William Davis's Blog: Dr. Davis Infinite Health Blog, page 64

Low-carb fairy tales

It’s been a busy week with no shortage of dietary fiction being reported by the media. In addition to the coconut oil is “pure poison” nonsense that I responded to, there are now lots of confused conversations about the purported dangers of low-carb diets because of a study that purports to show that both low-carb and high-carb eating lead to increased mortality over 25 years. You’ve seen the attention-grabbing headlines: “Low-carb linked to dying young.” “Low-carb kills.”

The several points I made in the “coconut is pure poison” blog post are the very same ones that apply here. This study is yet another in a long line of similar studies from Dr. Walter Willett and colleagues. All the data that these people generate is observational, not experimental. Because the issues with this awful study are the very same as those that lead to false conclusions such as “red meat causes cancer,” I shall re-post my comments on the dangers of trying to draw any cause-effect conclusions from observational data but applied to the low-carb question:

Let me talk for a moment about observational studies. An observational study is typically conducted like this: I have you fill out a dietary questionnaire that asks you to recall what you ate for, say, the last 3 days. I then recontact you 5, 10, 20, or 25 years later and see what happened to you: healthy, heart attack, dead. Problem: filling out a questionnaire at one moment in time is a lousy way to assess diet, people change diets for a variety of reasons over the years—to lose weight, financial troubles, diet fads, etc. Another problem: confounding factors. If you say, for instance, that you are a vegetarian, it also means that you don’t drink much, don’t smoke, don’t engage in other high-risk behaviors, probably take nutritional supplements, eat more whole foods over processed foods. In other words, eating a certain way means that there are other behaviors attached to that way of eating; any effect on outcomes cannot be assumed to be due to vegetarianism per se, but to the entire collation of behaviors. There are other sources of bias in observational studies that muddy the results. Bottom line: Observational studies cannot establish cause-effect relationships; they can only suggest an hypothesis. To prove whether or not low-carb intake does or does not impact mortality cannot be based on questionnaires; a randomized prospective study in which people are randomly assigned to an eating style are compared. Unfortunately, unlike the studies with saturated fat in which people randomized to low-fat diets did not have less cardiovascular events, there are no long-term randomized clinical studies on low-carb eating.

Observational data is like having no data at all. Time after time, the conclusions drawn from observational studies (and falsely reported by study authors or the media as definitive conclusion) have fallen apart in prospective studies. My favorite example is Premarin, horse estrogens prescribed to women for years. Observational data suggested that Premarin (that looks and acts NOTHING like human estrogens) reduced breast cancer, reduced endometrial cancer, and reduced heart disease. This was responsible for making Premarin the most widely-prescribed drug in the world for about a decade. Then the prospective, randomized HERS and Women’s Health Initiative trials were conducted. Conclusion: Premarin INCREASED breast cancer, INCREASED endometrial cancer, INCREASED cardiovascular death, even accelerated dementia. And this has been the story over and over again: Conclusions drawn in observational studies have proven to be flat wrong about 4 times out of 5. This hasn’t stopped people like Frank Sacks and Walter Willett, through the observational Physicians’ Health Study and Nurses’ Health Study to, time and again, declare observational findings as fact. Unfortunately, even the USDA buys this observational fiction, incorporating the findings of observational studies in their dietary guidelines.

So the observational data reported in this study cannot be used to draw conclusions. It would be nice if we could refute the claims being made with randomized, prospective data, but there are none. However, there are abundant data that look at various biomarkers that demonstrate the metabolic advantages of low-carb eating. Among improved biomarkers are:

Reduced HbA1c, fasting glucose, insulin, reduced insulin resistance
Reduced triglycerides (due to lack of carbs/sugars to fuel liver de novo lipogenesis, i.e., conversion of sugars to triglycerides )
Reduction or elimination of small LDL particles
Reduced severity of postprandial (after-meal) lipoproteins (especially VLDL)
Reduced blood pressure
Weight loss including from visceral fat
Reduced inflammatory markers such as c-reactive protein, IL-2, TNF-alpha
Reversal of fatty liver

Low-fat diets, in comparison, are typically accompanied by no drop in blood sugar or insulin or an increase, a marked increase in triglycerides and small LDL particles that cause heart disease, and no reversal of fatty liver.

The only problem with low-carb diets come when carbs are cut to very low levels of about 20 grams per day and ketosis sets in. I’ve discussed this before: There is nothing wrong with being ketotic, as it is a normal and natural physiological adaptation. The problems come, however, when you stay in ketosis for a prolonged periods of months to years. Because you have eliminated all prebiotic fibers (since they come as mostly carb-rich foods like legumes), dysbiosis and small intestinal bacterial overgrowth sets in, followed by constipation, diverticular disease, and increased risk for colon cancer. The initial metabolic improvements that derive from reducing carb exposure reverse over time with a rise in blood sugar and insulin, rise in blood pressure, rise in triglycerides. We know all this with confidence as thousands of children have been maintained on ketogenic diets to suppress intractable grand mal seizures. In addition to the above, kids stop growing (suggesting that something is fundamentally wrong with the diet), have exceptional risk for kidney stones, and there are occasional instances of sudden cardiac death. This makes people in the ketogenic diet world angry, but there is simply no way to just dismiss these observations made over many decades.

But back to the “low-carb kills argument”: Ignore it. It is the same misleading and non-conclusive data along with plenty of other nonsense that comes from Willett, Sacks, et al, who deliver their hypotheses as conclusive scientific findings—which they are NOT. Be content and happy with the magnificent overall health, reflected by numerous biomarkers, that results when you banish all grains and sugars from the diet, do not restrict fat, and take efforts to cultivate bowel flora and address a handful of common nutritional deficiencies that derive from living a modern life (not from the diet).

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What happens on Wheat Belly?

Here’s a sampling of some of the many, many magnificent successes people have shared living the Wheat Belly lifestyle.

Of course, we can only see what is visible on the surface: changes in facial contours, reduction in skin inflammation, reduction of around-the-eyes puffiness resulting in bigger eyes, reversal of skin rashes.

And note that many “befores” are unclear or fuzzy, while “afters” are clear and distinct that I believe reflect the fact that people feel better about themselves, self esteem boosted.

You simply cannot achieve these sorts of results by cutting calories, “move more, eat less,” increasing exercise, or all the other silly ideas promoted in conventional health advice. We achieve these sorts of extravagant successes, often in brief time periods, by removing foods that provoke inflammation—grains and sugars—while addressing a handful of modern health challenges such as vitamin D deficiency and cultivation of bowel flora.

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Coconut oil: Good or bad?

German epidemiologist Dr. Karin Michels of the University of Freiburg recently declared coconut oil a “pure poison” because of its saturated fat content, re-igniting the perceived controversy about this oil. This inevitably gets major media (you know, the industry now largely run by Big Pharma, given the extraordinary dominance of direct-to-consumer drug ads) in a tizzy, doing things like resurrecting American Heart Association (AHA) advice to limit saturated fats, interviewing dietitians and mainstream doctors who, like Freiburg, declare saturated fat a scourge on health.

Funny, because the data never did associate saturated fat nor total fat with cardiovascular risk. There were a handful of flawed studies, misrepresented studies, and data that demonstrated no connection between saturated fat and heart disease that was unpublished because it was contrary to prevailing opinion in the 1960s, 1970s, and onward. Think Ancel Keys’ notorious Seven Countries Study in which he cherry-picked the data to “prove” that, the greater the saturated fat intake in a country, the more heart disease deaths occurred . . . until it was revealed that he left out the data on 15 other countries that would have disproven the association. (The breathtaking blunders have been recounted in excruciating detail by authors Nina Teicholz in her The Big Fat Surprise and Gary Taubes in Good Calories, Bad Calories. And several reanalyses (“meta-analyses”) of the combined data, including more recent studies, such as this review, conclude that there is no association between saturated fat intake and cardiovascular risk.

Despite this, the AHA reiterated its stand on saturated fat, basing their opinion on the (flawed) studies from the 1960s and more recent observational data that did indeed suggest that saturated fat was associated with increased cardiovascular risk. After all, lead author on the AHA position paper was Dr. Frank Sacks, an author of numerous observational studies. (And the AHA has gotten their dietary message so wrong so many times in the past—use Crisco for heart health, the AHA Check-Mark stamp of approval on Cocoa Puffs, Pop Tarts, and Count Chocula—why should we believe ANYTHING they say in diet?)

Let me talk for a moment about observational studies. An observational study is typically conducted like this: I have you fill out a dietary questionnaire that asks you to recall what you ate for, say, the last 3 days. I then recontact you 5, 10, or 20 years later and see what happened to you: healthy, heart attack, dead. Problem: filling out a questionnaire at one moment in time is a lousy way to assess diet, people change diets for a variety of reasons over the years—to lose weight, financial troubles, diet fads, etc. Another problem: confounding factors. If you say, for instance, that you are a vegetarian, it also means that you don’t drink much, don’t smoke, don’t engage in other high-risk behaviors, probably take nutritional supplements, eat more whole foods over processed foods. In other words, eating a certain way means that there are other behaviors attached to that way of eating; any effect on outcomes cannot be assumed to be due to vegetarianism per se, but to the entire collation of behaviors. There are other sources of bias in observational studies that muddy the results. Bottom line: Observational studies cannot establish cause-effect relationships; they can only suggest an hypothesis. To prove whether or not saturated fat does or does not cause heart disease cannot be based on questionnaires; a randomized prospective study in which people are randomly assigned to an eating style are compared. This has indeed been done and has shown NO association between saturated fat consumption and heart disease. The huge National Institutes of Health Mr. Fit Study (Multiple Risk Factor Intervention Trial), for example, that compared a low-fat, low-saturated fat, low-cholesterol diet (skim milk, butter replaced with margarine, no more than two eggs per week, minimized red meats, etc.) versus people who stayed on their higher-fat and cholesterol diet. 12,000 participants over 7 years: no difference in outcome.

Observational data is like having no data at all. Time after time, the conclusions drawn from observational studies (and falsely reported by researchers like Sacks or the media as definitive conclusion) have fallen apart in prospective studies like Mr. Fit. My favorite example is Premarin, horse estrogens prescribed to women for years. Observational data suggested that Premarin (that looks and acts NOTHING like human estrogens) reduced breast cancer, reduced endometrial cancer, and reduced heart disease. This was responsible for making Premarin the most widely-prescribed drug in the world for about a decade. Then the prospective, randomized HERS and Women’s Health Initiative trials were conducted. Conclusion: Premarin INCREASED breast cancer, INCREASED endometrial cancer, INCREASED cardiovascular death, even accelerated dementia. And this has been the story over and over again: Conclusions drawn in observational studies have proven to be flat wrong about 4 times out of 5. This hasn’t stopped people like Frank Sacks, through his observational Physicians’ Health Study and Nurses’ Health Study to, time and again, declare observational findings as fact. Unfortunately, even the USDA buys this observational fiction, incorporating the findings of observational studies in their dietary guidelines.

Conventional thinkers also claim that saturated fat raises total and LDL cholesterol. Is that true? Yes, it is . . . but who cares? Let’s be clear: Cholesterol does not cause heart disease. And total and LDL cholesterol are lousy predictors of heart disease. Lipoproteins, inflammation, and phenomena such as postprandial (after-eating) lipoproteins cause heart disease. Cholesterol is a crude and indirect index of lipoproteins. Why not measure the lipoproteins themselves that are far superior predictors of cardiovascular risk. If you do, you will see that saturated fat:

Raises HDL (“good”) and shifts it towards larger, more protective, HDL particles
Reduces triglycerides—that would otherwise contribute to lipoprotein distortions (via triglyceride-rich VLDL particles that influence the composition of other particles, increasing small LDL particles, for instance)
Shifts LDL particles towards less harmful large with less small LDL particles

And, in the context of grain and sugar elimination that markedly reduces, often eliminates, small LDL particles, you will see that total and LDL cholesterol become wildly inaccurate reflections of REAL measures such as total low-density lipoprotein number. In other words, the crude total cholesterol and calculated LDL cholesterol derived via a crude, outdated equation no longer reflect lipoprotein composition.

Back to coconut oil. Eat it, enjoy it, use it to cook and bake, make Fat Blasters or Fat Bombs out of it. It is satiating, an excellent cooking oil, and the medium-chain triglyceride that comprises nearly half of its content by weight (lauric acid) improves cognition in people with cognitive impairment and dementia. It is rich in saturated fat that does not increase risk for cardiovascular disease.

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Our first L. reuteri challenge winner: Betty!

Betty is our first L. reuteri challenge winner. Congratulations, Betty!

Betty is a long-time friend of the Wheat Belly and now Undoctored lifestyle that, by itself, yields weight loss and health transforming effects.

Betty also incorporated the L. reuteri yogurt that smooths skin wrinkles, hugely increases dermal collagen, slows or prevents bone thinning, shuts off appetite, and yields other health benefits. You can see by her before/after photos that, despite 7 years passing between photos, she looks younger in the after than in the before. Look at the smoothing of her skin texture. And, because I’ve spoken to her a number of times (she came on one of our Wheat Belly Cruises), she has also experienced a number of life-changing health benefits.

Betty has chosen the $100 gift certificate to Wheat-Free Market as her prize. Well done, Betty!

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Refrigeration and the death of rot

All throughout human history until recently, if you killed an animal and harvested its organs and meat, or stumbled on a bounty of wild berries or other tree or bush fruit, or managed to squeeze some of the products of mammary glands from a ruminant like a goat, you would ferment the food to keep it from becoming inedible or poisonous. Surely the earliest humans, hungry and desperate at times, learned that many foods not consumed would ferment but remain edible.

Fermentation is essentially controlled rotting: the production of lactic acid by bacteria, the production of ethanol by fungi. You could, for instance, store milk or cream in the stomach of an animal you killed and used as a portable bag, and the rennet in the stomach lining would convert it to cheese. Or you would bury the excess meat and organs, fish, vegetables, eggs or other foods in the ground, allowing it to ferment and retrieved in a few weeks or months, especially when fresh food fell into short supply. Sauerkraut, fermented cabbage, was known to last for months and became one of the foods of choice to bring along on long ocean voyages to prevent scurvy. Such fermented foods persist to this day as garum (fermented fish), natto (fermented soybeans), of course, yogurt.

Then came refrigeration. Aside from the sporadic and relatively short-lived practices of saving ice from the winter (as long ago as 10,000 years ago in China) or shipping it from cold to warmer climates, large-scale refrigeration changed the way we ate. At first only available as a commercial process, by 1927 home refrigerators got their start, with a big boost when Frigidaire developed the refrigerant, freon. Then everything changed.

Refrigeration meant that foods like vegetables, meats, and fruits could be stored for extended periods and would not ferment or rot. In fact, as with so many modern habits, people started to view the products of fermentation with some distrust, as it seemed just a step away from being rotten (the exception being the products of fungal fermentation, beer and wine). Most people, upon viewing the cloudy, slimy bacterial soup that develops in veggies submerged in water, for instance, would promptly toss it in the trash, not recognizing it as edible and actually healthier. It means that our intake of Lactobacillus, Bifidobacteria, Leuconostoc and other bacterial species dropped way down to nearly nothing except from minimal surface contamination. And, even if you consumed common fermented foods like yogurt, most commercial preparations are fermented for the briefest period to hasten production or don’t even contain live cultures.

Combine our near century-long failure to consume fermented foods with practices like taking antibiotics, being exposed to herbicide and pesticide residues in commercial food, emulsifying agents in processed foods, and GMOs with glyphosate and Bt toxin, and we have a sure-fire way to create dysbiosis, massive disruption of bowel flora, and small intestinal bacterial overgrowth, SIBO.

My point: Return to the foods that humans consumed for millennia before refrigeration made us squeamish. It is part of your effort to regain health, in this case through restoration of a healthy oral and gastrointestinal microbiome.

 

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Susanne: Goodbye, gluten-free

It’s no exaggeration to say that lives are transformed by the Wheat Belly lifestyle. Look what happened to Susanne after her health was ruined by being gluten-free, reversed by following the Wheat Belly 10-Day Grain Detox.

Food manufacturers, out of ignorance or ruthless profiteering, have chosen to replace wheat and gluten with cornstarch, rice flour, tapioca starch, or potato starch—among the few foods that provoke high blood sugar and insulin more than even our favorite grain to bash, wheat. It means that people who are gluten-free and consume such garbage replacement products gain weight in visceral inflammatory fat, develop higher blood sugars and type 2 diabetes, glycate body proteins that lead to conditions such as cataracts and arthritis, develop hormonal distortions, and markedly increase risk for heart disease, cancer, and dementia. Gluten-free replacement foods are, in a word, awful.

Here is what Susanne learned by making the mistake of consuming gluten-free foods, now all reversed on the Wheat Belly grain-free lifestyle:

“I started Wheat Belly in September of 2017. I figured I’d give it a try to see if it would work for me. I had just looked into the Keto diet but hated the fact that you had to count micros and calories. It was the one thing that always discouraged me from starting a diet. Wheat Belly sounded like something I could stick with. After all, watching your carbs and eliminating grains and sugar seemed easy enough.

“Prior to starting Wheat Belly, I was gluten free for 6 years. 6 years earlier a doctor noticed a nodule on my thyroid. He suggested I go gluten free, so I did. I found removing wheat kept my nodule from growing and kept my Hashimotos from getting worse. However, over the next several years food manufacturers started to get smart and began making new products with gluten free flours (corn, cassava, rice, potato, tapioca, etc) and that’s when my issues really began to get worse.

“Over those next 5 years I thought I was doing the right thing for my body. However, my weight kept climbing and I gradually started to look like a swollen tick. I was frustrated, confused and my health started to decline pretty quickly. I struggled for years with:

1. heart palpitations

2. heartburn

3. anxiety attacks that sent me to the hospital twice

4. depression that kept me isolated and alone

5. eczema

6. arthritis

7. No sex drive

8. Tons of painful facial acne

9. back/hip pain

10. Slept on average 2 hours a night

11. High Blood pressure reaching 150/115

12. No energy

13. Sinusitis

14. Cravings for snacks all day long

“I had no idea what was wrong with me but once I started reading Wheat Belly it all became crystal clear. I was slowly killing myself by eating a gluten free lifestyle. I should have been grain free all along. The new gluten free products were easy to use but so much more toxic to my system!

Once I began to eliminate the grains and sugars I went through at least 2 months of withdrawal. It was a tough 2 months packed with headaches, increased heart

palpitations and heartburn. I kept pushing through and was thankful to have this group to support me.

“By the end of my 2 month detox I started to notice my feet weren’t as swollen and my ankles looked thinner. I had only lost about 8 pounds but the loss of inches was encouraging. Around the 2 month mark I had also figured out all the silly mistakes I was making and found myself reading labels every time I bought something whether I bought the same item the week before. Shockingly I learned food companies change ingredients like we change our underwear. The next few months I started to lose a lot more weight. I noticed the weight loss for me started at my hands and feet and worked it’s way towards my body. Right now I’m still looking to lose another 18 pounds and it’s mostly in the thighs and stomach. I know I can do it as I know this WOE (Way of eating) is easy and a lifestyle I can live with.

Now that I am down 42 pounds and went from a size 16 to a size 8 I feel great! Using the list above here are the biggest changes I have noticed:

1. No heart palpitations

2. No heartburn

3. No anxiety

4. No depression

5. No eczema

6. No arthritis

7. Sex drive returned (wow)

8. Facial acne only when I have been wheated or drink wines with added sulfites

9. No back/hip pain

10. Finally sleeping after years of struggle and upwards of 6 hours every night

11. Lowered Blood pressure

12. Enormous increase in energy level

13. Sinusitis improved

14. No cravings or desire to eat food. No longer a slave to food. It doesn’t interest me at all. I can go hours without eating.

“What I have learned:

1. If you really want to feel better and lose weight you have to make yourself a top priority. Cheating isn’t putting yourself first! Cheating hurts your body and pushes you back to inflammation and causes your body to struggle. It also allows your cravings and desires to continue.

2. A Gluten Free lifestyle can be toxic. If your currently gluten free and not fully grain free try to eat whole foods, not products designed by the food industry.

3. This is a lifestyle. Don’t look back!

4. The scale doesn’t always move and sometimes it goes up. That’s normal and expected. Your body does not weigh the same every moment of the day. If you weigh every day expect those days when it goes up a pound or two. It’s not the end of the world. It will come off if you stay the course.

5. Supplements are very important on this journey. Stop procrastinating and take them.

6. Healthy fats are your friend. They keep you feeling full and allow your body to work probably. If you don’t eat enough healthy fat your weight loss will slow down.

7. If your feeling hungry and want a snack you probably aren’t eating enough fat!

8. Avoid toxic oils like vegetable, canola and corn!

Good luck to all those starting the journey. Choose to make yourself a priority and choose to leave the excuses behind! It works if you want it to work!

“Thank you Dr. Davis! I feel like I’m in my 30’s again!”

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Grains are creating havoc in our brains. IT’S NOT YOUR IMAGINATION!

Something’s just not right: lately you are forgetful, stressed, and tired all of the time. Symptoms can vary from mood swings, to lack of concentration, to feeling chronically tired, and anxious. To top it off, no matter how healthy you try to eat, you still aren’t losing weight. So let’s add frustrated to the list. And you’re finding that all of this is affecting your performance at work, as a parent, and even as a partner/spouse. It’s not your imagination. 

Grains are behind it all…

The grains you consume may have numerous damaging effects on your brain and nervous system, not just your gastrointestinal tract. Wheat, barley, and rye are the main offenders, all sharing the same gliadin proteins. These gliadin proteins are digested into to smaller (4 or 5 long) amino-acid peptides, which are small enough to penetrate the brain and bind to opiate receptors. These peptides, dubbed exorphins or exogenously derived morphine-like compounds, are responsible for various ill-effects on the brain. Other non-wheat grains also have potential brain health implications by creating high blood sugar levels which lead to dementia.

Remove grains from your diet and your brain is released from the control of their mind-active components. It is liberating, wonderful, and empowering. Your brain can be restored to its normal alert, energetic, calculating, and creative state. The brain/mind effects of banishing all wheat and grains from you life include:

 

Eliminate Mind Fog –Disrupted concentration, inability to focus, impaired learning, impaired decision-making ability, and sleepiness are exceptionally common after consuming wheat, rye, and barley. Gliadin-derived opiates are the most likely culprits behind these effects, given their known ability to affect the mind. It’s also likely that the blood sugar fluctuations caused by all grains contribute, especially the low blood sugar of hypoglycemia.

Reduce Anxiety – Many people are plagued by constant low-level anxiety, the sort of pointless and unwarranted unease that makes day-to-day life an unpleasant experience, a layer of worry that is unnecessary, even incapacitating. Typically, such anxieties recede with grain removal. For some, the effect can be dramatic and life changing, sometimes even providing relief from years of phobias such as agoraphobia (the fear of leaving home) or claustrophobia (the fear of closed spaces). For others, it may be a more subtle change, with relief from frequent or pervasive anxieties that darkened your life. Like suicidal thoughts, anxiety is easily reprovoked with any grain exposure, so avoidance is key.

Enhance Learning Ability –Restoration of the capacity for prolonged concentration, clearer thinking, and reduced distractibility add up to an enhanced ability to learn. People listen more effectively, retain more with reading, acquire and synthesize data and concepts with greater ease, and enjoy overall improved memory. They are more focused, more creative, and more effective.

Increase Libido – Removing wheat from the diet increases the libido in both sexes. Because wheat elimination reduces estrogen and raises testosterone in males, and reduces abnormally high estrogen levels in females (and may modestly increase testosterone), libido is increased. Increased libido is generally associated with enhanced sexual performance and drive, which I believe can translate into improvements in other spheres of life.

Improve Mood – People are happier and more optimistic, causing them to become better engaged with the people and activities. Some people experience such dramatic improvements of mood that they are able to free themselves from suicidal thoughts and antidepressant.

Appetite Control – Grain-derived exorphins trigger the grain consumer to take in 400 more calories per day, every day. This is an average value; some people consume more, others less. At worst, it can cause calorie intake to be 1,000 or more calories per day or higher and trigger food obsessions or other addictive food behaviors. With grain consumption, your appetite is specifically stimulated for carbohydrates, such as pretzels, corn chips, and cookies, and it’s stimulated to a lesser degree for fat. The effect tends to be addictive, with cyclic and recurring desire for such foods driving dietary habits and even dominating thoughts and fantasies. Rid yourself of gliadin-derived opiates and calorie intake drops by 400 calories per day. Food obsessions and addictive food relationships are also typically reduced or completely eliminated.

Relief From Seizures – As seizures have been associated with grain consumption, especially consumption of wheat, removal of grains can be associated with relief from seizures if grains were the initiating cause. Most commonly, sufferers of temporal lobe seizures experience a marked reduction or complete relief from these episodes. Although the causal association between grains and grand mal seizures is more tenuous, I am hearing from more and more people who have experienced marked relief from these dangerous events as well.

Benefits on ADHD and Autistic Spectrum Disorder –While these disorders are unrelated, they share a similar response to gliadin-derived opiates. Children and adults with these conditions experience behavioral outbursts, such as temper tantrums or emotional “storms” without reason, and they have an impaired capacity to sustain attention. Kids with these conditions already have an impaired ability to learn and pay attention for more than a few seconds or minutes; grain-derived opiates just make it worse.

Reversal of Neurological Impairment –People with cerebellar ataxia often experience a slow, gradual improvement in coordination, balance, capacity to walk, and bladder control, or at least experience no further deterioration, after grains are eliminated. Likewise, the pain or impaired feelings of peripheral neuropathy recede slowly or stop progressing. Because the nervous system is slow to heal and may do so imperfectly, the process can take months to years, so a long-term commitment is required to gauge improvement.

Prevention of Dementia – High blood sugars that occur day in and day out, many times per day, due to habitual grain consumption are reversed when grains are removed. Clinical trials have demonstrated the powerful association between blood sugars that are around 110 mg/ dl (which is below the cut-offs for prediabetes and diabetes and considered just above normal) and the development of dementia. There are even higher risks of dementia and Alzheimer’s disease presented by the higher blood sugar levels of prediabetes and diabetes. Grain elimination is a powerful means of reversing high blood sugar levels (both fasting and after-meals). Some people are also prone to the autoimmune process which is triggered by the gliadin and prolamin proteins. This process leads to dementia; it is likewise turned off with elimination of the inciting grains.

Treatment of Psychiatric Disorders –Studies have demonstrated that removal of wheat, rye, barley, and corn reduce the risk of many conditions that affect the mind. Gliadin proteins contribute to the mania of bipolar illness, the paranoia and auditory hallucinations of schizophrenia, and the impaired learning and behavioral outbursts of children with attention deficit disorder and autistic spectrum disorder, phenomena that are reversible or lessened simply by removing grains from the diet.

 

Wheat and grains underlie an astounding amount of mental illness and emotional struggles. Yes, the food advocated by virtually all nutritional “authorities,” dietitians, and food companies sets you on a course that takes away your control over mood, clarity, and cognition. Recognize this fundamental fact and you are on your way to being liberated from their awful effects.

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Should you switch to A2 dairy?

No doubt: Dairy products have issues.

The issues with dairy are not as bad as they are with grains. After all, the consumption of the seeds of grasses was an entirely foreign practice, introduced very late in the human experience—we have spent less than 0.4% of our time on this planet consuming seeds of grasses, despite their dominant dietary role today, thanks to the lobbying of Big Agribusiness, Big Food, and the bungling of the USDA and U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Grains are physiologically inappropriate for consumption by Homo sapiens at any time, in any form. Wild, hunting, primitive humans did not consume it for the first 99.6% of our time here.

But consumption of dairy products has a human precedent in consumption of the milk of female humans, i.e., infants are meant to breastfeed for up to 4 years after birth. Consumption of the products of mammary glands is therefore not a practice foreign to us human mammals. What IS foreign is 1) consuming the product of bovine or other non-human mammary glands and 2) continued consumption after age 4.

Our yogurt-making, by the way, with fermentation extended to 36 hours to amplify counts of L. reuteri, reduces (but does not eliminate) some of the undesirable features of dairy since it consumes virtually all the lactose and converts it to lactic acid (thus the tartness), thereby reducing the pH that denatures (breaks down) the casein protein (though the residual immunogenicity, or immune-triggering potential, of the resulting peptides is uncertain). You can further disable dairy issues by either straining in cheesecloth to drain off the whey or just pour out the excess whey that results when you scoop out some of the yogurt. Recall that whey is insulin-provoking, or insulinotrophic, an effect that can contribute to insulin resistance and stalled or failed weight loss, despite its (puzzling) popularity as an additive to smoothies. By using organic dairy, you further cut back on the hormonal content, as well as potential antibiotic, growth hormone, or other exposures. Choosing full-fat is also important, as the fat is the healthiest component of dairy. Making the yogurt, especially using the methods we use with higher fat, extended fermentation times, and addition of prebiotic fibers to heighten bacterial counts and increase content of bacterial metabolites such as butyrate, reduces, though does not eliminate, the issues with dairy: little to no lactose, denatured casein, reduced whey.

Of all the issues with dairy, however, it is probably the casein prevalent in North America, so-called casein beta A1, that is the most concerning component. Human milk contains the casein beta A2 form (as do goat and sheep). A2 products from cows have been available in Australia, New Zealand, and parts of Western Europe for years. The casein beta A1 protein is immunogenic and has been associated with issues including initiating rheumatoid arthritis and type 1 diabetes (along with the gliadin protein of wheat/rye/barley and the zein protein of corn) and sudden infant death syndrome. Although just one amino acid differs between the two forms of casein, it means a big difference in immune-stimulating potential.

Awareness of these issues has prompted some dairy farmers to work towards converting their livestock to A2 cows—not an easy issue, as it means allowing A1 cows to age and die off, then purchasing cows genetically tested (costly) to be A2, a process measured in years. But it’s happening. I’ve now seen A2 milk (but not cream, half-and-half, butter, or other products) in Orlando, New York, Chicago, and now even Milwaukee. (If it’s in Milwaukee, it means it should be in most major and secondary cities.)

So just be aware that A2 dairy products are just starting to make their way to the North American market, another option for you to choose that further reduces the potential toxic components of dairy. Because it is uncertain whether our denatured casein beta A1 in yogurt remains immunogenic, converting to A2 milk and, perhaps in future, half-and-half and other products, is now an option.

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Irreversible

Follow the Wheat Belly lifestyle and literally hundreds of diseases can be reversed: type 2 diabetes reverts to normal within weeks to months (depending on how much weight needs to be lost to restore insulin sensitivity), fatty liver reverses to normal within a few weeks, skin rashes recede, IBS and acid reflux are gone within days in the majority, high triglycerides plummet, even several forms of kidney disease can reverse.

But there are health conditions that, once established, can leave effects that can be irreversible even if the initial causative condition reverses. For example, type 2 diabetes can cause kidney damage signaled by a rise in blood levels of creatinine (normal is around 1.0 mg/dl) and loss of protein in the urine. Reverse diabetes and enjoy a drop in HbA1c from, say, 11% to 5.0%—no longer diabetic—and creatinine may drop from a near-complete kidney failure level of 4.0 to 2.5–but not all the way back to normal and urinary protein loss can persist. Residual kidney damage remains, leaving the kidneys susceptible to future additional damage and failure. Another example is type 1 diabetes: Damage to pancreatic beta cells that produce insulin is initiated by the gliadin protein of wheat/rye/barley, the zein protein of corn, or the casein beta A1 of dairy and, after the offending proteins have been removed from the diet, the pancreas does not recover and type 1 diabetes persists for life, causing lifelong reliance on insulin injections.

Other examples include:

Cirrhosis—Grains and sugars cause elevation of the AST and ALT markers that reflect damage to liver tissue called “fatty liver” (so-called because there is fat deposition in the liver; it is not from consumption of fat). Banish grains and sugars and AST and ALT drop to normal within 2-3 weeks. But the fibrous replacement of liver tissue persists, as does diminished liver capacity to handle toxins, nutrients, synthesize proteins, etc. Similarly, if autoimmune hepatitis reverses with grain elimination, liver damage can persist.

Gastric parietal cell loss—People who have lost the parietal cells of their stomach responsible for acid production typically do not regrow these cells, even after the gliadin protein of wheat and related grains—responsible for initiating the autoimmune destruction of the cells—have been eliminated. This leaves you with hypo- or achlorhydria, i.e., reduction or absence of stomach acid. This is why so many people seem to do better by adding such things as apple cider vinegar and betaine hydrochloride that partially compensates for the lack of stomach acid. (This situation also leaves you highly prone to small intestinal bacterial overgrowth, SIBO.)

Diseases associated with endogenous glycation—I discussed the common process of endogenous glycation in the original Wheat Belly book. Glycation is the product of high blood sugars reacting with various body proteins, a process that is irreversible once it occurs. And it occurs every time your blood sugar rises above 100 mg/dl. So when your doctor tells you that it’s okay to have a high blood sugar as long as it does not exceed 200 mg/dl, he/she is ensuring a future of disease. The long-term consequences of glycation can take many forms that include cataracts, heart disease, Alzheimer’s dementia, arthritis, age spots and skin aging, and kidney disease. Glycation is cumulative: the more you glycate, the more the debris of glycation accumulate.

Atherosclerosis—Accumulation of atherosclerotic plaque in the coronary and carotid arteries is cumulative. Atherosclerosis can be reduced by following all Wheat Belly Total Health and Undoctored strategies, as evidenced, for example, by reductions of heart scan scores. But atherosclerosis does not typically reverse to zero; some degree of residual plaque will remain.

Autoimmune thyroid disease—The damage incurred with Hashimoto’s thyroiditis and Grave’s disease usually does not reverse even after the offending gliadin protein of wheat and related grains are removed. This is why people can reduce their thyroid antibody levels back to normal, signaling quiescence of autoimmune inflammation, but remain reliant on taking thyroid hormones.

There is more, but those are among the most common.

The key is therefore to engage in the Wheat Belly grain-free lifestyle as early in life as possible and not delay before irreversible damage occurs. So many health conditions reverse on the Wheat Belly lifestyle but not all the consequences can be reversed.

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Do you get brain fog with probiotics?

We may now have an explanation for the people who experience brain fog with probiotic use.

We already know that intolerance to prebiotic fibers within the first 60 minutes of ingestion strongly suggests that small intestinal bacterial overgrowth, SIBO, present. If you experience excessive gas, bloating, abdominal discomfort, or diarrhea within the first hour of consuming, say, inulin, a raw white potato, or legumes, it is virtually certain that you have SIBO that must be addressed if you desire full recovery of health. Recall that uncorrected SIBO can account for fibromyalgia, IBS, restless leg syndrome, psoriasis, and marked long-term potential for autoimmune diseases, diverticular disease, and various forms of neurological impairment and colon cancer. It is absolutely worth pursuing and correcting.

But people who add a probiotic or fermented foods like yogurt or kefir who experience brain fog—cloudy thinking, difficulty concentrating, fatigue, forgetfulness—have a condition called D-lactic acidosis, an excess of a poorly-metabolized form of lactic acid (as compared to the more common and more readily metabolized L-lactic acid). Brain fog is typically accompanied by bloating, abdominal discomfort and distension, and gas after meals.

A recent study suggests that this constellation of symptoms is due to the action of Lactobacillus and Bifidobacteria species present in common probiotic preparations and fermented foods,  microbes that are generally beneficial to humans, that convert sugars and carbohydrates to D-lactic acid. Higher blood levels of D-lactic acid can therefore be measured. In other words, the ordinarily beneficial probiotic species work against you.

The tangle gets worse: People who experience these symptoms with probiotic usage also appear to have SIBO. Recall that SIBO is proving to be a condition that is epidemic, likely on a par with the epidemics of type 2 diabetes and pre-diabetes. Extrapolating from existing data, it is likely that something like 60 to 100 million Americans have SIBO. SIBO may explain, for instance, why there has been a substantial uptick in colon cancer among 20 and 30-somethings.

The sequence goes like this: You have SIBO with invading Enterobacteriaceae Gram-negative organisms like E. coli and Shigella inhabiting the stomach, duodenum, jejunum, and ileum, as well as the colon where they are supposed to be confined. You have been taking a probiotic and/or fermented foods containing Lactobacillus or Bifidobacteria that, along with SIBO organisms, colonize the upper gastrointestinal tract. After meals, you experience mind fog and gastrointestinal upset due to an increase in blood levels of D-lactic acid produced by Lactobacillus and Bifidobacteria. In other words, in this situation probiotics add to the problem and do not solve it.

Intolerance to probiotics, fermented foods, and prebiotic fibers therefore serves as a therapeutic test that can uncover SIBO. You should not ignore this. Gram negative Enterobacteriaceae that live in the upper gastrointestinal tract are highly inflammatory, as they are both directly toxic to the intestinal lining and add to increased intestinal permeability, allowing the breakdown product, lipopolysaccharide, from the cell walls of these organisms, to enter the bloodstream. Even in minute quantities, bacterial lipopolysaccharide inflames the body and adds to autoimmune inflammation, skin inflammation,. brain inflammation, etc. This exceptionally common condition called SIBO is a 30-foot long chronic intestinal infection that will take you down in health unless you do something about it.

Solution: Should you experience these effects that persist after you initiate the Wheat Belly lifestyle—wheat/grain elimination, net carb limitation, vitamin D restoration, magnesium and iodine supplementation, fish oil, probiotic/fermented foods/prebiotics—stop the probiotic and prebiotics and start learning about SIBO. Efforts to identify and correct your SIBO are the next step, something we consider and discuss at length in the Undoctored program, especially the Undoctored Inner Circle. It would be nice if you could consult with your doctor and he/she would help you get the job done. Sadly, most physicians will have no idea what you are talking about, dismiss your question, tell you that you shouldn’t worry about it, or refer you to a gastroenterologist who performs and upper endoscopy and colonoscopy then declares you healthy because you don’t have stomach ulcers or colon cancer, while nobody addresses the SIBO.

So, more often than not, you are on your own with managing SIBO. Once SIBO is corrected, resume the probiotic, fermented foods, and probiotics to repopulate your colon with desired bacterial species and help beat back SIBO recurrences.

 

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