I was talking about breast-fed infants. If they receive only mother's milk, they shouldn't get any fiber into their guts. So fiber doesn't seem to be needed for bowel movements. Right?

Right. Mothers make the milk from the nutrients and water in their own bloodstreams. Fiber from the mother's diet doesn't cross the wall of the gut: it's indigestible, and stays in the gut, not crossing into the blood, where all actual nutrients go, to be carried to the places in the body where they're needed.

So: no fiber in breastmilk. And, because manufacturer's of formula try to imitate breastmilk, no fiber in formula, either.

Chew your veggies, instead of eschewing them, you'll get plenty of fiber without grains or legumes. String beans, salads, spaghetti squash, cabbage, broccoli... there's a lot of lovely LC vegetable matter out there! And they're oh so good drenched in butter or ghee.

Nancy, it's not so much that veggies aren't tasty and low carb. It's that they're not altogether necessary, for either nutrition or for proper elimination.

I just found out that brown rice has the highest proportion of soluble to insoluble fiber, since it has NO insoluble fiber. I was thinking of getting some, but the carbs seem kind of high, so I may go with fruit instead. Or maybe I'll get rice bran, or maybe FOS, as James Sloane advised. That's so I have something to feed my microflora. I hope to find out soon how much feed they need each day. Can you feed them too much? I think so.

Since you're talking about brown rice, I would think the husk (which is why it is called brown rice) is the insoluble fiber.

If the site I read last night is accurate, brown rice has NO insoluble fiber. Do you think that's incorrect and have a reason for thinking so?

Dr. B's opinion is that vegetables probably aren't needed for good health, but he advised eating a few "just in case."

Eating low carb, high fat takes care of any problems in the gut. Eating low carb, low fat might cause difficulties.

Go back to page 2 and see Greek Rib's post with the link to Marks Daily apple, then go to post #10 and read what this person wrote.

My thought is that any whole grain has a husk that is insoluble.

My guess - There is no single answer to the which is better question low fiber or high fiber. In my life the answer has been it depends. When my intestinal track was a mess and food tended to travel right through me I had to eliminate all fiber. After I removed all the foods that I was intolerant to I was able to add back small amounts of cooked vegetables. Like Nancy I figured out the intolerances with testing through Enterolab. After about 2 years of healing I started adding in more vegetables and now 5 years later I can eat large salads and stir fry vegetables every day and I do. My diet is now pretty high fiber with lots of added fat always. I average over 30 grams of fiber a day. I enjoy eating this way and I am following the Wahls Protocol (more or less) trying to make up for lost time with a diet high in micronutrients which were probably badly depleted after years of severe intestinal problems. Most of the recommendations about fiber now center around supporting the microbiome. I think when it comes to fiber there's been a whole lot of speculation but very little evidence. I go with my n=1 results.

Jean

Wow! I decided to check on my fiber intake & daily I get 1g, sometimes 2g. I knew my fiber was low, but didn't realize it was that low! Like you, I think my gut needs more healing. I had chronic diarrhea from taking metformin for way too long that my gut is even more sensitive than it was before.

You said there that you consider Fiber Menace to be mostly true and I think I agree, even though James Sloane pointed out a number of errors in Fiber Menace. He said the microflora require soluble in order to live (and we need the microflora to be healthy, of course) and that fiber is the only source of a vital nutrient, silica.

You also said there:

Well, if you can point to any online sites that show data for rice bran being insoluble fiber, I'd take note, but the site of data I found said it has only soluble fiber. So I'm going with that until I see data showing otherwise. I believe rice bran contains silica, the nutrient. I agree that excess fiber probably leads to constipation etc. Yesterday and today I've had much better bowel movements without extra laxatives besides vitamin C.

By the way, Sloane also said that hydroxides are caustic and can damage the GI tract and cause cancer. And milk of magnesia is a hydroxide. I wish I'd read that a week earlier before I took 3 or 4 tablespoons of it.

Wow, I went on here today to see about posting something just like what I find here. For years now I have suffered terribly with cronic constipation and just by happenstance seem to notice that when I eat less fiber (way less) my tummy does better. Every doc I have been to has told me otherwise. But dog gonnit, I would follow their advice and be right back at square one, almost in the emergency room at one point. I am so glad to see there are others that just cannot tolerate fiber. And here I thought I was nuts!

It is probably the 55% of calories from fat in breast milk that keeps babies very regular.

After I went gluten free, my gut had a several month healing period where it became SUPER fiber sensitive. Even now, I get salad greens and berries and avoid too much cruciferous veggies or other high fiber items.