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  #76   ^
Old Thu, Oct-13-11, 21:32
Thomas1492's Avatar
Thomas1492 Thomas1492 is offline
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Plan: Ketogenic
Stats: 500/408/300 Male 73 inches
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Karhys
From my personal experience with a number of Japanese men, I'd like to beg to differ on this point. [B]

...that said, all the Japanese men I've dated have been under 30... so maybe the introduction of so much Western food into their diets (a big change for them, and largely only since WWII) has been doing them some good after all? In that case, I can't complain entirely about such a diet! I'm willing to bet it wasn't the wheat though!

That's kinda like only having had Oscar-Mayer Wieners all your life and then one day you walk into a Deli and you see a Polish Sausage..
Just sayin'....
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  #77   ^
Old Fri, Oct-14-11, 00:43
Karhys's Avatar
Karhys Karhys is offline
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Plan: Primal-ish
Stats: 172/158/132 Female 5'2"
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Location: Rural NSW, Australia
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Thomas1492
That's kinda like only having had Oscar-Mayer Wieners all your life and then one day you walk into a Deli and you see a Polish Sausage..
Just sayin'....

LOL! Well, it would be if I was Japanese and had no other experience... but I've only spent three years of my life in Japan! I was born and raised in Australia, and we have just about every damn race on the planet there! And I've had my fair share. But I still stand by the belief that Japanese men can hold their heads high.

And all the Japanese men I know can't live without their white rice and soy products! (Just to get back to the point, haha.) But you know they have a lot more dairy in their diets now. And sugar, and wheat. (I firmly believe the latter two is where their currently increasing obesity rates are coming from. )
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  #78   ^
Old Fri, Nov-11-11, 13:04
Demi's Avatar
Demi Demi is offline
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Plan: Muscle Centric
Stats: 238/153/160 Female 5'10"
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Default Feast Like a Caveman and Watch the Pounds Melt Away

Quote:
November 11, 2011


Feast Like a Caveman and Watch the Pounds Melt Away

During the Paleolithic period, many thousands of years ago, people ate primarily vegetables, fruit, nuts, roots and meat—and a wide variety of it.

Today, these staples have been largely replaced with refined sugar, high fructose corn syrup, cereal, bread, potatoes and pasteurized milk products… and a much narrower selection of fruits, vegetables, roots and nuts.

While we may consider ourselves to be at the pinnacle of human development, our modern food manufacturing processes have not created a race of super-humans in possession of great health and longevity.

Quite the contrary...

Humans today suffer more chronic and debilitating diseases than ever before. And there can be little doubt that our food choices play a major role in this development.

Can a Stone Age Diet Make You Healthier?

CBS recently ran an excellent series of reports about the Paleolithic diet movement. Of the mainstream press, Dr. Kim Mulvihill was the sole member present at the recent Ancestral Health Symposium in Los Angeles. She ended up taking part in Dr. Lynda Frassetto's scientific study on the Paleo diet herself.

As reported on CBS:

"You can eat anything that would be able to be eaten without being processed," explained Dr. Lynda Frassetto. That means no grains, no bread, and no [pasteurized] dairy but does include lots of fruits and vegetables, some nuts and oils and lots of fish, poultry and lean meats.

... Dr. Frassetto and her team at the University of California in San Francisco tested the Paleo-diet on out-of-shape volunteers. The group ate lots of food without losing any weight or exercising. "In two weeks, everybody's blood pressure went down and everybody's cholesterol and triglyceride levels got better. The average drop was 30 points, which was pretty amazing. It's the type of drop you get by taking statins for six months," said Dr. Frassetto.

Dr. Frassetto says Paleo foods, also known as the caveman diet, works by keeping your body's chemistry in better balance. The goal of the caveman diet is to reduce excess body fat, aid in the normalization of blood sugar levels and reduce toxins and anti-nutrients."

"Normalizing" your system is the true strength of the so-called caveman diet. By eating foods that are concordant with your genetic ancestry, you can avoid many of the diseases associated with our modern diet. As Dr. Loren Cordain, author of The Paleo Diet andone of the world's leading experts on Paleolithic nutrition, states:

"The nutritional qualities of modern processed foods and foods introduced during the Neolithic period are discordant with our ancient and conservative genome. This genetic discordance ultimately manifests itself as various chronic illnesses, which have been dubbed "diseases of civilization." By severely reducing or eliminating these foods and replacing them with a more healthful cuisine, possessing nutrient qualities more in line with the foods our ancestors consumed, it is possible to improve health and reduce the risk of chronic disease."

Why the Paleo Diet Works for Weight Loss

A common "side effect" of rebalancing your body's chemistry is weight loss, as the two tend to go hand-in-hand. One explanation for this is that you don't really get fat from eating too much and exercising too little. Nor do you get fat from eating fat.

So what does cause your fat tissue to accumulate and hold on to fat?

In a word: carbohydrates.

In essence, overeating and excess weight could be viewed as a symptom of an improper diet, because when you consume too many sugars and carbs, you set off a cascade of chemical reactions in your body that makes you hungry and craving for sweets:

1. First, fructose is metabolized differently from glucose, with the majority being turned directly into fat because stimulates a powerful “fat switch.”

2. This rapidly leads to weight gain and abdominal obesity ("beer belly"), decreased HDL, increased LDL, elevated triglycerides, elevated blood sugar, and high blood pressure—i.e., classic metabolic syndrome.

3. Dietary carbohydrates, especially fructose, are also the primary source of a substance called glycerol-3-phosphate (g-3-p), which causes fat to become fixed in fat tissue

4. At the same time, high carb intake raises your insulin levels, which prevents fat from being released

5. Fructose further tricks your body into gaining weight by turning off your body's appetite-control system. Fructose does not suppress ghrelin (the "hunger hormone") and doesn't stimulate leptin (the "satiety hormone"), which together result in feeling hungry all the time, even though you've eaten. As a result, you overeat and develop insulin resistance, which is not only an underlying factor of type 2 diabetes and heart disease, but also many cancers

The resulting equation is simple: fructose and dietary carbohydrates (grains, which break down into sugar) lead to excess body fat, obesity and related health issues. Furthermore, no amount of exercise can compensate for this damage because if you eat excessive fructose and grains—the primary ingredients NOT found in the Paleo diet—it will activate programming to cause your body to become, and remain, fat.

Fructose and High Blood Pressure

As mentioned earlier, the Paleo diet can be very effective for reducing blood pressure, cholesterol and triglyceride levels—more effective, in fact, than a statin drug. According to Dr. Frassetto, people can see a 30 point drop in cholesterol in just two weeks!

That really is quite remarkable.

It is, however, also quite understandable once you realize that fructose is a major promoter of hypertension—far more so than salt. The connecting link between fructose consumption and hypertension lies in the uric acid produced. Uric acid is a byproduct of fructose metabolism, and increased uric acid levels drive up your blood pressure.

Excess sugars (including grains) also promote unhealthy cholesterol levels and raise triglyceride levels.

How does it do this?

Dr. Stephanie Seneff explained this in some detail in a previous interview. In summary, when you eat a diet high in fructose and other sugars, it over-taxes your liver as it cannot properly make cholesterol while simultaneously processing fructose (which it turns into fat). As a result, you end up with impaired cholesterol formation, which can eventually lead to a cholesterol- and cholesterol sulfate deficiency. At that point, your body begins to form arterial plaque to compensate for this deficiency, because your platelets can produce the cholesterol sulfate your heart and brain needs within that plaque. It's a sort of backup mechanism to maintain proper heart- and brain function.

Unfortunately, it's not an ideal backup mechanism because arterial plaque also increases your risk for heart- and vascular disease. So truly, you'll want to avoid forcing your body to resort to these measures in the first place, and the way you do that is by feeding it correctly... This is yet another important detail that explains how and why excessive fructose consumption is so detrimental to your health.

As you can see, simply cutting out fructose and grains from your diet effectively eliminates one of the underlying causes of a number of health problems, including:

• Hypertension

• Insulin resistance

• High cholesterol

• High triglycerides

• Overweight

... and that's one of the primary reasons the Paleo and other low-carb diets work so well.

The Diet that May Beat All Others...

While you wouldn't be able to find many of the wild varieties of plant foods eaten by cavemen even if you wanted to, you can certainly mold your diet around the principles of Paleo eating rather easily by following my nutrition plan.

I believe it to be one of the most profound interventions for the 21st century. Quite simply, we've strayed too far from the foods we are designed to eat, so going back to basics and refocusing your diet on fresh, whole, unprocessed, "real" food can improve just about anyone's health. The full details are outlined in my nutrition plan, but generally speaking a "healthy diet" is qualified by the following key factors:

• Unprocessed whole foods

• Often raw or only lightly cooked (ideally, try to eat at least one-third of your food raw, or as much as you can manage)

• Organic or grass-fed, and free from additives and genetically modified ingredients

• Come from high-quality, local sources

• Carbohydrates primarily come from vegetables (except corn and potatoes, which should typically be avoided)

The Case for Moving Like a Hunter-Gatherer Too...

Going back to our roots in terms of what we eat is about 80 percent of the battle and subsequent reward in terms of improved health. But there's a lot to be said about moving like a hunter-gatherer too. Instead of being sedentary for much of the day and then running for an hour on a treadmill, our ancient ancestors combined lots of walking with regular lifting and short bursts of high-intensity activities, and health experts agree that this may be a healthier way to live because this is what your body is "wired" for.
http://www.foodconsumer.org/newsite...1111110719.html

Click on the link above to view the CBS videos:

Part One: Caveman Trend Starting to Catch Fire
Part Two: Surprising Results from the Caveman Diet
Part Three: Caveman Diet Shows Blood Pressue and Cholesterol Benefits
Part Four: How Realistic is the Caveman Diet at Home?
Part Five: For Some, Caveman Lifestyle Goes Beyond Diet
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  #79   ^
Old Fri, Nov-11-11, 13:26
howlovely howlovely is offline
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Did I see that right? Are mainstream news sources finally starting to report that it is carbs that make us fat and mess up our cholesterol?
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  #80   ^
Old Fri, Nov-11-11, 14:16
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aj_cohn aj_cohn is offline
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Plan: Protein Power
Stats: 213/167/165 Male 65 in.
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Not too shabby, but coming from Dr. Mercola, I had a higher expectation than I do from the MSM. The author missed the other primary function of insulin, though: making cells take up fat. This notion of eating 1/3 of your food raw is a zombie: it's been killed multiple times but refuses to die.

Most importantly, the article ignores the proverbial "elephant in the room": If you cut down on carbs, you must eat more saturated animal fats. I know the vegetarians will take issue with that, but the weight of the evidence supports this idea. I'm really disappointed in Mercola for ignoring this issue.

Last edited by aj_cohn : Fri, Nov-11-11 at 15:03.
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  #81   ^
Old Fri, Nov-11-11, 18:44
Ilikemice's Avatar
Ilikemice Ilikemice is offline
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Plan: Paleo-ish general LC
Stats: 151/119/118 Female 64 in
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Quote:
Originally Posted by aj_cohn
Not too shabby, but coming from Dr. Mercola, I had a higher expectation than I do from the MSM. The author missed the other primary function of insulin, though: making cells take up fat. This notion of eating 1/3 of your food raw is a zombie: it's been killed multiple times but refuses to die.

Most importantly, the article ignores the proverbial "elephant in the room": If you cut down on carbs, you must eat more saturated animal fats. I know the vegetarians will take issue with that, but the weight of the evidence supports this idea. I'm really disappointed in Mercola for ignoring this issue.


I agree, but when it comes to fighting the conventional wisdom, one must tread carefully, one step at a time; any implication that evilsaturatedfats are actually beneficial will immediately cast doubt and throw these ideas into wacko territory in the general public's mind (and also open up for attacks from nutritionists, etc.) Changes in attitudes must sometimes inch along at a snail's pace.
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  #82   ^
Old Fri, Nov-11-11, 22:50
aj_cohn's Avatar
aj_cohn aj_cohn is offline
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Plan: Protein Power
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We shouldn't set people up to fail. Dr. Kim Mulvhill and Dr. Mercola are doing just that by emphasizing only one part of the paleo diet: reducing carbs. Without fat, you're going to be mighty hungry. If carbs are the only fuel source you know, then that's what you'll eat.

*That* will discredit the paleo diet quicker than the truth.
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  #83   ^
Old Sat, Nov-12-11, 06:38
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WereBear WereBear is offline
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I used to like Dr Mercola, but he dangles just enough of the truth to suck people in... there are far better sources out there.
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  #84   ^
Old Sun, Nov-13-11, 02:54
Demi's Avatar
Demi Demi is offline
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Plan: Muscle Centric
Stats: 238/153/160 Female 5'10"
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Default Eat Like A Caveman To Lose Weight

Quote:
November 12, 2011


Eat Like A Caveman To Lose Weight

Researchers from UCSF say that their research has shown people on a diet of high protein and plenty of vegetables show dramatic health improvements, including weight loss without exercising profusely and lower blood pressure. In short it's the diet of our caveman ancestors thousands of years ago who were what is termed "Hunter Gathers".

Dr. Tim White a paleobiologist from University of California Berkley says :

"Our Biology is still basically the same biology that we had as hunters and gathers 100,000 years ago in Africa."

Dr. White says that the constant physical activity that cavemen had to undertake to hunt and find food, not to mention cutting up animals or pounding grains or root vegetables to make the edible, using only very basic tools, kept them fit, lean, muscular and active. Their diet consisted of large amounts of lean meat, and basic vegetables. Fruits would have been highly seasonable and salt, pure sugar, and large amounts of carbohydrates in their diets pretty much impossible.

The problem today is that we just consume whatever and whenever we want, and generally speaking the food is heavily processed and high in sugar and salt compared to anything natural our ancestors would have eaten.

Dr. White continues :

"We don't have to pound it, we don't have to cut it, we don't have to break into the bones, we just consume it and there is very little energy that goes into that consumption ... and we are paying an enormous health cost for that."

Dr. White didn't want to confirm that obesity, diabetes, high blood pressure, heart disease, and cancer are directly caused by poor diet, his area of specialty is not concerned with the present day. However, researchers at University of California San Francisco tested out the diet on volunteers.

Dr. Linda Frasetto, MD. and her team selected people who were unhealthy in one way or another. They were given a specific diet of lean meat, fish, fresh fruits and vegetables. The diet includes only healthy fats, such as those in nuts and seeds, as a caveman faced with an entire carcass and no refrigerator would have been likely to go only for the best cuts in as much quantity as he could physically eat before the meat went rotten or attracted scavengers or predators.

Frasettoconfirmed the results :

"Everyone's blood pressure went down. In two weeks everybody's cholesterol and triglycerides got better and the average drop was 30 points ... That's the kind of drop you get by taking Statins for six months. "

Robert Lustig, MD. an endocrinologist at UCSF, said that people on the diet have experienced a regression of their diabetes as a result, to the point they are effectively cured.

Dr. Kim Mulvihill, a reporter from CBS tried the diet herself and doctors recommended she should stay on the diet permanently. Her cholesterol, blood pressure and blood sugar levels dropped dramatically over a few weeks. After seven weeks she was no longer pre-diabetic, and by combining the so called paleo diet with a weight loss program she lost thirty pounds.

Robert Lustig, MD. says :

"The bottom line is we are killing ourselves ... We have 66 million obese adults and 20 million obese kids in this country ... They are not all going to go on the Paleolithic diet."

He says the solution is not to be extreme, rather to get back to basics, effectively run our bodies on the correct fuel they were designed to burn :

"Low Sugar, High fibre and you've got it nailed. That's something you can do and its called ... Eat ... Real ... Food."

The one thing you can't really do is to be on the paleo diet and vegetarian, because so much of the diet comes from meat and fish.
http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/237563.php
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  #85   ^
Old Sun, Nov-13-11, 05:59
Demi's Avatar
Demi Demi is offline
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Default Act like a caveman at dinner

Quote:
November 13, 2011


Act like a caveman at dinner


About 18 years ago, I started competing in fitness figure competitions and needed to lower my body fat. I had about 22 per cent body fat and needed to reach 16 per cent.

My trainer told me to cut out grains and starches, including bread, pasta and rice, as well as refined sugars. My eating plan consisted of fish, chicken and other meat, eggs, salad, vegetables, fruit, nuts and seeds. This was my first experience of the Palaeolithic or ''caveman'' diet, which is based on the premise ''if the cavemen didn't eat it, you shouldn't, either''.

After overdosing on protein at first, I focused on a plant-based fresh-vegetable diet that included 65 grams of animal-based protein a day. I felt strong and full of energy, and never hungry. I leaned up ready for my competition and placed second. Since then, I've based the way I eat (and cook) on the paleo lifestyle.

The diet contains ''primal'' foods such as meat, vegetables, fruits, nuts and seeds, without newcomers such as refined sugar, preservatives and grain-based foods.

It's also automatically a gluten-free diet, which is great for coeliacs or those who are sensitive to grains.

A study published in the European Journal of Clinical Nutrition found that after only 10 days on a paleo diet, subjects had physiological and metabolic benefits that included reduced blood pressure, lower levels of total cholesterol and lower insulin secretion after ingestion of glucose. If continued it would reduce the risk of type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease.

In another three-month study, the paleo diet improved glycaemic control and cardiovascular risk factors in subjects with type 2 diabetes, compared with a conventional diabetes diet. The diet also has anti-inflammatory benefits thanks to high levels of mono-unsaturated fats and omega-3 fatty acids.

If you're thinking about giving this a go, approach it as a lifestyle makeover. Eat vegetables, meat, nuts and seeds, some fruit, little starch and no sugar. Keep your food intake at a level that supports plenty of exercise.

It's important to note that the paleo diet is not a zero-carb diet. You get ample amounts every day from fresh fruit and vegetables.

thehealthychef.com


PALEO DIET FOR BEGINNERS

Pantry patrol Throw out the junk - packets of chips, processed foods, cereal, bread, pasta and sugar.

Shop smart Buy plenty of seasonal vegetables and fruit as well as healthy protein sources such as fish, grass-fed or free-range chicken or beef and eggs.

Cook healthily Include a little protein in every meal and combine with plenty of fresh green salad and vegies.

Exercise You don't have to train like an Olympian; the Greek physician Hippocrates believed walking to be humankind's best medicine. It supports health physiologically and mentally.


For more info, see nourishingaustralia.org.au.
http://www.westernadvocate.com.au/n...er/2356066.aspx
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  #86   ^
Old Sun, Nov-13-11, 12:01
aj_cohn's Avatar
aj_cohn aj_cohn is offline
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Plan: Protein Power
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If "Their diet consisted of large amounts of lean meat, and basic vegetables," then they would have starved. Other studies have determined that Paleo humans' diet was much higher in fat, with hunters/warriors of tribes being allocated the majority of that.

As I mentioned in another article that cited this study, leaving fat out of the equation sets people up to be hungry, and therefore to fail.
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  #87   ^
Old Mon, Nov-14-11, 06:01
Ron_Mocci Ron_Mocci is offline
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aj_cohn , You are so right ! that was the first thing I seen * were is the fat *
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  #88   ^
Old Sat, Dec-03-11, 10:34
Demi's Avatar
Demi Demi is offline
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Plan: Muscle Centric
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Default Diet like a caveman

Quote:
December 1, 2011

Diet like a caveman

Many modern-day diets look to prepared low-fat, high protein or low-calorie options as the ideal way to lose weight, but what if you could lose weight without any of these strategies? Instead of buying packaged “diet” foods, people would go outside and fetch dinner for themselves, like hunters and gatherers of the Stone Age did to survive.


William R. Leonard, anthropology chair of the Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences at Northwestern University, said reverting back to a Paleolithic diet could be the answer to our country’s health problems.

After studying biology at Penn State University and earning his Ph.D. in biological anthropology from the University of Michigan, Leonard has spent his career studying human evolution and ecology. He talks about Paleolithic diets and the Discovery Channel’s “I Caveman,” a show he helped orchestrate along with doctoral candidate Aaron A. Miller that features 10 people who lived on a diet of meats, fish, fruits, vegetables roots and nuts in Colorado.

Q. Tell us about your research. What drew you to studying Paleolithic diets?

A. My research examines how human populations, in the past and today, adapt to the particular stressors of their environments, and how these adaptations influence their biology and health. Much of my work particularly focuses nutritional and metabolic adaptations: how do populations adjust to constraints or abundance in food availability, and what are the implications for various aspects of health and wellbeing (for example, child growth, obesity, or malnutrition, chronic diseases).

To date, I have worked with 'traditional' farming populations of the Andes of Peru and Ecuador, animal herding groups of Siberia and farmer and foragers of the jungles of Bolivia. In each place, many of the basic research questions have been the same: how have these populations adapted to their particular dietary and nutritional environments, and how ongoing patterns of lifestyle change and 'modernization' influences their diets and nutritional health.

Beyond the field research portion of my work, I also draw on comparative information from other primates and the human fossil record to model how our ancestors lived and survived in the past. What is clear is that food and nutrition were critically important factors that promoted the evolution of many unique human characteristics: for example, our big brain and our upright, 'bipedal' locomotion.

Ultimately, these are the issues that drew me to study Paleolithic diets. Seeing that nutrition has been such an important force of human evolution, and seeing that an evolutionary perspective on nutrition can also be helpful for understanding and dealing with modern day health problems like obesity, diabetes and other chronic diseases.

Q. What were your findings?

A. Broadly, our work has shown that throughout most of our evolutionary past and among tradition subsistence-level (i.e., food producing) populations today, food availability was marginal, and populations had to work much harder to obtain food and stay alive. Our work with traditional foraging, farming and herding populations has shown that these populations typically expend more calories over the course of a day than people in modern, urban societies.

These differences between 'traditional' and 'modern' life ways were clearly evident in the 'I Caveman' project. Over only a 10-day period, the group members lost an average of 13.6 pounds. Part of this weight loss reflected limited food availability; however, part of it also reflected the fact that they were spending many more calories living as Stone Age hunter-gatherers (an extra 500 calories a day for the men, and an extra 250 to 300 calories a day for the women).

Q. What exactly is a Paleolithic diet, and how can it be translated to modern-day eating?

A. Paleolithic diet refers to dietary patterns of human hunting and gathering populations from the Stone Age (up to 10,000 years ago). The term was coined in a famous paper from the New England Journal of Medicine in 1985.

The reconstruction of Paleolithic diets potentially gives us an idea about what humans were eating throughout most of our evolutionary history. This is the central idea of evolutionary approaches to health and nutrition: that many of our health problems today reflect an imbalance between our current dietary and lifestyle patterns and the conditions we adapted to throughout most of our evolutionary history.

Q. Tell us about the television show, 'I Caveman.' How did it work?

A. The program was shot out in Colorado. For the program, 10 people (six men and four women) were selected and provided with training in basic tool making, how to make fire and foraging hunting strategies. They were given traditional and primitive clothing, like skins and hide boots. For 10 days, they lived as Stone Age hunter-gatherers, using basic Paleolithic technology to obtain food.

There was at least one camera crew on the group at all times. I served as the expert on nutrition and health. Before they started, we collected baseline nutrition and health measures (like height, weight, percentage of body fat, resting metabolism, grip strength, blood pressure, cholesterol, glucose and hemoglobin levels). We then collected the same measurements at the end to see how well they did.

Two of the participants (one man and one woman) did not complete the entire 10-day experiment. We measured them immediately after they quit.

Q. How do you hope to expand your research?

A. We have continuing research among rainforest populations of Bolivia and among indigenous horse and reindeer herders of Siberia. In both places we are tracking how people's health changes over time in response to changes in lifestyle and environment.

There is talk of doing another 'I Caveman'-type show, in a different environment.

Q. How does your research relate to the obesity crisis in the United States? Why do you think Americans are so obese?

A. Rates of obesity in U.S. adults today are about 33 percent, which is 2.5 to three times what it they were in the 1960s. In discussing our obesity problem, most of the attention is focused on food intake alone. This is certainly a problem. However, the available data indicate the calorie intakes have increased only modestly over the last 40 to 50 years. What are generally ignored are changes in activity and energy expenditure.

This is where the evolutionary/Paleolithic perspective is helpful. It highlights the fact that our obesity problem is not simply a problem of too much food or what we eat, but also a problem of limited activity and exertion in our daily lives. So many of the elements of our modern lives, like cars, elevators, dishwashers, heating and cooling our houses, reduce the energy, or calories, we spend just to stay alive.
http://news.medill.northwestern.edu....aspx?id=197182
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  #89   ^
Old Sun, Dec-04-11, 07:36
M Levac M Levac is offline
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Plan: VLC, mostly meat
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Quote:
A. Broadly, our work has shown that throughout most of our evolutionary past and among tradition subsistence-level (i.e., food producing) populations today, food availability was marginal, and populations had to work much harder to obtain food and stay alive. Our work with traditional foraging, farming and herding populations has shown that these populations typically expend more calories over the course of a day than people in modern, urban societies.

These differences between 'traditional' and 'modern' life ways were clearly evident in the 'I Caveman' project. Over only a 10-day period, the group members lost an average of 13.6 pounds. Part of this weight loss reflected limited food availability; however, part of it also reflected the fact that they were spending many more calories living as Stone Age hunter-gatherers (an extra 500 calories a day for the men, and an extra 250 to 300 calories a day for the women).

Remember what Taubes said about obesity? It occurs over several years and the caloric balance can be off by as little as 20 kcals per day. The implication here, of course, is that cavemen expended about 10 more calories per day, and ate about 10 less calories per day. It's absurd and obviously doesn't fit the idea that "food availability was marginal, and populations had to work much harder to obtain food."

The reality is that food availability was not marginal as a rule, but instead depended on local conditions. The I Caveman show showed that food was scarce here, but go just a few miles that way, and elk was abundant. It makes sense. Elk go where food is, cavemen go where elk go. It was the same before hunting. We scavenged so we went where predators went. Due to the nature of hunting and scavenging, even if it's very expensive in terms of energy cost, the product provides literally a surplus of energy which we can store after only the most basic processing. After all, fat is the most stable form of biological fuel storage we know. This would probably still be true outside of the body.

I understand how it's easier to explain it all with calories. If our modern cavemen lost weight during the show because of Ein-Eout, then we can continue to blame calories for obesity today, and we can keep our paradigm intact, and the Paleo diet becomes much easier to accept. But dig just a little bit, and the whole thing falls apart. If the whole thing falls apart, then the Paleo diet becomes just another fad diet. For the Paleo diet to be taken seriously, it must rely on actual facts, not try to fit the existing paradigm.

Just a few weeks ago, it occurred to me that the Paleo diet in its most popular incarnation looks almost exactly like a generic Mediterranean diet: Lean meats, fruits and vegetables, nuts and healthy fats. I digress, but this is just another example of the Paleo diet trying to fit the existing paradigm instead of trying to fit the facts.

Notice how when they quartered the elk, they showed the big guy carrying a leg to the camp. The reality is that a caveman would have taken the skin and the back fat if he couldn't have taken the whole animal back to the camp.
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Default Paleo diet followers love eating like cavemen, but health experts wary

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Paleo diet followers love eating like cavemen, but health experts wary

You can forget about that bowl of Total cereal with cold milk. Don't think about crunching on Triscuits either.

Want some brown rice with your veggies? Nope. Feel like a little slow-churned ice cream? Sorry, not allowed on the Paleo diet.

If cavemen in the Paleolithic period of more than 10,000 years ago didn't eat it, then you're not supposed to either under this diet. They hunted and gathered their food. That pretty much limited them to animal protein and plants.

Can -- and should -- we duplicate that diet now?

Local Paleo diet followers boast about the great success they've had -- weight loss, leaner bodies, better athletic performance and overall good feeling. The diet's growing and devoted following say it's a lifestyle to follow permanently.

"I started the diet two months ago, and I've lost 31 pounds," said Cris Thompson, 36, Avon, who works for Hewlett-Packard.

"I'm seeing and feeling very positive results," he said. "My doctor reduced my high blood pressure medication. Fatigue doesn't linger as long as it used to when I go to the gym or run. For me, the results have been worth any sacrifice."

Yet some health experts are skeptical. A panel ranked the Paleo diet last among 25 evaluated for U.S. News & World Report magazine.

A big health benefit is the diet's lack of junk food, processed food, alcohol and refined sugars -- all of which are too big a part of most modern-day diets. We can all do without doughnuts, cookies and candy, right? Giving up canned soups, jarred pasta sauce and frozen diet meals may be tougher.

"The hardest part was saying no to beer," said Mindy Schelling, who professed a love for craft brews.

Paleo followers eat a high-protein, low-carb diet rich in lean meat (ideally from grass-fed animals). Again, foods that could be hunted or gathered: seafood, vegetables, fruits, nuts and seeds.

The Paleo diet shuns dairy, legumes and grains. That's not just whole milk, white bread, white rice and high-fat cheese. The diet also excludes healthier counterparts -- skim milk, brown rice, quinoa, beans and whole-wheat pasta and bread.

The diet is popular with those who practice CrossFit, an intense training program in bare-bones gyms in Indianapolis and worldwide. Few people followed Paleo diets until CrossFitters began championing them in the past five years.

"Paleo changed my life. It gave me back confidence in myself," said Schelling, 30, while working up a sweat at the CrossFit Naptown gym in Downtown Indianapolis. "I failed at Weight Watchers, Atkins and others for two years. For the first time in 10 years, I've lost weight.

"I feel as good as I did in the military nine years ago," she said.

Schelling has lost 10 pounds in about five weeks and is just getting started. She eats a lot of vegetables, chicken, buffalo and 10 eggs per week. She snacks on grapes, cantaloupe and carrots. When she works out, she treats herself to a Lara all-natural, fruit-nut bar.

Schelling had been a vegetarian since junior high school, but had a hard time keeping off weight. Eliminating refined sugars and cutting back carbohydrates has done the trick, along with exercising more. When she reaches her weight goal, she may cut back to following a Paleo diet 80 percent of the time.

Operators of CrossFit gyms often recommend the Paleo diet and have weight-loss challenges. Their routines feature weight lifting, pull-ups, push-ups, short runs and other muscle-building practices.

Health benefits debated

Supporters of the Paleo diet say it can be maintained -- either strictly or with exceptions, throughout life.

The diet is based on the work of Loren Cordain, a leading expert on the diet of Paleolithic societies and author of "The Paleo Diet," published in 2002. Cordain, a Colorado State University health and exercise science professor, found that people who ate diets rich in meat, vegetables, fruits, nuts and seeds had fewer diseases and health problems than Western contemporaries.

Paleo diets haven't been widely researched, so that makes it harder to evaluate their long-term viability and health impact.

Some local dietitians say cutting out two major food groups -- grains and dairy -- from your diet isn't a good idea and could lead to a lack of calcium and vitamin D. They also say risk for heart problems may increase if you're not careful about making lean-meat choices.

"I would describe it as a very low-carb diet and low in a lot of nutrients, vitamins and minerals," said Angie Scheetz, registered dietitian and wellness coordinator at the National Institute for Fitness and Sport. "It's not something I would recommend."

However, if the diet helps motivate people to make changes and lose weight, then the health community needs to pay attention to what works, said Margie Fougeron, registered dietitian with St. Vincent Medical Group.

Just as people with allergies to wheat, grain and dairy products make diet adjustments and use supplements, she said people on this diet need to be cautious in replacing nutrients.

Fougeron thinks it would be a hard diet to sustain. But she said adopting positive aspects of it and making healthy, small changes would be workable.

The panel of 22 health experts who evaluated diets for U.S. News & World Report in its Jan. 3 issue didn't think highly of the Paleo.

"Experts took issue with the diet on every measure," the issue reported. "Regardless of the goal -- weight loss, heart health or finding a diet that's easy to follow -- most experts concluded that it would be better for dieters to look elsewhere."

The experts noted the lack of large research studies to back up claims that the diet improves people's health. Cordain responded that five studies have found Paleo diets to be superior to Mediterranean, diabetic and typical Western diets regarding weight loss, cardiovascular disease and diabetes risk factors.

Success story

Elyse Merchant, 25, is an assistant coach at CrossFit Naptown. The Indianapolis woman doesn't need to see study results to know how the diet has helped her. She's followed it for 18 months, during which time she competed in the Muncie Half-Ironman in July.

Her body fat has gone from 23 percent to 16 percent. Her muscle tone has improved. Her blood pressure has gone from 120 over 80 to 107 over 68. And her resting heart rate is 54.

At first, she struggled with the diet because of its lack of carbohydrates. But she made adjustments by eating starchy vegetables such as sweet potatoes, more fruit like bananas and a lot of broccoli. She doesn't eat much red meat and drinks coconut milk to supplement her calcium.

"After awhile, you get your body used to using its own fat for energy," she said. "It's more of a sustained energy. You don't have the spikes in blood sugar. Once I upped my fat intake, I really started to notice an improvement, and I had more energy."

That's exactly what Kate Onuska lacked when she tried the diet for nearly a month. A petite, physically active 31-year-old, Onuska thought the diet would be a good way to eat "cleanly."

It wasn't for her.

"I noticed immediately I was hungry, which I was told would subside. But I was never full," she said. "I normally have the energy of an eternal cheerleader, but I felt really fatigued. At the end, I laid on the couch and couldn't get up."

She thinks the diet might not be good for a person who is the correct weight, eats well and has no health issues or food allergies, and it may even be harmful.

Frank Dennis, who owns QuantumFit on the Northeastside, follows the diet and recommends it to his clients. He says he's seen many successes with the diet. People who follow it have to make sure they're getting enough protein, and they need to replace sugar with healthy fats.

"There is a huge amount of energy missing because they haven't replaced the sugar with anything," he said. "If you follow this diet right, you are not missing anything nutritionally. It's certainly something that anyone can sustain."

http://www.indystar.com/article/201...th-experts-wary


Quote:
Paleo participants speak out

"I haven't had a case of IBS (irritable bowel syndrome) in four weeks. It's amazing. I've lost 3 1/2 inches off my waist, three inches off my hips and 2 1/2 off my thighs." Jonna Satterfield, 33, Indianapolis, medical marketing professional

"You're essentially giving your body premium food. The whole idea is clean eating. I've lost 47 pounds since I started Paleo." Christina Garten, 28, Indianapolis, owner of residential/commercial cleaning business

"I'm very motivated to stay healthy. There's heart disease and diabetes in my family. Honestly, I just physically feel better." Leslie Gardner, 26, Indianapolis, instructor of children with autism, Lovaas Institute

"I follow the diet about 85 to 90 percent of the time, but I also eat beans and drink milk. If you're going to eat fresh fruit and vegetables and meat from cage-free, grass-fed animals, it's a huge financial investment." Jared Cantrell, 29, Indianapolis, drug and alcohol abuse counselor, Wheeler Mission Industries

"At first, I felt like I was never full. After two weeks, my body decided to reconcile to the diet. I'm doing this for overall wellness. It's not meant to be temporary." Jamie Manuel, 26, Indianapolis, sales representative

"By eating Paleo and doing CrossFit I've lost 130 pounds in one year and my wife, Heather, has lost 35 pounds. My goal is another 45 pounds to get down to 200. My doctor told me my weight was affecting our ability to have children. That was my wake-up call." Josh Barkley, 32, Fort Wayne, construction business owner

"I did it to lose weight and to help the inflammation in my joints. Every time I would eat dairy or gluten, I would double over in pain in the evening. After two weeks on the diet, my stomach wasn't bothering me and my joints weren't swollen. When I realized how I felt, that was a bigger reason." Annie Hamilton, Carmel

http://www.indystar.com/article/201...dyssey=obinsite

Quote:
Barb Berggoetz: Diet's doable despite no grains or dairy

The idea of trying a low-carb, high-protein diet didn't hold much appeal for me. But I figured I could handle about anything for a short period.

Anything for a story, right?

Then when I learned the Paleo diet my editor asked me to try didn't allow any grains or dairy products, I had second thoughts.

Could I live without my favorite "healthy" snack, hummus and whole-wheat pita? My daily crackers at lunch? My Cheerios and whole-wheat toast for breakfast? I wasn't sure.

I couldn't even indulge in my occasional handful of dark chocolate chips or 60-calorie dark chocolate pudding cup. Dark chocolate is good for your heart, isn't it?

I figured my diet was pretty good and balanced, but not perfect. Perhaps I could learn something from this diet with some obvious benefits -- no processed foods or refined sugars. I learned it's hard to cut all processed foods and refined sugars out of your diet. I learned I can eat more vegetables and cut back on not-so-healthy carbohydrates and sugar even more than I have.

Until now, I have defended a fairly high carbohydrate intake because I run or bike every day and do strength training. But I probably don't get enough protein. I do enjoy pasta. And I have a bit of sweet tooth.

But I maintain a healthy weight. My key essential health barometers -- blood pressure, cholesterol, blood sugar -- are all good. So, I must be doing something right.

For nine days, I ate almost exclusively lean meats, eggs, fresh vegetables and fruits and nuts. This wasn't enough time to really test the diet, but I got a sense of what it's like.

I had one "cheat" meal that was previously planned at a Mexican restaurant. Rice, beans and chicken tortillas were mostly off the diet. Other than that, I had two or three snacks (hummus, pudding) off the diet.

Breakfast was the hardest meal because I was used to mostly cereal, toast and fruit. I switched to two scrambled eggs and fruit, with a snack of nuts.

For lunch, I eliminated my daily low-fat yogurt and crackers, replacing them with a chicken breast and a bigger serving of raw vegetables and nuts or a Paleo-approved fruit/nut bar. That's in addition to two fruits.

Thankfully, dinner didn't change much since I often had salmon, turkey or chicken, salad and another vegetable and/or fruit. I missed having noodles, rice or pasta, although I had sweet potatoes -- allowed if you're not trying to lose weight.

I got hungrier than usual between meals. During the day, I relied on nuts and dried or fresh fruit for snacks.

One of this diet's goals is to eliminate insulin spikes due to carbohydrates quickly breaking down into sugar in your body.

Without as many carbohydrates and more foods naturally low in sugar, insulin is more slowly released into the body, allowing the body to recognize true hunger.

Some people get hungry and fatigued on this diet at first, while their bodies adjust to using fat for energy. I didn't notice unusual fatigue, but I probably had enough starchy vegetables and "cheats" to make up for it. It appears I lost 1 or 2 pounds.

Although the benefits of eliminating processed foods and refined sugars are clear, I would say just cutting back on them might be more practical for most of us.

Cutting out grains and dairy is a more serious step, with potential losses of nutrients like calcium and vitamin D. But I think smart dieters could make up for those losses with other foods or supplements.

The Paleo diet isn't one I could sustain. However, I'm definitely going to kick up my vegetables and my protein. But I'm not giving up my hummus and pita -- or my dark chocolate.

http://www.indystar.com/article/201...no-grains-dairy
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