those that live with inflammation that can kill or rather livED with it - can say there's value in what many who have said might work.
The by product of what the original post calls Paleo and I call a rip off of the anti inflammatory method is weight loss. How can you NOT lose weight when you aren't eating a sandwich, pretzels, and apple for lunch everyday and instead eating four cups of spinach, raw red cabbage, strawberries, RAW walnuts, and cubed grilled chicken (always free range) with dressing made from scratch? You are too full and full of energy for that afternoon fat, starch, preservative laden sleeve of Chips Ahoy.