low-carb diets do not promote optimal health

[gymeejet]

hi everyone,
i realize that i will not be too popular here - LOL. low-carb diets are not healthy ones. we need a certain amount of protein each day - 100 to 200 grams for most people, depending on size. we need our 2 essential fats, omega3 and omega6 - 2 tablespoons of safflower oil, and a couple tablespoons of flax meal should be ample for most people. the rest of your diet should be filled with as much healthy carbs as possible - fruits, vegetables, and whole grains - as much unprocessed as possible.

[Lisa N]

we need a certain amount of protein each day - 100 to 200 grams for most people, depending on size. we need our 2 essential fats, omega3 and omega6 - 2 tablespoons of safflower oil, and a couple tablespoons of flax meal should be ample for most people. the rest of your diet should be filled with as much healthy carbs as possible - fruits, vegetables, and whole grains - as much unprocessed as possible.

Strangely enough, that pretty much describes the ongoing weight loss through maintainance phases of most low carb plans. :)

[gymeejet]

hi lisa, i hope that is true. i know i was aghast at reading "protein power", and using such silliness as deleting carrots from your diet, because they were too high in carbs. i think one thing that we should do is quit thinking in terms of "low-carb", as that places all carbohydrate foods in one bucket. rather, lets think about deleting processed sugars, and "foods" from our diet, that our bodies do not want, and replace them with REAL FOODS, that our bodies appreciate. our bodies are electrochemical systems, and like any system, they run best when they are given the correct requirements.

[Lisa N]

our bodies are electrochemical systems, and like any system, they run best when they are given the correct requirements.

Yes, but unlike machines, different bodies have different requirements to run at peak performance and what some tolerate or even thrive on, others do not. There are also varying medical conditions that make it necessary to eat in a rather unbalanced way for a time to correct an existing imbalance such as insulin resistance. You seem to be rather focused on the earliest phases of Atkins which he fully admitted is unbalanced...for a purpose....and it only lasts a few weeks out of a lifetime of eating.

i was aghast at reading "protein power", and using such silliness as deleting carrots from your diet, because they were too high in carbs.

Why? There are other veggies lower in carbs and glycemic index that can provide the same (or better) amounts of beta carotine as carrots. Also, leaving them out would only be for a short while, not forever. Did you read the entire book?

i think one thing that we should do is quit thinking in terms of "low-carb", as that places all carbohydrate foods in one bucket. rather, lets think about deleting processed sugars, and "foods" from our diet, that our bodies do not want, and replace them with REAL FOODS, that our bodies appreciate.

To the casual reader/observer, this may seem like what low carbers do, when in fact, what most who have chosen to make this a lifestyle are doing is exactly what you are suggesting once they reach their weight loss goals and even while they are working towards their weight loss goals. ALL carbohydrates are not bad, even some higher glycemic carbs in the form of higher GI fruits and higher GI veggies are not bad in moderation for some people (higher GI doesn't work well for diabetics or insulin resistant people). There is plenty of room within a low carb lifestyle for meeting nutritional needs without eating high carb, high GI, highly processed foods. Interestingly enough, those fruits and veggies that are highest in vitamins, minerals and phytochemicals also tend to be those that are lowest in carbs and glycemic index as well. If I choose wisely, I seldom have trouble meeting my vitamin and mineral requirements even on 30 grams of carb per day. I also get 25-30 grams of fiber per day. Imagine what someone on maintainance levels of carbs between 60 and 100 grams per day can do nutrition-wise.

[gymeejet]

hi lisa,
i am referring to people en masse, not those that have particular problems, such as diabetes, or such. it is my belief that none of us differ in our requirements, by all that much, in terms of our genetic make-up. what is more important is our activity levels, and the environment in which we live. for example, on a day that i do vigourous cardio activity, i need a lot of carbs. that is true for everyone. i want to see a marathon runner, etc., who is not intaking a lot of carbs. carbs are by far and away, our best and fastest source of energy. however, on a day that i do weight training, and do not put any large strain on my body's resources, i do not need nearly as many carbohydrates. people are too focused on losing weight. the goal of nutrition is not about weight control, although correct nutrition will stabilize one's weight. the goal of nutrition is to keep the body healthy, and working as it was designed.

when you mention that i am too focused on those early stages, you could be correct. but then we should change the name of it to something other than "low carb", because low-carbohydrate diets are not optimal. let's start naming it the "optimal nutrition" diet. even in my "optimal Nutrition" diet, i would not have a first phase of low carbs. the diet that is best for an individual on day 1000 is also the same one that is best on day 1.

[Dean4Prez]

people are too focused on losing weight. the goal of nutrition is not about weight control, although correct nutrition will stabilize one's weight. the goal of nutrition is to keep the body healthy

So do you think that someone who is 80 lbs overweight will be "healthy" if he/she "stabilizes" at that weight? Or should he/she "focus" on losing the extra pounds?

and working as it was designed.

Designed for what? Spending 8 hours running down and killing a deer with a sharp rock, or spending 8 hours running down and killing a computer worm with a software patch? :) People don't have the same activity levels or metabolisms -- why should they have the same diets?

[gymeejet]

again, the goal of nutrition is to bring the body to its maximum health, not to bring it to some weight level. one needs to focus on the goal of optimum health. if you do that, your weight will stabilize at the point where your body is designed to be. this may not be where you want it to be, by looking in the mirror, but where your body wants to be, based on health. however, it will not be 80 pounds overweight.

if you re-read my post, i think you will find that i already said that people need different requirements, based upon their activity levels, and their environment. the more vigorous activity one does, the more carbohydrates one needs, but you never want to go as low as most of the low-carb diets talk about.

these diets give quick weight losses, which is why they are so popular, and make lots of bucks for those touting them. but the bottom line remains the same - they are not good for you. they allow too much fat, and not enough carbs. the only fat that one needs in their diets are the 2 essential fats. the body can easily manufacture all the others.

like i said in my first post - we need to meet our protein requirements, our 2 essential fats, and then the rest in fruits, vegetables, and whole grains. if people followed this, they would live to their maximum, which is somewhere between 100 and 140, and would keep their 21ish energy peak into their 50's. the standard american diet (SAD) keeps people at less than 50% of their optimums, which is why they age so quickly, live with diseases their last decade, and die in their 60s and 70s (many of them.)

[Lisa N]

i am referring to people en masse, not those that have particular problems, such as diabetes, or such.

Currently in America alone, there are at least 20 million people that have diabetes and at least half as many again who have it and have not yet been diagnosed with it. That's a lot of people and doesn't even begin the address the number of people who are insulin resistant but have not yet developed diabetes. If that's not people en masse, I don't know what is.

i want to see a marathon runner, etc., who is not intaking a lot of carbs.

Have a look through the General Excercise forum. I also read about a doctor who works for the Atkins center, although I can't remember his name, who runs marathons while following a low carb lifestyle. Again, since you're talking about people "en masse", people en masse don't run marathons and certainly don't do so on a daily basis for those that do. For those that do run marathons on a regular basis, they most likely don't need to restrict their carbs as much as an average person who does not participate in such strenuous activities on a regular basis (and I'd wager that includes most of us).


the goal of nutrition is not about weight control, although correct nutrition will stabilize one's weight. the goal of nutrition is to keep the body healthy, and working as it was designed.

While this sounds good in theory, it doesn't seem to work as predicted in practice, when pursued through the recommended food pyramid. Americans have been exercising more and eating less fat and calories over the past couple of decades and yet heart disease, obesity and diabetes are soaring. One can have very good nutrition and still be overweight through various mechanisms besides simply too many calories. You're right in that the goal of nutrition is not weight control, it's about providing the body with optimal nutrients to function at its best but that doesn't address being overweight or give a solution for it.
Being overweight carries with it a great deal more health risks than eating in even an unbalanced manner for a period of time and we've already established that low carbing is not unbalanced if done properly; if provides the needed vitamins, minerals, essential fatty acids and essential proteins that a body needs for good health.


we should change the name of it to something other than "low carb", because low-carbohydrate diets are not optimal.

It's called low carb, because in relation to what the average person eats in a day (300+ grams of carb) it IS low, even at maintainanace levels of 60-100 grams per day. There are a few who would need to consume less carbs than that to maintain and a few who can consume more and maintain, but 60-100 is the average. You also have not established that low carb diets are not optimal. In fact, it seems that we've established that optimal nutrition is quite possible on a level of carb intake even below 60 grams of carb per day.


these diets give quick weight losses, which is why they are so popular, and make lots of bucks for those touting them. but the bottom line remains the same - they are not good for you. they allow too much fat, and not enough carbs.

Again, you have not established that too much fat (how much would that be, by the way, and which types of fat?) is bad for you and that the body has some required level of carbs. In fact, there are no "essential" carbs while there are essential fatty acids, essential amino acids and essential vitamins and minerals. Studies have shown that the body can function just as well using ketones as an energy source as it can using glucose, in some cases (heart muscle, for example), it functions better on ketones than glucose.
Studies have also shown that the amount of fat, even saturated fats, typical to a low carb diet do not have the negative impact on cardiac profiles predicted. In fact, the cardiac profiles of those following a low carb/high fat regime as opposed to a high carb/low fat regime improved more.

the more vigorous activity one does, the more carbohydrates one needs, but you never want to go as low as most of the low-carb diets talk about.

I won't argue with that, but nobody needs 300+ grams of carb per day. Most people even doing vigorous excercise do just fine on less than 100 grams of carb per day. Again, going as low as most of the low carb diets talk about is for the purpose of weight loss while doing moderate exercise and carb levels are increased as the individual can tolerate througout that process until maintainance is reached. Since your profile indicates that you've read Protein Power, I'll assume that you understand the physiological reasons why lowering carbs would be necessary to get to that point. Personally, I never had a problem completing a Curves For Women workout, which combines cardio with weight resistance, on 30 grams of carb per day.


we need to meet our protein requirements, our 2 essential fats, and then the rest in fruits, vegetables, and whole grains. if people followed this, they would live to their maximum, which is somewhere between 100 and 140, and would keep their 21ish energy peak into their 50's.

This has never been shown to be true. In fact, when they interviewed centenarians about their diets and lifestyles, they did not differ greatly from their counterparts who had died at a much younger age and their cardiac profiles were not better, either. It appears that genetics plays a much greater role in how long a person will live than merely diet.
Eating correctly, however, will certainly do much to keep you healthy and energetic longer than eating incorrectly. For me, eating correctly is low carb and involves eating every food that you listed above, although most likely in very different proportions than you do.

[gymeejet]

hi lisa,
i do not know to which studies that you refer, but most studies belong in the circular file, because they have pre-determined outcomes, when said information influences people's behavior. this is tremendously true in the field of nutrition.

one does not have the same energy levels on low-carb diets, as they do when using sugar. sugar is a wonderful nutrient for the body, IN ITS CORRECT PROPORTION. people have abused their bodies through their diets, by eating lots of junk food. low-carb diets have gone too far the other way. it is scary to me that there are people who believe in limiting the amount of carrots they eat, but intaking quite a bit of animal fat is okay. all carbohydrates are not the same. all fats are not the same. we need plenty of sugar along with our essential fats, and protein.

those people living to 100 today, would be those who should be living to 140. and i do not only mean living long, but living healthily. medicine/science allows people to exist longer, not necessarily LIVE longer.

in terms of how much fat, i have stated as a starting point, 2 tablespoons of safflower oil (75% omega6, which is 28 grams of fat, and about 240 calories.) protein (probably at least 100 grams for everyone, with many having higher requirements, because of size and other variables.) the rest should be fresh produce and whole grains, because it is in these foods where we get all our phyto-nutrients, as well as our sugar. but not processed twinkies and such. as much freshly grown produce as possible. this is the biggest mistake that low-carb diets make. they do not differentiate between the carbs. and i laugh whenever i hear that potatoes are to be avoided because they have a high glycemic index. one does not need to worry about glycemic index, but rather the types of carbs they are eating. if one limited oneself to fresh produce and whole grains as one's carbohydrate intake, this would be all one would need to do. you could toss the high glycemic index out the window.

[Lisa N]

most studies belong in the circular file, because they have pre-determined outcomes

Sometimes that is true, especially with the studies that "showed" that fat is bad for us because the discounted the high amounts of carbs that the participants also ate. However...the studies that I referred to regarding the effect of low carb/high fat diets on cardiac profiles don't appear to fit the notion that there was a pre-determined outcome as the researchers readily admitted that they expected exactly the opposite outcomes (worsened cardiac profiles) that they got.

sugar is a wonderful nutrient for the body, IN ITS CORRECT PROPORTION

I disagree. Sugar is not a nutrient at all and has never been defined as such. Furthermore, there is no established "minimum daily requirement" for sugar. Sugar is quite harmful for most people, and I'm not talking about the natural sugars that one finds in fruits and vegetables, but the processed refined sugars and corn syrups found in most processed foods today. Sugar does not provide any essential vitamin, mineral or phytonutrient, nor does it provide any essential fatty acid or amino acid and the WHO has recently recommended that added sugars be kept to a total of 10% of caloric intake per day for all people.


it is scary to me that there are people who believe in limiting the amount of carrots they eat, but intaking quite a bit of animal fat is okay.

Why? On what do you base that the intake of animal fat is bad?


all carbohydrates are not the same. all fats are not the same.

On that we agree. Highly processed, high GI carbs do not provide your body with the same nutrition that unprocessed low GI carb do. Transfats should never be consumed.


in terms of how much fat, i have stated as a starting point, 2 tablespoons of safflower oil (75% omega6, which is 28 grams of fat, and about 240 calories.)

And this was determined how?


this is the biggest mistake that low-carb diets make. they do not differentiate between the carbs. and i laugh whenever i hear that potatoes are to be avoided because they have a high glycemic index. one does not need to worry about glycemic index, but rather the types of carbs they are eating.

I get the impression that you haven't read enough on the subject yet. Low carb diets make a very big distinction between the different carbs. If you disagree that glycemic index matters, you're disagreeing with a growing number of doctors and scientists. GI does matter for a lot of reasons that you seem to be unaware of. Furthermore, glycemic index IS about the types of carbs you are eating; it's how they are distinguished. Those with a high GI raise your blood sugar higher and and faster (diabetic or not) and produce a greater insulin response than those that are lower. If you don't understand the impact that this higher insulin response has on a person, you may wish to go back and re-read those sections in Protein Power that explain it in very good detail.
You might also want to consider reading Atkins For Life because it seems that the two of you are in fairly good agreement about what a healthy diet as a lifestyle for those that do not need to lose weight looks like, other than the fat content. Carrots and potatoes are not banned from a low carb lifestyle forever, depending on the individual's tolerance for them. The only thing that is to be avoided on a permanent basis are processed sugar and highly processed foods that contain added sugars and transfats.

Gymeejet..with all due respect, it seems like what we have here is your opinion that a low carb lifestyle is bad based on what I'm not quite sure since you haven't produced any studies or scientific evidence to back up your opinion thus far and don't seem to have done a great deal of reading on the subject. Furthermore, you don't seem to have a good understanding of what a low carb lifestyle IS other than the initial phases which last a short time out of a lifetime of eating.

[gymeejet]

hi lisa,
irregardless of what topic we could be debating, i could come up with studies showing that both sides are true. through life experience, i have come to realize that most "studies" would be better classified as "advertising". so i do not intend to quote any studies to you. you surely must be aware that there are many in the nutrition field who are vigorously opposed to low-carb diets.

i think you missed the main point about glycemic index. if you are eating good natural foods, you do not need to worry about it, because you will get a mix. it is only when people started eating twinkies and such, that sugar became a problem. if you eat a variety of vegetables, you do not need to worry about the glycemic index. just make sure you are eating plenty of fresh produce.

i have read tons and tons of nutritional articles in my life. but "my opinions" come from putting that into practice, both with myself, and with others whom i help. most of these doctors and researchers have never done this.

there is only one person in the nutritional field that i truly respect. he is truly a pioneer. but to my knowledge, he has never written any books about it. he simply tows boats across the harbor on his 70th or 80th birthday.

a big part of optimal health is consistent exercise. some of that should be vigorous cardiovascular exercise, to stimulate your body, help it delete toxins, etc. you will never get out of 2nd gear on a low-carb diet. if you want to shift to 3rd, 4th, and overdrive, you had better darn well have trained your muscles to store a lot of glycogen, be eating plenty of carbs.

i know on days when i don't have my full pepp, i benefit more by eating a lot of carbs that evening, moreso than i need rest.

if i recall correctly, the brain pretty much runs on sugar, and vigorous exercise demands it.

you asked how i determined the amount of fat - there is no magical formula. i at least doubled the average amount of essential fats that most books were suggesting. the one big nutritional mistake that i made was going non-fat for over a decade. and i still eat no other fat. so i want to get lots of my essential fats. i never felt any ill effects from non-fat during that period. it was only when it started to affect my sleep, that i knew something needed fixing. but i never put any toxics or other crap in me. i never smoked, etc., so my body was probably able to cope with deficient essential fats much better because of it.

you asked about animal fat. all other fats are totally unneeded. most fats carry very little nutrients with them. while natural carbohydrate foods (produce) carry tons and tons of phytonutrients that we will never be able to totally classify.

it may surprise you that there are many people whom i tell that their diets are too weighed down with carbs. there is a large group of people who basically eat very well, in terms of toxics. this is because they are eating lots of natural foods. i was one of these people. many females and many older people fall into this group. the carbs that we are consuming is not the problem. it is the LACK OF PROPER PROTEIN AND ESSENTIAL FATS. the fix is easy. one needs to get the proper protein and essential fats, and the rest fixes itself.

we can not really go to supermarkets and get real food

[gymeejet]

hi lisa,
you are distinguishing carbs strictly by GI. i am distinguishing them by good food, and crap food, which is what low carb diets do not do. to think that a potato and a twinkie are the same, if their GI happens to be the same, is absolutely ludicrous. this is what i am saying. low carb diets remind me of the blind men on the elephant. low-carbers are not seeing the whole picture.

when i am speaking sugars, i am always referring to natural foods. i am sure that at least we agree on all the processed foods are not good for us. most of that is loaded with sugar and animal fat.

[gymeejet]

hi lisa,
just to show you that i can find articles, here is one.

http://www.cnpp.usda.gov/FENR/FENRv13n1/fenrv13n1p87.pdf

among other things, it states the following :

within the body, most dietary sugars are converted to glucose, a major fuel used by all cells and the primary fuel required by brain tissue for normal function. low levels of glucose in the blood will impair the brain and cause permanent mental impairment or worse - coma or death.

so "my opinions" are not just wild dreams i came up with when i was pondering the universe. they have some basis in fact. but until i put into practice any article, including this one, it had better pass the "gymeejet test" - whereby i test it on me and other people. it has been encouraging to me that whenever i get a result from something, most other people also get the same results, which allows me a greater confidence level that my body is behaving in the same fashion as the overwhelming majority.

in strenuous exercise, nothing can take the place of sugar. without it, you will do a lot more dropping than shopping - LOL.

again, sugar/carbs are important and are our best source of creating energy to do all the things our bodies do, both internally, and externally. SUGAR IS A WONDERFUL THING, in the correct amounts. we have evolved in tandem with all the other living things on this planet, and we had better darn well eat many of the foods that have evolved along with us, instead of the crap that we have manufactured in the past 100 years.

sugar is not bad - however many foods containing sugar are bad. fat is not bad - however many foods containing fat are bad. protein is not bad - however many foods containing protein are bad. iron is important. too much iron is toxic. etc. etc. etc.

once again, the correct amount of protein and essential fats are needed for most of our anabolic functions, and the good carbs for our catabolic functions.

[cc48510]

For starters, noone has ever shown Monounsaturated Fats to be bad for you. So, I don't see any reason they should be restricted. In fact, studies have shown Monounsaturates to be good for Cholesterol. There may be a minimum intake of Omega-3s, but there should be no maximum [within reason.] Omega-3s are known to not only improve Cholesterol, but may also improve Triglycerides. Based on the above, a diet high in Monounsaturates and Omega-3s would be beneficial for the heart.

As for animal fats, Stearic Acid (primary saturated fat in Beef) has been shown to have little negative effect on Cholesterol. In fact, Beef [and Lard] are slightly higher in Monounsaturates than Saturates. Some leaner meats perform even better. Chicken and Pork are higher in Unsaturates relative to Saturates than Beef. Some fish are high in Monounsaturates, and others high in Omega-3s, but very low in Saturates. Eggs are actually relatively low in Saturated Fat. The main complaint most nutritionists have against them is their Cholesterol content. Yet, no study has proven a direct link between dietary and blood cholesterol.

As for nutrients, Beef and it juices are a particularly rich source of Potassium and B Vitamins (B6 and B12). In fact, without animal products (meat or dairy) it is very difficult, if not virtually impossible to get you RDA of B12. Pork and some lean meats are high in other vitamins and minerals.

You say we should eat whole grains because of their Nutrient content. Whole Wheat Bread has less than 5% of the vitamins/minerals it does contain (except Sodium.) Whole Grain bread is missing 4 Vitamins and Minerals entirely...Pork is missing only 2. Pork meets or exceeds the levels [found in Whole Grain Bread] of 12 vitamins. That is almost all of them. In addition, it has almost 5 times the Potassium, and less than one-third of the sodium of Whole Grain Bread. A serving of Steak has more vitamins and minerals than a serving of Whole Grain bread. About the only major nutrient they have meat beat on is Fiber (meat has no fiber.) But, compared to other lower-carb produce (Green veggies)...Whole grain bread is actually rather low in fiber. Bran is the only whole grain that even begins to compete with green vegetables on fiber content (realtive to carbs/calories). Shrimp is high in Vitamin D...Milk has to have it added. Most vegetables and grains have NO Vitamin D.

My point is that Whole Grains [and Tubers] have little nutritional value. I do not consider potatoes to be vegetables. They are botanically very disimilar to lower-glycemic, higher-fiber*, higher-nutrient* leafy vegetables. A Tuber (such as a potato) holds the plants excess starch (almost always super high GI) or sugar that a plant produces. Tubers contain only a few nutrients. I'll admit, the few nutrients they contain are off the scales. A potato has 1/4 your RDA of Vitamin C, but is it really the best way to get your Vitamin C ??? Brocolli is much higher (near 100%). Most fruits have just as much Vitamin C and Potassium...plus they also usually contain Vitamin A. A carrot has 343% of your Vitamin A, but is low in all other Vitamins and Minerals. One carrot is actually not too bad carb-wise at about 4g Net Carbs. But, it would take alot of them [and alot of carbs] to get your other vitamins.

I have no problem eating lots of fruits and vegetables...in fact, I already eat well in excess of USDA/AHA recomendations [on Atkins.] My point is that not all fruits and vegetables are as good for you as others and animal products is not always a bad thing. In fact, dairy is a rich source of Calcium. Choose vegetables that are high in fiber and vitamins/minerals, eat reasonable amounts of animal products (especially fish), and limit your consumption of grains and tubers and you will be healthy.

[gymeejet]

hi cc,
with respect to vegetables, i say eat them all, for the most part. we do not need them for their vitamin c, beta carotene, vitamin e, etc., because we can get them in pill form. but there are literally tens of thousands of chemicals that make up an apple or a potato. the health food industry thrives on it. a year doesn't go by when some phytonutrient, such as lycopene, etc. isn't touted as the world's greatest since sliced bread - LOL. so i am happy to hear that you eat lots of them.

with regards to fat, our 2 essentials are the only fats that our body can not produce. most foods high in fat, are low in nutrients, with respect to the number of calories they contain.

however, i did not say that saturated fat or mono fat was bad for you, in the sense that it is toxic. the body does use it. while most of it is stored, and used for energy, some of it is used for building processes. there is just no need to intake it, since none of us is gonna run out of fat. we will die long before that happens - LOL. and the great majority of us are eating way more than our body needs.

i won't get in the meat debate with you, other than to say that i think it is one of the worst things that our society eats.

my appearance here is based on reaching one's optimal health. the outline i have given will allow you to do that. a low carb diet will not. most of the low-carbers have this irrational hatred of sugar, as the scapegoat for all eating disorders. i have often said that sugar is the most abused substance in america. it is still also one of the most important things our bodies need, IN ITS CORRECT PROPORTION. the low-carbers limit it too much. you have swung the pendulum too far. at some point, perhaps they will find the middle of the swing, and intake a more healthy amount.

thanks for your input.

[tamarian]

i won't get in the meat debate with you, other than to say that i think it is one of the worst things that our society eats.

my appearance here is based on reaching one's optimal health. the outline i have given will allow you to do that.

How can one reach optimal health without meat? De-evolve back?

I respect your religious beliefs, but they should be acknowledged as such, opinions and religious bias.

If you have any logical arguments, please feel free to share. It's been several posts so far, and all with vague titles such as "optimal health, healthy" etc. Which obviously means what you consider healthy. That's fine, but it's not healthy, it's just what you think is healthy.

Would be nice if you read a bit before to educate yourself, before attempting to inform others. I hope you don't get offended, and this is not meant as an insult, but people should read some, before starting to debate issues they haven't read, and just take on personal beliefs.

Wa'il

[gymeejet]

hi tamarian,
i am christian. but i stopped eating meat, solely for nutritional reasons. now at this point, i would not revert for both nutritional and moral reasons, but the moral did not develop until long after i stopped for nutritional reasons.

however, i would not call it religious. there are many proclaimed atheists who also feel the same away about taking another animal's life. i would simply label it as "believing another life is as special to that animal as mine is to me".

i know my mom had extreme worries when i stopped eating meat. she had been taught that it was necessary for correct protein (i wonder if the meat lobby had anything to do with that - LOL). well it has been 28 years without meat, and while i am 48, i still can perform at my peak energy levels.

thanks for your input.

[Frederick]

Hi Gymeejet,

I think it’s great for anyone to show compassion for all living species on Earth. Truly, I think the world would be a far better place for everyone if we all held such compassion equally for all under the Sun.

However, that is a philosophical issue (by the way, loved Animal Liberation, though it didn’t sway me to give up meat), and not pragmatic nutritional one. I appreciate that while you feel it is optimal in regards to aggregate values in your life to abstain from eating animal flesh, this in no means extends to optimal nutrition per se. Refraining from animal sustenance based on religious, philosophical, or even palate preference has absolutely no bearing on the values of nutrition.

Now, as you saliently observed earlier, there are countless studies—both from the beef and vegan cliques—which substantially bolster each respective side of the issue. All other considerations aside, in my view, I’d have to assert that the newest research has swayed the argument in favor that eating animal products would be more conducive to optimal health than abstaining from it.

I agree that it would be pointless to offer you the tons articles and research reports which validates the veracity of my view, which you’ve probably already read; and, equally, it would be futile for you to offer studies in return, since I’ve no doubt read them at one time or another. Nonetheless, I will offer this. First, eating animal products was essential to our brains evolution—there is no dispute in the scientific community that if our ancestors had not become carnivorous, our brain capacity not be anywhere near what it is today. Secondly, vitamin b12, an essential nutrient is ONLY found in animal products (I mean absorbable b12, and not the unusable ones in seaweed). Finally, there have been countless documented cases of “failure to thrive” for many who have adopted Vegan diets over a period of time; but, there has never been such a case for those who eat primarily animal products.

I’m glad you are thriving while keeping to an eating regimen consistent not only with your personal views on nutrition but also on your wider philosophical views. However, respectfully, in my view, your assertions that animal products are less than optimal should be qualified by your philosophical views more so than pure nutritional concerns. I think in recent years, the science of this debate is becoming clearer, and will be even more so until eventually the murky pools of this issue can’t be denied by any rational person.

With kindest regards,

Frederick

[mnbooger]

Hi Gymeejet,
I was wondering if you read the whole article that you provided a link for.
In the paragraph imediately following the coma or death line that you quoted, they found that there was no direct correlation between sucrose and carb consumption and the risk for diabetes. However, there is a link between high glycemic loads and diets high in refined grains and the risk for diabetes. So GI does matter, coming from the article you provided.
Most of the article seems to defend sugar. But, when I read stuff like "there is no evidence that refined sugars such as sucrose behave any differently from other types of simple carbohydrates." I don't get their message that sugar is good. I get the message that simple carbs and sugar have the same effect regardless of where they come from. And from my experience, sugar is bad for me.

[Lisa N]

you asked about animal fat. all other fats are totally unneeded.

Unneeded for what? According to what I've read, saturated fats increase the pattern A LDL particles and decrease the pattern B LDL particles which decreases risk for cardiovascular disease.
Dietary fat is also needed for calcium absorption.
Conjugated Linoleic Acid can only be obtained through intake of ruminant products (beef fat, full-fat cheese, full-fat milk).
Fat is one of the body's primary energy sources.


within the body, most dietary sugars are converted to glucose, a major fuel used by all cells and the primary fuel required by brain tissue for normal function. low levels of glucose in the blood will impair the brain and cause permanent mental impairment or worse - coma or death.

First of all, the brain can and does function quite well on ketones as an energy source. Secondly, the body maintains blood glucose within a certain range in non-diabetic individuals (70-110), either through converting carbohydrates to glucose or through gluconeogenesis if carbohydrates are unavailable. It is only in diabetic individuals where blood glucose can fall to the levels that would induce coma or death.


i want to see a marathon runner, etc., who is not intaking a lot of carbs. carbs are by far and away, our best and fastest source of energy.

I've read 2 studies recently where they tested this theory. Results? In a study of trained male and female runners, those with 44% of their calories coming from fat increased their endurance time by up to 14% over the low fat group (13% of calories from fat). In another study of cyclists, those with up to 70% of their caloric intake from fat nearly doubled their resistance to fatigue during prolonged moderate intensity cycling.

you are distinguishing carbs strictly by GI. i am distinguishing them by good food, and crap food, which is what low carb diets do not do. to think that a potato and a twinkie are the same, if their GI happens to be the same, is absolutely ludicrous.

low carb does distinguish between good food and crap food (hint...you won't find anyone on low carb eating crap food as you call it). As for the difference in GI between the potato and the twinkie, the twinkie is actually lower as would be a Snickers bar, but both of those are also nutritionally empty and neither are part of a low carb program.

one does not need to worry about glycemic index, but rather the types of carbs they are eating. if one limited oneself to fresh produce and whole grains as one's carbohydrate intake, this would be all one would need to do. you could toss the high glycemic index out the window.

I see. So it doesn't matter how many or what types of high glycemic grains and veggies you consume as long as they are fresh and natural? Studies (yes, I know...you don't care about studies) have shown that diets that contain a lot of high GI foods, and the source didn't matter; when it comes to GI, your body doesn't care if it's a Twinkie or a potato, lead to lower HDL which increases risk for cardiovascular disease.
You can throw the glycemic index out the window if you like, but I'll continue to use it as a basis for how good or not good any food is for me as well as the vitamin, mineral and phytonutrient content. Once again, those that are highest in all these categories also tend to be the lowest in carbs and lowest on the glycemic index, so I win on all fronts. :)

i know my mom had extreme worries when i stopped eating meat. she had been taught that it was necessary for correct protein

And she was right to be concerned since animal protein is the only source of complete essential amino acids. Without using animal protein as your source of essential amino acids, most people have a tough time getting enough of them.

in terms of how much fat, i have stated as a starting point, 2 tablespoons of safflower oil (75% omega6, which is 28 grams of fat, and about 240 calories.) protein (probably at least 100 grams for everyone, with many having higher requirements, because of size and other variables.) the rest should be fresh produce and whole grains, because it is in these foods where we get all our phyto-nutrients, as well as our sugar.

Let's see....that's a total of 640 calories from fat and protein. If I'm shooting for about 1,600 calories total per day, that means that the other 960 have to come from carbs. That's 240 grams of carb per day. Can we say "Diabetic developing complications and needing to go on insulin therapy because blood sugars are shooting into the atmosphere"? Sorry...tried it that way (ala the ADA high carb/low fat/low protein diet) and wound up with my blood pressure sky high and my blood sugars out of control. No, thanks. :p I'd rather eat like this and have normal blood pressure, normal blood sugar, no need for medications and picture-perfect blood work.

[Lisa N]

i have read tons and tons of nutritional articles in my life. but "my opinions" come from putting that into practice, both with myself, and with others whom i help. most of these doctors and researchers have never done this.

Let's see. Dr. Atkins not only used his nutritional approach to treat his patients, he followed it himself. Same for Drs. Sears (The Zone), Bernstein (Dr. Bernstein's Diabetes Solution), Eades (Protein Power), Heller (Carbohydrate Addict's Diet) and Schwarzbein (The Schwarzbein Principle). Their experience in themselves and in their patients directly contradicts yours.
Furthermore, since you base your opinions on what you have put into practice, how are you then qualified in any way to give an opinion on a low carb diet since you yourself said that you have never tried it nor do you ever intend to?
At least I have the benefit of experience on both sides of the fence and in comparing the two, feel that this is far better for my health than the high carb/low fat way. My doctor and my blood studies agree. :)

[gymeejet]

hi frederick,
just to reiterate one point, that i am not sure you understood. i stopped eating meat SOLELY for nutritional reasons. i was interjecting my philosophy because the one post hinted that my reasons were not of a nutritional nature.

and though i am extremely disciplined with my diet, i do also take pills twice a day. while i can not be sure, i feel that extra supplies of some nutrients may be important for optimal health. at worse, i have more expensive urine than average - LOL.

whether i would be getting enough b12 without meat is not known, since i think for most of my adult life, i have taken supplements. for example, i take about 3 grams of C, another 3 of bio-flavonoids, full b complex, multi-mineral, and a few others.

thanks for your input.

[gymeejet]

hi mnbooger,
somehow my message or point about GI is not sinking in. perhaps it is my poor explanation. let me try again.

if your car needs 85 octane to run efficiently, and all the pumps at your station meet that requirement, then octane is not an issue for you.

likewise, if you eat a good natural foods diet, full of fresh produce, the glycemic index of your foods in your diet will not cause the average person any problem. it is only when processed sugar foods became a staple of the american diet, and thusly the extreme abuse of sugar, did sugar become a problem.

i skimmed through parts of the article, but did not read it in complete detail.

[FionaMcB]

i have read tons and tons of nutritional articles in my life. but "my opinions" come from putting that into practice, both with myself, and with others whom i help. most of these doctors and researchers have never done this.

gymeejet, I'm sure it would be instructive to meet some of those "others whom i help." Hear what they have to say about your medical and dietary advice.

[gymeejet]

hi lisa,
i have also earlier mentioned taking flax for omega3, and i said at least 100 grams of protein. basically finding out how much protein and essential fats that you need, and then the rest as good carbs.

the body does try to burn fat whenever possible, during exercise, simply because it has a very limited supply of glycogen. moderate intensity bicycling would be one such exercise where fat may be used for energy, especially if we are talking about a somewhat consistent routine (i.e. flat land, as say opposed to uphill, downhill, uphill, downhill).

as you know, i do not buy into studies anywhere near as much as you do. i use my life experience, and others that i know, because at least with these results, i know they can be trusted to be accurate.

as far as other doctors putting their plans into action, that is good. might i ask what they have accomplished, or able to do ?

i am 48. people are amazed at how young i look, and more importantly, the energy level that i have. i know of no one, at any age, who can exercise at my level of intensity and endurance. i do not expect you to believe me. but for sake of argument, let us just assume that this is true. would you not wonder how a 48-year old can outlast a 21-year old ? do sears, and atkins, and the rest make such claims. when i went in to have my special blood tests done, the doctor had me come in again to re-do my heart electrical tests. he said he does many professional soccer players, and had never seen a heart as strong as mine.

i do a lot of high-intensity training. without sugar, you just can not do it. fat is for prolonged, slower types of activity. but vigorous exercise requires sugar. and you will not get to your highest level of fitness and health without doing some high intensity workouts.

i have absolutely no doubts that my original advice will have the last word. it leads to "optimal health". and i do not intend to worry about the GI of the potatoes and carrots that i eat.

[gymeejet]

hi lisa,
http://www.nutricia.com.my/facts_lactose.htm

above article stresses the need for lactose for calcium absorption. i have no doubts it was funded by the dairy industry. i suspect that someday you will not be so willing to believe in "studies". i can find you some study supporting just about anything you say. heck, there is a whole society out there, who still believes that the earth is flat, and has studies proving it - LOL.

i do not consider my diet to be low-fat. i now get an overabundace of essential fats, based upon any reading. so if fat is indeed needed for calcium absorption, that is fine with me. i may take as much as 4 tablespoons of safflower oil each day, and eat a half cup of flax meal 5 days out of 7. once again, saturated fat is not needed in one's diet. our body will manufacture whatever we need.

[tamarian]

i have absolutely no doubts that my original advice will have the last word. it leads to "optimal health". and i do not intend to worry about the GI of the potatoes and carrots that i eat.

I have no doubt that "optimal health" is the right way to go. Unfortunately, I don't think you know what that means :) Just judging by how you view it, and how you base it not on reason but on faith.

You might look like a knock out young lady at 48, but that makes you no different than my old roomate Bob, A 2 pack smoker, 6-pack drinker, and a baby face, healthy, eats all junk. That doesn't mean much in the genetic pool.

By religion, you misunderstood that to mean "organized" religion, doesn't have to be so. Many members of organized religions have their own superstitions. I would use the word philosophy, but it won't apply in this case, as philosophy implies some form of deduction and reasoning.

It may seem reasonable to you that people should ignore scientific studies and imperical evidence, and follow some anonymous poster named gymeejet who found a new buzz word for them like "optimal health". But it's not :) So, feel free to keep ignoring science, nutrition and biochemistry, but don't feel bad if your valuable advice gets ignored as well.

Wa'il

[gymeejet]

hi tamarian,
i am a full believer in empirical knowledge. what we read is all third-party. we have no idea whether it is true or not. i "empirically" put theories to work. i have first-hand empirical knowledge of what i say. i guess i should be called thomas - LOL. btw, i am a male. i did not intend to say that i was a knockout, but just young looking. but again, the activity/energy of youth is what is of main importance.

you seem to think that your side has all the scientific evidence. actually, my side probably has tons more. but i am not here to argue studies supporting low carbs versus studies not suppoirting low carbs. but rather, to inject some good advice from someone who EMPIRICALLY practices it, and has had tremendous results from it - moreso than i think all of your low-carb doctors can claim.

[tamarian]

you seem to think that your side has all the scientific evidence. actually, my side probably has tons more

Umm, so why are you afraid to show them? We've gone through the effort to publish all these scientific studies on the website and in the studies forum. There's nothing to hide.

Why would you "refrain" from showing such evidence? Should the world just follow you because you say you're healthy? Even if I believe all the great health you describe for yourself, how imperical is one's personal account? Even if you submit personal photos and medical records, that's one person. An evidence of one person is not scientific, and mathematically weak. Otherwise, I'd recommend everyone follow my old roomate Bob's diet, of 2-packs a day, and 6 bears a day for "optimal health". At least I've seen Bob. ;)

Wa'il

[gymeejet]

do you recall my mentioning of the 1 person in nutrition that i respect ? in the 50's, he was considered a kook by the medical field. exercise was bad for you, so the doctors told us. and studies by the gross to prove it. Jack LaLaane just kept preaching and doing, and now look who has crow on their faces. If I want to know about something, i go to someone who does it, not someone who writes about it.

i loved that quote by yul brynner in the king and i that went something like positively knowing, and then not so sure. i am sure one of you can recite it exactly. but the point is how knowledge that we are so sure has been proven, turns out to be wrong. use studies, but do not let studies use you.

[tamarian]

do you recall my mentioning of the 1 person in nutrition that i respect ? in the 50's, he was considered a kook by the medical field. exercise was bad for you, so the doctors told us. and studies by the gross to prove it. Jack LaLaane just kept preaching and doing, and now look who has crow on their faces. If I want to know about something, i go to someone who does it, not someone who writes about it.

i loved that quote by yul brynner in the king and i that went something like positively knowing, and then not so sure. i am sure one of you can recite it exactly. but the point is how knowledge that we are so sure has been proven, turns out to be wrong. use studies, but do not let studies use you.

Actually, exercise is good for you, and I'm not sure why science is bad? But I thought you said you had ton of scientific studies to prove your point. Just read your previous post, just before the last one.

However, I won't pressure you further, as I said, I realise this is more of a superstition/religion to you, and science is not in the picture as far as you're concerned.

I don't agree with you, but I won't disrespect your beliefs, you are entitled to that.

Wa'il

[gymeejet]

tamarian,
i gave you 2 studies that would probably be against your beliefs, as a low-carber. i could find you tons - you are still in the minority. but i have already told you guys that i am not into studies, and i have no desire to argue one man's studies versus another's.

and i do not think that science is bad. i have a major in computer science, and a very scientific mind. but i have enough wisdom to know that most studies belong in the circular file. perhaps you may find this out sometime. perhaps you do not fully understand the "scientific method". it involves formulating a theory, gathering empirical facts or data, and then re-formulating the theory to match the given results. everything i say has been put to practice in exactly this way. so please refrain from the ludicrous comments about me not being scientific, and using superstitions. it only serves to make you look biased.

and i have tested this out on other people, like i have already mentioned, very specifically to eliminate the possibility that for some reason my body is different. i have already stated that i have found that my body seems to act the same as everyone else's. so this gives me greater confidence that what i observe in myself is also true for a great number of people. and i do not need to wonder whether my data is accurate, or who is paying to have my study done.

and i do not have much respect for doctors with regards to nutrition and health. just as with jack lalaane, they are very often wrong. the doctors thought that jack was gonna have a heart attack and worse, by doing all that useless exercise.

you guys are not getting enough carbs for optimum health.

it is my belief that many of you are willing to rationalize anything away, if it means loss of weight.

[gymeejet]

tamarian,
you have been the only poster who has been openly attacking of me. i now notice that you are also the forum founder. this leads me to believe that you do not want anyone here to argue against the low carb diets that you believe in. so i will leave - i do not believe in staying where i am not wanted.

i gave you guys some advice. perhaps it may have some good results in the future with one of you. in any case, good bye, and i wish all of you the very healthiest.

[Lisa N]

above article stresses the need for lactose for calcium absorption.

Yes. How convenient that all dairy products contain lactose. It also stresses that Vitamin D is needed for calcium absorption. Vitamin D is a fat soluble vitamin and nowhere in the article does it say that you need only lactose and vitamin D.

i may take as much as 4 tablespoons of safflower oil each day, and eat a half cup of flax meal 5 days out of 7

Wait...this is about double what you started out recommending at the beginning of the thread. What you started out recommending would be about 13% fat on an 1,800 calorie diet and most would need more calories than that to maintain making the fat percentage even lower, especially if they were doing the type of strenuous exercise that you are prescribing. That's a very low fat diet by any standards.
You might also want to watch that Safflower oil since it's high in Omega 6 and most people already get too much in their diets from other sources. The best ratio of Omega 3:6 is 4:1. Also...where are you getting your Omega 9 fats from and your CLA?

as far as other doctors putting their plans into action, that is good. might i ask what they have accomplished, or able to do ?

Reversal of heart disease, normalization of blood sugars in diabetics, many of them without medications and helping hundreds of thousands of people achieve weight loss without starvation and loss of muscle mass and keep it off. In their experience, high levels of carbs combined with low levels of fats lead to high LDL and triglycerides along with low HDL, exactly the opposite of what is desired.


i do a lot of high-intensity training. without sugar, you just can not do it. fat is for prolonged, slower types of activity.

How do you know since you've never tried it? You also ignored the other study that I posted regarding runners and incresing their endurance time with a higher percentage of their calories (and therefore decreasing the amount of calories from carbs). Running IS a high intensity exercise.


You're also totally missing the point of GI. When it comes to GI, if two foods (let's use the potato and Twinkie example) have identical GI, your body will respond exactly the same to each of them and doesn't care what the source of the sugar is. As far as glycemic index is concerned, your body doesn't care if the sugar comes from a potato or a Twinkie, it will respond with a rise in blood sugar along with an equal response of insulin production to each of them. Now, we know that as far as nutrients (and by this I mean vitamins, minerals and fiber), the potato is marginally better, but as far as how your body will respond to the sugars in them, there is no difference.

[tamarian]

this leads me to believe that you do not want anyone here to argue against the low carb diets that you believe in. so i will leave - i do not believe in staying where i am not wanted.

LOL, aren't you arguing already? Did I stop you? I'm just trying to find out if you have any grounds to your claims.

Sorry if debate offends you, but that's to be expected when when you make such outlandish claims. :)

Wa'il

[tamarian]

tamarian,
i gave you 2 studies that would probably be against your beliefs, as a low-carber. i could find you tons - you are still in the minority.

You provided two links to opinion pieces, with no scientific studies.

There's a difference. :) And I won't hold my breath to see any of those tons you say you've read, if they're just article and personal advice..

I suspect your information is quite misguided, if you think vegetarians are the majority, but so is the rest of your plan.

Wa'il

[gymeejet]

tamarian,
you have shown an attitude towards me with every one of your posts. you continually misqote me. by being in the minority, i meant by being a low-carber. i am sure that was obvious to everyone else reading. by continually attempting to make me look superstitious, when i am not, etc. etc. lisa, on the other hand, never does that. she counters my points with points of her own. as the forum founder, you have shown poor taste.

[gymeejet]

lisa,
i have truly enjoyed your posts. you have never resorted to going after me personally, but instead gave good arguments for your beliefs. so let me take the time to answer your questions.

i try to get people to eat better. i used 2 tablespoons of safflower and some flax meal as starting points. i would be thrilled to death if people did this much. it would at least give them enough essential fats, according to anything i have read. it was not meant to define exact dosages, or say what i do personally.

we do differ on the amount of fat needed. other than essential fats, i do not believe that fat is needed in the diets. you will also never hear me speak about percentages of the 3 main food groups. what you will hear me say is get enough protein, and enough essential fats. then feed your body with natural carbs. not only will the percentages vary with different people, but more importantly, it will vary on a day to day basis, for one person. the level of proteins and essentials does not vary nearly so much with our activity levels, as does our carbohydrate needs.

so on a personal note, this is what i do. i make sure i meet my protein and essential needs each day. whatever else i eat during the day, to keep me satiated, is with good natural foods, which for the most part, is highly carb oriented.

while you tend to concentrate on the percentage of fat, i am concentrating on grams of essential fat. this i know is needed, by first-hand empirical knowledge.

i do not believe there have been any tests done with my suggestions. i do not disagree with you in regards to the low-fat, high carb diets that the masses have been on. but the problem has not been a lack of fat, but rather a lack of ESSENTIAL FATS. and of course, a lack of protein, in many of these cases.

from what i have read, a starting point for people in most climates is 2 omega6 to 1 omega3. the colder the climate, it has been found, even with fish and plants, that they contain a higher omega3 concentration, than does their warmer counterparts.

i am not convinced that people's intake of omega6 is all that beneficial to them, since a lot of it comes from processed foods. which can mean that what might have started out as a healthy omega6 source, because of heat or other processing, has been destroyed. so while the body may be able to use these fats for energy sources, i try to make sure that they use the safflower and flax, without processing, so i know that they are at least getting a good supply of good essential fat.

omega9 is not needed in the diet. the body can make it. i am not sure that conjugated la is needed. according to what i have read, any omega6 we actually need is derived from linoleic acid. my blood tests test for linoleic 18:2, gamma linolenic 18:3, eicosadienoic 20:2, dihomogamma linolenic 20:3, arachidonic 20:4, docosadienoic 22:2, docosatetraenoic 22:4 (omega6 family). it tests for alpha linolenic 18:3, eicosapentaenoic 20:5, docosapentaenoic 22:5, and docosahexaenoic 22:6 (omega3 family). it also tests for omega 9 and a bunch of saturated as well as odd chain fats. these results do show that my body makes omega9.

i was not missing your point about GI. what i am saying is that make yourself a salad with 15 different vegetables, and your GI will not be anywhere nearly so high as it is when eating twinkies and oreos. in otherwards, your GI will not be a problem when you are eating a host of natural foods.

i do know what it feels like when i have not eaten enough carbs, so i do not intend to make that an actual way of eating. i would first have to kiss all my cardio good-bye, because my body will just laugh at me, if i try to do vigorous cardio without enough carbs.

i will just caution you once again concerning studies. it is all 3rd hand information to us. i know that much of it is pre-ordained. please just use caution if you are allowing studies to dictate your actions, especially when it is important, such as your health and well-being.

i am not familiar with either the bicycling or running study. i am sure we could find "studies" supporting the opposite, with regards to runners and bicyclists. the dairy article that i showed you was just an example. believe me, they have all kinds of scientific studies showing how important milk products are - because they have something they want to sell you.

[tamarian]

tamarian,
you have shown an attitude towards me with every one of your posts. you continually misqote me. by being in the minority, i meant by being a low-carber.

You miss the point completely. You're acting like you're the majority, by recommending vegetable protein and 2 spoons of vegetable oil as "optimal health", and you think we're the minority here? Seriously?

I'm afraid I didn't misquote you, just zeroed in on your inconsistency. Too bad you keep avoiding showing your cllaims of tons of proof.


by continually attempting to make me look superstitious, when i am not, etc. etc. lisa, on the other hand, never does that. she counters my points with points of her own. as the forum founder, you have shown poor taste.

I haven't made you into anything, you're doing that on your own. Make health claims, and avoid having to support them, except through repetition, and self aggrandising authority.

If it make it easier for you that I exit the debate because I'm a forum founder, I'll gladly do that. But this excuse isn't just a poor taste on your part, it's a very cheap shot. :(

Wa'il

[gymeejet]

tamarian, it would be best for us not to communicate any more. never did i say i was in the majority. i said that low-carbers are in the minority, when compared to non-low-carbers. god knows, i would hate to be in the current majority - the standard american diet is atrocious. i do find it interesting that you always misunderstand me, while lisa never misunderstands me. you continually make mis-interpretations. as i do not want to continue to correct your interpretations of my statements, i have decided just not to respond to any of your posts. if you decide to delete me, that is your option.

[Quest]

I just stumbled on this thread. It seems that Gymmejet has found a nutrition and exercise plan that works really well for him. If I read correctly he has a Jack LaLane type physique and stamina level. I'm impressed someone can do that on a vegetarian diet.

I'm also 48 and female. I tried for many years to follow a carb-intensive, low meat, low fat diet. My husband, who is very athletic, stayed thin on this diet and seems to be in good health (a bit thin, I think, at 6'2" and 170 pounds). I gained weight steadily over the years. When I cut back portions, I was hungry and could not stay on the plan. With Atkins, however, I have lost 26 pounds in three months. This has been wonderful for me. I am not hungry. I eat vegetables every day, but very little fruit or grain.

But I would not insist that my husband, or anyone else, follow my diet plan. We each have to find what works.

[wsgts]

I guess I am kind of like you. Evangilist (non-religious) for what I believe

I have had success with the Atkins approach with both my diabetes and my weight. I am looking forward to weigh in Friday, because I am pretty sure I am going to be down a good deal more (I go to the doctor's office every Friday to use their scale).

Since I have had success here, also with my mountain bike, running 9 miles 3 days a week, I start to think that my way is the only proper way for people "en masse" as you and Lisa put it.

The reality though, is that everyone is different. You would not do well on my eating plan, nor would I do well on yours (I have tried yours). We are kind of like those silly dietitians that basically say "my way is the only way", and "anything other than my way is ______" (unhealthy, dangerous, etc, etc, etc).

I am a firm believer in doing what works, and not doing what doesn't work. Carby diets are dangerous for some people (diabetics). Other people on unbothered by them (my wife). I gain weight on high carb low-fat, with a dietitian help mind you, and lose weight with optimum health on low-carb any percentage of fat I like diet.

Interesting question though: if you eat an apple for a snack, how long before you are hungry again (say for next meal or snack)?

Me: 15 minutes
Wife: 3 hours

I think that has something to do with it.

Good luck, don't expect to change any minds around here though,

wsgts

[tamarian]

i have decided just not to respond to any of your posts. if you decide to delete me, that is your option.

No, I will not delete you, and never thought to do so. You are very polite and civil, and have not violated our forum rules. You're not a low-carber, and this war zone area is designated for such discussion, so you're very welcome here.

It's just my nature to demand proof, and I can be very pushy looking for it. But I'll gladly withdraw from the discussion :)

Wa'il

[Lisa N]

we do differ on the amount of fat needed. other than essential fats, i do not believe that fat is needed in the diets.

Yes, we do and I've already laid out my reasons why I disagree so I won't repeat them. Besides being a necessary component of diet, it just plain makes foods taste good and provides satiety. With the amount of carbs in your diet, you're wise to keep your fats to a minimum; high carb/high fat is a deadly mix. However...for those of us who find it necessary to restrict carbs (and there are many of us here) because of a whole list of medical conditions such as PCOS, hypothyroid, hypoglycemia, diabetes and insulin resistance (for all of which restricting carbs is recommended treatment), calories need to come from somewhere and you can only eat so much protein. If you did any amount of reading here on the forum, you'd find that the majority of us here are quite aware of essential fatty acid requirements and strive to achieve them. You'll see quite a few posts about fish oil supplements and flax, either ground or as oil as well as the use of various other oils. Considering the amount of protein from animal sources that most of us eat, it's more important to focus on getting enough Omega 3 than omega 6 as we're already getting plenty. As for higher amounts of fat, they do not have a negative impact on cardiovascular health when eaten in combination with a low carb, low GI diet. In fact, the recent studies have shown that cardiovascular profiles actually improve under these conditions.

while you tend to concentrate on the percentage of fat, i am concentrating on grams of essential fat.

Actually, I don't concentrate on the percentage of fat at all other than to make sure that I get enough of what I need. I was merely pointing out to you that what you are recommending would be considered a very low fat diet by any standard and most of us have been there/done that.


i do know what it feels like when i have not eaten enough carbs

You know what it feels like for a body that is used to getting its main energy source from glucose to run short of it. It takes 3-5 days for your body to deplete its glycogen stores and switch from being a primarily glucose burning system to a ketone burning one and yes, you will likely not feel up to par while this happens. However...this is the energy source that our bodies were adapted to prior to organized agriculture; humans existed and even thrived primarily on animal protein and fats. Before the advent of agriculture, the only carbs that you got were that which you could find and gather and in temperate climates, they were not available for a good part of the year. In the case of strenuous exercise, it may take up to 2 weeks for your body to fully adapt to using ketones as an energy source, but when it does most find that their performance is not diminished (see the post from wsgts above).


i do not disagree with you in regards to the low-fat, high carb diets that the masses have been on. but the problem has not been a lack of fat, but rather a lack of ESSENTIAL FATS. and of course, a lack of protein, in many of these cases.

I couldn't disagree more. Most Americans at least are not lacking in protein OR fat, although they probably get way too much Omega 6 and not enough Omega 3. That in an of itself is not enough to explain the current obesity, diabetes and heart disease epidemics currently occurring. The problem in many (not all) cases is that people are eating way too many carbs and the wrong types when they do in trying to follow the food pyramid (heavy on the grains, light on the protein and fats).

i will just caution you once again concerning studies. it is all 3rd hand information to us.

Well...concerning a low carb lifestyle and its effects on health, it's all first hand information to those of us here because we are applying it directly to ourselves and finding that not only does it work, it works best of anything else we have tried (and a lot of us have tried it all). The studies being done confirm that we are not on the wrong track because those results are being duplicated in the studies being done. One of the tests of science is whether or not the results can be duplicated by a number of scientists using the same methods.


you will also never hear me speak about percentages of the 3 main food groups. what you will hear me say is get enough protein, and enough essential fats. then feed your body with natural carbs.

Well, you did start out this thread by giving specific amounts of proteins and essential fats stating that this is what everyone needed for "optimal health". Most low carbers are getting enough protein and essential fats, but choose not to fill the bulk of their diet with carbs because they have found that doing so does not promote optimal health for them. Instead we choose to keep our carbs limited and those that we do include in our daily diets are the highest in vitamins, minerals and phytochemicals possible. Fortunately for us, those that tend to be the highest in all those categories are also the lowest in carbs and glycemic index, so we can easily meet our requirements of these things and still keep our carbs within our individual tolerance levels.

I get the impression from your posts, at least intially, that you have the mistaken notion that most of us here are merely just trying out the latest fad diet and for a minority of members, that may be true. But for the majority of us, we are very serious about our health and have done our research as well and feel that this is the best possible way of eating for OUR optimal health. Many of us have tried everything else out there only to find our weight climbing and our health deteriorating. This is not a fad to us, but a way of life that has brought great improvement to our health and wellbeing.

Your way works for you? Great! Congratulations...you have a healthy body that seems to be able to tolerate a high level of carbs. Your doctor says he's never seen a stronger heart (but I bet he didn't tell you that having a strong heart won't protect you from a myocardial infarction...cardiac muscle strength has nothing to do with that). Don't, however, make the mistake of thinking that what works great for you will work great for the rest of us. I'm here to tell you that it won't because when it comes to what we eat, one size does not fit all or even most. Why? Because, as you pointed out, all of us have different needs and dietary requirements, not so much in what we eat, but in the propotions of those foods. Some people, actually a great many people, can't tolerate high amounts of carbs or high glycemic carbs for varying reasons that I mentioned earlier and their health, weight and bloodwork reflects that clearly. Insisting that they eat like you or risk not achieving "optimal health" is doing them a great disservice and comes across as arrogant and uninformed, especially when their experience has showed them otherwise. Similarly, you won't find me saying that you should not eat the way that you do; obviously this works for you. It just doesn't work for me or for the majority of us here.

So, again, what we have is your opinion versus ours. We have quite a bit of sound research behind us as well as experience on both sides of the fence, you have mostly opinion, not a lot of knowledge about what low carb is really about and no practical experience with it at all.
You expected when you first posted that your opinion wouldn't be a popular one and you're right, but it's not a knee-jerk, uninformed response that you're getting. It's a well thought out response based on study and experience.
When it comes down to it, we're really looking at two sides of the same coin and our goals are the same. We're just chosing to get to those goals by different means.

[gymeejet]

hi quest,
i definitely do not have a jack lalaane physique - LOL. i have a low testosterone level, and therefore could never put on the same amount of muscle.

[gymeejet]

hi ws,
a lot of that depends on the type of foods one is eating. fruits, especially apples and bananas, are especially filling for people that are not used to eating lots. this is just my surmise - i think our stomachs have some sort of sensor mechanisms that tell us how full we are, by volume. i remember when i first started my change from eating poorly to eating well, i was not used to eating high-volume, low density foods (i.e. ones that contain a lot of water), and i would get full more quickly. today, i can sit down and eat 3 bananas and 2 apples, and then my protein meal, and still not be real full, if i have been exercising.

[gymeejet]

tamarian,
perhaps we can start anew. to my knowledge, my diet suggestions have never been a fad. it is not the low-fat, high-carb diet of before. the addition of a LARGE DOSAGE of essential fats, along with ample protein, changes it completely. so without any popular diet, i do not know that there would be any particular studies on it that would suit you.

i know you guys believe in all these studies. believe me, i more than understand, since i used to be just like that. while i know i can not change your mind, i also know that you are putting way too much confidence in them. i could give you many examples, but here is one that comes to mind, simply because it had bugged me a lot.

i know you guys are well read, currently. probably much more so than myself, because i tend not to believe most stuff. and i do not know how old you are, so you may not be aware. i got started on my health kick about 30 years ago. at that time, every health book, every article i could find preached the same thing about protein consumption - for the body to use protein for anabolic purposes, it had to be complete protein consumed at roughly the same time. the aminos that were left over, could only be burned for fuel. this was sacrosanct at the time - no one dared to go against that rule. well in the past 5-10 years, they have found that "absolute positive fact" was not true, after all. we simply break our protein down, and store the amino acids separately, and call for them when we need them. the other thing that used to bug me is that i could read 25 different articles about protein quantities, and they were all over the farm - as low as 30 grams to as high as 125. today, i am sure i take in 200+ on most days.

i am very much like thomas - i want to see the scars for my own self. i am experiencing an aging process that i have yet to see. my original goal was to be about 75% as good or energetic, when i turned 35, as i was when i was 21. at the time, that seemed to be a very optimistic goal, that i hoped to reach, but was not sure if it was possible. to be 48, and have the energy level and lack of health problems that i do, is amazing to me. never in my wildest dreams did i think this could happen, back at 21. because of my personal experience, i have very strong convictions. i don't expect you to fully understand that, as it is an experiential thing. but that does not mean it is any less true - it just does not have "studies" by people who are making some pretty big bucks, selling it. you guys seem to feel comfortable with studies, while i need to experience it. i use studies, but do not let them use me. before i accept anything as fact, i have to prove it to myself. perhaps this is my pessimism shining through. in any case, i am starting anew. any problems we had before, have been deleted.

[gymeejet]

lisa, i did not get to read your long post. i will get back to you when i have more time.

[wsgts]

On the eating fruit side, one apple has 80 calories (or there about). One Atkins bars has 150 calories.

If I eat just an apple, I am hungrier in 15 minutes than I was before I actually went to get a snack. So when I am hungry, it's difficult to watch the quantity (then you get into the vending machine, candybar, etc etc). Same holds true to anything with sugar in it. Whereas, if I eat say a large dill pickle, it does the trick usually, and I am not hungry for several hours. This, of course, might be just me.

On the other hand, a cup of blueberries (we pick them ourselves) doesn't have the apple effect on me. This is what Lisa was referring to when she mentioned GI scale.

So for me, it's eat high GI carbs (or sugar) and I get hungry. Eat low GI carbs or very few carbs, and I don't get hungry. I can eat a 200 calorie low-carb breakfast (3 bacon strips, coffee) and not be hungry till 2:00 in the afternoon or eat a 500 calorie low-fat (grapefruit, toast, skim milk) breakfast and be hungry within the same hour.

I, along with others, have to eat this way to maintain good health. Boy, I sure would love to be able to eat sweet stuff again, but my health is more important than that.

BTW, I do appreciate you civil tones with everyone.

Later,
wsgts

[cc48510]

Just for Reference --

2 tbsp Safflower Oil = 240 kcal [from fat]
2 tbsp Flax Seeds = 118 kcal (-17.84: Protein) = 100 kcal (-6.08: Net Carbs) = 93.98 kcal [from fat]
200g Protein = 800 kcal [from protein]

1500 kcal: 22% Fat/25% Carbs/53% Protein
2000 kcal: 17% Fat/43% Carbs/40% Protein
2500 kcal: 13% Fat/55% Carbs/32% Protein
3000 kcal: 11% Fat/62% Carbs/27% Protein

1500 kcal: 94g Carbs
2000 kcal: 215g Carbs
2500 kcal: 344g Carbs
3000 kcal: 465g Carbs

Of course, this is based on Produce Calories being 100% carbs. So, the actual carb counts would be lower...especially if he eats Avocados, Nuts, Legumes, Olives, or other produce high in unsaturates. I don't remember if he indicated what his caloric intake was. But, the number 1600 is sticking in my mind for some reason. So, if he is taking in 1600 kcal/day, eating 200g+ protein...then his carb intake would actually be around maintnance levels [for most LC plans,] especially if he eats some unsaturate-rich produce (olives, avocados, nuts, and legumes).

If he was getting his produce entirely from potatoes [which I doubt,] his net carb intake [at 1600 kcal] would be 97g*. If they came from carrots, it would be 77g*. If [as is likely,] it is a mix of greens, tubers, legumes, nuts, etc...the net carb count could be even lower. His numbers are not very far off for a person who needs 1500 kcal/day [give or take.] The fat is too low and carbs too high for those needing 2000-3000 kcal/day IMHO. I have no complaints about the protein content.

My main issue is that he doesn't specify what types of produce to eat. For some people, this could become a diet composed almost entirely of bread and potatoes...which is what put alot of the folks on this board where they are today. You need plenty of green (fiber/nutrient rich) vegetables and nutrient rich fruits. Just saying "eat produce" does not insure a properly balanced diet. You could theoretically fill your diet out with produce, but entirely exclude 4 food groups (meat/legumes/nuts, dairy, vegetables, and fruits)...eating whole grains.

*Net Carbs = Total Carbs - Fiber. Fiber is not counted [as a carb] on most LC Diets.

[gymeejet]

hi lisa,
i do not have much to add that i have not already said, but i am doubtful that you have tried my diet, where there is a large amount of essential fats and quite a bit of protein, along with the carbs.
HOWEVER :

hi lisa and ws,
i can buy that you guys have some problems with sugar metabolism. i suspect that it was mainly because of past dietary abuses/inadequacies/whatever label you want to call it. in otherwards, i do not believe that it is of a genetic nature. now whether that damage is permanent or not, i am not sure. and even if my diet would eventually prove to be better for you, i can also buy that there may be a long interim process by which you very gradually added carbs back to your diet.

what i would love to see is a friendly, scientific battle with you guys, IF IT IS YOUR CLAIM THAT YOUR DIET WOULD BE BETTER FOR PEOPLE FROM THE GET-GO.

i would love to have 100 2-year-olds, train them with my food regimen, monitor their blood tests, use whatever supplements they needed, and you do the same with another 100 2-year-olds, with your dietary regimen. we could then monitor them throughout their entire lives. i think my team would trounce you guys - LOL, in terms of overall health, energy, longevity, etc. i know what i am experiencing, and i do not believe i have any genetic uniqueness that makes my body better than any other body. but the only way to prove this to both myself and others, would be to see the results of others on my diet regimen.

[gymeejet]

hi cc,
those numbers were not intended to define what i ate, but more as starting points for people. i know my overall fat percentage will be abysmally small in your eyes. and i truly have no idea how many calories and protein i get each day. like i said, it can vary wildly, depending on my activity level. i took the day off from the beach today. but here is what i ate yesterday. i add stevia and flavoring (many of them essential oils) to stuff, and nutrient powders, but i am omitting things that have very little caloric input.

my main staple is what i call my protein concoction. i eat this twice every single day, as it is my main protein/fat/anabolic building food. i am actually weighing things currently, so it will be the first time that i have this accurate of a measurement.
1)60 grams of protein powder (half milk protein, half soy protein).
2)15 grams of an equal mixture of alfalfa leaf powder, grean tea powder, and kelp powder.
3)30 grams of nutritional yeast, which is almost exactly 2 servings. each serving is 8 g protein, 1 gram sugar and 1/2 gram of fat.
4)10 grams of equal mixture of chlorella/spirulina/green barley grass powders.
5)32 grams of carob powder - enough to make the mixture a dark brown, instead of icky green - LOL.
6)15 grams of natural herb powders. equal mixtures of peppermint, spearmint, hawthorne berry, black walnut, fennel, parsley leaf, milk thistle seed, bee pollen, siberian ginseng, saw palmetto, licorice root, horsetail, coriander seed, cumin seed, ginkgo leaf, eyebright, catnip, bilberry leaf, and celery seed.
7)1.5 tablespoons of safflower oil.

again, the above concoction i take religiously twice every day, irregardless of my activity levels. yesterday i went to the beach and did my cardio. here is the rest of what i ate. currently the fruit in season and cheapest for me the past few weeks have been green grapes, watermelon and cantaloupe. i ate 1 pound 10 ounces of grapes, and 1 cantaloupe (the one in the frig currently weighs 3 pounds, 5.7 ounces). but note that the pounds of grapes are just that, as the remaining twig weighs next to nothing, but the actual fruit of the melon is a lot less than its weight.

i bring 2 workout drinks during the day. each has appoximately 30 grams of whey protein and 6 ounces of juice concentrate (pineapple in one and apple in the other.)

when i came home, i ate another bag of grapes about the same size. i ate 2 servings of 60 grams of my milk/soy protein with another approximately 6 ounces of pineapple juice concentrate. (60 grams plus 6 ounces in each one)

then the last thing i eat in most evenings is 40 grams of flax meal, which turns out to be almost exactly 6 tablespoons, which according to the bag would be 13.5 grams of fat and 9 grams of protein. i also dring my apple cider drink, where i put in my amino acid powder supplements, which weighs 5 grams.

now this is a day at the beach, in the sun, exercising vigorously, so the amount of water intake is probably extremely high. the days when i lift weights will have a much different look, and there are at least 2 days a week where i go to the restaurant and get my fresh salad.

[Lisa N]

i can buy that you guys have some problems with sugar metabolism. i suspect that it was mainly because of past dietary abuses/inadequacies/whatever label you want to call it. in otherwards, i do not believe that it is of a genetic nature.

Blanket statements like this are quite inflammatory, often untrue and typical of the prejudice rampant in society today. If you have a weight problem, it must be all your fault. Yes, some people wind up with carbohydrate intolerances because of dietary abuse. Others develop them because of disease processes, in my case PCOS and the corresponding hyperinsulinism that goes with it. First it lead to hypoglycemia, later diabetes. The excess insulin also leads to weight gain, often on a diet of 1,200 calories or less. 5-7% of women in the US have PCOS. Genetic? Nobody knows and if you can figure it out, you'll be a multi-millionaire as well as quite a few of your descendents after you. Ditto for hypothyroid, hypoglycemia and diabetes.
You can believe that this is all dietary related or due to dietary abuse, but you would be hard-pressed to prove your belief.
If I were to apply your way of eating to myself, I would be on insulin in no time and no amount of time, exercise or careful re-introduction of carbs is going to change that. When your beta cells are burned out, they're gone for good.

i have a low testosterone level

Unless you have some organic cause for this (a tumor, for example), this should be a pretty big clue that something is wrong with your diet. You need fat in your diet for prostaglandin synthesis. Prostaglandins are an arachidonic acid metabolite. Where do you find arachidonic acid? Primarily in beef fat and egg yolks (saturated fats).

i would love to have 100 2-year-olds, train them with my food regimen, monitor their blood tests, use whatever supplements they needed, and you do the same with another 100 2-year-olds, with your dietary regimen. we could then monitor them throughout their entire lives.

LOL...and I'd wish you lots of luck because once those 2 year olds start school and their classmates (and teachers too) introduce them to the delights of Twinkies and Ding Dongs, it would be all over with unless you planned to have someone stay with each child 24/7 to make sure that they didn't eat something not on the plan. I have yet to meet someone who ate ONLY what was good for them 100% of the time, even as an adult, and never ate something, even unknowingly, that wasn't.


What you seem to keep missing is that the majority of us are getting good nutrition. We're getting plenty of protein. We're getting plenty of essential fatty acids. We're getting plenty of vitamins, minerals and phytochemicals from veggies and low glycemic fruits. So where's the problem? About the only argument you can pose about the difference between low carb and what you are doing is that we don't get nearly the amount of carbs that you do and have not posted any proof that the amount of fat in our diets is harming our health or preventing us from getting proper amounts of nutrients or that the level of carbs that you are eating and recommending is actually needed for optimal health. As for not being able to exercise without carbs, several people have posted refuting that as well and I've posted studies showing that, if anything, athletic performance is improved with a higher percentage of calories coming from fats.


what i would love to see is a friendly, scientific battle with you guys, IF IT IS YOUR CLAIM THAT YOUR DIET WOULD BE BETTER FOR PEOPLE FROM THE GET-GO.

Nobody made any such assertion, except perhaps you. As I pointed out earlier, no one diet works optimally for everyone, although I think it would benefit most people to pay closer attention to the glycemic index and glycemic load of the foods they are eating. Most of us are doing this because we have found that this is what works best for us.

[gymeejet]

hi lisa,
i said i had a low testosterone level. that is how i was made. you will need to talk to the Creator if you want to know why - LOL. our sex hormone levels are determined at a very early age, possibly before we are born. not all males have high testosterone levels.

my arachidonic acid levels are at a low-normal level. although these tests are before i added all my omega-6 to my diet, so it is probably higher now.

i did say that i could also buy that there was permanent damage done, which you are saying is your case, because of loss of beta cells.

diabetes, and such diseases have increased since the onset of procesed foods. i am not singling you out, but yes i most certainly think that much of diabetes is caused by the standard american diets of today.

i also believe in the body's ability to rebuild itself, probably moreso than most people. in any case, i think it is great that you are doing what you feel you must do, to better yourselves.

i do not believe my team of kids would develop diabetes in the first place - which is i guess my main point - that my diet is best for optimum health from the GET-GO. i believe that ounces of prevention are always better than pounds of cure.

[Lisa N]

i do not believe my team of kids would develop diabetes in the first place - which is i guess my main point - that my diet is best for optimum health from the GET-GO. i believe that ounces of prevention are always better than pounds of cure.

Actually, that would be a bad assumption since type 1 diabetes strikes children and has nothing to do with diet whatsoever (it's thought to be viral or autoimmune in nature) Odds are good that at least one of your children would be afflicted with type 1 diabetes. Also, assuming that you had 100 children, half female and half male, statistically 2 or 3 of the girls would be likely to develop PCOS which is primarily a hormonal dysfunction and greatly increases the liklihood of developing diabetes irregardless of diet.
Secondly, it's highly unlikely that kids following a low carb regimen would develop diabetes either (other than type 1), less likely even than with even your diet since you aren't paying any particular attention to glycemic index, and if they did they would be far better able to control it with low carb than they would with high carb. Children would also not do well with brain development on the level of fats that you follow. It's highly not recommended to restrict fat consumption in children under the age of 5 just for that reason.
The high carb kids would also be more likely to have problems with high LDL, low HDL and high triglycerides than the low carb kids.

i most certainly think that much of diabetes is caused by the standard american diets of today.

And on that we could agree, but it is not the onlycause. You can develop diabetes eating unprocessed carbs at the wrong levels as well.

i said i had a low testosterone level. that is how i was made.

Perhaps, but not getting enough of the right kinds of fats isn't helping matters any, nor is getting too much of your protein sources from soy. ;)

[tamarian]

tamarian,
perhaps we can start anew.

I highly doubt it, so I'll agree with your original suggestion that we are not compatible, in terms of our thinking

Since I find it very frustrating that you refuse any scientific studies, repeatedly, despite having tons of them, then you say:

what i would love to see is a friendly, scientific battle with you guys

So, if science to you is the claims of one person with no verifiable records, except verbal claims, there's no common grounds for such dialogue, let alone common sense.

Even if I beleive your incredible undocumeted results, I'd be a fool to ignore the results of hundreds of subjects who were documented by clinical studies, with quantitative results.

Your only acceptable "science" is your own personal claims in such a debate and that "what I say is so". Since I'm a doubting person who demands scientific proof, I find that I'd go no where with such claims.

I know you call that science, but to me is mere superstition, or a form of self delusion resulting in your blind faith in vegetarianism.

Wa'il

[Kestrel]

Good day, I've followed this "discussion" off and on, and I have to side with Tamarian. However there is no winner here, since gymeejet really doesn't want to debate from an objective position, just like Tamarian says.

When it comes down to it, humans seem to do pretty well with about any diet, just as do most other omnivores. And what I mean by that is two examples: Clarence Bass, bodybuilder, low-fat, high carb, looks damn good at 60+. Dr. Ellis, also bodybuilder, but high-fat, low carb, looks damn good at 55+.

Does this prove one diet better than the other?? Not necessarily, but research Dr. Lutz from Austria, who has four decades of clinical use of low-carb diets for improving health, with weight control being secondary, and that will help lean you towards low-carb. In his case, we're talking thousands of patients, not hundreds... Real life stuff, not studies...

[Frederick]

I know you call that science, but to me is mere superstition, or a form of self delusion resulting in your blind faith in vegetarianism.


What really irks me are when Vegans seek to impose their chosen beliefs on others, making such ridiculous statements such as, "you shouldn't have a choice on whether or not to eat meat."

In my view, I agree that most vegetarians, vegans specifically, seek to impose their way of life to other's under the guise of well-meaning nutritional advice. Such as, "oh, eating meat is bad for you" etc...

It just strikes me that to the Vegans, human health even if adversely affected by complete abstinence from animal products, would still insist and force the rest of us from eating meat, if they could.

I believe we should all live as we please, and feel this courtesy should be equally reciprocated.

[tamarian]

Not necessarily, but research Dr. Lutz from Austria

Ah, my favourite former anti low-carb doctor! :thup:

Wa'il

[tamarian]

What really irks me are when Vegans seek to impose their chosen beliefs on others, making such ridiculous statements such as, "you shouldn't have a choice on whether or not to eat meat."

In my view, I agree that most vegetarians, vegans specifically, seek to impose their way of life to other's under the guise of well-meaning nutritional advice. Such as, "oh, eating meat is bad for you" etc...

It just strikes me that to the Vegans, human health even if adversely affected by complete abstinence from animal products, would still insist and force the rest of us from eating meat, if they could.

I believe we should all live as we please, and feel this courtesy should be equally reciprocated.

I totally agree. I personally have never made the claim that low-carb is the only way to go for every single person, despite finding no scientific evidence to the contrary.

A scintific study (yikes!) published a few years ago, showed plants have nerves that actually feel pain, and their reactions to such pain can be recorded and correlated to the times pain was inflicted.

It didn't make the rounds much, except in humerous spoof sites, one spoofing a press release by PETA in reaction to the published study :)

Wa'il

[gymeejet]

i am good acquaintances with someone who knew from first-hand sources that the studies about aspartame were deliberately changed, to avoid the problems they knew it caused in the brain. studies can be deliberately falsified, and will come out with the desired results that benefit those who paid for them in the first place.

i already mentioned the protein consumption studies that were ABSOLUTELY TRUE.
they used to say that we could not generate new brain cells, with their studies. now all of a sudden, they find that we can.

i have seen so much of this in my life, that i do not put any where near the confidence in studies that the rest of you do. and if you guys live long enough, i have no doubts that you will begin to experience that for yourselves, as well. when financial concerns enter the picture, just kiss honesty good-bye.

atkins, sears, and the rest of the kit and caboodle are making tons and tons and tons of money on this. if they were touting it as a diet for those with diabetic problems, i would not complain. but they are not - they are touting it as the overall best way of eating, for the masses.

for every female like lisa, who is using this low-carb diet to help with her disease, there are a hundred gals using it to "lose those last 5 pounds". and because there is instant water weight, and thus instant weight loss, it goes a long way to confirm in these gals what a great thing they are doing. AND THIS IS WHERE I COME IN. it is not the proper diet to bring optimum health to healthy people.

it may bring some positive results for many. but big deal. many, many people are eating atrociously - just about any change would be better than what they are doing - coffee and donuts for breakfast, fast food for lunch, and frozen dinners for dinner. it doesn't take much to beat that.

[gymeejet]

hi lisa,
actually i am happy i have a low testosterone level. i use the head on the top of my shoulders to make my decisions - LOL.

it is not abnormally low. i won't be turning into a female - LOL. just on the lower side of normal. of course, i never claimed to be NORMAL - LOL.

[gymeejet]

http://health.nzoom.com/cda/printable/1,1856,190699,00.html

Carbohydrates are your body's main source of energy. Your body converts carbohydrates into fuel (glucose) for energy production. Your muscles store large amounts of glucose in order to supply energy during prolonged exercise. Your brain also requires glucose.

Sometimes lack of fuel or even the foods we choose can make a difference in how the brain works. Because it cannot store glucose, the brain needs a continuous source of fuel from foods.

"Carbohydrate-containing foods should be eaten at each meal and also before, during and after exercise," says Leslie Bonci, registered dietitian and director of Sports Medicine Nutrition at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Centre.

"At meals, carbohydrates (pasta, rice, bread, cereal, fruits and vegetables) should take up about two-thirds of the plate."

[Lisa N]

Once again, that's an opinion, not a study. Regarding glucose and brain function versus ketones and brain function, this is a study:

Reference:
Amiel, S.A., "Organ Fuel Selection: Brain," The Proceedings of the Nutrition Society, 54(1), 1995, pages 151-155.

Summary:
This review article analyzes fuel utilization of the brain. The brain’s first choice for energy is glucose. However, when glucose is not available, the brain uses ketone bodies. Using ketones meets the energy requirements of the brain and maintains its proper function.

Cardiac muscle actually prefers and functions better on ketones derived from saturated fat then it does glucose.

if they were touting it as a diet for those with diabetic problems, i would not complain

Drs Bernstein and Schwarzbein do, and not just diabetes, either. Also...just because a doctor publishes a plan and makes money off it does not mean that it does not work, is not healthy or is the equivalent of snake oil. Bad logic there.

AND THIS IS WHERE I COME IN. it is not the proper diet to bring optimum health to healthy people.

You have yet to show that except through subjective, unverifiable information with yourself and opinion.
Just out of curiosity, what do you think a low carb way of eating looks like at maintainance levels?

[tamarian]

http://health.nzoom.com/cda/printable/1,1856,190699,00.html

Carbohydrates are your body's main source of energy. Your body converts carbohydrates into fuel (glucose) for energy production. Your muscles store large amounts of glucose in order to supply energy during prolonged exercise. Your brain also requires glucose.

Just for the record, the above link is not a scientific study, it's a brochure stating personal opinions. No one here to my knowledge claimed there are no such brochures. I really don't know if you can tell what is a scientific study and what isn't.....

i have seen so much of this in my life, that i do not put any where near the confidence in studies that the rest of you do. and if you guys live long enough, i have no doubts that you will begin to experience that for yourselves, as well. when financial concerns enter the picture, just kiss honesty good-bye.

All this "life" and you're still in your 40's? You think we're teenagers here? :)

atkins, sears, and the rest of the kit and caboodle are making tons and tons and tons of money on this. if they were touting it as a diet for those with diabetic problems, i would not complain. but they are not - they are touting it as the overall best way of eating, for the masses.

And vegetarian diet gurus like Onish, Bernard et all, are giving away their books for free? Well, they don't, and they are making a lot of money too. So if that's your argument, then your diet is unhealthy, because the authors made money on it?

Wa'il

[gymeejet]

i am not being influenced by any doctor, in making my health decisions. not any more. i did listen when all the doctors and scientific studies community were touting the low-fat diet. never was it mentioned that there was a need for the essential fats.

i have cited several examples where studies have been wrong, and one where it was known to be falsified.

i prefer to use my own verifiable results, and those of whom i know, and detailed nutritional tests to show me where i am at. i wish you guys would at least get these tests. they may give you some information that may be of help. i know they certainly increased my knowledge.

however, i do believe that you guys have special needs (those that have diabetes, etc.) of which i do not know much about, so if this helps you, i am happy for you. i do not believe it is best for the average healthy person.

[gymeejet]

there are studies supporting just about everything. car manufacturer's all have studies that prove their cars did the best in handling, acceleration, etc.

YOU PUT TOO MUCH EMPHASIS ON STUDIES. i will continue to preach that to you.

if i want to know about building stresses, i will talk to an engineer. if i want to know about building, i will talk to a carpenter. if i find someone with more stamina than me, i want to know what the heck he is doing.

the minute i find that said information has financial implications, forget it. it will be twisted to match the desired results.

i don't care about these vegetarian doctors. i am surprised that even any of their names sounded familiar. but i think i have heard of ornish. is that dean ornish ? something tells me that he has a radio show. in any case, i have no idea of his beliefs, nor do i have any particular interest in finding out.

[gymeejet]

i think it was lisa that mentioned that soy protein was not good. i have no doubts she can show me a dozen studies supporting her belief. just a bunch of hooey from the animal-touters.

most everything we read, in the nutrition field, has large financial implications. you got the meat lobby, the dairy guys, the sugar industry, etc., etc.

they flip-flop about eggs faster than a mexican jumping bean. what is the going philosophy this week ?

when all the medical community thought good ole jack was nuts, he just kept preaching what he knew was correct, and of course he was right. you guys can continue to believe in the white coats and all of their studies. i will continue to believe in those who do it, not those who write about it. when you find a doctor who can out-do me, hey then i am interested. until then, no thank you.

[gymeejet]

gosh lisa, i think my testosterone level just jumped 25 points. so perhaps you guys are good for me after all - LOL.

[wsgts]

I am going to throw this out.

Unlike dietitians, I certainly wouldn't recommend one diet for the "masses" or "en Masse". There are many factors to look at when figuring out what works best. Saying that some one is better off being obese and eating a certain eating plan certainly makes no sense (I. E. the high-carb food pyramid).

For instance, a normal weight person with no medical issues shouldn't be too concerned about their diet composition. Someone with five pounds to lose shouldn't start any type of diet, they should start with a little exercise first and move to an eating plan if exercise doesn't produce the desired results. If that eating plan doesn't help the exercise achieve the desired results, try another eating plan or increase exercise or both.

The problem has never really been what the best diet composition for the masses (which damn near killed a lot of us), but what is diet composition works for optimum health for the individual.

Gymeejet, would you agree or disagree with my logic? (notice I have not used any studies :dazzle: )

Later,
wsgts

[tamarian]

YOU PUT TOO MUCH EMPHASIS ON STUDIES. i will continue to preach that to you.

I know. That's what I told you a few pages ago, and you got offended. Your method is nothing but preaching, based on faith and feelings, with no scientifc or verifibale evidence. We need to have faith in you, to beleive you.....

You get offfended with demands for proof, and rely on just your personal stories. That's fine, I just find it odd you don't realize how ironic that is, and why people react to it with a mix of amusement and doubt.

Wa'il

[Ashtaroth]

"if i want to know about building stresses, i will talk to an engineer"

-Unfortunately for you, that engineer will be relying on studies done by others to determine those stresses.

"the minute i find that said information has financial implications, forget it. it will be twisted to match the desired results."

-So I guess this means that anyone who gives a professional opinion for money should be ignored. As a professional engineer who does exactly that for a living I'm confused.

-Ashtaroth

[rhaazz]

gymeejet, yes, you do need a lot of carbs on days when you're doing a lot of aerobic activity -- IF you're not in ketosis.

If your body has successfully switched to burning its own stored fat, you do not need a lot of carbs to sustain aerobic activity, as I can testify.

I am currently getting my energy from the stored fat around my midsection -- and yes, our bodies WERE designed to work that way, too.

The body is adaptible to more than one kind of diet. Think about it: it had to be, or our ancestors would never have survived.

[rhaazz]

gymeejet, I've been reading some more of your posts -- and I wonder what all the quarreling is about. I think you're saying -- at least now, anywa -- "I go with what works for me, you LCers go with what works for you."

And I sort of agree with what you say about learning to distrust the white coats. I too have had a number of experiences where medical or scientific gospel turned out to be a dangerous half truth that actually harmed me. You do have to trust yourself.

[Lisa N]

YOU PUT TOO MUCH EMPHASIS ON STUDIES.

And you put too much emphasis on personal opinion and unverifiable evidence. Given the choice between someone's subjective opinion, based on who knows what and a sound study where I can read what they did as well as the results they got as well as the number of participants in the study, I'll go with the study every time. If you choose to do otherwise, that's your choice, but I belive that you are missing out.

the minute i find that said information has financial implications, forget it. it will be twisted to match the desired results.

So how do you explain that the results we are getting with low carb are comparable to those that the studies got? Coincidence? One study doesn't prove much, several that get the same results performed by different groups should get a person's attention, though, as well as thousands of people applying it to their own diets and getting the same results. I'd also like to point out that the person whom you so admire also made money promoting his particular plan and yet you trust what he says without question apparantly.

I'm also noticing that you dodged my question regarding what you think an average days' menu on maintainance low carb would look like. Could it be that you don't know and if you don't how can you possibly argue that your way is better? Your profile indicates that you have read one book on low carb and from your posts it's becoming more and more obvious that you either didn't understand or didn't fully appreciate the principles behind what you read as well as the large number of people to whom this plan has been applied with very good results by a number of physicians.
I'd also be interested in knowing precisely what vitamin, mineral, protein or essential fatty acid you think we all are deficient in and please don't go on about lack of carbs because there is no verified amount of carbs necessary for good health to date; we've already been over that one. There are essential vitamins and minerals, there are essential amino acids, there are essential fatty acids, but there are no essential carbs.

[rhaazz]

Lisa N I love your posts and you have helped me many many times. You have given me strength and patience to stay with this diet. Also I LOVE some of your very scientific posts. Love love love them -- you answer my questions.

But you know -- we don't have to choose between being all pro- or anti-study, you know? My husband is a scientist and he was shocked to learn (in grad school) that good, reputable scientists do skew their results. They're not "lying" exactly -- just selectively viewing their results so as to confirm hypotheses (and promote their research). (It's not quite like picking patterns out of the stars to see "constellations" when the stars are actually random, but it's a little bit comparable to that.)

That doesn't mean scientists have nothing to offer (I agree, this anti-LC guy is a little extreme in seeming to reject ALL scientific evidence). It turns out Gregor Mendel exaggerated/falsified some of his results, as we now know, but that doesn't mean he didn't do good science or make useful discoveries.

I don't know about you, but I used to believe all the authorities that said that animal fat in one's diet was absolutely deadly. Now I'm annoyed that the authorities were really lying to me (and that's not the first time). So this whole LC experience has made me much more distrustful of medical authority in general.

[Lisa N]

My husband is a scientist and he was shocked to learn (in grad school) that good, reputable scientists do skew their results. They're not "lying" exactly -- just selectively viewing their results so as to confirm hypotheses (and promote their research).

Hi Rhazz!

Yes, I do realize that this happens. However, as I noted before, one study doesn't necessarily prove anything, but when the results can be duplicated by a variety of scientists (with different motivations), that tends to show that the results are reliable and accurate.
Studies can also be skewed to achieve a desired result, but again that is often obvious when you read the details of the study and know what you are reading (a good example of this is the studies that have "proved" high fat and saturated fat to cause cardiac disease).
Distrust of ALL studies because the above has happened on occasion borders on paranoia and is really throwing out the baby with the bathwater. You can either throw up your hands in frustration and say "I just don't know WHAT to believe" and ignore and disbelieve it all (and what a state we would all be in if everyone did that!) or you can educate yourself so that you can see the difference between a sound study and one where the results have been deliberately skewed through the methods of the study or where information has been deliberately ignored in favor of the results that the researchers were after.
In an unscientific way, all of us who are following a low carb lifestyle are verifying the results of the studies that have been done by duplicating the results in our own lives and experience. :)

I don't know about you, but I used to believe all the authorities that said that animal fat in one's diet was absolutely deadly. Now I'm annoyed that the authorities were really lying to me (and that's not the first time). So this whole LC experience has made me much more distrustful of medical authority in general.

To be honest, with what I know it never made a great deal of sense to me and I never completely followed the "low fat" recommendation (I've always refused to give up butter in favor of margarine, for example) and the high carb recommendations also didn't make a lot of sense to me in regards to diabetes since diabetes is by nature a problem with carbohydrate metabolism. Do I feel I've been lied to? Yes and no. Those that made those recommendations in large part were basing them on what they mistakenly believed to be sound science (doctors, for example, who really have very little training in nutrition and have to rely on the recommendations of others). Others had more sinister motives, such as promoting their particular interests and those are the people that I am most annoyed with. :nono:
Instead of making me more mistrustful, the result that it had on me was to learn more myself so that I could make an informed decision on what was best for my health instead of relying on someone else to tell me what that is. I've disagreed with my doctor on more than a few occasions and while I can't say that he's thrilled with that, he does respect my knowledge and opinion at this point and is always willing to hear me out. We've become partners in caring for my health and that is as I believe it should be. :)

[gymeejet]

hi ws,
you be the man. yea, you gotta get results. i am a results person. i have already given in to these diets for diabetics, and such, if that indeed is gives them the healthiest results.

i put forth the diet that i think works best for the majority. in so doing, each individual should get tested, to see where he is. probably most of us have some nutrients that we don't absorb as well, or need more of, for whatever reason.

so i would say that just about everyone would need some supplementation. but i would be the first one to admit my diet was not working for someone, when and if it did not. obviously, if you have lost the ability to metabolize sugar, my diet would not work for you.

[gymeejet]

hi ashtaroth,
one needs to have enough sense and wisdom to understand the situation. if i go to an architect for blueprints for my house, it makes no difference to him what size timber i use. he has nothing to gain or lose. his only goal is to make sure the house is strong enough to stand the elements. so i would value his professional opinion. for the most part, i would say that most of what your profession does would not have strings attached.

in the computer field, it was not so good. consultants would very often reccommend IBM, so they would not get in trouble, or the machine that they personally knew the best, or in the worst situation the machine, because they got kickbacks from the manufacturer.

but the worse scenario of all, is information we get delivered to change the masses (i call it advertising), and there is a lot of money to be made in the nutritional field (we all gotta eat).

so again, evaluate the particular situation we find ourselves in, to see if said information benefits someone else.

[gymeejet]

tamarian,
that is where i disagree with you. you seem to think that studies by someone else is the only scientific method.

i already explained to you the "scientific method" - that of theory, testing, and then repostulating your previous theory so it can stand up to the new empirical evidence.

this i do faithfully. i am simply not willing to allow third-hand information to make decisions for me.

[gymeejet]

hi rhaazz,
because the body has limited glycogen stores, it will try to burn fat whenever possible. here is what occurs.

when exercise commences, sugar is used first. for whatever reason, it takes the body awhile to get its fat-burning system going.

as exercise continues, and the fat burners have warmed up, the body will attempt to burn fat, when possible, during aerobic activity.

if you turn up the burners, and go anaerobic, the body has to burn sugar to have a chance to keep up with you.

one can do more exercise one of 3 ways. (more often, longer, or harder). all 3 are good. but to push your body to the next level, you gotta go harder, which let me tell you, is by far and away the hardest one to do, of the 3. it separates the men from the boys, or the women from the girls.

while i have never had a meter put on me, i would suspect that my vigorous routine puts me in anaerobic mode at least 50% of the time, and i go for 80 minutes. not only do i need glycogen stores, i need sugar in my drink, while i am working out. because once the body gets low on something, it sure as heck doesn't care whether you want to do some exercising. it goes into protection/starvation mode. it allows me to get crazy, only if i do not let it get low on any nutrients.

[gymeejet]

hi lisa,
never did i say that you were missing any vitamins, etc. carbohydrates are essential for optimum health. our bodies prefer to burn glucose. if you want to rationalize that away, and think it wants to burn ketones, that is your choice.

if carbs are not essential, then why eat them at all ? our bodies prefer to burn glucose - any physiology book will tell you that. if you want to listen to a group of people, who have lots to gain, then that again is up to you.

with regards to jack, sure they used his name and he made a lot from the gyms. but look at his personal accomplishments, both before and after he became wealthy. and most importantly, look at what he was able to do, at his respective age, versus others at his age.

[gymeejet]

again, i am a results person. if i want to know how to do something, i go to the person who knows how to do it. jack lalaane was a pioneer in eating healthy. he wasn't just a muscle jock. he was THE PIONEER in terms of exercising, and had to take ridicule from the WHOLE MEDICAL COMMUNITY, who branded him a nut who was advising people to do something dangerous to their bodies. this is why i admire him. he stood his ground WHEN ALL THE STUDIES TOLD HIM HE WAS WRONG.

what many of you guys do not seem to understand is that my opinions did not just float into my brain one evening. i have used many books, some well-educated people in the field to toss around ideas. i then used the scientific method and tested stuff. it has been over a long, long time that these ideas have come to me, not by osmosis.

but at 48, i will tip my hat to any 21-year-old who can keep up with me. i haven't lost a bit of energy capacity yet. to me, that is one heckuva lot more persuasive to me than a million best sellers. again, show me the doctor who can keep up with me, and he will get my attention. not because of what he wrote, but what he can do from what he has learned - that is the proof of the pudding. OOPS - my testosterone is going up again. LOL.

[tamarian]

this i do faithfully. i am simply not willing to allow third-hand information to make decisions for me.

LOL, but you have nothing but thrid hand information!

Your personal stories, are only first hand information to your anonymous self.

Scientific evidence that has been confirmed by multiple parties, with hundreds of subjects, repeated numerous times, with reproducable results and documented, is a lot more scientific than an unknown person preaching undocumented results based on their faith that theey are healthier than others. Let alone more credible first-hand personal accounts by members how know about scientific methods.

Your knowledge of scientific studies, based on what you said so far is based on a few brochures published by sponsored organizations, and a comment made by your doctor stating how healthy you are. You should hear how Dr. Ornish describe his health, and we've all seen him. :)

Wa'il

[tamarian]

again, show me the doctor who can keep up with me

I know of a couple of 70 year old low-carberss who can have you bite the dust, one happens to be a doctor. But that's probably not good enough for you, since none of them happen to be you, so they probably don't count. ;)

Wa'il

[Rosebud]

our bodies prefer to burn glucose - any physiology book will tell you that.
Actually, given a choice, our bodies prefer to burn alcohol before burning either glucose or fat! So by your logic we should live on alcohol? Could be fun... :lol:

:rose:Rosebud:rose:

[gymeejet]

tamarian,
i realize my info is 3rd hand to you guys. if the situation were reversed, you already know that i would not believe myself. i do not expect any of you to believe me, either. but i relate to jack because i understand how he must have felt, when he was experiencing what exercise was doing for him, just as i am experiencing the gift of real youth - i wouldn't trade it for all the tea in china.

but on the same token, since you have never seen me, you have no scientific basis whatsoever to make a judgment about whether someone else is more energetic than myself.

but all i can say, is that i doubt it - LOL. my level of self-confidence is pretty high - LOL.

[gymeejet]

btw, i was wondering if your sign-off had any particular meaning, so i searched the internet, and found the following :

The meaning of Wa'il
Origin: Muslim
Meaning: Coming back (for shelter).

does this correspond with your sign-off ?

[Lisa N]

if carbs are not essential, then why eat them at all ?

Because while carbs in and of themselves are not essential (and you can not eat them at all and remain healthy and fit....take the Inuits and Masai for example, who live primarily on protein and fat), the fiber, vitamins, minerals and phytochemicals that they contain can be helpful in promoting optimal health. You can get plenty of all those things without eating high glycemic carbs or a lot of them and still keep insulin response and circulating insulin levels low enough to prevent fat storage as well as a host of inflammatory responses associated with high levels of circulating insulin.


carbohydrates are essential for optimum health.

And your proof of that would be? Wait...you don't have any other than subjective opinion and third hand information. As Rosebud pointed out, our bodies will burn alcohol in preference to any other energy source available, but you won't hear anyone stating that we should be getting all our energy from Jack Daniels. Our bodies have become a primarily glucose burning system because we have made them that way through out diets. Before the advent of agriculture, this was not the case and most humans were using primarily ketones for energy.

never did i say that you were missing any vitamins, etc.

So your sole argument with a low carb lifestyle is that it is lacking in carbs which for some reason that you cannot prove you feel are necessary for optimal health? Gymeejet...you don't even know how many carbs those who are on maintainace are getting while you're maintaining that they are not getting enough of them!
LOL...you still haven't posted what you think an average days menu looks like on maintainance low carb. :)

had to take ridicule from the WHOLE MEDICAL COMMUNITY, who branded him a nut who was advising people to do something dangerous to their bodies. this is why i admire him. he stood his ground WHEN ALL THE STUDIES TOLD HIM HE WAS WRONG.

Wow...sounds just like Dr. Atkins and to a lesser degree the rest of the doctors who have been promoting a low carb lifestyle as healthier and better for our bodies than the currently recommended diet. And yet, you're willing to trash all of their studies and experience with their patients based on....????
As for doctors who are healthy, Dr. Bernstein (Bernstein's Diabetes Solution), who is a type 1 diabetic in his 60's, is an active runner and uses weight resistance training, all on 30 grams of carb per day, which you keep maintaining is impossible to do without a lot of carbs.
Exercise? Let me ask you...how much exercise at the intensity level you are recommending is someone who is 100 pounds or more overweight (or even 50 pounds overweight) capable of? They need to lose weight first? Now how would you recommend that they do that?

[gymeejet]

hi lisa,
with respect to the typical maintenance diet, 10 people probably eat 10 different things. but you already told me that it is between 30 and 100 grams of carbs.

for obese people, i won't argue with you.

i tire of all this comparison to what the caveman used to eat. for some reason, people think that they used to be really healthy 2000 years ago or more. the truth is that one was a grandpa if he made it into his 40's. their lifespan was very short in comparison. they have found egyptian mummies riddled with arthritis, worms, etc. people in the olden days were far from optimum health.

your arguments are based upon helping those with problems, i.e. diabetes, obesity, etc. i have already told you that my focus is what people should be eating TO PREVENT THEM IN THE FIRST PLACE. i have no problem with special diets for special needs. it is when they attempt to tout that diet as what is healthiest from the GET-GO, where my disagreements begin.

also, there is a huge difference between essential for life, and essential for optimum health.

[gymeejet]

some reading on glyconutrients

http://www.glycoscience.com/glycoscience/home.wm

[gymeejet]

more reading on glyconutrients

http://www.prweb.com/releases/2003/3/prweb58824.htm

[Natrushka]

i tire of all this comparison to what the caveman used to eat. for some reason, people think that they used to be really healthy 2000 years ago or more. the truth is that one was a grandpa if he made it into his 40's. their lifespan was very short in comparison. they have found egyptian mummies riddled with arthritis, worms, etc. people in the olden days were far from optimum health. Interestingly enough, cavemen did die young - from harsh climates and run ins with big nasty creatures, their remains have proven that they had healthy strong bones and very few rotten teeth.

Eqyptians, on the other hand, ate a low fat / high carb diet and were, as you so kindly pointed out, riddled with arthritis, diabetes, arterial plaque and most had lost all their teeth.

[cc48510]

If you want to talk cavemen, you have to go alot farther back than 2,000 years. They are refering to 10s of thousands or even millions of years ago, before the advent of agriculture and domestication. Granted, people lived shorter lives back then...But, they also didn't have: Antibiotics, Antiviral Medicines, and most other medicines available to modern humans. Take away modern medicine and and the average lifespan would probably drop significantly.

Add to that, that many were killed by animal attacks, they had little protection from the environment, and that there was constant war. Of course, their lifespan was short. If we jump ahead to the last 5,000-2,000 years...we can see the true effects of a Hi-Carb/Low-Fat diet. Egyptians were especially fond of bread. Egyptians mummies as you stated were found with Tooth Decay, Diabetes, Clogged Arteries, etc...

[rhaazz]

gymeejet, you keep saying that you are "results oriented" and you rely on your own experience to determine the truth. OK, if you're so interested in finding the truth, do induction. After all, it's only two weeks. After induction, gradually add a few carbs back in . Follow the diet Atkins recommends. Then come back here and tell us that you were incapable of anaerobic exercise after a few weeks. Otherwise, what you say is bunk according to your own logic: you haven't tried Atkins so you can't say whether it works.

It's just nonsense to say "the body works best on THIS ONE type of diet." Human beings would never have been able to survive in so many different climates if they weren't able to adapt to a variety of different diets. The Inuit have no heart disease on their traditional diet.

Fact is, refined carbohydrates are deadly to most Americans who struggle with their weight. This is what every single person who has ever been in Overeaters Anonymous will tell you. They don't go to OA because they have diabetes: they go because they are addicted to sugar, white flour, white rice, potatoes, etc. Those foods trigger cravings in them just like alcohol triggers an alcoholic. Once they eat just one bite of bread, they are bingeing their brains out. This happens, sadly, to many overweight people who just don't understand that carbs are killing them.

Million and millions of people in developed countries will die premature and painful deaths because of obesity. Because of the "low fat" gospel, they don't understand that it's the carbs that are keeping them fat.

For folks like you, who have no trouble with their weight - carbs may be fine. But for those of us who've been enslaved to the carb-insulin-fat storing cycle that was sending us to an early grave, Atkins is a life saver.

[Kristine]

>>"it is not the proper diet to bring optimum health to healthy people."

You keep saying this over and over again. What will it take for us to convince you that it simply isn't correct? That there *isn't* one optimal diet? That optimal to one person would be terrible for the next?

I started LCing at the recommendation of other women having glucose problems and weight gain from taking a medication (which I had recently stopped.) Technically, I was "healthy", I just wanted to get myself back to normal. The weight is long gone, so I now eat at a maintenance level of anywhere from 30-100 g carbs a day. Why did I bother sticking around? Lemme tell you why: my cholesterol profile improved, my depression packed its bags and left, my acne is almost completely gone, my messed-up hormones straightened themselves out, I need less sleep, and I have plenty of energy all day, no more afternoon slumps. I feel like a million bucks. This is "sub-optimal?" :lol: I don't think so. "Sub-optimal" is what happens when I let the carbs creep back in. All of those benefits I listed disappear.

So if your way is THE optimal way, then please entertain us with an explanation of why I (and hundreds of people on this forum) have the opposite experience.

[gymeejet]

hi raz,
i wouldn't disagree with what you are saying, from a scientific viewpoint. and i was of average health, i probably would have done so, already. but i have managed to retain my youthful energy at 48, so i ain't gonna fix something that ain't broke - LOL.

refined carbs are bad for all people - i have championed this, since way before low carb diets were around, so no disagreement there.

[gymeejet]

hi kristine,
just how many forum moderators are there ? i better put on some protective gear !! LOL.

this is one reason that i mentioned to lisa about starting an experiment with people, before they had time to allow the standard american diet to play havoc with their systems.

while you guys may get 3 times the amount of fat that i do, i would wager that i get double the essential fats that you guys do. animal fat has almost no essential fats - mostly all saturated.

take a young person, who is still very healthy. my belief has not been altered. meet his protein requirements, and then do some amino supplementation, give him extremely ample amounts of omega 6 and omega 3, then the rest in wide variety of produce and grains.

it is still my belief that this diet would be best for the overwhelming masses.

of course, exercise is also a must, as well as proper sleep, etc.

but when you have people smoking, drinking, eating tons of processed foods, and reeking all kinds of havoc on their system, some perhaps permanent, it can change what they must do, in order to stay as healthy as possible.

[gymeejet]

for as scientific as you guys claim you are, not a one of you has even been curious enough to ask about the nutritional tests that i take. the first time i heard about them, i was jumping out of my socks to see how i could get them taken. no matter how much i read, there was nothing like getting exact numbers as to just how one's body was doing.

i found my levels of 40 different amino acids, 40 different fatty acids, 12 minerals in the blood cells, as well as 5 potentially toxic minerals, a vitamin profile, and a whole slew of other nutrients, close to 200, altogether.

i would make some changes, re-do my tests, and see what was actually occurring - no guesswork, no studies - you could not do it any more scientific than that, for your own body.

there are many diets that will keep people alive, and some variations, depending on climate. but i am not sold on this complete variability of diet that most of you guys believe in.

but then i am not a multi-millionaire, attempting to make millions on what i say, so i have no ability to fund such a study. perhaps one day, some one will - PROTEIN, ESSENTIAL FATS, FRESH PRODUCE WITH ALL OF ITS PHYTONUTRIENTS.

[rhaazz]

Maybe we agree with each other almost completely?

I don't think anyone here in this forum thinks that everyone should do Atkins or similar -- just that it works for us. So we're not trying to take your carbs away from you.

And you're willing to accept the idea that some folks whose metabolisms are messed up should avoid refined carbs.

You don't seem to agree that they should avoid MOST carbs --during induction. But we can agree to disagree about induction -- it's just two weeks, ok?

As for phytonutrients, Omega 3 and 6 fatty acids -- ATKINS ADVOCATES A DIET RICH IN THESE! Dude, read the book!! It's full of flaxseed, olive oil, sesame oil, nuts of all kinds, salmon, tuna, and fresh vegetables -- and some fruits, too, for the later stages.

You seem to think induction is all we do, or that meat & eggs are all we eat. Nothing could be further from the truth. Many on this diet say that they eat MORE veggies on Atkins than they did before. The reason is: you actually find you CRAVE green vegetables on this diet -- or at least I find that's true for me.

[gymeejet]

with regards to people from tens of thousands or millions of years ago, i am not sold that anyone is exactly sure just what they ate, or how healthy they were. there is tons of anecdotal evidence that both sides (meat, vegetarian) claim.

it is my belief that man would eat whatever he could, more than likely. he was not gonna risk taking down wild animals, if at all possible, because his tools would put him in extreme danger.

in modern climates, where i live, fruit grows year round. i personally grow fruit that ripens from fall through winter, and then eat the more typical fruits during the summer season.

in colder climates, they would have natural freezers to store picked produce. so i suspect they ate vegetation year round, and smaller animals when they could catch them. and in fact, if i recall correctly, salt was used to help preserve meat as well. you gotta figure there were not as many animals running around during the winter, and it would not have been as conducive for man to go chasing after them, even if they were around.

so i suspect that there was a lot more preservation of foods than i think is normally regarded as being so. in any case, i am not sure that it plays a large role in the decision-making process of our nutritional needs today, other than they did not have supermarkets with manufactured foods to mess up their bodies.

[gymeejet]

raz,
i have always been willing to admit that your diet was better than the standard. i do believe that you eat too much saturated fat, and not enough carbs. however, you do get enough protein and good fats.

i don't consider most of what people eat, as food; so when i use the term carbs, it is short for fresh produce and whole grain products, not twinkies - LOL.

[rhaazz]

gymeejet,

1. have you read the book?

2. why do you think saturated fats are bad?

My husband and I are vegetarians who avoided cheese and butter (except when eating out occasionally) and we ate almost NO saturated fat prior to my doing Atkins.

He's still on a low-fat diet -- and recently, his cholesterol tested as extremely high. (He's also a fanatical runner with a 10k pace of 6:42.)

I, by contrast, am eating more cholesterol than ever before in my whole life. I have never had high cholesterol, but recently had mine tested -- and it's gone DOWN 8 points since I started doing the diet. (I exercise -- but only moderately.) My doctor couldn't believe it when I told him wht I'd been eating in the months prior to having my cholesterol checked.

[Natrushka]

animal fat has almost no essential fats - mostly all saturated. I think you meant to specify "meat" since some of the best sources of EPA and DHA are cold-water fish, including salmon, trout, sardines, mackerel and cod - unless we can't agree that fish are animals.

while you guys may get 3 times the amount of fat that i do, i would wager that i get double the essential fats that you guys do. Including more Omega 6, I'll bet. No, thank you. Eating a 'standard' diet has unbalanced our ratio of omega 3 to 6 dramatically - so much so that it's responsible for a host of illnesses. Where do you find O6? In safflower, olive, almond, sunflower, hemp, soybean, walnut, pumpkin, sesame, and flaxseed oils.

with regards to people from tens of thousands or millions of years ago, i am not sold that anyone is exactly sure just what they ate, or how healthy they were This is an amazing field of study that you must have not heard of - archeology (defined by webster as the scientific study of material remains [as fossil relics, artifacts, and monuments] of past human life and activities).

Twinkies aren't carbs, they are carbs and fat. Perhaps you should provide us with a list of gymeejet standard definitions so we are not so easily confused in the future ;)

-Nat

[gymeejet]

hi raz,

http://www.sdearthtimes.com/et0598/et0598s12.html

i just believe that too much saturated fat clogs up your arteries. and if there is not enough essential fats, one's cellular membranes become too stiff, and non-permeable, thereby making it harder for nutrients to both ingress and egress from the cellular walls, and the organelle's walls.

in my viewpoint, i am not advocating a low-fat diet, as i was on that for a long time, and know that my body does indeed need the essentials. if your hubby wants to continue on that type of diet, perhaps he can do what i am doing, to make sure he has enough of the essentials.

i first started fixing my fats by adding fish and flax oils. my omega3 tests were coming out on the high side, but my omega6 was extremely low. it was when i added the omega6 that i really saw most of my results.

i will repeat one thing - most omega6 that people get in their diets has been heated and processed, so it is really not an essential fat any more. i do not believe that omega6 is to blame, but rather the type of omega6 that we are eating.

i make sure that people do not heat, cook, or anything to the safflower oil, or flax meal, as the polunsaturates are highly suspect, when heat or light hits them.

[rhaazz]

gymeejet, have you read the book?

Dr Atkins was a cardiologist.

He developed this diet to help people who had clogged arteries.

He succeeded.

My serum cholesterol dropped, and so does the serum cholesterol of most LCers.

Why?

Only 20% of serum cholesterol comes from diet.

80% is manufactured by the liver (when I was a strict vegan, an had eaten NO cholesterol for a year, I had my cholesterol tested: it was 144 --ALL created by the liver even though NO saturated fat was in my diet).

Why does a LC diet LOWER serum cholesterol?

Insulin surges will provoke the liver to create more cholesterol.

[gymeejet]

hi raz,
i have not read the atkins book, just "protein power". i have always had low cholesterol numbers. i knew something needed fixing, in my late 30's, but wasn't sure what. so i was really excited to get these tests. right about that time, i had seen the first jump in cholesterol that i had ever seen. when i got my essentials in, my cholesterol went back down. also it has only been somewhat recently that they have been breaking cholesterol down (LDL HDL and one other). but now they are even breaking it down even further, by differentiating different kinds of ldl and hdl (i think it had something to do with aggregate molecule size. so we are learning a lot more about it, and perhaps these other differentiations will help better explain why some people have problems with cholesterol, while others do not.

however, cholesterol is not the only thing. there are triglycerides. saturated fat, because of its makeup, is able to stack molecule after molecule, right on top of each other, creating a very dense globule. i do not want too much of it in my system. especially when i know it is not needed - the body can make all other fats. so i choose to let my body make what it wants, without giving it any extra.

bad carbs are absolutely a bad thing for us, of which we are both in agreement. the body is gonna build glycogen stores from glucose. since physical activity is a large part of my enjoyment, i have no doubts that my body stores more glycogen than most people.

i do not believe people would have sugar problems if their sugar came from just the good stuff, and they also got enough protein and essential fats.

perhaps all this is just gonna take a generation or so, to really let the chips fall where they may - it has been so "saturated" in our brains by everyone how bad excess saturated fat is - if it turns out not to be so bad, i will be happy for you guys. but i do not want to take that chance for myself.

one thing i wish we could do is change the word "fat" to the word "lipid", when we are talking about nutrition. we will never change the negative connotation that the word fat has. getting most females to take essential fats is like pulling teeth. essential lipids does not sound so bad - LOL.

[Lisa N]

My serum cholesterol dropped, and so does the serum cholesterol of most LCers.

Yes. Mine went from a total of 238 to 177. HDL is at 45 (down from 50), LDL went from 160 to 108, Tryglycerides from 250+ to 120. And this on a high saturated fat diet...go figure! :)
Total cholesterol is made up of 3 components, HDL, LDL and triglycerides. While we need fat for HDL and LDL production, a good portion is produced by the liver. Triglycerides need carbohydrates to be formed (sugar). Generally, the more carbs you consume, the higher your triglycerides will be.
Studies have also shown that total cholesterol levels below 160 are associated with an increased risk of disease. In this case, lower is not better.
Cutting carbs has also been shown to cause a shift from production of the small, dense LDL particles (the bad kind) to the light fluffy kind (the good type).

Insulin surges will provoke the liver to create more cholesterol.

Yes, as will a low cholesterol diet and it's usually the bad LDL kind when it does.


i do not believe people would have sugar problems if their sugar came from just the good stuff, and they also got enough protein and essential fats.

You could, but you'd be wrong. You can develop type 2 diabetes from getting too many carbs from even the "good stuff" as you put it, unless the good stuff means low glycemic fruits and vegetables and even then, it's possible to get too much as glycemic load also plays a part. Thousands of people have develped diabetes while following the recommended low fat, high carb diet. As I said before, your body doesn't care where the sugar comes from..it's all sugar to your body and too much of it from any source is not a good thing. Your belief also would be wrong in the case of type 1 diabetes; it has nothing to do with diet as its cause. Beta cells are destroyed in the case of type 1 through a viral or autoimmune process.

i just believe that too much saturated fat clogs up your arteries.

In the case of a high carb diet combined with saturated fats, you'd be right, but it's not the fats alone that are causing the problem. This is why I said earlier that in your case with a high carb diet, you're wise to limit your fats. However...all the studies to date that show that saturated fats have this effect have been on subjects that are also consuming a high carb and often high glycemic diet. Studies done on subjects who consume saturated fat combined with a low carb diet showed the opposite effect; cardiac profiles improved considerably even with high amounts of saturated fat. This would imply that it's the carbs as well as their corresponding glycemic index that are the problem, not the saturated fat, so if you're going to insist on eating a lot of carbs, better keep those fats down. :rolleyes:

[gymeejet]

hi lisa,
my cholesterol is at 179 on my last test, and my triglycerides at 86. the third type of cholesterol that i was referring to is VLDL. (i think it stands for very low density).

you want to limit carbs. i feel it is essential fats that we need to increase.

we will just have to agree to disagree about some things. when i am running around at 100, you can get ole atkins and the boys to figure out how i surpassed em all, eating all these terrible carbohydrates - LOL.

[gymeejet]

btw, my glucose is at 81, with a given normal range of 65-114. this was a few years ago, so i need to get another test. after fixing my problems, i have not been so diligent about testing, especially since i am performing so well.

[rhaazz]

gymejeet,

My mom, obese all her adult life and clearly addicted to carbs, (she couldn't stop eating bread all day long) developed adult onset diabetes at age 56.

After being diagnosed, she did everything her physician told her to do -- adopted a low calorie, low fat, low sugar diet, exercised every day.

She did not lose a POUND -- and her diabetes didn't improve either.

Her diabetes caused her to suffer several strokes. [Diabetes is a terrible disease and affects every part of your body.]

The strokes caused her to develop "multiple infarction dementia." Meaning, if you have a series of stroke, you can go crazy.

This bright, funny, interesting woman went crazy -- age age 58.

She was UNRECOGNIZABLE.

I cannot emphasize enough how horrible this was for her and me and my father and my brothers.

It was tragic.

In her craziness, she eventually became a bag lady and alienated every member of her family (she thought we were all trying to kill her).

Today, tragically, she's still alive -- at age 76. She exists in a semi-comatose state in a nursing home. They control her blood sugar with injections of insulin.

They control her congestive heart failure with nitroglycerin patches.

They keep her alive.

Her mind is totally gone.

I am convinced that had she tried the Atkins diet prior to developing diabetes, her life -- and mine, and my father's, and my brothers' -- would be nothing like what they turned out to be.

Look, higher "good" carbs work for you. OK, I have no problem with that.

But, gymejeet, If you and Lisa N are BOTH telling the truth -- then maybe BOTH types of diet work -- for different people?

Maybe Lisa N and I are unfortunate enough not to be able to tolerate carbs, for whatever reason -- activity level, past dietary abuses, genetics, whatever.

But you, for whatever reason (genetics, activity level, or even simply having avoided high glycemic carbs) DO tolerate carbs.

So what?

Diabetes is TRAGIC and must be avoided at all costs by those who see that they have signs of heading in that direction. People like me, and other chornically overweight people for whom low fat diets have failed repeatedly, and who have success with Atkins, should not play around with carbs.

As for people who've never had any problems with weight or health -- I say, more power to you. Whatever works for you.

[gymeejet]

hi raz,
i am fine with that. like i have said repeatedly, this may be the way you need to go, because you do not metabolize carbs very well. i wish you great success.

like i said, i would love to see a bunch of young people placed on both yours and my diets, and be able to see what occurs. my belief is that people would not develop sugar intolerances, except those that are born with that disease. in otherwards, their intake of sugar would not cause it. unfortunately, there is no standard for my diet, like there is for the lc diet. at least i have not heard of the HEFLSFAPRNC high essential fat, low saturated fat, ample protein, remainder natural carb diet being touted by any large identifiable group of people.

even i started showing some carb symptoms with my rise in cholesterol. but it immediately came down with the introduction of just essential fats. my essential fat intake is about 75% of my fat, while my saturated is only about 10%, the remainder being omega9. so i do have first hand evidence of a low essential fat diet starting to have some of the typical high carb diet symptoms, disappear when essential fats were added in abundance. that is one very important piece of information that i keep close to my memory.

like i said, we will have a much better understanding in another generation - sometimes the only answer is the passage of time.

i also have someone close to me whose life was compromised by excessive bad sugars, so i can empathize with you, in that regard.

anyways, i will check back here and there, but it seems as if we may have come to an end point. i have enjoyed my conversations with you guys, and am delighted that you guys are doing what you feel is necessary to be the best that you can be.

[gymeejet]

hi raz,
one last thing - bread is not really what i would call a great carb. whole grain bread is okay, but i do not think we are in need of grains in the same way that we are in need of fruits and vegetables.

there are some times when i do need some bread. it occurs when my fruit just doesn't seem to have the same ability to fill me up. so i do eat bread on a regular basis, but i would guess that grains are 10% of my carbs, where produce is 90%. so on this we may also be in agreement. eating a lot of bread is not something i would advise at all, simply because we would be sacrificing a lot of other much more needed foods.

[cc48510]

hi raz,
one last thing - bread is not really what i would call a great carb. whole grain bread is okay, but i do not think we are in need of grains in the same way that we are in need of fruits and vegetables.

For once we semi-agree. I disagree on the Whole Grain issue, though. Whole Wheat Bread is only slightly higher [<1g more Fiber and <1% more of a few Vitamins/Minerals] in Fiber, Vitamins, and Minerals. The difference in Glycemic Index is very small. IMHO, there is not much difference [nutritionally] between White and Whole Wheat Bread.

When I eat Bread [occassionally] I chose Nature's Own Wheat 'n Fiber, which is made with: Whole Wheat Flour, Wheat Protein, Wheat Gluten, Soy Flour, Soy Fiber, and Wheat Bran. It has about 1g more Fiber and half the carbs per slice compared to regular whole wheat bread. This or Hi-Fiber (2g or more per slice) Whole Grain Breads are the only breads I would call "okay" and then only for use in moderation.

I believe that if you are going to eat alot of carbs, they should come mostly from Fresh Green Vegetables, Low-GI Fruits, Unsalted Nuts, and Legumes. Tubers and Hi-GI Fruits should be kept to a minimum and Whole Grains should not be an every day food.

[cc48510]

animal fat has almost no essential fats - mostly all saturated.

Not true at all. Grain-Fed meats are generally low in "essential" fats. But, they are not all saturated. The fat in most Grain-Fed meats are about 46% Saturated, 48% Monounsaturated, and 6% Polyunsaturated. Grass-Fed (Organic) Beef is lower in Saturated Fat and higher in "Essential" Fats than Grain-Fed Beef. Fish [especially cold-water ones] can be high in Omega-3s, an "Essential" Fat. Even those that aren't particularly high in Omega-3s are low in Saturated Fat.

As another member pointed out, you want your Omega-3 and Omega-6 fats to be in the proper ratio. If you eat too much Omega-6 [relative to Omega-3] it puts you at risk.

[Lisa N]

there are some times when i do need some bread. it occurs when my fruit just doesn't seem to have the same ability to fill me up.

This is a pattern that many of us are familiar with: Eat carbs ---> blood sugar rises ----> insulin response ------> blood sugar falls -----> increased hunger -----> eat more carbs and then the process repeats itself. In people who are sensitive to carbs, this often results in overeating due to hunger and an ever-increasing insulin response with increasing hunger that promotes conversion of carbs to fat storage; it's a vicious cycle. The higher and higher amounts of ciruclating insulin start causing a host of physical problems as well.
The best way we've found for breaking this vicious cycle is to cut the carbs which moderates the insulin response/blood sugar crash/hunger cycle very effectively and causes our bodies to start burning fat instead of storing it (the body cannot store fat when insulin levels are low and glucagon levels are high).
I would posit that you can get away with eating the amount of carbs you do for now because of your intense exercise regime. I hope you can continue it as long as you eat this way or your may start to see the same effects the rest of us have. However, many people don't have the time/ability/inclincation to excercise to the intensity level that you do (hey, we have jobs and families that require a good bit of our attention!), so we choose to excercise as much as we can and control or weight while promoting health through our diet.

[rhaazz]

gymeejet, I'm glad that your essential-fat diet works so well for you! Atkins and other LC docs (like Perricone) also recommend essential fats -- your story makes me want to make sure I'm more on the ball with this.

And aren't you surprised -- I know I am -- at how much you have in common with LCers on the topic of nutrition?

Lisa N -- I LOVE you! Your posts always contain so much information and they make it easier for me to commit to LCing. :wiggle:

[csj]

Quote:"we need to meet our protein requirements, our 2 essential fats, and then the rest in fruits, vegetables, and whole grains. if people followed this, they would live to their maximum, which is somewhere between 100 and 140, and would keep their 21ish energy peak into their 50's."

How did you determine the 100-140 numbers?

[gymeejet]

hi cc,
i have a high belief in eating natural foods. we evolved right along with every other life form, and share a lot in common.

i crumple white bread into a mass of white dough - it makes me sick to look at. i buy bran-for-life sprouted grain breads, and it will never look that way. with natural foods, it is also what we do not measure. we will never know all the nutrients in a food.

i suspect that there is something in the bread that i eat that my body desires. i eat the bread plain, and will eat half the loaf in 1 sitting, and the other half the next day, quite likely. i might not have any more for several weeks.

[gymeejet]

hi lisa,
my desire for bread has nothing to do with craving for carbs, as i am actually replacing an almost complete carb food (fruit) for a lesser percentage (my bread).

i will not have to change my eating habits, since i just allow my body to do that naturally. i pretty much always get the same protein and fats each day. the extra is carbs. so when i work out hard, i eat more, which means more carbs, and when i just lift weights, or take the day off, my body does not want as many calories, and since my protein and fats will stay the same, this means that my carbs go down. so in essence, i am doing just what you suggested - cutting carbs on lower exercise days.

[gymeejet]

i feel that the average person is aging way too quickly. when i go to my reunions, many of my classmates are looking a complete generation older. since 60-100 is what is common today, 100-140 does not seem too high, when one sees the degradation that should not be occurring so quickly.

http://www.lauralee.com/news/130years.htm

i actually think it might be over 140, but i wanted to make a point, with many people seeing it as at least within reason. i do not believe i have overstepped my bounds by saying 100-140, but it still shows great room for improvement over our existing norms.

[gymeejet]

hi raz,
if you get your hubby to increase his essential fats by quite a bit, could you keep me posted. he seems to have a fairly active life, and it would be interesting to me to compare his results with mine.

[cc48510]

The longest living person so far lived into his early 130s if I remember correctly. As technology evolves, we will find ways to make people live even longer. So, the 140 gymee states is not entirely impossible. But, making that number will require alot more than just the right amounts of essential fats, phytonutrients, etc...You will also need plenty of exercise, a low-stress lifestyle, to abstain from smoking, have good genes, and be just plain lucky [enough to avoid dying in an accident.]

[gymeejet]

hi cc,
there is much talk about finding the genes that cause aging. people may live a long, long time in the centuries to come. but i was only referring to our bodies and our technology, at present, when i was citing our possible maximums. i think that today, people would be attaining those ages, if they were to treat their bodies, OPTIMALLY.

[pltrygeist]

it is my belief that none of us differ in our requirements, by all that much, in terms of our genetic make-up.

It is my belief that you could not be more wrong. If this were truly the case, then a dietary supplement that works for one person would work for everyone else.

Simply put, we are bags of chemicals, each different in many many ways. Most people have differing fluid volume and viscosity, blood and tissue pH, rates and preferences of processing carbohydrates, fats and proteins, efficiencies of mitochondria, genetic cellular makeup, stress and environmental exposures, electrolyte needs, blood types, diets, genders, fatty acid oxidation rates, hormone levels, etc., etc., etc.

To say that we all have the same needs is outdated. vitamin C for you may do wonders, whereas taking more vitamin C for me can result in problems. I may take magnesium chloride and it can help remove my joint pain, but if you take it, it could worsen how you feel. I might do well taking antioxidants, whereas someone else it might not be beneficial. It all has to do with chemical makeup. We are all different and so too are our requirements.

[gymeejet]

hi pltrygeist,

i will attempt to address your post more completely, but i want to address one part now.

It is my belief that you could not be more wrong. If this were truly the case, then a dietary supplement that works for one person would work for everyone else.

this of course is wrong logic, because each individual body is in different states of need. for example, if my body has the correct amount of iron, and yours is low, then adding extra iron to my body might be toxic, while for you, just the right amount.

so your conclusion is incorrect, because it does nothing to negate my statement of people's genetic makeup. instead, it would be better used as an argument that individual's body's have currently different needs, because they are in different states of flux. of this, i do not disagree. i merely stated that, for the most part, not counting those with diseases, that all of our bodies operate in much the same fashion (i.e. we all use the same amino acids for the same reactions, etc.). so our requirements can change because of environment and lifestyle, and certainly in amounts of nutrients, but the basic workings are the same.

[lose55pds]

Hi gymeejet -

Interesting thread, and one can take away that the nutrition information out in the world can likely support any claim, no matter the validity.

As a technical professional, I'm very much a believer in proof and facts. Published information is conflicting at best, and likely hasn't even begun to scratch the surface. I'd say research hasn't even detected the key indicators for success.

But, experience is the best teacher.

I've been following the Atkins nutritional plan for 13 weeks, and am progressing through the stages (I'm in Ongoing Weight Loss). Since I've started this approach:

- I've lost 40 pounds to date, toward a goal of 55 pounds
- I have more energy during the day
- I no longer have headaches
- I no longer have nighttime backaches
- I'm able to concentrate better

I consume more vegetables and fruits now than I ever have. I've never eaten so healthy. I've benefited because I was intelligent enough to follow this approach, in understanding how food acts as fuel for the body. And, I'm not unique in this respect.

While I believe your characterization of low-carb nutrition is "bad", remember it's never so much the arrow's fault as it is the archer. There are individuals who don't follow the plan appropriately, and it gives the associated plan a poor impression to others.

In your consideration of the "bad", I would encourage you to look to those who are succeeding with a low-carb approach and prove your hypotheses to them. It's very difficult to argue with physical success.

[gymeejet]

hi lose55pds,
thanks for the post, and congratulations. the fact that you are eating lots more fruits and vegetables is stupendous.

the standard american diet (sad) is atrocious. i have no doubts that your diet is much better, as your body is telling you.

many of the people on this forum have diabetic-type symptoms, where they have no choice but not to consume much sugar. i respect that that is what they need to do.

from an "optimum health" standpoint, i do believe that one needs to consume more carbs. again, a healthy person, who does not have sugar metabolism problems.

but you are getting a lot of other nutrients that the body needs.

one of my biggest beefs with atkins, and the rest of the crew, as well as most other "NUTRITIONISTS", is that everyone touts weight loss, and exploits those who are overweight. this is because they can not make money any other way.

i am giving you guys the best absolute nutritional advice you will ever get. i believe that someday some of you will realize that this is true.

the goal is not to lose weight, not to limit carbs, not to limit saturated fat, etc. etc.

THE GOAL is to BRING BALANCE TO THE BODY, SO THAT THE BODY CAN WORK AS IT WAS DESIGNED. once your body is actually working optimally, the weight will take care of itself. we are not all made to be 10% body fat, but our bodies will stabilize at weights that are healthiest for each of us, so you will not be obese, either. our natural levels of hormones control that. testosterone for muscle, estrogen for fat, thyroid for our metabolic rate. if we start messing with what God gave us, we get in trouble.

i also believe in results. and i am accomplishing a physical fitness/health that i never believed possible, when i was 21. i am told i look good, but i certainly do not look like anything special, in terms of muscularity, etc. but i can run circles around the best looking muscular specimen, in terms of intensity and duration of cardio exercise.

the reason for this is that when one's body is working optimally, every mitochondra in every cell is ready to make that energy for us. it is the one most indicative sign of our health.

thanks again for the great post, and congratulations for making improvements to your diet. your body will thank you every day.

[lose55pds]

from an "optimum health" standpoint, i do believe that one needs to consume more carbs.

I believe I agree, assuming that this statement is extended to "...than what is presently consumed on a low-carb diet." This tends to be true in the later stages of Atkins. The basis of Atkins is that you're eventually finding the optimal point at which you maintain your ideal body weight.

The outsider's unfortunate view of Atkins is that the initial start of the plan (Induction to restrict carbohydrates in an effort to bring blood sugar balances back to normal) is considered to be the only thing you do, which couldn't be more wrong. However, this is what the public seizes upon.

Most people, no matter which approach, often determine that a nutritional approach of balanced carbohydrates along with reduction or elimination of trans fats are the way to go. The Pre-Maintenance or Lifetime stages of Atkins preach this very thing. The only difference is that the carbohydrate balance is determined on an individual basis.


the goal is not to lose weight, not to limit carbs, not to limit saturated fat, etc. etc.

THE GOAL is to BRING BALANCE TO THE BODY, SO THAT THE BODY CAN WORK AS IT WAS DESIGNED. once your body is actually working optimally, the weight will take care of itself.

True, but you have to walk before you run. I, for one, have not in the past been able to shed the weight necessary to get in a position to have balance. Maybe it's a difference in approach (get balance to achieve ideal weight vs. achieve ideal weight in order to get balance), but I know the old way just wasn't cutting it. For me, the weight never has taken care of itself.

I would encourage you to review the Pre-Maintenance and Lifetime stages of the Atkins approach, as I believe those are closer to your opinions than you might realize. The key point is to understand, under this approach, that the relative balance in terms of nutrition is not hard and fast for everyone, i.e. 40-30-30 under "The Zone".

Excellent topic of discussion, thanks for bringing a discussion focusing on knowledge and logic into the War Zone. While we may still disagree, it's nice to have conversation about differences that stay on point.

Cheers.

[gary]

Hi Gymeejet!

You said way back in this thread: with regards to people from tens of thousands or millions of years ago, i am not sold that anyone is exactly sure just what they ate, or how healthy they were. there is tons of anecdotal evidence that both sides (meat, vegetarian) claim.

gary says: Maybe not millions of years but scientists have examined stomach and dung remains from some very old humans. One of note recently is the Iceman (about 5,300years old). They know all the contents of his stomach and there ain't no twinkies! :)

Do you call that anecdotal evidence? :daze:

I have a science degree and I did Atkins cold turkey as an experiment on myself. I was surprised at how well it worked when I lost 18 lbs in one month. I stayed on induction for 3.5 months - ate close to zero fruit. After that moved right into maintenance. After one year I had my blood retested and everything got better. My Doctor said I am healthier than healthy. So I am doing Atkins maintenance for my optimum health.
I have not had one potatoe, rice, very little bread, one serving of pasta in over one year.

You say: i am giving you guys the best absolute nutritional advice you will ever get. i believe that someday some of you will realize that this is true.

gary says: So when are you going to win a Nobel prize? Your arguments are purely subjective and are nothing but your own opinion.

[Lisa N]

THE GOAL is to BRING BALANCE TO THE BODY, SO THAT THE BODY CAN WORK AS IT WAS DESIGNED. once your body is actually working optimally, the weight will take care of itself. we are not all made to be 10% body fat, but our bodies will stabilize at weights that are healthiest for each of us, so you will not be obese, either. our natural levels of hormones control that. testosterone for muscle, estrogen for fat, thyroid for our metabolic rate. if we start messing with what God gave us, we get in trouble.

Gymeejet...you have yet to show other than through opinion, anecdotal evidence and your own experience that the human body was designed to burn carbs as its main energy source. In fact, the evidence to date seems to point to the exact opposite. Cultures where the diet is largely fat and protein get sicker and overweight and get that way quickly when a higher carb diet is introduced (take a good look at how the Inuit are doing on a higher carb diet).
When you say that hormones to a large degree control our weight, you are correct, but you don't address how eating higher amounts of carbs in many people results in hormonal imbalances (insulin, for example) which can only be corrected by cutting the carbs. Insulin is actually a master hormone and when you get that out of whack, it also tends to throw off the other hormones as well and drives eicosanoid production in the wrong direction producing inflammatory responses and increasing the wrong types of lipids in the blood as well as triglycerides. Excess insulin production doesn't just result in diabetes and insulin resistance, although these are two of the problems that can result. It results in a whole lot of other problems as well, including obesity and unbalanced blood lipid readings. How do you get insulin production out of whack? Too many carbs.
Essential fats are needed. Yes. Essential amino acids are needed. Yes. But...they are not THE magic bullet that you seem to think that they are with the ability to cure all that ails us. The human body is a very complicated system and what keeps you in balance may very well throw someone else OUT of balance.

[gymeejet]

hi 55,
it appears to me that while you may not get as many carbs as i think you should, you seem to have settled towards the higher range, when compared to other low-carbers. and you are getting a good supply of produce. continued good luck.

[gymeejet]

hi gary,
i believe in the results from examining mummies. i think this is pre-christ. we know that they suffered from arthritis, and worms. i think that it is not as safe a bet, to judge the food they ate. within the stomach, meat digests much more slowly, so there is bound to be more of it left. how positive are we that this is indeed human dung. i just see a lot more chances for errors. but when i mentioned this in the first place, the others were talking about way before that.

even the low-carb doctors are willing to admit that most initial weight loss is water.

you mention not having bread or pasta or rice. these are not the important carbs. as long as you are getting your fruits and veggies, i have no surprises that you can thrive without bread and pasta, especially if you were overeating on them in the first place.

i am sure you could find a couple of nobel prize winners in the complete medical field that told jack lalaane how dangerous exercise was. the real and only proof in the pudding is results, not prizes. let's see how i do in life, and how low-carbing does, say over the next 50 years. that will be more conducive towards giving us correct information.

[gymeejet]

hi lisa,
from the very first, i have openly admitted that environment plays a part. we know, for instance, that both plant and animal life has more omega3 in it, the colder the climate.

all my testing here is done locally with friends in southern california. what i would find interesting is to bring all sorts of people from varying climates together in Podunk, Arkansas. Allow them a year or so to really get aclimated to their environments, and then see what sorts of differences they still had. And then another experiment that would bring babies from those same environments, and see what sorts of results they had. The first one would tell us if adults had any real differences. If we truly did find differences that were not environment-causal, then the second test would tell us if it was genetic, or something that occurred to people as they lived in these varying climates. I have an open mind about that. However, I would want to be one of the main scientists, so i could first hand know that the results were not being fudged one way or the other. Thanks for the post.

[pltrygeist]

hi pltrygeist,

i will attempt to address your post more completely, but i want to address one part now.
this of course is wrong logic, because each individual body is in different states of need. for example, if my body has the correct amount of iron, and yours is low, then adding extra iron to my body might be toxic, while for you, just the right amount.

so your conclusion is incorrect, because it does nothing to negate my statement of people's genetic makeup. instead, it would be better used as an argument that individual's body's have currently different needs, because they are in different states of flux. of this, i do not disagree. i merely stated that, for the most part, not counting those with diseases, that all of our bodies operate in much the same fashion (i.e. we all use the same amino acids for the same reactions, etc.). so our requirements can change because of environment and lifestyle, and certainly in amounts of nutrients, but the basic workings are the same.

Bear with me, and I apologize for this post being so long, but this is a debate on a subject that is near and dear to me...and one that I actually hold a specialty in.

Just a little background on myself. I supervise a clinic specializing in clinical nutrition evaluation where we examine the nutrient needs of people not only with broad degrees of health infirmities, but also of people who otherwise appear to be healthy. Our work is based, in part, on the works of some of the most renowned natural health clinics in the world. While we do not specialize in weight loss, nor do we really accept patients solely on the basis of disproportionate body weight, we do have to treat people for such conditions when it is part of a vicious cycle creating a barrier to healthy expression. It is actually because of the many things I have seen with regards to obese patients that we have formulated working knowledge of a variety of metabolic types differing not in how the body works on a mechanical level (even though there are some slight differences occasionally), but how it operates in regards to what it needs to fuel the properly operating system. In doing so, we have made large strides in helping to isolate the needs of individuals which has proven successful more often than not.

Specifically, each nutrient available from the environment serves a purpose in the human body not just qualitatively, but quantitatively as well. Flux does not determine your levels of needs in the respects of how they differ from anyone else’s individual needs. A person’s individual needs for various nutrients is derived from normal homeostasis—certainly a function of both genetics and environment. There is strong consideration that must be given to the argument that normal homeostasis for any given individual develops out of varying and imperfect conditions...and to that end, I will agree that it could possibly be a reason why we all have metabolic differences. However, it is because of both genetics and metabolic individuality that some groups of people are predisposed to various health conditions, as it is similarly a reason why we are all nutrient-different. Your pH and mine are not the same, nor should they be necessarily. Normal tissue pH is not a reflection of how cells are operating but rather the constituency of the mineral components of that specific tissue, disease states, genetics, ingested nutrients and metabolism. Simply put, in most people a certain tissue pH is a reflection of specific polarity of some minerals. However, normal variation and difference between two people does not a disease make. If it did, then a specific pH range would prove not only disease inducing for all people but a fatality at a much smaller unit of change. It is because of each of our metabolic differences and varying individual needs that the human race is so successful and adaptive. It is part of the reason why candida yeast (the oldest and most adaptive organism on Earth) does not kill every one it affects. So metabolic differences are partly why you and I both are here to discuss this matter. Speaking of flux, flux is only part of the equation and to some degree not that important in terms of determining a person’s needs and what they are actually getting from their diet. I think we can all agree that any given persons needs change given their age, gender, level of activity, etc. However, this is not the primary reason for variation in terms of nutrient requirements.

Based on mine and others findings, there is no such thing as an RDA that is the same for 2 different people even for the seemingly innocuous vitamins and minerals. This is irrespective of the actual function of the micronutrients. For example, if your RDA for iron and mine are different, and we are both determined to be healthy by the strictest standards available, then it is erroneous to say that one of our needs is not being met simply because the RDA is not met in one person.

The reason for this is simple. Each micronutrient in the body serves a function based on the level of homeostasis in each person. Compare two persons with different and nearly opposite metabolic profiles. Feed them both large quantities of magnesium and you will have one who thrives and one who becomes lethargic. The same analogy can be made for all the valences on the periodic chart.

The fundamental truth to what you and I are both saying is that physiologically we all function somewhat similarly. That is, cell for cell, they function in much the same way between two otherwise healthy individuals. But because of differences in actual physiologic need of micronutrients, we cannot extrapolate that simply because we share some physiological similarities that we have identical needs for the same nutrients...even if we both need all of those same nutrients…even if we are healthy and similar in many respects...we have differing needs for not only the nutrients themselves, but also the amounts of the nutrients.

[gymeejet]

hi pltrygeist,
good post. i am not sure that we are in complete disagreement. i do not feel that we all need the exact amounts of any particular nutrient. i may need more vitamin c than you, while you may need more calcium than me.

but that is different to me, than to suggest that i run on sugar, while someone else runs on ketones.

the first is minor differences. the second is not. perhaps it could be compared to 2 gasoline cars that run on different octane levels (the same), versus a gas car and an electric one.

if they are living in the same environments, i do not believe that there are gas humans and electric humans, but i do believe there are different octane humans.

[gymeejet]

lisa,
i forgot to address your post about carbs. my experience is similar to any physiology book that i read. they all say that the brain runs on glucose. most of the rest of us burns fat, when in low intensity levels - our bodies have evolved to store tons more fat, than it has for glycogen, so it had darn well better use that fat, or we would all be in serious trouble - LOL.

however, when it comes to exercise, especially vigorous, we need ample supplies of sugar. we will never run out of fat.

on a personal level, i stopped abusing sugar very early on. my first change was to delete meat, as i did not want to place that much saturated fat in me, nor any of the chemicals that are fed to the animals to get them fat, in me. very soon afterwards, i deleted twinkies, and such.

i could never get satisfactory answers with respect to protein consumption, and i was not aware of the nutritional tests then, so there was nothing i could do to test myself. i turned out to be fairly low.

the biggest mistake i made was to listen to the low-fat diet craze, as i learned the hard way that essential fats are needed.

but today, i am experiencing exhilarating, unbelievable results. even without input from anyone else's results, it is hard for me to believe that my body could be that singularly different from everyone else. i have not seen evidence of this in anything else. perhaps i have some bionic implants, and am not aware - LOL.

the answers to this are at least a generation away or more. but i would love to see my type of diet become more widespread. then i could show you all my STUDIES. LOL. and you could tell me that studies are not always correct. LOL.

[gary]

To Gymeejet,

You said: even the low-carb doctors are willing to admit that most initial weight loss is water.

So what does this have to do with me? I lost 18 lbs in the first month - what part of that is water weight? When I reached 37 lbs lost in three months - what part was water weight. None of the weight has come back.

Even if the first few pounds were water weight who cares?

Plus it is subjective anyway and I don't really buy it. I lost the first 4 lbs and people said oh yeah that is probably water weight. Then I lost 10 - oh yeah that is probably water weight. Then 18 in one month - come on are you going to say water weight. It is all "probablies" Who can really say. The bottom line is 37 lbs lost in 3.5 months and i am maintaining well.

You say: i think that it is not as safe a bet, to judge the food they ate. within the stomach, meat digests much more slowly, so there is bound to be more of it left. how positive are we that this is indeed human dung. i just see a lot more chances for errors.

gary says: Do you think any of the scientists have enough intelligence to understand that different foods digest at different rates? So you can only assume with your superior intelligence that they must make errors. I give a lot more credit to the scientists than your unsubstantiated assumptions. Plus many of these studies are not for quantitative analysis but qualitative. They know what these people ate. In the case of the Iceman - he did not have a last meal in his stomach before he was killed. They anaylized what was in his intestine and can tell you exactly what animals and what grains he ate. This is scientific evidence. You tried to call it anecdotal. :yay:

[gymeejet]

gary, due to your attitude, i will not reply to any more of your posts.

i said that i felt there was a lot more chance for errors. you changed that to "So you can only assume with your superior intelligence that they must make errors."

good luck with your current nutrition.

[Lisa N]

even the low-carb doctors are willing to admit that most initial weight loss is water.

Initial being defined as the first 3-5 days which is true for any weight loss method. After that, you're burning fat. No doctor or scientist in their right mind would try to assert that I've lost 70 pounds of water and since my lean body mass has remained unchanged, it stands to reason that that majority of that weight loss has been fat.


my experience is similar to any physiology book that i read. they all say that the brain runs on glucose.

Your experience is just that: your experience. In fact, the body has a preference for whatever fuel source is in greatest abundance in the bloodstream. In your case (and that of anyone consuming the levels of carbs you do), that would be glucose. In my case (and most people following a weight loss phase of low carb), that would be ketones. There are some cells within the body (specifically those without mitochondria) that can only use glucose, but they are small enough in number to be easily supplied even on induction levels of carbs and lacking that, the body can manufacture sufficient supply through gluconeogenesis. In fact, recent studies have shown that certain tissues in the body actually prefer ketones as an energy source over glucose. Since you have never actually attempted to exercise after having adapted to a ketogenic diet, you really have no idea how your body would perform. You only have experience on one side of the equation. Others here have experience on both sides.
Come to think of it, considering your stance that the brain can only run on glucose, I'm doing pretty well continuing the debate on a non-functioning brain that's running on ketones and has been for 2+ years now. :lol:

my first change was to delete meat, as i did not want to place that much saturated fat in me, nor any of the chemicals that are fed to the animals to get them fat, in me.

As any person raising animals for slaughter can tell you, the fastest way to get animals fat is to feed them lots of grains. If a cow or pig can make saturated fat from eating only grains, guess what; your body can too.

perhaps it could be compared to 2 gasoline cars that run on different octane levels (the same), versus a gas car and an electric one.

Or how about a car that runs on gas versus one that runs on diesel or alcohol?
You keep claiming that you can't do intense exercise without a lot of carbs (and I believe you since you have your body effectively in a glucose burning state) and yet we have had people posting here stating quite the opposite, running long distances and working out hard on a much lower level of carbs. Can't be done? Apparantly, it can. You just feel that you can't do it and as I've pointed out before, you haven't tried either.

[gary]

Gymeejet,

Just because you can not tell the difference between anecdotal evidence and scientific evidence - just admit you were wrong. Why
can't you do it? :lol:

How many of the studies did you ever read and why don't you take one of them that you think may have errors - be specific. You just make unsubstantiated assertions. And really stupid ones! Do you know the scientists involved and what evidence do you have that they study the remains for food and don't no anything about digestion? As far as Human dung - first there is association by all the remains at a site - then there is DNA. You imply that you have more intelligence than the scientists that do the studies.

You've been pointed out by others that your arguments are purely subjective and only your own opinions. :lol:

[wsgts]

I can't believe this thread is still going, most people have given up by now so kudos gymeejet!!

Anyways, when I was catching up reading Lisa's post above, I remembered when we were fattening up cows to send them to the stockyard for sale. As most of you know, cows eat no meat at all, they are in effect, vegetarians.

So to make them weight more (you sell cattle by the pound), we would give them oats or cracked corn with mollasses mixed in, I believe we purchased this for the express purpose of fattening up the cows. Of course, we also gave them salt licks to keep them from getting dehydrated in the Mississippi sun.

Haven't thought about that in years, but it makes sense as to why they were all so fat. It's been 20 years since we raised cows. I wonder if we should call the low-fat diet the "cow" diet?? LOL...

Thanks for the stroll down memory lane, and interesting thoughts.

Later,
wsgts

[Dean4Prez]

I can't believe this thread is still going, most people have given up by now so kudos gymeejet!!

Anyways, when I was catching up reading Lisa's post above, I remembered when we were fattening up cows to send them to the stockyard for sale. As most of you know, cows eat no meat at all, they are in effect, vegetarians.

So to make them weight more (you sell cattle by the pound), we would give them oats or cracked corn with mollasses mixed in, I believe we purchased this for the express purpose of fattening up the cows. Of course, we also gave them salt licks to keep them from getting dehydrated in the Mississippi sun.

Haven't thought about that in years, but it makes sense as to why they were all so fat. It's been 20 years since we raised cows. I wonder if we should call the low-fat diet the "cow" diet?? LOL...

Thanks for the stroll down memory lane, and interesting thoughts.

Later,
wsgts

Maybe we've been taught to think low-fat is more healthy as part of a plan to fatten us up for slaughter on intergalactic markets. It's the Flying Saucer People -- they're controlling our leaders behind the scenes!

[lose55pds]

Let's get back to square one: the premise that relative nutrition under a carbohydrate-restricted way of eating is unhealthy.

What scientific evidence suggests this?

The Harvard Medical Journal reported earlier this year that, over a long duration (I think 20 years, but I'm unsure) participants on a low-carb eating plan fared better in health (very specific measures, but not sure which) than participants on a low-fat eating plan. In the medical world, it's tough to find greater credibility than the HMJ. If this can be impeached, I'd be very surprised.

I'm not suggesting this refutes any claims made by Gymeejet, but let's get the opinions of "this just doesn't seem right" out of the way and go to hard, credible evidence.

Are there any credible studies that suggest the opposite of what the HMJ research found? :q:

[gymeejet]

hey 55,

take a look at the Harvard School of Public Health. they are saying a lot of what i have been saying. limit your saturated fat, but make sure that you get lots of the good fats. about the only 2 high-glycemic carbs that i eat are bananas and potatoes. most produce is placed in the low-glycemic table.

there was a test done on nurses whereby a number of grams of carbs were deleted, and replaced by essential fats, with good results.

http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/nutritionsource/index.html

[gary]

To lose55pds,

You have to assume that Gymeejet's answer is no - there are no scientific studies that present scientific evidence that counter the Harvard study. Notice Gymeejet ignored your question and did not reference any counter scientific evidence. :roll:

[gary]

Note the reference Gymeejet posted unlike Gymeejet they are concerned about high glycemic carbohydrates for non-diabetics:

Diets filled with high-glycemic-index foods, which cause quick and strong increases in blood sugar levels, have been linked to an increased risk for both diabetes and heart disease.

:yay:

[Lisa N]

about the only 2 high-glycemic carbs that i eat are bananas and potatoes.

Hmmm...based on your previous posts, you should also add Apple Cider, pineapple juice concentrate, watermelon and sugar-sweetened sports drinks to that list.
Apples and grapes are in the moderate GI category which means that while they are not high GI, too many of them will lead to a high glycemic load.

[gymeejet]

quote from the harvard medical school

Dietary Fat, Dietary Cholesterol, and Blood Cholesterol Levels

One of the most important determinants of blood cholesterol level is fat in the diet--not total fat, as mentioned already, but the specific types of fat. Research has shown that some types of fat are clearly good for blood cholesterol and others, clearly bad. As for cholesterol in food, it does affect blood cholesterol levels, but not nearly as much as many people believe. For some people with high cholesterol, reducing the amount of cholesterol in the diet has a small but helpful impact on blood cholesterol levels. For others, the amount of cholesterol eaten has little impact on the amount of cholesterol circulating in the blood.

In studies in which polyunsaturated and monounsaturated fats were eaten in place of carbohydrates, these good fats decreased LDL levels and increased HDL levels.

Saturated fats are mainly animal fats. They are found in meat, seafood, whole-milk dairy products (cheese, milk, and ice cream), poultry skin, and egg yolks. Some plant foods are also high in saturated fats, including coconut and coconut oil, palm oil, and palm kernel oil. While saturated fats raise total blood cholesterol levels more than dietary cholesterol does, they tend to raise both the "good" HDL and the "bad" LDL cholesterol.

Trans fats are worse for cholesterol levels than saturated fats because they not only raise LDL (bad) cholesterol, but also lower HDL (good) cholesterol.

[Lisa N]

Whoah! Somebody forgot to tell my body that Harvard is right about saturated fats that that it had better start raising my LDL and total cholesterol immediately! :lol: Total last check: 177, HDL: 45, LDL: 108, Triglycerides: 125: near ideal numbers after two years + eating a diet high in saturated fat. :cool: Stranger still...most people who follow low carb see this effect without restricting saturated fat.

Once again, we have another study villifying saturated fats based on....folks not controlling their carb intake. Who woulda guessed? :rolleyes: Interesting to note that at least they are starting to understand the importance of glycemic index and glycemic load in causing disase.

While on the other hand, we have a study showing that even after a year's time, those on the low carb (high saturated fats) diet had a better cardiac profile (better levels of HDL and triglycerides) than those following the low fat diet. LDL was unchanged in either group, so those with the high saturated fat diet got the prize for "most improved cardiac profile". Exactly opposite of what Harvard is predicting here. How could that be?? When results don't match predictions, it's time to go back and reformulate the hypothesis.

You might want to have a read through Gary Taubes' article that was printed in the New York Times in July, 2002 titled, "What if it's all been a big fat lie?" for more information on why the studies that villify saturated fats are off base in the first place and can't be applied to those who are restricting carbs in the second place since the studies are based on those who are not restricting their carbs (either in quantity or in glycemic index).

And I thought you didn't place any faith in studies...except perhaps when they agree with you? ;)

[gymeejet]

lisa,
i told you that is exactly what you would say. if i do not quote studies, i am berated that it is my subjective opinion. then when i do show them to you, you tell me that i am not supposed to believe in studies.

you better take a hard look in the mirror. it is actually you guys who are prejudiced, and only believe in studies that support your beliefs.

many of you guys are obese and/or diabetic. i have long since been willing to stipulate that you have special needs for special problems.

but it does not necessarily apply to the average healthy person.

now i am showing you the harvard school of public health is saying much of what i am saying, so it is a little harder to accuse me of voicing my personal opinions.

[gymeejet]

my adding essential fats to my diet did exactly what the harvard medical school said its studies did.

[gymeejet]

from the Harvard School of Public Health:

Low Carbohydrate, High Protein Diets
(For example, The Zone, Atkins diet, Gerald Reavan, and Protein Power Lifeplan)

In response to the potentially negative effects of a high-carbohydrate, low-fat diet, many books have been written on the potential benefits of a low-carbohydrate, high-protein diet. This approach often features types of food that most people avoid when trying to lose weight, for example, whole milk, steak, ham, and bacon. Although such diets are gaining in popularity, thus far only a few research studies have examined them or their underlying rationale. Although some initial results suggest that people can lose weight over the short term on a high-protein diet, this may simply be because they were consuming fewer calories, something that often happens when people drastically change what they eat. Whether a high-protein diet will actually maintain long-term weight loss still needs to be studied.

Apart from the uncertainty about its ability to maintain weight loss, the high-protein diet may have outright detrimental effects. Many of the high-protein foods that people choose while on this type of diet (red meat, cheese, and full-fat dairy products, for example) are high in saturated fat and low in vitamins and minerals. This may increase the risk for heart disease and colon cancer. Diets very high in protein (especially animal protein, like red meat) may also increase the risk for osteoporosis in women because the body takes calcium from the bone to neutralize the acids that build up in the blood as a result of digesting large amounts of protein.

Until more is known about the true risks and benefits of these low-carbohydrate, high-protein diets, they should be viewed with caution. Protein intake should be kept at moderate amounts (about 8 grams per day for every 20 pounds of body weight) and should be mainly vegetable protein. And carbohydrate-rich foods--in the form of whole grains, fruits, and vegetables--should still make up a large part of the diet.

[Lisa N]

you better take a hard look in the mirror. it is actually you guys who are prejudiced, and only believe in studies that support your beliefs.

No..it says that I've read both sides and when you have a study of more than 100 participants getting exactly the opposite results of what was predicted (better cardiac profiles instead of worse) when the "demon" diet is put into practice in at least 3 different trials combined with the real-life experiences of those of us here who are also following the same plan AND the experiences of the doctors who also recommend the same type of plans to their patients, somebody needs to go back and take another look at their hypothesis. Harvard uses words like "may" (which leaves the option open of it may not...we don't know for sure) in the above articles. What we have in the study that I referenced is those who actually put it into practice and DID (not might have, could have or MAY) improve their cardiac profiles despite what the researchers were expecting. So I'm comparing hypothesis against what happens in reality. Given the choice between predictions and actual results, I think I'll go with the actual results.
I also pointed out that the study you are referring to does not apply to low carb since the dietary parameters are totally different in each case.
Now...if you want to post a study that shows that saturated fat causes worsened blood lipids in low carbers in live test subjects (not in theory), we'll have something to discuss.
While you're looking, you might want to spend some time browsing this site: www.thincs.org the whole issue or cholesterol may be totally irrelevent, especially given that more than half of the people who have cardiac episodes have totally normal cholesterol readings. :read2:

So what we have here again is an opinion, albeit from a widely respected institution, based on a study with parameters that do not apply to low carbers.

now i am showing you the harvard school of public health is saying much of what i am saying, so it is a little harder to accuse me of voicing my personal opinions.

Okay...so now you've moved on to quoting the opinions of others who kinda-sorta agree with you, are based on studies that are not applicable to low carb and pretty much ignoring what they had to say about glycemic index even in healthy people which disagrees with what you said earlier about not having to worry about glycemic index as long as the sugars were coming from "natural" produce so long as you didn't have a problem with glucose metabolism.

[gymeejet]

lisa,
with regards to glycemic index, you might notice that whole fruits, with the exception of the banana, were placed in the low glycemic index. foods that were put in the high glycemic index were
White bread
White rice
French fries
Refined breakfast cereals
White spaghetti
Soft drinks
Sugar

pretty much exactly what i said - CRAP FOOD.

this has been the most severe problem with american diets, and probably still is, and is the reason for the epidemic in diabetes, which experts say is gonna skyrocket further.

you guys were correct in deleting these foods from your diets. you will suffer from deleting the good carbs and substituting them with the bad fats.

i told you from the beginning, i did not want to fight you with my study is better than your study. but i did need to bring some respect to your constant berating of my personal subjective opinion. for those silent, but observing viewers, being on the same side as the Harvard Medical School, lends me some credibility, since no one on the internet, knows me.

as i already told you, studies are not a big thing to me, because i can not verify its authenticity. why not go to some other health discussion forums. you will hear tons of people whose health was ailing after going on a low-carb diet. i know one gal who was hospitalized for kidney problems.

again, for those that have/will get sugar metabolic problems, i say okay, i guess that this is what you may be forced to do. for otherwise healthy people, my solution is much, much better.

AMPLE PROTEIN, AMPLE ESSENTIAL FATS. you should get full nutritional profiles to test these nutrients. REMAINDER NATURAL CARBS, MOSTLY PRODUCE, SOME WHOLE GRAIN PRODUCTS.

[gymeejet]

A Duke University study, funded by the Atkins Foundation, showed that people lose more weight following Atkins' high-fat, high-protein, low-carb diet than a traditional low-fat diet. What the headlines didn't point out was that the low-carb dieters in this study took in 100 to 150 fewer calories a day than the low-fat group -- a significant difference over six months.

imagine that - a study funded by a low-carb group found that the low-carb diet was superior. wonders never cease. and if there had been a study for low-fat, funded by special interests, you can be darn well sure that it would have showed how good the low-fat diets were. i think i may have said this one or two thousand times before. LOL.

[gymeejet]

i'll be gosh darn. here is another study funded by the atkins foundation. no wonder there are so many studies on low-carb, and funded by none other than the man trying to sell books and such.

http://www.wesh.com/health/1795097/detail.html

[gary]

Too bad all these studies are scientific studies. Another thing to note is all the recent low carb studies have simliar results showing the success for LC WOE. You know if Gymeejet really studied up on the subject he would understand Dr. Atkins warned about such a situation. For years no one would take his ideas seriously and fund research. He said if he uses his own money to fund a study then clueless critiques like Gymeejet would imply the studies are biased. So finally he funded some studies despite this problem. Funny how the results of these studies parallel non-Atkins funded studies.

Real science and scientific studies are hard for Gymeejet to comprehend!

:yay:

[gymeejet]

dr. atkins died at the age of 72, from cardiac arrest. claims that diet was not at fault, but rather a fall on the sidewalk. boy, those sidewalks are meaner than i had imagined.

[csj]

Did you do the post-mortem? Head injury is nothing to joke about. Ultimately we all die because our hearts stop beating so I guess Dr. A. did die of cardiac arrest. Funny thing how it followed so closely after his severe head injury.

[gary]

Plus he slipped on ice so "ice" was the instigator the sidewalk came second. The injury resulted in a blood clot in his brain. Certainly nothing to make fun of and nothing to do with diet.

[gymeejet]

what we know for certain, is that dead doctors don't lie.

[gymeejet]

Dr. Dean Ornish is the first clinician to offer documented proof that heart disease can be halted, or even reversed, simply by changing your lifestyle. Based on his internationally acclaimed scientific study, which has now been ongoing for years, Dr. Ornish's program has yielded amazing results. Participants reduced or discontinued medications; their chest pain diminished or disappeared; they felt more energetic, happy, and calm; they lost weight while eating more; and blockages in coronary arteries were actually reduced.

well, i'll be gosh darn. ornish's study shows that a low-fat (10% or less fat) is doing wonders for people. now how is it, that 2 studies, purporting very different things, both have results showing that they are correct. something can not be both black and white.

i wonder if perhaps, by any wild figment of our imaginations, that there is any connection with the person funding/benefitting from the "study", with the outcome of the "study".

[pltrygeist]

One of the problems with those who get all of their information from available research: there is no new viable ideas put forth. This puts us in an odd predicament; it means that anything “new” is considered to be dangerous and unhealthy until proven otherwise. So if new theories are only as good as what science has already proven then we have a catch-22. It means that science is forcing itself to live in the past, so to speak.

So research for the sake of argument is not as much an advancement as it is a way of being critical via yesterday’s knowledge. However, in the case of critiquing the analytical process, everyone should know that there are literally no absolute statements. Almost anything can be proven or disproven with some type of research. Case and point: do you think a normal adult male elephant can be suspeded only by his tail tied to the anchor hook of a crane? I have formulae from theoretical physics which says yes it can be done. However, reality is cold and would say otherwise. So we should temper absolute statements based our research findings because to do so in light of this would prove to be arguing science on the basis of emotion. Doesn't work that way.

The other point I want to make is that just because a research study is funded by supporters of the conclusion of said research does not make that research invalid. This is the case in the argument against aspartame. Arguments against aspartame conclude that just because the companies themselves funded the studies therefore the studies are invalid. This is not necessarily so. Many of these studies can be duplicated and the research can be verified independently by other researchers. Even the research techniques themselves can be scrutinized by others. That’s the beauty of peer-reviewed research. So the argument that just because Atkins funded research therefore such research should be void is not scientific justification to do so.

Okay, now back to the subject at hand.

GymeeJet, what is the date of the Ornish study you are referring to as being “the first”?
I literally have tens of thousands of research articles in my desk files arranged by date and author. I can verify your statement for you.

One thing that I keep hearing from the carbohydrate junkies is that we Atkins dieters should be eating lots more fruit. I have a beef with this (no pun intended). I have examined documents detailing agricultural methods over the last few hundred years specifically dealing with fruits and vegetables. Most of the fruits we so commonly think of as “healthy and natural” are in reality, neither. Not included are things like some varieties of apples and bananas, dates and figs and wild vine berries. However, that’s a far cry from the supermarket items. Consider this: when was the last time you went for a walk in the country and found wild fruit to eat? No, not the ones that someone planted, but the actual fruit growing on it’s own? Not very often I bet. If you did, it was probably a fruit bearing plant that didn’t produce a large amount. That should be clue #1. Also, since when and in what species is it natural to eat fruit year-round? Even tropical fruits have seasonal peaks. Yet we tend to eat these things all the time.

The problem I have with fruit is simple. Fruit today is a far cry from what our ancestors ate. We eat hybrid fruits, genetically altered to be twice as sweet as what you find in nature, fruit that does not rot as fast as wild fruit, but stays ripe nearly twice as long, and sometimes the fruit has insecticides genetically spliced into the actual fruit genes.

If I only had a problem with the sugar content of our “Frankenfruit” that would be sufficient to have me avoid it pretty much except as an occasion. Care to take a look at the research at what large amounts of fructose do for the liver? For obesity? Cholesterol levels?

Post some of that research if you dare.

You bet I will.

[cc48510]

Dr. Dean Ornish is the first clinician to offer documented proof that heart disease can be halted, or even reversed, simply by changing your lifestyle. Based on his internationally acclaimed scientific study, which has now been ongoing for years, Dr. Ornish's program has yielded amazing results. Participants reduced or discontinued medications; their chest pain diminished or disappeared; they felt more energetic, happy, and calm; they lost weight while eating more; and blockages in coronary arteries were actually reduced.

well, i'll be gosh darn. ornish's study shows that a low-fat (10% or less fat) is doing wonders for people. now how is it, that 2 studies, purporting very different things, both have results showing that they are correct. something can not be both black and white.

i wonder if perhaps, by any wild figment of our imaginations, that there is any connection with the person funding/benefitting from the "study", with the outcome of the "study".

You forgot to mention that the participants in those studies saw their Triglycerides go off the charts and their Blood Sugar became high. Granted overall their Cholesterol improved [though their HDL did decrease slightly.] But, their Triglycerides and Blood Sugar got worse. Triglycerides are as important a determinant of Heart Health as Cholesterol. BTW, did I mention that studies done of Atkins dieters have shown just as marked and in some cases better improvement in Cholesterol than those on Ornish...while also improving Triglycerides and Blood Sugar.

BTW, after 8 months on Atkins, my Cholesterol is 175, my Triglycerides are 96 and my Blood Sugar is 84. All are well within the normal range. My LDL is within the normal range for a person with 2+ Risk Factors. I fall into this group because of my family history of heart disease and my weight [which has greatly improved on Atkins.] Healthy LDL for someone with 1 or less Risk factors is 30 points higher than it is for me.

[bvtaylor]

You know this all boils down to a difference of opinion as to what is optimal nutrition.

If you take the variables of genetics, body composition type, and activity level, and add to them the variables of the FDA food pyramid, the Low-Fat lifestyle, the Low-Carb lifestyle, and every other purported dietary lifestyle, one can simply bog down as to what is right and what is not.

I strongly believe that the human population is more than likely typed into several differet types of builds and metabolisms, so certainly finding the right proportion of fats to carbs to proteins is very individual.

For those of us with a family history of diabetes and heart disease, the LC approach appears to be very successful overall at normalizing blood levels (cholesterol, triglycerides, sugars, etc.) and reducing our risk factors.

But what is LC? Perhaps that's a misnomer. The USRDA is what recommends the 200 g of carbohydrates in the average diet. That's not necessarily the optimal nutritional writeup. Nor is it a historical nutritional standard. We're looking at nutrition in a very small window box, when our human biology has been evolving over thousands of years, and certainly did not start with an agragrian constitution. We were hunters and gatherers long before we were farmers and our biology is set that way.

Finding the correct ratio to the body type, genes, and activity level of an individual may vary a great deal.

I have a lot of misgivings about what is purported to be sound nutrition by the so-called experts, and without having an absolute determination, debating on what is "low" vs. "optimum" is very difficult.

As Einstein would say, "it's relative."

[Lisa N]

well, i'll be gosh darn. ornish's study shows that a low-fat (10% or less fat) is doing wonders for people. now how is it, that 2 studies, purporting very different things, both have results showing that they are correct.

Nowhere has anyone here said that you can have your carbs and eat your fat, too. In fact, I have stated just the opposite in at least a couple of occasions. Dean Ornish's diet is high in carbs, so he does well to restrict fat. The problem with that is that even the AHA recognizes that this is such a severe restriction in fats that most people are not able to adhere to it for long and does not recommend cutting fats that low for any length of time. Any benefit from changing eating habits will only last as long as the person is able to maintain them. Also, see an earlier post for the effect that this diet had on the poster (worsened triglycerides, etc...). Strange how Ornish's study (that he did himself, I might add..at least Atkins funded the research and stayed out of it. You do understand what a "free grant" is, right?) showed such marvelous improvement, yet when others try it on their own they see very different results. Not so with low carb. Here we have a whole board full of people doing this with minimal supervision and getting exactly the same results obtained in the study. With low carb, you have exactly the opposite approach as Ornish...don't worry about the fats, except for hydrogenated fats, but limit the carbs and sugars. Wonder of wonders...it beats out the low fat camp every time in improvements in cardiac profile.
I also have to ask why you believe that a study that Ornish did himself would not be biased while those that were funded by the Atkins foundation were?

with regards to glycemic index, you might notice that whole fruits, with the exception of the banana, were placed in the low glycemic index.

Very interesting. You'd think that an institution as prestigious as Harvard would know that GI is divided into 3 categories; low, moderate and high as well as the fact that most fruits (with the exception of berries and melons) are in the moderate GI category (not low) unless they've redefined the glycemic index and I saw no mention of that in their article. Fruits in the high category include bananas (as you mentioned), watermelon, raisins, prunes, and other dried fruts (which, by the way, are also "whole" fruits; they just have had the water removed from them). And once again, no mention of glycemic load.
I'd also like to point out that it's not necessary to even eat fruit to get the nutrients you need. Any nutrient that is found in fruit can also be found in abundance in veggies. I happen to like berries, so I include small amounts of them (1/2 cup at a time) when they are in season and make sure to eat them with some protein or fat to lower the glycemic load.

dr. atkins died at the age of 72, from cardiac arrest. claims that diet was not at fault, but rather a fall on the sidewalk. boy, those sidewalks are meaner than i had imagined.

Gymeejet...that was both an ignorant and disrespectful comment to make as well as having absolutely nothing to do with your argument, not to mention completely unfounded and unproven; methinks you're grasping at straws at this point and that stooping to making such a comment is in very poor taste. Thousands of people die each year from subdural hematoma and other closed head injuries from situations exactly like that which Dr. Atkins suffered from: A fall from slipping on ice resulting in a blow to the head. We had 3 such instances where I live after an ice storm this past spring. Of course, living in California you would have limited exposure to such things. The young and the elderly are particularly at risk for this type of injury.
Quotes from E-medicine and Tripod.com: "Acute subdural hematoma is the most common type of traumatic intracranial hematoma, occurring in 24% of patients who present comatose. This type of head injury also is strongly associated with delayed brain damage, later demonstrated on CT scan. Such patients portend devastating outcomes, and overall mortality rates are usually quoted at around 60% [but can be as high as 90%].
"Subdural hemorrhage or hematoma is seen most often in seniors who have sustained a fall and struck their head."
"Acute subdural hematoma often is fatal, despite prompt medical attention and surgical intervention."

As for the "they're all lying" theory, downtown Manhattan is a busy place at the time of morning that Dr. Atkins fell. Surely there would be at least a few people who could come forward and testify that Dr. Atkins had actually walked into his office without incident if he had and then collapsed from a cardiac arrest at a later time. Dr. Atkins suffered a cardiac arrest not that long before that brought about by a non-dietary related condition called cardiac myopathy which he developed due to a virus and has had for several years and he and his family/associates were quite open about it as well as the test results that showed his coronary angiogram to be completely normal. Also, cardiac arrest does not indicate that there is something necessarily wrong with the person's diet as it can be caused by a myriad of things as well as being the ultimate cause of death of us all (the question being what brought about the cardiac arrest) where a myocardial infarction can only be caused by a blockage of a cardiac artery. Please learn the difference.

[bvtaylor]

The Harvard study mentioned in this thread discussed the "low calorie" attributes of the Atkins diet. I find this terribly amusing.

Although calorie intake vs. expenditure is a basic formula for maintaining/gaining/or losing weight, this formula is not as simple as looking at a height/weight chart.

Because expenditure is affected by genes, metabolism, and activity level concurrently, any one of these other factors will alter the "expenditure" and thus the basic formula, focusing on net calorie intake is not meaningful.

I've lost a considerable amount of weight on Atkins eating over 2000 calories per day, which is significantly more calories than the standard LF diet (usually recommended at 1200 - 1600 calories for my 5' 4" height).

This diet gives me more energy, so exercise happened naturally. This diet helps curb appetite, so binge eating disappeared naturally. I've done the LF diet, going to bed hungry, being tired and getting depressed. Then I used to say "hell with it" and gave up and figured I'd rather be heavy than feel deprived forever. Well, with this diet, I have more energy, I am happier, I don't let myself get hungry, and my 700 triglycerides dropped down to 78 with no meds.

Plus I haven't succumbed to a virus since March of this year when I started this diet, which is pretty amazing because I used to get sick all the time. Between the supplements and the LC lifestyle, I know I'm a healthier person... but then so is my Mom who is doing Atkins who has been on Cholesterol meds for years and no longer needs them--her doctor is so amazed... in fact her cholesterol dropped too low, she had to stop taking Lipitor, and so is my diabetic husband who is doing Atkins (and went from 5 regular prescriptions down to 1, and almost normal blood sugar levels).

I've done complete panel bloodwork and everything is within normal ranges, even after more than 6 months eating 25 or less net carbs. I eat 3 eggs most every day, and my cholesterol is just fine.

Everything Dr. Atkins has written about has checked out with me personally, so I am totally pleased with this LC lifestyle. I won't be on induction forever, and plan to add more grains, veggies, and fruits, but I'm in no sudden hurry. We lost a great asset to medicine, to humankind, and to the startling epidemic of diabetes worldwide. I was personally very sad at his passing.

I'm enjoying exploring the range of great LC food that I love.

Dr. Ornish can kiss my athletic- :dazzle: -you know what.

[pltrygeist]

bvtaylor, I agree with your stance on metabolic and genetic variance between individuals. I posted a little something about that a few pages back in this thread that you might find some interest in. It only makes sense biologically that we should be varied in terms of metabolisms due to the fact that we are all different in so many other documented ways (blood types, immune system constitution, even genetic weaknesses). If we were all the same metabolically on a cellular level this would most certainly predispose us to opportunistic diseases and infections.

It appears that some of the most successful private health clinics in the world agree and have taken steps to address such differences. I seriously doubt the successes of these clinics has anything to do with sheer luck.

[gymeejet]

hi pltry,
i don't recall the year of the ornish study. apparently it had been a long on-going one. my point was merely to show that everyone has studies. i am sure that Pritikin has studies supporting his claims, whatever they may be.

i have had huge success with essential fatty acids with myself, and many others - never fails to help. so you could show me 10,000 studies saying that they weren't needed, and i would have 10,000 circular files.

i don't rely on studies, because for the most part, they are paid advertisements, with pre-determined solutions. i trust results, and listen to knowledgeable people, whom i know personally.

i still read books, and articles, but until i see it work, i take it with a grain of salt.

i do like your style, and can tell that you are knowledgeable, so i enjoy reading what you have to say.

[gymeejet]

hi cc,
good to hear from you. i am glad that you are having so much success.

[gymeejet]

lisa,
you must not have gotten the gist of what i wrote. my bit about ornish was sarcastic - i was just pointing out that everyone that is selling you something, has studies, i.e. advertising, showing you how well it works.

[gymeejet]

lisa,
i believe that as a diabetic, your definition of high glycemic, is different than what it is for non-diabetic people.

but here is what i believe. i do not believe hi GI is the horrible bad thing that you do. in fact, i think there are many times when they are preferable. i look at things logically.

gymeejet, he get up in morning, he want some instant go. he no want wait 1 hour. gymeejet, when he go 100 miles per hour on his bicycle, want energy now. he like happy. much energy make gymee happy, happy, happy. gymee say best to have the type nutrition needed now. when gymee stop exercise, and slow down, then gymee no need as much sugar. so then gymee not eat so many bananas.

gymee say vegetables very good. he say God gave us both fruits and veggies for reasons. so gymee say both are good, and neither one takes the place of the other. gymee say we know 20 or so nutrients in fruits. he say maybe those are in veggies. but that leaves 9,980 undiscovered nutrients. gymee say we will never make an apple, or ever know everything it contains. so gymee say eat fruits and veggies. cause gymee know produce make him happy, happy, happy. gymee, he like happy.

[cc48510]

Plus I haven't succumbed to a virus since March of this year when I started this diet, which is pretty amazing because I used to get sick all the time.

Interesting thing about that...When I copied my weights over time off the doctor's chart, I noticed that EVERY time I went on a low-calorie diet, I ended up in the doctor's office. I was in the Doctor's office 8 times in the 6 months I was on my first Low-Calorie/Low-Fat Diet. Last time I got sick was last November. I would get sick on Average once every 3 months. I went on Atkins last December and haven't been sick since.

[gymeejet]

i have never been to a doctor, as an adult, for sickness.

[gymeejet]

just wondering - i am now a senior member. how did that happen. i hope that doesn't mean i am a senior citizen - LOL. although i do wish it would show a couple of apples, instead of drumsticks, for us vegetarians - LOL.

[Lisa N]

gymeejet, he get up in morning, he want some instant go. he no want wait 1 hour. gymeejet, when he go 100 miles per hour on his bicycle, want energy now. he like happy. much energy make gymee happy, happy, happy. gymee say best to have the type nutrition needed now. when gymee stop exercise, and slow down, then gymee no need as much sugar. so then gymee not eat so many bananas.
gymee say vegetables very good. he say God gave us both fruits and veggies for reasons. so gymee say both are good, and neither one takes the place of the other. gymee say we know 20 or so nutrients in fruits. he say maybe those are in veggies. but that leaves 9,980 undiscovered nutrients. gymee say we will never make an apple, or ever know everything it contains. so gymee say eat fruits and veggies. cause gymee know produce make him happy, happy, happy. gymee, he like happy

Gymee...if you were trying to sound silly...congratulations. You succeeded. As for the 9,980 undiscovered nutrients, if they're undiscovered how do you know how many there are? :lol:

i do not believe hi GI is the horrible bad thing that you do.

Maybe you don't (and I never said it was a horrible bad thing, just something that not nearly enough people, including yourself, pay attention to), but apparently Harvard and a lot of other respected health institutions are starting to realize its importance in preventing disease and maintaining health even if you don't. Glycemic index and glycemic load isn't important only to diabetics. It's important to pay attention to both so that you can prevent yourself from becoming diabetic. If you haven't understood that from everything I've posted thus far, I think we'd better drop it. I can explain it to you, but I can't understand it for you.

[cc48510]

he say God gave us both fruits and veggies for reasons.

Actually, Potatoes only grew naturally in one small area of the Andes Mountains. They were not known to anyone other than the local indians until the 16th Century, when Spanish Conquistadors took them back to Europe. They didn't gain acceptance [because the Potato is a member of a family of Poisonous plants] until the 17th/18th Centuries. They weren't eaten in all parts of the world until the last couple centuries.

In addition, God didn't give us all fruits and veggies. There are alot of Fruits and Veggies out there that are the result of Human manipulation. In fact, citrus and melons are some of the most crossbred/hybridized produce out there.

[bvtaylor]

Hello pltrygeist. I read your interesting post on page 9 as you recommended. I'm glad that there are organizations like yours that are using these techniques. Frankly I'm surprised that this sort of approach is not more widespread among the healthcare professions. To label this sort of thing as "alternative" is disturbing.

Even more so is the disturbing trend of Type 2 diabetes, both in the USA and in increasing amounts in the developing world. I seriously doubt that only a lack of exercise is at fault... for example we haven't been in the USA a strictly agrarian culture in 200 years... the majority of the population in this country lives in cities and physically does not do the kind of physical effort one does on a farm.

I think that the refined diet as gymeejet indicates is truly the primary culprit in an epidemic that appears to be suddenly and recently crossing a few decades. I think Dr. Atkins calls this the 30-year rule. He predicted this epidemic.

Although the "frankenfruit" as you describe is certainly a disturbing issue, and certainly not natural, it does seem that those of us who have fallen into dire straits with our health with regards to diabetes and obesity are not there due to our excessive intake of fruit or whole foods, but rather to all the other foods, along with the fruit, that are touted as "healthy".

I read an article on LifeScript.com recently that recommended the following diet for overweight children:

http://www.lifescript.com/resources/tips/overweight_child.asp

Healthy foods & snacks - here are some healthy foods and snacks suitable for your kids and the other adults in your home.

Fresh fruit
Fruit canned in juice or light syrup, such as mandarin oranges, peaches, or pineapples
Small amounts of dried fruits such as raisins, apple rings, or apricots
Fresh vegetables such as baby carrots, cucumber, zucchini, or tomatoes cut and served with low-fat salad dressing for dipping
Reduced fat cheese served with whole-wheat crackers
Low-fat yogurt with fruit
Bagel spread with small amount of peanut butter
Graham crackers, animal crackers, or low-fat vanilla wafers
Tortilla spread with low-fat refried beans


Almost all of these suggestions above are excessively high in carbohydrates (particularly refined sugar/flour/corn syrup), low in fat and low in protein (although I don't object to whole fruit and veggies). What this does to a hungry child is to make them hungrier. Plus the glycemic load is going to lean the child towards obesity rather than away from it... moreover, how many of us can eat a "normal" serving of a bagel for example? I find a half a 2" bagel to be really paltry when I'm hungry.

I don't think that low fat is so good... moderate fat is better.

More protein is even better... balancing the protein, fat, and carbs makes more sense to me.

Better snacks would be to add to the fruit or veggies or whole wheat crackers a hard boiled egg, a whole fat cheese stick, a handful of nuts, grilled chicken strips or fish sticks, and a glass of whole milk.

As you recall from the Atkins program being accused of having lower calories... more than likely this is because the folks eating aren't as hungry, not because they are depriving themselves more. We Atkins folks choose this lifestyle because we like to eat and are hungry all the time and LF doesn't make us feel good.

I was feeding my hyperactive son cereal with 2% milk for breakfast. When I switched to eggs and/or waffles with LC syrup and a glass of whole milk, his behavior in school vastly improved.

Voodoo? I think not. :nono:

You're right. It's more than a matter of luck.

[bvtaylor]

ON POTATOES:
I read somewhere that potatoes would not even be approved as food by today's FDA standards because of the amount of arsenic they contain.

ON CARB-LOADING FOR EXERCISE:
There are some recent studies that show that more fat and protein before athletic endeavors causes less injury (esp. muscle tears, etc.) and may be better than the traditional carb loading.

[cc48510]

Berries [which are all Low-Carb and Low-Glycemic] all rank in the top 10 of the most Antioxidant Rich Fruits and Veggies. Only two fruits had higher Antioxidant content by volume...and both are dried fruits. A serving of Dried Fruits is larger [in number of fruit] than the fruit they came from, even though both are nutritionally identical [all that is removed is the water.] I bet if someone figured out a way to dry out berries, that they'd take the #1 spot for Antioxidant content.

[pltrygeist]

CC actually, if you can find a way to simplify grape cultivation in a way that does not inhibit formation of these effective antioxidants, followed by removing the fructose content, dry them, then powderize the raisins, you will make a mint off of my business alone. One company has a pretty good product where this is attempted and I think I'm paying his overhead in what I order for my clients every month.
I'm not kidding.

And I don't want to sound like I'm anti-fruit. I'm not. Certain metabolic types can handle the sugar content to an appreciable degree, while they typically oxidize fats extremely rapidly to such a large extent that they in fact do need the powerful antioxidants found in natural fruits.

I try and encourage many people to go on a nature walk when possible to a farm or other location where natural fruits are growing wild and in season. Limiting intake of course to no more than a specified amount. Most people do say, "the wild fruits are not nearly as sweet as what's in the supermarket selections,". Another comment I get is that wild fruit does not usually make people thirsty minutes after consuming them. That is an interesting thing that I'm finding.

bv--it would surprise you to know that I'm getting quite a few referrals from the medical community because of positive interaction. These referrals are usually some of the most unhealthy individuals you can imagine and their recoveries, sometimes long and difficult, are nearly always the most rewarding. So the alternative label I wear proudly in being somewhat alternative to the medical answers to preventative health. But what is most exciting is that the public is getting not only more knowledgeable on the science of nutrition but also interested in becoming their own doctors, so to speak, relying on their own judgements. This cannot happen without in-depth study into varieties of human nutritional needs.

[rhaazz]

pltrygeist, that is soooo cool! I want to know more about what you're doing!

Gymeejet, I don't know anything about hi-carb metabolism & health (only that I lost weight on atkins) but did you SEE what the riders on the tour de france eat? carbs, carbs, carbs, som ewater, and then more carbs. mostly simple carbs to the tune of 6,000 calories per day!) Which makes me think, the more you exercise, the more carbs you tolerate -- or need.

Still, to counter what I just said: i was doing a weightlifitng class for a year. Every class (this was on a traditional hi carb vegetarian diet) left me in agony for days -- barely able to move from pain. Then I started eating WAY more protein on atkins and suddenly the class was no big deal. I think I was finally consuming enough protein for my muscles to repair themselves after each class. Go figure.

But I have to admit: I am no expert on nutrition and anaerobic vs. aerobic exercise. All I know is, meat is murder.

[gymeejet]

raz,
you understand a lot more than you think. weightlifting does not require anywhere near the amount of carbs as aerobic exercise.

here is the main difference. in weightlifting, we are for the most part working just our muscular system. we do 10-15 lifts that tire a specific muscle or muscle group. there is not a lot of energy spent, but there is a reasonable amount of muscle tissue that needs repair - hence the greater need for protein and essential fats, and the less the need for carbs.

intense aerobic or anaerobic exercise is completely different. this is extremely energy-consuming. the mitochondria in just about every cell in the body is zooming away, making atp from glucose. when you are done, you may feel exhausted for quite some time. not so with weightlifting. you may not be able to raise your arms, because your muscles are sore, but you don't feel exhausted, because you have not taxed your whole body.

of the two, cardio is much more important for health. but weightlifting is also important, because it not only strengthens our muscles, but STUDIES, ahem, show that it also helps our skeleton.

the bikers to which you refer have probably trained their muscles to store large amounts of glycogen. our bodies respond to the demands we place upon them, AS LONG AS WE LISTEN TO THEM, AND DON'T OVERDO IT.

as far as anaerobic and aerobic, there is not a lot of difference. anaerobic (without oxygen), is for the most intense activities. but you will eventually finish the job, aerobically. if i recall correctly, we create lactic acid during anaerobic activity, and then when the body is able, it oxidizes that lactic acid. so a 100-yard dash is all anaerobic, and i might add, all glucose burning.

i have no doubts that i double my carbs on a big cardio day. like i said earlier, even in the same individual, the 3 percentages can change drastically, based on their activity for the day.

always nice to hear from you.

[gymeejet]

gymee may be silly, but he also very, very FEISTY. anytime he told he subjective, he sic the HMS on 'em. gymee, he like Harvard Medical School.

gymee pushin 50, and can still go like rocket. gymee like go. go gymee go. underage girls still flirt with gymee. gymee very thankful to Creator for youthful vitality. gymee want everyone to drink from fountain. cuz gymee goal everyone healthy happy. gymee like healthy, happy.

[gymeejet]

hey cc,
if i recall correctly, they were doing some gene-fiddling with tomatoes. but i don't mind natural hyridizing. that is still nature making small changes. they may plant 10,000 apple trees, hoping for just 1 that will give them some sort of advancement, and then graft from that one. this does not bother me. do you think it should ?

as far as genetic fiddling ourselves, i am on the fence. my guess is that most of it is not dangerous. to what extent some of it is dangerous, i don't have any gut feeling. perhaps only time will tell.

[gymeejet]

hi pltry,
do you do any of the nutritional testing to which i referred to earlier on ? (i.e. amino acid profile, fatty acid profile, mineral profile, etc.). if you want some info on it, i can post a web site for you to look at.

[cc48510]

hey cc,
if i recall correctly, they were doing some gene-fiddling with tomatoes. but i don't mind natural hyridizing. that is still nature making small changes. they may plant 10,000 apple trees, hoping for just 1 that will give them some sort of advancement, and then graft from that one. this does not bother me. do you think it should ?

as far as genetic fiddling ourselves, i am on the fence. my guess is that most of it is not dangerous. to what extent some of it is dangerous, i don't have any gut feeling. perhaps only time will tell.

Actually [assuming the plants created are nutritionally good] I have no problem with it. I heard somewhere that they are trying to hybridize some to produce more sugar...That is not a good thing. The Sugar serves no usefull function. If you are going to crossbreed/manipulate plants, do it for more Antioxidants/Phytonutrients, not for more sugar. Heck, if you could figure out a way to grow fruit w.o Sugar in them...you could probably make a small fortune.

[gymeejet]

hi cc,
mostly it seems to be about getting them to market (i.e. resistance to nematodes or some sort of insect, etc., or not rotting so fast on the vine, or during shipment, etc.). if they are developing ones for more sugar, it is more than likely a fruit that many/most people find too sour.

[gymeejet]

cc,
i think the fruit will always remain nutritious. but could we alter it in some way, as to cause us some sort of problem ? i am not a genetecist, and just do not feel well-informed or knowledgeable about the situation, to really have an informed opinion.

[pltrygeist]

mostly it seems to be about getting them to market (i.e. resistance to nematodes or some sort of insect, etc., or not rotting so fast on the vine, or during shipment, etc.). if they are developing ones for more sugar, it is more than likely a fruit that many/most people find too sour.

I would dare say, it COMPLETELY seems to be about getting them to market. More money is made via everything that is happening with regards to food engineering. It literally has nothing to do with health. And it has nothing to do with being natural. And yes, more sugary taste is playing into the hands of sales at the risk of health. Only the health conscious will make concious attempts to eat only wild and indigenous fruits. And you're right, wild fruit does not have the same sweetness. Most people have no clue that there is as much sugar content in supermarket fruits as there is. The issue that we're looking into more closely is if the extra fructose is at the expense of fiber content. This remains to be seen at this point.


hi pltry,
do you do any of the nutritional testing to which i referred to earlier on ? (i.e. amino acid profile, fatty acid profile, mineral profile, etc.). if you want some info on it, i can post a web site for you to look at.

These tests that you mention are only a part of what we do in total. For the most part as they are but a piece of the individual's metabolic puzzle. As you have mentioned the term "empirical", likewise, we don't make the mistake of reaching broad-based conclusions about the person as a whole from isolated pieces of data. That's one error medical clinicians are making routinely with regard to quantifying a person's health. We go the extra few miles. So to answer your question, yes, we can do that stuff too.

Not to sound arrogant, if you would like to post a link I can render my opinion as to my impression of the quality of it's diagnostic and/or interpetational criteria. We (the group of clinics mine is associated with) have been recognized as setting the trend and standards for metabolic testing worldwide. I can't guarantee that I can even render an opinion as some places on the internet will not readily reveal such info (usually the ones plagiarizing data and extrapolating incorrectly). But I will take a look if you like and tell you from a cursory exam if it looks to be sound or not if that will help. Some are sound, others are not, as you can imagine.




Changing gears for a minute, are you convinced about saturated fat not being needed.

once again, saturated fat is not needed in one's diet.

I direct you to Gillman, et al. Journal of the American Medical Association, 1997 in which it was found that the more saturated fat you eat the less likely you are to suffer from a stroke, identifying the protective effect of saturated fats in decreasing the risk of stroke by 15% for every 3% increase in dietary saturated fat intake.
I also point to a study published in 1997 in Volume 29 of Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise in which elite athletes wer placed on low fat and high fat diets in different groups and evaluated for health and sports performance. The low fat diet group was found to suffer lowered HDL and higher triglycerides.


i have a low testosterone level

Here's something that might be of interest to you:

Hamalainen, et al. Journal of Steroid Biochemistry "Diet and Serum Sex Hormones in Healthy Men" found that a decrease in dietary fat (in particular switching from saturated fats to polyunsaturated fats that testosterone levels decreased by 15%.

I probably don't have to tell you the implication of low serum testosterone levels and the connection with cardiovascular disease (and the subsequent reversal with testosterone therapy), so I would only add that my recommendation, aside from making changes in your amount of dietary fruit, returning to meat intake would also include butterfat.

I won't pretend to know that this is positively or negatively a reason for the symptom you speak of having (low test), but it does seem an interesting connection.


You may find analyses of all of this peer-reviewed research online and at research colloquia on the net with a little searching, so if there are strong weaknesses they have already been addressed most likely.

My point from this is that we should not focus on saturated fat as a culprit in the SAD. In reality, it's quite difficult to elevate someone's cholesterol or triglyceride levels by increasing dietary saturated fat or cholesterol. It's almost scary how easy it is to increase triglyceride with increasing dietary sugar content. And as an HMS devotee, you're aware of the 1997 study which directly linked triglyceride levels as the dominant indicator of CVD.

If you don't want to argue the research, which I must agree is painstakingly boring then let's look at those groups actually "doing" and "putting" this type of lifestyle into practice. The French have some of the highest fat intakes in the world however, they have dramatically fewer arteriosclerosis and CAD as the SAD. Also, as the Atkins and other low carb dieters have been doing this type of self-induced experimental research on ourselves (many for years now) we should comprise a rather large study group if you ever wanted to do epidemiological data on what's happening to our groups even in this short time. (Hint: it's being collected and analyzed extensively at a school for public health as we speak) the results will be quite interesting to say the least!

[gymeejet]

hi pltry,
i read your post, and will re-read it, and try to give you some more detail. but shortly, for the present.

1)yes, i do not believe saturated fat is needed in the diet, as the body can manufacture whatever it needs from calories.

2)actually, i am happy with a low testosterone level. while it could be argued that one could increase it by diet, i have none of the symptoms of high testosterone, and never have.

3)the tests that i take, did a whole bunch, in terms of getting me more balanced.

thanks again for the long post, and i will answer back in further detail, when i have some time to compose a somewhat-readable reply - LOL.

[gymeejet]

hi pltry,
i thought i would first discuss the fat issue with you. most, if not all, tests that test LF with high-fat diets, do not really apply towards my statements, since i am not recommending a LF diet.

it is obvious to me why many of you do well initially, and why many HF studies (assuming for the moment, perfect honesty, and no bias), might outdo LF studies.

the average person on a LF diet, is also low on protein, and eating a lot of refined carbs, i.e. twinkies and such. they go on your diet - their protein levels increase, their fatty acids increase, and their sugar junk-food is eliminated or close. so of course, that is gonna make some improvements in some places. assuming for the moment that i am correct, and that you are putting too much saturated fat in your diet, whatever problems that may cause, is not gonna happen overnight.

the sugar abuse has been occurring for maybe decades, and all sorts of problems are now appearing. you have not been on high saturated fat for long enough to have any long-term results.

i am taking 33 g of unprocessed omega6 and 15 g of unprocessed omega3 - way more than most of you guys. i am in a position to help dozens of people. since it is your business, you are in a position to help thousands.

if you took a LF person, and added the oils to his diet, like i am doing, i think you would find some remarkable results. at the same time, perhaps up his protein a bit. his carb intake would go down some, if for no other reason that the other foods would have some satiety to them.

if you grabbed 10 21-year-old male athletes, it is unlikely that any of them could keep up with me, cardiovascularly, and i am pushing 50. this is why i have such strong subjective opinions.

i hope you may try that with a few of your patients. it is not the amount of fat in our diets, but rather the amount of essential fats in our diets. if we measure by that yardstick, then my diet is high in fat, while yours is only mediocre.

[pltrygeist]

I’m not sure where you’re coming from at this point. I thought we were talking about saturated fats…

Don't make the mistake of assuming that my dietary recommendations are lacking in EFA’s. Again, we must understand that everyone is different even in terms of how much EFA’s one should consume (and even the source). Broad sweeping recommendations are seldom correct 100% of the time for 100% of the people. The gold standard of metabolic and nutritional assessment must be tailored to the individual's needs, and not getting caught up in trying to force someone into one category or another.

EFA’s can, in fact, certainly help some people. Such people would do well to add even a relatively small amount of DHA and EPA oils to their diet—supplemental or food derived. However, if someone has highly efficient mitochondria coupled with excessive fatty acid oxidation and cetain signs and symptoms, then high doses of fatty acids without compensating with fairly large doses of specific antioxidants can be a prescription for long term disaster. We have seen this too on occasion, and it is a clinically measurable phenomenon.

Likewise, there are definitely people who are on low carb diets who need to be taking antioxidants for the same reason. However, this is not the majority from my findings, and from my experience, concentrating the diet to meat and vegetables has been the most common diet recommendation whether I like it or not. There are occasional exceptions, but it is mainly in terms of food preparation, amounts and source of the nutrients. So literally everything has to be recommended specific to the individual’s needs, but there are still percentages and statistics. From my experience, the statistics weigh heavily in favor of the OWL and maintenence phases of the Atkins diet. So overwhelming is it that this is the primary reason I changed to the diet myself.

As to cardiovascular health/endurance, there are certain metabolic types which have higher general metabolic efficiency, macronutrient sources of energy, oxygen processing and utilization rates, and therefore would not be as prone to endurance exercise as others. This helps clarify why some people naturally excel in certain sports or activities than others. I recall one case years ago where a mother brought her teenage son to me for evaluation to find out why he was no longer performing well in his particular sport. After determining his metabolic and nutritional needs, I advised that he try and switch to a different position on the team--one with a more anaerobic type workload. He did and is now performing at all-star level. However, conditioning and training must be taken into strong consideration. But even then, such conditioning and even cardiovascular constitution do not always reflect dietary and nutritional status as the sole factor in determining what level you’re at. So in the case of activities, sometimes it’s best to capitalize on your strong points rather than trying to do something that your body will resist.

I hope you won’t take this the wrong way. I know you’re trying to be helpful but keep in mind that my recommendations for patients come from laboratory and examination data. Every person is different and has different needs. When I was new at doing nutritional evaluation years ago, I did try various things based on the recommendations of others. My successes were infrequent and always by chance. This got frustrating, so I began to do in-depth studies, interviews, research (yes, I’ve done that too), taking sabbatical trips to observe and glean information from some of the most respected clinics in the world. It did not take long for me to want to emulate their success rates by doing what they were doing. My successes are dramatically greater now and I cannot imagine going back to experimenting based on word of mouth. However, I do appreciate the thought behind your suggestions.

You may be as healthy as you can be, however, you have mentioned earlier that you have low testosterone. This is not a normal metabolic variant in my experience. However, you must consider the time of day the test was administered, whether it was low free testosterone or total testosterone, as well as what your general body type composition is. These can all be variables but at this point offer only cursory clues. I will say that there are sometimes reasons beyond nutritional status (or even age) why primary gender-specific hormone levels can drop below normal. However, correcting the low hormone levels is usually to someone’s long and short term benefit. Who knows, you might be able to even surpass your current abilities with the proper nutritional evaluation. You don’t necessarily have to try and elevate such beyond the normal range, that’s actually more difficult than expected.

[gymeejet]

hi pltry,
thanks for the informative post. i certainly did not mean to suggest that your testing was not good, and i did not take things badly, at all. it does concern me that the end result is placing people on large amounts of saturated fat, with very limited carbs. i suppose it will take a generation of people to see the real results, just as it did with the LF diet. just don't be surprised if they find that the LC diet swung the pendulum too far in the other direction from the LF diet.

as far as testosterone, i never thought of it as a problem. when i observe many males spending half their lives devoted to getting laid, i thank God for not inflicting me with "man's disease". LOL.

plus i like having most of my hair. i definitely carry the genetics for baldness. my dad was an obvious high testosterone male, and had advanced hairloss. i have some hairloss in the frontal area, but not at all on the top. there is no doubt in my mind how i would look, with a high testosterone level.

all my testing is done in the morning. a requirement is no eating that morning. since i have been performing so well, it has been about 5 years since i have taken the tests. so i do not know what my testosterone levels are after a sustained time period of upping my essential fats.

testosterone is 257 ng/dl normal is 241-850
progesterone is .10 normal is <1.22
t4 is 6.9 normal is 5.0-13.0
tsh is .72 normal is .60-4.60
fsh is 5.2 normal is 1.4-18.1
lh is 2.9 normal is 1.5-9.3
estradiol is 46 normal 2-54
ferritin is 41 normal is 25-325
dhea is 194 normal is 80-560
igf is 216 normal is 90-360
homocysteine is 3.5 normal is 5-18
free test is 1.3 normal is 1.1-4.0

blood type is o-positive. i am 5'4", 160. most people guess me at 140-145.

[The Duck]

I think Lisa is absolutely right: different bodies, different requirements - to me this is the soundest possible remark about results of studies and research!

Veggies might be o.k. for most people, but humans were not intense fruit eaters for hundredthousands of years as much as they weren´t eating much cooked grains or cubers some thousand years ago.

I would not rely too much on studies, because the findings contradict each other in many points. Studies can only indicate some isolated aspects. And frankly said, what might be good for the heart is not necessarily good for kidneys or other parts of the body.

I think everybody has to decide for him/her/self and to compromise. I believe everybody has to inform him/her/self and to try to find out what will be the best individual nourishment a la longue terme!

[gymeejet]

hi pltry,
when i originally did my research, i could find only 2 laboratories in the country that did this type of testing. i first used AATRON. my last few i have used Metametrix.
http://www.metametrix.com/Testing%20Services/default.asp

[gymeejet]

hi lisa,
you mentioned the cost of chicken for you. most people pay more than 30-60 cents per pound for the meat that they buy. but you really can not compare a pound of meat with a pound of protein. for with the pound of meat, you get all the saturated fats, hormones, and other stuff that people like myself, will not allow in our bodies. lots of meats contain less than 50% protein.

my soy and milk proteins cost me about $6/pound, while whey costs me about $8/pound. since i have shopped around, these are lower than average, for sure.

as far as availability, i get mine over the internet. so it is available to anyone with postal delivery.

as far as aminos, i was suggesting that all of us would benefit, irregardless of our protein source. the thing to do would be to get your amino profile, after you have adjusted for the correct amount of grams of protein. then supplement with those that you are low in, but especially the sulfur aminos.

one caution - many protein concoctions in the health food store, are not 100% protein, either. for the most part, stay away from the ready-made mixes, as they are also likely to contain aspartame, or some other sweetener, along with not being all protein.

in any case, continued good luck with your nutrition.

[rhaazz]

gymee, he be on a mission! he bring the EFA good news to the peeps of the world.

[alaskaman]

gymeejet - I can't go back over this entire thread to see if its been mentioned before, but Please, do yourself a favor, read Sally Fallon, Mary Enig, Barry Grove and Uve Ravsknov, and see that you are in no way helping yourself by avoiding saturated fat. On the hormones and stuff, sure, so find organic butter, free range chicken or beef or bison. You will be better off by far. Bill

[gymeejet]

hi alaska,
there is very little to read in the nutrition field, that i would be willing to believe. the great majority of it is extremely biased, mainly for financial reasons. i have long since stopped listening to doctors.

i know that saturated fat is not needed. we manufacture as much as we need. if it turns out that it is not as bad as i think, fine - no harm, no foul, from my personal vantage point.

i do not think that saturated fat is a toxic, though. i wanted to set the record straight on that. my big beef (pun intended) with the lc diet is HOW MUCH fat is ingested. for your sake, i hope i am wrong. but i know that you guys are not getting near the amount of phytochemicals as i do, since your intake of fruits and veggies is not nearly as high.

and i do consider sugar to be essential. i showed you an article where there are 8 sugars that are used by the body anabolically, 2 of them are not made by the body. however, i do think that most of you guys probably get enough carbs for that.

in any case, thanks for the post.

[pltrygeist]

i know that saturated fat is not needed. we manufacture as much as we need. if it turns out that it is not as bad as i think, fine - no harm, no foul, from my personal vantage point.

That first sentence should probably be amended to indicate that you feel you know saturated fat is not needed for YOU personally and should not be construed by anyone as anything other than your personal opinion rather than stating it as fact-based.

Sometimes we need to remove as much subjectivity as possible from the discussion and try to limit absolute statements for which there is no conclusive proof.

[gymeejet]

pltry,
i disagree. since saturated fat can be made by the body, it is not needed.

[gymeejet]

quote from shortstuff --> People can skue "facts" any direction they wish to and them present them as truth.

hmm ! seems like i have heard that somewhere before. LOL. excellent warning, nonetheless.

[bvtaylor]

.... Are not the same as the saturated fats you consume.

:nono:

In fact that's a very dangerous way of thinking because to my understanding it is the body's excess production of saturated fat (and cholesterol and triglycerides) rather than the dietary fats which ultimately causes heart disease and hardening of the arteries.

Insulin + unused glucose lays the primary groundwork for body fat. Exercise can burn glucose, plus controling carbohydrates reduces glucose.

How are beef and chicken fattened up? Feeding a diet consisting of mostly grain. It's not the saturated fat in their diet that makes them fat. I would venture that in the wild, unless an animal does a lot of running like deer (excercise) most animals with a higher percentage of body fat are either sea animals who need the protection of the fat for the cold or are vegetarian animals. The only high fat predator I can think of is a bear, and a bear's metabolism is a little different due to the hibernation and probably his fondness for sweet things.

According to Dr. Atkins: Scientific research over recent decades has shown the importance of quality fats to our health. Dietary fats are necessary for the absorption and mobilization of the fat-soluble vitamins and antioxidants, and fats are the main way our bodies store energy for future use.

http://atkins.com/Archive/2002/1/15-795582.html

[gymeejet]

hi bv,
actually the saturated fats produced or consumed, are the same. the main saturated fatty acids in our blood (from my blood profile) are: capric-10:0, lauric-12:0, myristic-14:0, palmitic-16:0, stearic-18:0, arachidic-20:0, behenic-22:0, lignoceric-24:0, and hexacosanoic-26:0. palmitic and stearic comprise the overwhelming majority of our saturated fats.

dietary fat is composed of 3 fatty acids and a glycerol molecule. i think the glycerol can be broken down to glucose. the fatty acids are not. the better way of looking at the fat in our body is that any excess calories will be stored as fat. the fat that we consume stays as fatty acids. the excess sugars and proteins that our body has no use for, will also be turned into fat.

too much saturated fat, whether eaten as fat, or turned into fat by the body, is not good.

saturated fat is primarily used as a source of energy. it does however have anabolic purposes, as well. our cell walls are a combination of essential fats and saturated fats. the essentials give it pliability, while the saturated give it rigidity. if we go back to the 3 bears, who did not want it too soft or too hard, likewise our bodies do not want our cells to flimsy, nor too rigid. while most of us are low on our essential fats, we will never run out of saturated fat. so our main problem is that our cell walls and organelle walls are too rigid, which is not good for ingress/egress of the needed nutrients. and it will give us wrinkling earlier.

since i have a diet high in essential fats, i easily have enough fat to absorb my fat soluble vitamins. remember, i do not have a low-fat diet. i have a high essential fat diet, with low saturated fat intake. i allow my body to make what it needs.

i feel it is preferable to take in a lot of good carbs, with all of their phytonutrients, and other good stuff, instead of saturated fat, which has almost no nutrients. by doing this, my brain and body can run full blast with ample amounts of sugar, and whatever is left over, is then turned into the saturated fat that my body desires.

i realize that those of you who can no longer metabolize sugar well, need to veer away from this. i have mentioned this many times, but once again, i want to re-inforce that i am speaking for the average healthy person, who does not have any specific disease process that may cause special fixes for special problems.

[bvtaylor]

Hi, Gymee... My point about the saturated fats is that when you eat them, from what I've read at least :cool: , it appears that they operate differently in your body than the fats you produce.

If I'm understanding the principle, this is similar to eating a lot of eggs, which are high in cholesterol, does not necessarily raise your own blood cholesterol, because it is not the cholesterol that you consume, but rather the cholesterol that you produce which is measured in your bloodstream.

What's interesting about saturated fats which have been so often criticized is that they make up a hefty part of the fats comprising the Mediterranean diet, which has of late shown up in the news as the diet that folks with the most longevity have. :angel:

If you review the components of the Mediterranean diet, you will see a lot of olive oil (which has a significant amount of saturated fat, and yet is very good for you) as well as a lot of dairy (also with a significant amount of saturated fat). Add the regular consumption of nuts (also with a lot of saturated fat), the occasional lamb or other meat, and it would seem to be contradictory that a diet so regularly high in saturated fat would also be so heart-healthy.

Granted, there are a lot of other elements to the Mediterranean diet--particularly fruits and vegetables (lots of high fiber ones), so it may be a combination of essential nutrients that make this diet ideal, but it is something to ponder, particularly because of the purported evils of saturated fat.

Dr. Atkins Age-Defying diet, pp. 31, reads as follows: "Lipoprotein(a) is as good a leading predictor of heart disease as triglycerides.... a good way to lower your Lp(a) level is to eat more saturated fat."

The other thing that Dr. Atkins notes is that Vitamin C keeps Lp(a) in check. This might also be a significant part of the healthy aspect of the Mediterranean diet (particularly the fruits and vegetables).

pp. 185 reads as follows: "What often gets forgotten in discussions of fats is that all dietary fats actually contain a mixture of saturated and unsaturated fats.... The fat you store in your body is almost entirely saturated..."

and on the following page on the Framingham Heart Study: "Dr. William Castelli, the director of the study, [said about it] in 1992: 'In Framingham Massachusetts, the more saturated fat one ate, the more cholesterol one ate, the more calories one ate, the lower people's serum cholesterol.... We found that the people who ate the most cholesterol, ate the most saturated fat, ate the most calories weighed the least and were the most physically active."

Of course that might be because people who are physically active can and need to really eat a lot more than folks who are not as active.

Diet and exercise... seems as though there's a lot of debate on the ideal diet, but certainly nobody can put the cabosh on exercise.

:yay:

Just something to think about.

[alaskaman]

Gymeejet, I don't quite follow your reasoning about saturated fats, since they can be made by our body, we don't need them? Surely this applies even more to carbohydrates? Since we can convert excess protein to glucose, and Stefansson and the inuit have shown that people can live healthily, indefitely, on NO carbs, what possible justification is there for including carbs in our diets? phytochemicals? Cancer was unknown among the eskimo on their traditional diet. So again, carbs turn out to be totally unnecessary for health. Energy? I have seen eskimos perform prodigious feats of endurance, with no "energy bars" "carbo loading" or any of that bs. Fat. seal oil. blubber. muktuk. and of course adequate protein from the meaty parts of the whales, seals, etc. When I was at Point Barrow in the '50s the diet was mostly traditional, but store food was creeping in, Pilot Biscuits, sugar in the tea, stuff like that. And the word among the old timers was, "Gussik (white man) food makes you weak." Bill

[gymeejet]

hi bv, nutrients in our body do not remember, nor do they care, where they originated. the palmitic fatty acid in our bodies operates exactly the same, irregardless if it came from a hamburger, or was manufactured inside our body from excess calories.

ditto for cholesterol. cholesterol is an absolute needed substance, but our bodies can manufacture all it needs. so as long as our intake of cholesterol is less than our maximum requirement, our bodies just make the difference, and there is no problem. this is true of saturated fat, as well. our bodies are very geared to make it easily, since we have evolved to store most of our excess calories in our adipose tissue.

olive oil is 76% mono-unsaturated fat, while just 16% saturated fat. most nuts are 10-15% saturated fat. with the exception of a few that have omega3, most seeds and nuts are a combination of omega6 (essential poly) and omega9 (mono-unsaturated). dairy and meats do contain significant saturated fats.

as far as atkins, who is selling books and diet products, i don't believe a thing he says. from what i have read, unsatured fats (poly or mono) both cause drops in ldl and rise in hdl, both good. saturated fats cause rise in both hdl and ldl, and trans-fats are the worse, since they cause rise in ldl and drop in hdl.

from your post:
pp. 185 reads as follows: "What often gets forgotten in discussions of fats is that all dietary fats actually contain a mixture of saturated and unsaturated fats.... The fat you store in your body is almost entirely saturated..."

this has no relevance to what we are discussing, that i can see. i am afraid you are using this statement to draw incorrect conclusions.

well i guess we can at least agree about exercise. LOL.

[bvtaylor]

Respectfully, Dr. Atkins methods and research are grounded in case histories and studies dating beyond 30 years ago when "doing Atkins" first became a buzz word.

To simply discount his theories, discounts the millions of us (and the thousands on this site) who have improved our health and health profiles by following his methodology.

I disagree that the ingestion/digestion of fats and cholesterol has the same effect as our body's production of fats and cholesterol. Those are completely different processes and affect our bodies differently. Consuming fats helps the body to metabolize certain nutrients. Producing body fat doesn't do the same thing. In fact the excess production of body fat and cholesterol is the problem with hardening of the arteries, rather than the dietary intake alone... it's the stuff we produce ourselves that goes out there and clogs things up.

Not to say that excess consumption of fatty foods in a high caloric amount won't stimulate the body to produce unhealthy body fat and cholesterol, but that occurs particularly in tandem with a carb load and insufficient exercise. The same amount of fat in a low-carbohydrate environment, saturated or otherwise, does not hurt the body and in fact stimulates the body to burn up the fat stores. This is not only Dr. Atkins theory, but Dr. Sears as well.

As we know it's not just the calories alone that count when losing weight. Calories only count in proportion to an individual's metabolism and activity level, and the origin of the calorie may have different effect on the body... 100 calories of glucose vs. 100 calories of fat will do different things to the body. A calorie count alone doesn't mean anything. If you eat more calories on an Atkins program and lose equivalent or more weight than on a different diet, it may simply be due to a metabolic change effected by the diet (which may stimulate mood and/or energy and get you to exercise for example).

Atkins is, by Dr. Atkins own words, a high fat, rather than strictly a high protein regimen.

If what you are saying is true about consuming and producing fat and cholesterol being the same thing, then the high amount of cholesterol and fat I consume on this diet should send my bloodwork's readouts through the roof... instead just the opposite. My cholesterol and triglycerides are way down, so are my husband's, so are my mother's... in fact my mother had chronic high cholesterol until she started this diet--she had given up on eggs and butter for years... and her doctor had to recently take her off of Lipitor because her cholesterol plummeted (and she eats buttered eggs every day now). In fact her doctor is so amazed at her bloodwork, that her doctor is having my mother keep a journal of what she is eating. :thup:

Before you discount the good Dr.'s work, you might want to take a thorough look at his books. They are awfully interesting and informative and have helped millions of people. The more studies that come out on the benefits of the low-carb approach, the more the good Dr. becomes vindicated.

[Lisa N]

cholesterol is an absolute needed substance, but our bodies can manufacture all it needs. so as long as our intake of cholesterol is less than our maximum requirement, our bodies just make the difference, and there is no problem. this is true of saturated fat, as well. our bodies are very geared to make it easily, since we have evolved to store most of our excess calories in our adipose tissue.

Just because our bodies CAN make cholesterol and saturated fat does not mean that they were designed to do so on a prolonged basis. This is actually a protection mechanism to provide us what we cannot live without during times of food shortage and famine. When the body has to make its own because it is not getting any/enough from dietary sources, it's the less than optimal kind. Yes, saturated fat can cause an increase in LDL, but it's a positive increase. Saturated fat also does not lower HDL as you stated above; it either raises it or maintains it. In the case of cholesterol, lack of saturated fat causes the body to produce the small, dense harmful LDL particles (subgroup B) as shown in this study:

Reference:
Dreon, D.M., Fenstrom, H.A., Campos, H., et al., "Change in Dietary Saturated Fat Intake Is Correlated With Change in Mass of Large Low-Density-Lipoprotein Particles in Men," American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, 67, 1998, pages 828-836.

Summary:
The purpose of this study was to evaluate the relationship between dietary saturated fat intake and changes in size (subclasses) of low-density-lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol. One hundred and three men completed an outpatient study for 12 weeks to determine whether nutrient composition was associated with changes in LDL subclasses. A low-fat (24% of calories from fat: 6% saturated; 59% carbohydrate) and high-fat (46% fat: 18% saturated; 39% carbohydrate) diet was followed for six weeks each. Blood samples were collected at the start of the study and after the sixth week of each diet. It’s been established that a predominance of small dense LDL particles (subclass pattern B) is associated with increased risk of myocardial infarction. Results revealed that changes in dietary saturated fat are associated with changes in LDL subclasses in healthy men. An increase in saturated fat was associated with increases with larger (lower risk) LDL particles and decreases in smaller (increased risk) LDL particles.

and this study:

Reference:
Pai, T., Yeh, Y.Y., "Stearic Acid Modifies Very Low Density Lipoprotein Lipid Composition and Particle Size Differently From Shorter-Chain Saturated Fatty Acids in Cultured Rat Hepatocytes," Lipids, 32(2), 1997, pages 143-149.

Summary:
This study investigated the effects of four separate fatty acids on very-low-density-lipoprotein (VLDL) cholesterol levels in rats. Fatty acids are carried in the blood as HDL (“good”), LDL (“bad”) or very-low-density-lipoprotein (VLDL) cholesterol. Stearic acid is a saturated fat found in meats and fat-containing dairy products. Compared to other fats such as myristate, palmitate or oleate fed to rats, stearic acid was not converted into VLDL cholesterol as efficiently. When it was changed into VLDL cholesterol, it produced a larger VLDL cholesterol molecule. Furthermore, the liver cells of rats produced less VLDL cholesterol when fed stearic acid, compared to when fed other fats.

It seems that your reasoning that because or bodies can make it, we dont need it in our diets and that which our bodies make is no different from that which we eat is in error.
From the study above, an increase in saturated fat intake resulted in a lower risk of myocardial infarction due to the shift in LDL production from the dense type to the large fluffy type.

[gymeejet]

hi alaska,
according to TORTORA AND ANAGNOSTAKOS in their PRINCIPLES OF ANATOMY AND PHYSIOLOGY, carbohydrates perform a number of major functions in living systems. a few even form structural units. for instance, one type of sugar (deoxyribose) is a building block of DNA, the molecule that carries hereditary information. some carbohydrates are converted to other substances, which are used to build structures and provide an emergency source of energy. other carbohydrates function as food reserves. one example is glycogen, which is stored in the liver and skeletal muscles. the principal function of carbohydrates, however, is to provide the MOST READILY AVAILABLE source of energy to sustain life.

earlier, i directed you to an article/study, which stated that there are 8 such sugars used anabolically, within the cells of our bodies, 2 of them are essential, in that the body can not make them. so it appears as if we have 2 essential fats (both polyunsaturated, and 2 essential sugars.

protein costs 10 times more than fats and carbs, so it is an extremely expensive solution to break down our protein into fats or carbs. some of the amino acids are glucogenic (able to make sugar), while others are ketogenic (able to make fat), so not all aminos can be converted to sugar. in order to do so, the NH2 has to be clipped from the moleculem which is then turned into NH3 (ammonia), and further into urea. it is not advisable to have lots of ammonia in our system.

the way our bodies were designed or evolved, is that fat storage is our main source of future survival. so, it is a very easy and safe mechanism for our bodies to make fat from excess calories, as this is what they are supposed to do. converting amino acids into sugar is something that the body has developed, as a safeguard. while it can do it with some of the amino acids, it is not designed to do so, as our major source of making glucose.

our bodies do not store much glycogen, like we store fat in our adipose tissue. the amount of energy in the glycogen in our muscles is probably no more than 1% of the total energy of the fat in our adipose tissue. so we need to update our sugar levels each day, since we are not able to store much at any one time.

phytochemicals are not just about protecting ourselves from cancer. i look at them, in a more general sense, as nutrients that help us in ways that we may never completely understand. but it is part of the process of evolution of all animals on this planet - we had better consume foods that have evolved with us, instead of our manufactured foods in today's supermarkets.

i said from the very beginning that our needs vary, based upon our lifestyle and environment. does it not seem a bit odd to you, that you have to resort to eskimos, as someone to support your dietary lifestyle ? just what percentage of the world's population do you think live in the frigid climates of the eskimos ? i doubt that you see many eskimos running miles across the snow, on a daily basis, for their cardiovascular health. in that sort of environment, survival is an every day situation. so is creating heat, so the body does not freeze. etc. etc.

and of course GUSSIK makes them weak. what type of GUSSIK do you think was more likely to reach them - fresh vegetables, or MCDONALDS hamburgers. you certainly do not need to convince me that our GUSSIK is pretty horrible. that is probably the one point in which i am in agreement with you low-carbers. but you guys have swung the pendulum way too far in the other direction - like the kid in the candy store, who was never allowed any when he was a kid. so now as an adult, he eats up everything in sight.

AMPLE PROTEIN, AMPLE ESSENTIAL FATS, LOTS OF NATURAL CARBS - my mantra has not changed. and i have results to show for it - my youthfulness and pushin 50.

[joanne42]

Why even bother with someone who isn't even low carbing in the first place??? I think they are just a waste of time on something we've obviously found that's worked for us...I'm so tired of people coming in preaching what is and isn't good for you when they haven't even had the personal experience of trying the program themselves :( Oh and by the way?? I'm now 3 1/2 years into my program..

[Kestrel]

Actually, there is a reason for nay-sayers; they help provide clarity, purpose, and conviction to what you believe. In some cases they help you build on your own experience and research, and help strengthen your conviction.

For those that jump into a diet without research, they'll be swayed daily by just about anything. Count yourself lucky that you've got the experience to less easily swayed.

[Lisa N]

i said from the very beginning that our needs vary, based upon our lifestyle and environment. does it not seem a bit odd to you, that you have to resort to eskimos, as someone to support your dietary lifestyle ? just what percentage of the world's population do you think live in the frigid climates of the eskimos ?

You forgot about the Masai who do NOT live in a frigid climate and are a warrior culture whose diets are also low in carbs. So much for that theory; the fact that here we have two cultures that live in very different climates, one frigid and one hot and arid, and both seem to thrive on very little carbs should put that theory to rest.
Besides...do you have any valid proof that the metabolisms of the Inuit could or should be any different from those that live in more temperate climates besides perhaps the need for additional caloric intake? And since you prefer to base your opinions on personal experience instead of studies, what exactly is your personal experience with traditional Inuit culture?

[alaskaman]

I kind of wonder why some of us keep coming back here, we're not going to convince gymee - but at least the discussion is pretty civil. The real point is that for most of us, lc is the ONLY hope we have. Gymees mantra of "ample protein, ample essential fats, lots of natural carbs" just will not work for most of us. Not gymees fault, perhaps, maybe we could have done that once, now we're insulin resistant or (in my case) diabetic, and the "lots of" carbs, natural or otherwise, would kill me, literally, without a lot of medication. Maybe if our parents hadn't let us have sodas, white bread, whatever, "lots of natural carbohydrates" might work. Having said that, I'm doubting it -- is a potato natural? brown rice? a cup of either of those will push my blood sugar up into the range where blindness and nerve damage can occur. Sorry, gymee, no can do.

[Charlif761]

Maybe I am missing the point here, but I feel COMPELLED to say something. There are page after page after page of GYMEES comments about what is wrong with Atkins and page after page after page of people responding about what they think is right about it. I find it as curious as Alaskaman does that anyone feels compelled to continue this discussion with Gymee. The guy is, by his own accounts, his ideal weight and not needing to lose any weight. If this is so, and he has no interest in the Atkis diet, why is he here on this forum all the time?

Either he has his OWN agenda, ie: a diet he wants to promote.... or, he likes spending his time trying to be discouraging and negative to people who are here for exactly the opposite reason. Either way, I see no reason why any of you should spend time trying to change his mind. He has his opinion and we have ours. He thinks this cannot be a healthy WOE and there are millions of people who are proving him wrong. Enough said. If everyone would stop giving him the attention he is getting, he'll get bored and go away.

Maybe he can find a cancer forum where he can cite statistics about how many people die from various forms of cancer or tell people how horrible chemo is. I am sorry Gymee, but I think what you are doing here is counter productive and cruel. Even if this were the worst WOE on the planet, it continues to give people hope and bring them to a place that feels good. Who are YOU to argue with that? Certainly you are not God, nor the conscience of Atkins WOE followers worldwide.

I have only been overweight the past 4 years, since my mother passed away. I cannot IMAGINE what a life of carrying excess weight must be like. But, I know that as bad as I feel about my 4 year stint with being overweight, I am happy that I found something that will take me back to my former weight and that leaves me feeling good while I do it. I say Congratualtions to everyone who is taking matters into their own hands and finding a way that is comfortable for them to lose weight. Screw the naysayers and keep on trucking on! Who cares who agrees with Atkins, as long as Atkins agrees with YOU!

Charlotte Fordham, LAc

[joanne42]

Charlotte he keeps coming back because if you read above this is the Low Carb War Zone.. He's basically been invited here with that headline.. People are allowed to voice their opinions here.. It's just up to us to not continue to give him reason to respond right :D >> I said what I had to say and no way am I gonna let one person talk me into changin my mind about following this program.. I've never felt better about myself in a long long time..

[Lisa N]

I find it as curious as Alaskaman does that anyone feels compelled to continue this discussion with Gymee. The guy is, by his own accounts, his ideal weight and not needing to lose any weight.

Keep in mind that the posts and replies are not just to the original poster or really even intended to convince the poster that low carb is the way to go. Obviously what gymee is doing works well for him for now. But...the replies, studies and responses are also for the benefit of anyone else who wanders in here and reads them as well. There's lots of good information here and if the orginal poster doesn't benefit from it, many others who read it will. :)

[gymeejet]

hi bv,
discounting atkins, does not discount you guys. anyone who sells diet products on top of his books, places big red marks around himself.

most people equate losing weight with health betterment. the two are not the same.

in terms of improvement of your health, i don't doubt that you have made inroads. but if one looks at the standard american diet, it is not that hard to make inroads. the fact that there has been an improvement, does not necesarily equate to finding the nutrition that is optimum for one's self. it simply means that what one is doing now is better than what one was doing before.

whether we ingest a nutrient, or our body produces the same nutrient, makes no difference, as it is now inside our body. our body does not remember, nor does it care, from whence it came.

[Lisa N]

most people equate losing weight with health betterment. the two are not the same.

LOL...neither does physical fitness necessarily equate to health betterment. How many people have dropped dead of a sudden myocardial infarction while running (who were avid runners and appeared to be very physically fit)? I can think of a few right off the top of my head, one of whom was a well known marathon runner. Yup...he had all kinds of endurance and energy, but it certainly didn't seem to protect his cardiovascular system. Let me guess...he wasn't getting enough essential fatty acids or protein?
Now, on to the improvements in health. I would call normalizing blood pressure and blood sugars with no more need for medications, disappearance of IBS symptoms and GERD symptoms, improvement in cardiac profile bloodwork to optimal or near-optimal levels, again without the need for medications, measureable improvements in health and that's what many of the low carbers here on the board have experienced.
None of the low carb authors that I'm aware of equate weight loss with improved health, although losing weight certainly doesn't hurt in a lot of cases. They base improved health on most of the things I listed above...bloodwork and improvement or disappearance of previous symptoms.

[NickFender]

It's not really on topic, but I'm not sure that I would use Eskimos and Masai as examples of succesful low-carb cultures; both of those groups have a life-expectancy of less than 50 years.

[Lisa N]

It's not really on topic, but I'm not sure that I would use Eskimos and Masai as examples of succesful low-carb cultures; both of those groups have a life-expectancy of less than 50 years.

Not sure where you get those figures, but traditionally Inuits did have lower lifespans than we do...most likely due to poor medical care, harsh climate, injury and infections resulting from injury. Harpooning whales is hardly a low-risk activity. Same goes for the Masai. The point of using those two cultures is that Stroke, heart disease and diabetes are virtually unknown among these peoples when they are following their native diets AND that they can obviously function quite well for decades (no kidney failure, brain damage, lack of strength/endurance) on a diet that is very low in carbs. It is only when a more Western type diet that is higher in carbs (even unprocessed ones) was introduced that these diseases began to appear among these populations.
Life expectancies also don't give a complete picture of the health of a population as a whole because it can be heavily skewed by things such as a high rate of infant mortality or deaths from injuries/ilnesses amoung relatively young members of the population (those who would be most likely to be involved in whaling and fighting). Things that wouldn't necessarily relate to diet, but are related to lifestyle and climate.

[NickFender]

The life expectancy figures I relied upon came from the World Bank and were similar to (but not exactly the same as) two or three lesser sources.

My point is simply that comparing the results of a Western diet (either low-carb or traditional) to a nomadic subsistence diet (whether it's low-carb or not) is an apples-to-oranges comparison that is unlikely to sway opinion.

Just as you argue that a low-carb diet is healthy because of the the absence of certain medical problems in these subsistence cultures, someone else might argue that low-carb subsistence diets contribute to malnutrition which is often present in those same populations. While either argument may or may not be true with regard to those populations, I don't think either one is of value when attempting to prove correlation between a low-carb diet and health in the western world because there are so many significant variations between the populations.

[Lisa N]

Actually, Nick, if you want to look at how healthy a diet is or is not, you don't look at average lifespan which can be heavily influeced by a host of non-dietary related factors, not the least of which is availability of medical care. The US is filled with very unhealthy people and yet our lifespans are quite high. You look at the incidence of degenerative diseases such as stroke, cancer, hypertension, diabetes and cardiovascular disease and the fact still remains that all of these are far lower (extremely rare, in fact) in these two cultures when following their native diets than in Western Countries. I'm not sure what you mean by subsistance diets as the caloric intakes from eating high amounts of fats would hardly classify as "subsistance" intake.
As I said before, I haven't seen evidence that their biochemistry differs significantly from ours (they are, after all, still homo sapiens), so a comparison of degenerative disease rates would be valid.

[NickFender]

I am not correlating lifespan with the healthiness of any particular diet. The point I tried to make (and obviously failed) is that the populations you are comparing are radically different in many ways that impact health, not just diet. Environment, for example. Lifespan is just one dramatic indicator of that difference.

Observing that group A eats a low-carb diet and lacks certain health problems, while group B eats a high-carb diet and exhibits certain health problems does not lead to the conclusion that a low-carb diet prevents certain health problems when groups A and B are radically different. A convincing argument would be made by comparing similar low-carb and high-carb populations, not dissimilar populations.

I think of a susbsistence diet as one where the calories expended to gather food are roughly equal to the calories that the food provides. Put another way, the population spends most of its time gathering or preparing food to ensure its survival. Certainly in a subsistence diet there are times when food is abundant, just as there are times of when food is short.

[gymeejet]

Just because our bodies CAN make cholesterol and saturated fat does not mean that they were designed to do so on a prolonged basis. This is actually a protection mechanism to provide us what we cannot live without during times of food shortage and famine. When the body has to make its own because it is not getting any/enough from dietary sources, it's the less than optimal kind. Yes, saturated fat can cause an increase in LDL, but it's a positive increase. Saturated fat also does not lower HDL as you stated above; it either raises it or maintains it. In the case of cholesterol, lack of saturated fat causes the body to produce the small, dense harmful LDL particles (subgroup B) as shown in this study:

hi lisa,
if you look again, i said that saturated fat causes a rise in both ldl and hdl. yes, the bodies are designed over a prolonged basis, to make fat out of excess calories.

with regards to study #1:
firstly, it does not say how much of the fat was essential. the amount of essential fat controls our overall lipid metabolism in more ways than one can say. it also does not specify what types of carbohydrates were used. so to make any sort of comment about it, would require more detail.

with regards to study #2:
it neglects to say what occurred with ldl and hdl levels - only the vldl levels. it also says nothing about the composition of the overall diet, so again, not much to say about a very limiting set of details.

the body can easily make stearic acid from palmitic acid, and vice versa, so perhaps it does or does not do so, because in the overall scheme of things, the body takes everything into effect, not just whether ones ldl is dense or fluffy. our bodies are pretty intelligent at doing the best with what it is given. it can not turn iron into zinc, but it can turn palmitic fatty acid into stearic fatty acid.

[Lisa N]

yes, the bodies are designed over a prolonged basis, to make fat out of excess calories.

Not just excess calories. The body needs excess carbs/glucose and the presence of elevated levels of insulin to store fat. When insulin is very low in the bloodstream, fat storage cannot occur as glucagon is dominant in that situation. High levels of glucagon = fat burning, not fat storage. Yes, the body can make saturated fat, but again, the body needs excess glucose to do so. For many of us, it's that excess glucose caused by too high carb consumption that wreaks havoc on our systems; hyperinsulinemia ----> fat storage ------> insulin resistance
------> greater hyperinsulinemia with resulting hypertriglyceridemia and other cholesterol elevations (LDL) and HDL suppression.
We're not talking Twinkies here, either. Any high glycemic source would do such as bread, potatoes, rice, bananas, etc...and the amounts needed to produce this effect will vary from person to person. Some can consume upwards of 100 grams of carb per day and be fine, others find that 60 or less is where they need to stay.
As I said before, most of us are getting plenty of essential fats and it seems from our bloodwork results that saturated fats aren't causing us any harm as well...in fact, they are improving our cardiac profiles considerably.
As far as saturated fats go...again, you can't speak from experience since you try to avoid them. I can speak from experience because I don't and the studies seem to back my experience up.

[rickb41]

I sit and read about how Low carb plans are either good or bad for you. The fact of the matter is, I eat healthy, have a salad and other yummy ingredients along with lots of protein as well as vitamins daily. I don't crave sugar or carbohydrates. Most of all, I was over 400 pounds at one point of my life. I had gastric bypass and lost down to 249 pounds. I continued to eat as if I had never had the surgery...Just lots less. I ate my way back up to 330. Since the low carb approach I am now down to 232. I am full of self esteem and my cholesterol is down considerably to 174 and my blood pressure is now at a normal level. I am happier now than I have been in years, heck decades even! My doctor is very pleased with my blood work and I should live to see my grandchildren graduate...God willing. The way I look at it, God is going to punch my ticket when it is time. I have no control of that, I do however have control of my comfort level the time I am here on this wonderful planet! Don't you see? It isn't about what is healthier, it is all in the eye of the beholder...It is all about happiness and the ability to look at myself in the mirror without disgust and shame. My wife who has also lost 105 pounds is also very pleased. After 24 years of marriage I plan to spend many more together. Our happiness is all that matters to me...Have a great day all !

[Kestrel]

Wow, and thats the name of that tune.

Wonderful results, and great outlook...

[bvtaylor]

http://www.lowcarb.ca/atkins-diet-and-low-carb-plans/index.html

I thought that this link on our site to low carb plans gives some very interesting summaries of the popular books and regimens out there, moreover about what living low carb is about.

Although all the books take their own particular spin on low-carb living, I think that the common thread should be of interest to those nay-sayers who don't think that low-carb is a healthy approach to weight loss and weight management.

To those of you who have improved your lives with low-carb methodology, I salute you. Sometimes going against the grain ('scuse the pun) has benefits.

Health is really not a clinical term in my mind... health is about feeling good about yourself, feeling a sense of harmony with yourself and your body, being able to do the things you want to do, without feeling self-conscious or severely hampered by your physical or mental condition.

I hope that we all get there, however we do it. :thup:

[gymeejet]

<B>You forgot about the Masai who do NOT live in a frigid climate and are a warrior culture whose diets are also low in carbs. So much for that theory; the fact that here we have two cultures that live in very different climates, one frigid and one hot and arid, and both seem to thrive on very little carbs should put that theory to rest.
</B>

hi lisa,
i did not forget anything. i simply responded to the post as it was presented to me. but now that you mention it....

according to an article by stephen byrnes, The Masai, and related tribes in East Africa, consume a diet almost completely composed of beef, milk, and blood. At some parts of the year, a typical Masai warrior will consume up to 10 quarts of whole, raw cow's milk a day.

10 qts of milk would seem to have quite a few carbs in it.

according to the following url,
http://www.westonaprice.org/traditional_diets/out_of_africa.html

The healthiest tribe that Price studied was the Dinkas, a Sudanese tribe on the western bank of the Nile. They were not as tall as the cattle-herding Neurs groups but they were physically better proportioned and had greater strength. Their diet consisted mainly of fish and cereal grains. This is perhaps the greatest lesson of Price’s African research—that a diet of whole foods, one that avoids the extremes of the carnivorous Masai and the largely vegetarian Bantu, but incorporates both nutrient dense grains and seafood, ensures optimum physical development.

but in all cases, all 3 tribes were much healthier than westerners, and all of their processed foods.

gosh, sorta reminds me of what i have beens saying - eat as much natural foods as possible, and still get your proteins, essential fats, and carbs.

OOPS, looks like it woke up. you put it to rest to early - before it was sleepy - LOL.

[Lisa N]

Quoting Mary Enig from the Weston A Price website:

"Foods containing trans fat sell because the American public is afraid of the alternative—saturated fats found in tallow, lard, butter, palm and coconut oil, fats traditionally used for frying and baking. Yet the scientific literature delineates a number of vital roles for dietary saturated fats—they enhance the immune system,54 are necessary for healthy bones,55 provide energy and structural integrity to the cells,56 protect the liver57 and enhance the body’s use of essential fatty acids.58 Stearic acid, found in beef tallow and butter, has cholesterol lowering properties and is a preferred food for the heart.59 As saturated fats are stable, they do not become rancid easily, do not call upon the body’s reserves of antioxidants, do not initiate cancer, do not irritate the artery walls.

Your body makes saturated fats, and your body makes cholesterol—about 2000 mg per day. In general, cholesterol that the average American absorbs from food amounts to about 100 mg per day. So, in theory, even reducing animal foods to zero will result in a mere 5% decrease in the total amount of cholesterol available to the blood and tissues. In practice, such a diet is likely to deprive the body of the substrates it needs to manufacture enough of this vital substance ; for cholesterol, like saturated fats, stands unfairly accused. It acts as a precursor to vital corticosteroids, hormones that help us deal with stress and protect the body against heart disease and cancer; and to the sex hormones like androgen, testosterone, estrogen and progesterone; it is a precursor to vitamin D, a vital fat-soluble vitamin needed for healthy bones and nervous system, proper growth, mineral metabolism, muscle tone, insulin production, reproduction and immune system function; it is the precursor to bile salts, which are vital for digestion and assimilation of fats in the diet. Recent research shows that cholesterol acts as an antioxidant.60 This is the likely explanation for the fact that cholesterol levels go up with age. As an antioxidant, cholesterol protects us against free radical damage that leads to heart disease and cancer. Cholesterol is the body’s repair substance, manufactured in large amounts when the arteries are irritated or weak. Blaming heart disease on high serum cholesterol levels is like blaming firemen who have come to put out a fire for starting the blaze.

Cholesterol is needed for proper function of serotonin receptors in the brain.61 Serotonin is the body's natural "feel-good" chemical. This explains why low cholesterol levels have been linked to aggressive and violent behavior, depression and suicidal tendencies."

Mary Enig also had some not so nice things to say about polyunsaturated oils as well with the studies to back her up.

I'll get back to you on that milk thing. The milk that the Masai drink is not the same cow's milk that we have in the market...it's far higher in butter fat (saturated fat again) than what we get from our cows and they are a different breed of cow.

[alaskaman]

Thanks to Lisa for continuing to jump in here with reasoned arguments. Gymee still seems to think that his diet would work for us, when in fact for whatever reason, we've been ruined and cannot handle carbs as he can. So, lock us all in metabolic labs for a couple of years, feed gymee on the Stefannson all-meat diet, and he would emerge in great health, good cholesterol levels, but worried as h.... about missing all the good natural carbs. Lock US up, feed us his diet, with no medication, some of us would die, others would lose body parts, gain weight, whatever. He may argue this, but many of us have been there, done that, tried the "whole grain" 'natural carb" routine. My wife worked in a hippie bakery back when, loves wheat berries, all that natural stuff. A cup of wheat berries will take me just as far along the road to blindness as a twinkie. Bill PS, forgive me if I've got gymees gender wrong, ok?

[gymeejet]

hi lisa,

lisa wrote:
Besides...do you have any valid proof that the metabolisms of the Inuit could or should be any different from those that live in more temperate climates besides perhaps the need for additional caloric intake? And since you prefer to base your opinions on personal experience instead of studies, what exactly is your personal experience with traditional Inuit culture?

gymee says:
now lisa, you can't be on both sides of the fence at the same time. just who do you think first made the comment on this thread about human physiology being basically the same ? pltry went on to attack those ideas. you certainly stayed silent. perhaps you only want to argue with those that do not agree with low-carbing ?

well, i still have not changed my idea on that, so somehow you have misconstrued what i think. the eskimos live in frigid weather. many scientists believe that our needs change because of our environment. from personal experience, i know it changes based on our lifestyle. i need look no further than days when i do vigorous cardio, and days when i do not.

as far as our needs changing for different climatic environments, i don't know from practical experience, since i have not lived in more than 1. but many scientists believe so. and we have factual evidence that at least in regard to omega3 fats, that plants and animals all have more of them in their tissues, when compared to their southern, warmer neighbors. so it seems as if it has some truth to it. to what extent, i do not know.

with regards to the eskimo, it is believed by almost all scientists that the huge amount of omega3 fats is what keeps their arteries clean. but i have also read that the same proportion of fats eaten by the eskimo, would be harmful to someone living on the equator.

i don't know if you have heard of udo erasmus, but he is one of the pioneers with regards to fats. if i recall, once the w3/w6 ratio approaches about 3.5 (i think), the w6 fats start to get over shadowed. from the other direction, once the w6/w3 ratio is over 5, the w3 fats get over shadowed. now don't quote me on the ratios, but rather the idea that there seem to be safe ratios, on either side, and unsafe ones as well. however, i doubt that many of these studies have been done with people from the climatic extremes.

the essential fats have so many roles in our physiology, that to me, just about any study, even if it is unbiased, is useless, if it studies people who are not getting enough of them.

see, i am interested in approaching OPTIMUM HEALTH. it does not matter to me what happens with people who are alread quite sub-optimal. how things work in sub-optimal systems very often has no correlation with how those same nutrients behave, when in a balanced system.

our society has eaten foods filled with trans fats, carbohydrates minus all of the vitamins, minerals, and other phytonutrients, along with too much greasy fat, and then some group decides to limit carrots, because they have too many carbs, and bananas, because of some tool they call high glycemic index.

no wonder they are not healthy. they basically have very little of the needed nutrients in them. but in america, we always have to have the bad guy, the scapegoat. 30 years ago, it was fat, so said the low-fat guys. today, it is carbs, say the low-carb guys.

well, i will say it again. give me the average healthy young person. i would tell him to throw out the HI-glycemic index. if he eats all the right carbs, he ain't gonna have to worry about it, because he ain't a never gonna have diabetic-type problems to begin with. if he gets his essential fats and correct protein, along with the corresponding vitamins, minerals, and phytonutrients, his body is gonna work, as it was designed. he gonna be able to go like gymee.

he can still eat some saturated fat if he wants. it is not necessary, because our bodies can make it, but a certain amount is not harmful. S16 AND S18 (palmitic and stearic), are the only 2 saturated fats that are used anabolically. their main anabolic use is as partners with unsaturated fats in phosphatides. these phosphatides, along with proteins, form the membranes of our cells and the organelles within our cells. the saturated fats give some rigidity to the membrane, as well as preventing the unsaturated fats from reacting with one another.

[alaskaman]

climatic extremes have nothing to do with it, neither does racial metabolism. Stefansson and his pal were, obviously caucasian, and in New York when they did their diet, and all the drs waited for them to develop scurvy or drop dead. But you put your finger on it when you said that you're not interested in what happens in sub-optimal systems, which is all of us on the forum.Not much to argue about, you must know we could never eat your way. I'm still suspicious tho, of a diet which only works on young healthy people, you know? As to optimal health, I'm still here, 58 yrs old, can still hike 20 miles or carry a canoe and a hundred pounds of duffle to the end of the portage, then do it again a few times a day, on my <20 g carbs per day. That's optimal enough for me.

[gymeejet]

I kind of wonder why some of us keep coming back here, we're not going to convince gymee - but at least the discussion is pretty civil. The real point is that for most of us, lc is the ONLY hope we have. Gymees mantra of "ample protein, ample essential fats, lots of natural carbs" just will not work for most of us. Not gymees fault, perhaps, maybe we could have done that once, now we're insulin resistant or (in my case) diabetic, and the "lots of" carbs, natural or otherwise, would kill me, literally, without a lot of medication. Maybe if our parents hadn't let us have sodas, white bread, whatever, "lots of natural carbohydrates" might work. Having said that, I'm doubting it -- is a potato natural? brown rice? a cup of either of those will push my blood sugar up into the range where blindness and nerve damage can occur. Sorry, gymee, no can do.

hey alaska,
your first post to me started out with something like "i have not had time to read through all the posts".

so you may be unaware of the following. i have repeatedly said that my advice is for healthy people. it is not intended for diabetics or those with sugar metabolism problems. in no way am i attempting to alter the diabetic's diet. diabetics have a special problem, which requires a special solution. since i have no diabetic experience, i certainly do not think i know more about it, than someone who has been struggling with it for years.

i admire and commend you guys for doing what you are forced to do, in order to be the healthiest that you can be. nevertheless, you are forced to do so.

it does seem that most of the people who are responding to me on this thread, are people who have some sort of problem, be it obesity or diabetes. whether everyone who lurks, has the same problem, i don't know. to be honest, if i had thought that this forum was basically being visited by only those with sugar metabolic problems, i probably would not have posted in the first place.

it may be posted somewhere, but i was not, and am not aware that this web site is basically for diabetic people. when i started the thread, i assumed that the web site would be filled proportionately with those in everyday life, who were trying the low-carb diets. in the real world, low-carb diets are not being advertised as diets for diabetics, but rather diets that we should all be on, for they promote the best health.

and many people are trying it. i can not recall anyone ever telling me they are on a low-carb diet because they were diabetic. but i recall countless number of people, generally females, who are trying it, to lose "those last five pounds". and when they lose that initial water weight, it only reinforces an idea, which i think is false, and possible harmful. and this was the main goal of my post - to discuss/debate what sort of diet the average person should be on, to bring about optimum health, not weight loss.

i do agree with you that i think diabetes is a disease that is being brought to us, because of past dietary problems/deficiencies. however i am more hopeful in one way about diabetes, than are most diabetics. i am not convinced that a diabetic is always a diabetic. there are supposedly some cells that no longer work, or are gone forever. i am not totally convinced of this, simply because i very much believe in the body's ability to regenerate itself, given time and the needed nutrients.

if you are old enough, some of you may recall when it was an exclusively held idea, that the body could regenerate any cell but brain cells. it was thought we were born with so many, we lost some thorugh living, but we never made any others, during life. not that long ago, it was found that apparently we are able to make brain cells, after all.

lisa and the gang firmly believe that the low-carb diet is what is best for the masses. they are perfectly aware of how often i have stated that i am arguing with regards to the non-diabetic person. and in that light, i plan to stand toe-to-toe with them. it is one thing to argue that it is a diet plan for diabetics - a completely different story when it is being passed on as the best diet for the every day person.

[Kristine]

>>"i do agree with you that i think diabetes is a disease that is being brought to us, because of past dietary problems/deficiencies."

Why should people wait until they're diabetic before they start correcting the problem? If kids over the last few decades were raised on healthy, whole foods, I'd agree with you. But get real: most kids are raised on KD and sugar cereal, which means "average, healthy" adults are few and far between. Diabetes is going to be a massive problem in my generation if people don't get their act together. (I'm in my 20s.) I was already approaching diabetes and decided I didn't want to go down that road.

Again, most of the people you see here who are doing it for weight loss purposes have an extreme problem with sugar and starch. The issue begins with insulin resistance and it begins young. Even those who are just doing it to "lose the last few pounds," there's no reason for those people *not* to do it. Carb levels are gradually increased after the sugar/insulin cycle is broken. If they didn't previously have an insulin resistance problem, they'll be able to eat a lot more carbs and keep the weight off, anyway.

[gymeejet]

LOL...neither does physical fitness necessarily equate to health betterment. How many people have dropped dead of a sudden myocardial infarction while running (who were avid runners and appeared to be very physically fit)? I can think of a few right off the top of my head, one of whom was a well known marathon runner. Yup...he had all kinds of endurance and energy, but it certainly didn't seem to protect his cardiovascular system. Let me guess...he wasn't getting enough essential fatty acids or protein?


hi lisa,
i assume you were referring to Jim Fixx - the only one that comes to my mind. actually, few if any, top-class marathoners are healthy. it is an unfortunate fact that if you want to be top class, you need to catabolize half of your body, so that there is not too much weight to carry for 26 miles. i am surprised that we do not hear of more of them with problems, but perhaps when they can no longer be competitive, they also start healing their bodies.

but i would say, that if i could only know 1 thing about a person, the one i would like to see is how far he could run, etc. before he was huffing and puffing. in order to have a truly efficient cardio system, one has to be eating the proper nutrients. one has to have good ingress and egress from cells and organelles, as well as efficient manufacture. then one has to have efficient blood system to deliver nutrients to and fro. all these things have to be working well, in order to have efficient cardio output.

this does not mean that you could not have other problems, like a tumor, etc., but neither would low cholesterol mean that you do not have a tumor, etc. and not too many people deliberately catabolize their bodies like marathon runners. nor are they walking ghosts. if you look at bikers, they are typically pretty healthy looking. some can be muscular. the ones that are lean, are a good lean, not a ghostly lean, like marathoners.

give me one and only one thing - LET ME SEE HIS CARDIO OUTPUT. i am absolutely positive that will be the thing i will have to slow down on first, say as opposed to weight lifting. cardio is the most strenuous activity, because we are asking each and every one of our cells to produce for us. and when the time comes for me that i am not quite as efficient, my cardio output will let me know almost immediately. i am positively stunned and gleeful that i haven't had to slow down yet, and am very curious just how much longer i can stay on top. because i know if i can do it, others following my basic advice, could also do it. i do not believe there is anything special about my genetics. it has all been lifestyle choices, and determination.

[alaskaman]

Cardio output - made me think of Dr Bernstein, who says, "I can exercise at 165 even though my theoretical maximum is 152" he says in part because he's been exercising strenuously for 35 years. But, as you may know, he's the dr who discovered the benefits of lc for diabetes, and has been practicing his <30gm carb, no fruit, only very low gi veg like broccoli and spinach, for 50 years or so. Bill

[Lisa N]

As to optimal health, I'm still here, 58 yrs old, can still hike 20 miles or carry a canoe and a hundred pounds of duffle to the end of the portage, then do it again a few times a day, on my <20 g carbs per day. That's optimal enough for me.

Alaskaman, he the man! He go, go, go without all that sugar!
Dr. Bernstein, he the man too. He excercise at intensity levels when he in his mid-60's that many non-diabetic people half his age can't match...all on less than 30 grams of carb per day! :thup:


Diabetes is going to be a massive problem in my generation if people don't get their act together. (I'm in my 20s.) I was already approaching diabetes and decided I didn't want to go down that road.
The issue begins with insulin resistance and it begins young.

Yes, it does. Doctors are now starting to see insulin resistance in kids 10-12 years old and younger as well as adult onset diabetes in kids within the same age rage; something that was unheard of as little as 15 years ago.
The average healthy adult? With more than 60% of the population overweight or obese, who might that be?

[gymeejet]

http://www.westonaprice.org/ihf/ihf_vanuatu.html

darn them south sea islanders. they are eating all those terrible natural fruits and vegetables. how dare they grow up to be strong and beautiful !!! perhaps we should warn them about the high glycemic content of their food !!! LOL.

[tamarian]

http://www.westonaprice.org/ihf/ihf_vanuatu.html

darn them south sea islanders. they are eating all those terrible natural fruits and vegetables. how dare they grow up to be strong and beautiful !!! perhaps we should warn them about the high glycemic content of their food !!! LOL. Only after eating the essentials, protein and fat :) Read carefully next time. ;)


Those who grew up on the outer islands enjoyed a nutrient-dense diet of seafood of all sorts, particularly the coconut crab and giant clams, and many plant foods including coconut, island cabbage, manioc, yams, taro, banana and other delicious native fruits. These are the ones with beautiful teeth, and slender strong bodies that move with lightness and grace.

[gymeejet]

hi tamarian,
let me see. protein, essential fats, and lots of good carbs. now who do you suppose has been preaching that since day 1 ? thank you for making my point. i know i can always rely on you to make my points more valid.

once again, they are eating lots of carbs. wow, look at that glycemic index rise - high in the sky. LOL.

my mantra - for healthy people. ample protein, ample essential fats, lots of good carbs. none of the silly low-fat, low-carb, low-protein, or whatever other silly newfangled diet made to make money, arrives here in the future. and no doubt there will be one.

[gymeejet]

oh yes, i forgot. along with the high glycemic index, we can't forget to send along with them all the low-carb studies, paid and supported by low-carb doctors, telling them how unhealthy they are. LOL !!!!!

[tamarian]

hi tamarian,
let me see. protein, essential fats, and lots of good carbs. now who do you suppose has been preaching that since day 1 ? thank you for making my point. i know i can always rely on you to make my points more valid. . Well, if you finally admit that eating seafood is essential, then perhaps I made your point valid, but I doubt that's your belief.

Your "mantra, from the other thread is "ethical veganism", but in this thread you'd rather not mention that..

So I was pointing out that all you got from what you reported in that article is fruits and vegetables, while claimign (in quite an inaccurate summary) that they support your view on fruits and vegetables only, but tthey don't, they are very anti-vegan on that site.

Wa'il

[Kristine]

...and again, we're not talking about people from a culture who eat whole foods all their lives - we're talking about 21st century Western world processed food junkies.

[korry1977]

gymeejet:

Yeah, I'm sure they got a McDonald's and Taco Bell just around the corner from there...

[Lisa N]

along with the high glycemic index, we can't forget to send along with them all the low-carb studies

Based on the following quote from that same article, it appears that they already know all about it, although perhaps not in those terms:

"The villagers told me that rather than eat all the ripe papayas, they left them as food for the flying foxes and birds, to fatten them. The birds and animals were then hunted and enjoyed for their delicious flesh. A local chef is now making jams of local fruits, including bananas, pineapple, papaya, guava,and chimoiya (custard apple) but there is far more nutrition in the birds and animals that have eaten the fruits left for them."

While you're telling them about the glycemic index, don't forget to give them a few cans of that protein powder and tell them how much better it is for them than all that fin fish, shellfish and animal protein they've been eating.


[/QUOTE]my mantra - for healthy people. ample protein, ample essential fats, lots of good carbs. [QUOTE]

Let's not also forget that these people are getting plenty of saturated fats from pigs, goats, goat and cow milk, beef and coconuts. These are now considered part of the "native" diet as well, not to forget those fattened flying foxes and birds.
Add to that the fact that they walk or canoe everywhere they go (there are few cars on the islands) and I'd say those folks can afford a few more carbs than those of us who spend our days behind a desk in front of a computer, which is also something I've said all along.

Let's see...lots of seafood, flying fox, wild birds, pig, goat, beef along with vegetation and some fruits which it seems that they recognize that too much of fattens you up (I note there are no grains in there as well). Thanks for making OUR point! :)

[gymeejet]

tamarian,
let's not mix up ethical with nutrition. it is true that i will not kill an animal. it is not true that that had anything to do with my removing animal flesh from my system - done strictly for nutritional reasons that i have already outlined.

the point here is that these people rely on their fruits and vegetables to make up the basis of their diets. they eat way more carbs than even the most liberal of you low-carbers. now i am talking about those eating their native diets, not those that eating the manufactured western foods, and already paying the price for it.

that is the one point of agreement that i have with you guys. i know that our processed foods, filled with sugar and trans-fats, and stripped from all of its essential ingredients, is the reason for diabetes, and all of our other health problems.

you guys do well to eliminate all that crap. but you have too much saturated fat and not enough good carbs, for your diet to be ideal. i have much to say about meat, but i still have quite a few older posts that i have not yet made replies. on this thread, i am making comments strictly about nutrition. my opinions regarding nutrition are not tainted with my desire to protect all animal's right to their lives. but i am more than willing to duke it out with you on that issue, on the other thread, but you guys already found out that you don't have a leg to stand on, trying to support that it is okay to take another animal's life. but let's redirect that aspect of it in the other thread, and nutrition in this thread.