Paleo Diet

[JessRD]

(Sorry I wrote so much, its just I am SUPER into nutrition..and these are just my thoughts....)

 

So overall from what I've been taught and seen in my own life as well as the lives of others, "ketosis" and paleo diets are moving in the right direction, but kind of miss the mark a little.  My major gripe with paleo is the exclusion of beans/legumes/whole grains.  Specifically beans/legumes, I mean there has been a TON of research on the heart health, protection against certain cancers, diabetes prevention (but these involve health goals over weight goals) etc related to legumes.  Also I feel that these diets, as a results of eliminating carbs cause you to increase your intake of animal proteins and dairy proteins.  And again, from what I have seen, studied, researched, read, an excessive amount of animal protein and dairy products just isn't good for our organs in the long run, specifically the kidneys and heart.  

 

Now this is just a personal account but, like a lot of RD's I am very preoccupied by eating healthy and living an active lifestyle.  For the past 6 years, I have always had extremely low cholesterol, while at the same time maintaining extremely high HDL (good) cholesterol levels, so high that they are categorized as a negative risk factor for heart disease.  So about 8 months ago I had my blood checked and it reflected these same things.  Then I adopted a paleo diet for the past 8 months. Cut out all grains, legumes, etc, etc.  I just had my blood checked again, not only is my cholesterol high for the first time in my life, but my HgA1c is also the highest it has ever been.  I did not change the amount of calories I was eating or my exercise regimen, just my diet.  I attribute this mostly to the increase in protein and dairy products (even though they were always lean cuts of meat and low-fat dairy) I just don't think it worked for me.

 

My brother on the other hand, a quite large, cut, cross-fitting male, saw a lot of gains in his performance, fitness, and body definition by adopting a paleo diet.  And he even told me his cholesterol went down. 

 

The thing is that following a ketosis diet or a paleo like diet is likely to lead to weight loss.  Carbs do hold onto water molecules in the body, so by minimizing them, you do minimize water weight.  Also, our brains and central nervous systems NEED glucose to function properly.  Therefore if we do not supply glucose via carbs, our body will need to metabolize fat and protein to create that energy source.  Fat and protein are much less efficient at creating glucose (which is converted to pyruvate and then converted to ATP which we use for energy) than carbohydrates are.  But don't been think that your body will just breakdown your fat, it will go after the muscle too. 

 

Overall I would say that ketosis is great for weight loss, increasing lifting performance, and recovery time from workouts. It is definitely something that is hard to keep up in the long run, just because of the world we live in. Is it protective of our organs, against cancer, other disease, etc? That I don't think so. Our bodies need carbs, seriously they are not inherently bad. Just eliminate refined carbs, limit starches and fruits, and eat lots of veggies and legumes.

[thebiglebowski]

Your comments lead me to believe that you didn't do the keto diet correctly. Lean cuts of meat and low-fat dairy are not great keto foods, they are ok. You may have not eaten enough fat to stay in a strong state of ketosis.

 

Keto requires a carb-up to replenish glycogen in the muscles. It is usually a day or two.

 

Keto is a little dangerous in that it works if you do it right. It is horrible for you if you don't.

 

Cancer is a whole 'nother story. No one knows what causes cancer (outside of substances classified as carcinogens). There might be research published correlating cancer with certain foods and the absence of cancer with others. This is confounded by 100 other things, from stress to prosperity to exercise level to body fat etc. Vegans do a lot of other things that make them less susceptible to cancer and no one can really say which one it is that causes that effect.

[JessRD]

Yea, so like I said I haven't really looked into ketosis diet so much. I just thought it involved putting your body into the state of ketosis, which from everything I have learned occurs when your body doesn't have glucose available due to lack of carbohydrate sources in the diet. In ketosis, from what I understood in biochem occurs when your body then converts lactate (from fat in the body) to pyruvate (via the Cori Cycle), which then goes into the Krebs Cycle to create ATP or energy.  The process of converting lactate to pyruvate creates a by-product of ketone bodies. As these build up in your blood your body can go into ketosis.  But from what you are saying the diet is different then just cutting off carbs.

 

I actually never did a ketogenic diet, just the paleo diet.  Lean meats and dairy (only non fat greek yogurt) are supposedly ok on the newer paleo diet.  I agree with you and the whole cancer thing, as in we don't really know what causes cancer and there haven't been any studies showing causal relationships with foods.  I just feel like if there is some possible protective correlation between something like legumes and prostate cancer, etc. why claim they are unnatural for our bodies and we aren't made to eat them, like the paleo diet does.  

 

I am going to look into the keto diet though, just to inform myself, though you have already explained a fair amount!

[thebiglebowski]

I think you def know more about the science behind it but maybe I know a little more about the practice.

Really probably the best thing for a keto diet is fish, and there is annecdotal evidence that fish is great at prolonging your life (Japanese people have really long avg lifespans). Fish have a good amount of fat in them, but it's the unsaturated kinds. Something like tuna needs a little fat added to it though, cause it is like chicken breast...too lean. Salmon is money, just a little expensive.

Lentils and stuff like that (as you said) are money on a traditional diet. You just gotta choose one way or the other and then do it right.

[¯\_(ツ)_/¯]

I guess I always thought if you ate fatty foods that it was bad for you because it would build up in your arteries and cause clots/blockages.  so the keto diet, because youre eating so much fatty food in place of sugars, the fats being burned up before it can cause health risks?  

[thebiglebowski]

Yeah, that is essentially the idea. I am going to post something long from a website on the subject in the next post related to the topic I took off a keto website. Judge for yourself.

[thebiglebowski]

Risk of Heart Disease But even if saturated fat doesn't adversely affect cholesterol, it's still really associated with getting a heart attack though right? I mean arterycloggingsaturatedfat is almost one word it's been drilled into us so often.

Well, again the science just doesn't back this up. If you look at observational studies you'll find some studies showing that people who go heavy on the butter and bacon tend to die of more heart attacks. But the problem with these kinds of studies is that you cannot infer a causal relationship from an retrospective observational study because the 'experiment' has been tainted.

An example: Lets pretend 20 years ago we decide that people that wear more yellow clothes have less heart disease. All the health-conscious people listen to their doctors and start wearing yellow shirts, along with doing thousands of other things that health-conscious people tend to do either unconsciously or consciously (exercise, no smoking, less fast food) that can't be fully accounted for by mathematically controlling the statistics. Lo and behold a few decades later it's as clear as day that people who wear yellow clothes have less heart attacks!

If you think the above example is completely silly then think how silly it is that even the observational evidence from the last few decades is not consistent the theory. The totality of the studies of this nature don't even support an association with an increase in heart disease even though we've been told to lay off the cream and butter for decades now.

The best version of an observational study is a prospective cohort study, this is where rather than asking people to remember what they were eating ten years ago, you ask them what they eat now and at regular intervals and follow their progress for a number of years. Although still far from perfect, these kind of studies minimise 'recall' bias or the bias we all have in remembering what we eat.

There have been 25 prospective studies done examining the relationship between heart-disease and saturated fat and only four of them managed to find any relationship whatsoever. If there was a real danger from eating saturated fat, we would see a far more consistent relationship, especially considering how healthy people in general tend to avoid it based on public health recommendations.

This recent meta-analysis by Krauss et al. is the most comprehensive review of it's nature: http://www.ajcn.org/content/early/20...27725.abstract

[thebiglebowski]

Here's another example I am fond of -- Look at a great white shark. It eats nothing but fish and blubbery mammals. Yet it is a powerhouse that never gets heart disease or cancer. If saturated fat intake was the most important factor in heart disease, how would this be possible? Bears behave similarly too. When those salmon runs are happening, they don't even bother eating the protein, just the fat and skin. Yet there aren't epidemics of bear heart attacks.

 

Obviously, the difference in the comparison is genetics. And genetics is a huge part of human heart disease, along with diet and behaviour. We still don't understand genetics that well, though, and even if we did we have trouble controlling it, so all the focus is put on diet instead.

[Guest]

So, I've been strength training for the past week... surprisingly I remember a ton from high school and most of it's coming back to me fairly easily.

I read quite a bit about the paleo diet over the last week also, and am starting it today. I'm psyched.

Any thoughts on coffee during this diet? I usually drink one-two cups of black coffee every day in the a.m.

cut it out completely? switch to tea?

also, has anyone tried intermittent fasting?

[nivek87]

So, I've been strength training for the past week... surprisingly I remember a ton from high school and most of it's coming back to me fairly easily.

I read quite a bit about the paleo diet over the last week also, and am starting it today. I'm psyched.

Any thoughts on coffee during this diet? I usually drink one-two cups of black coffee every day in the a.m.

cut it out completely? switch to tea?

while im on the paleo i rid it from my intake. i have really found my body wakes up and has a lot more energy and after (usually) a week on, i don't feel like i need it.

tea is probably a better option, however; 1 to 2 black cups of coffee might be good for the first couple weeks, but i would try to ween myself off at a point sooner or later.

what recipes are you trying?

[Guest]

chicken veggie stir fry tonight... salmon and asparagus tomorrow maybe, also grilled chicken salad.

I'm also planning on grilling up a bunch of chicken on my george forman (yessss) and portioning it in baggies for quick meals.

I'm probably going to depend a lot on bags of frozen veggies also. on long days I end up eating all my meals at work so I need quick and easy.

this guy has a ton of meals I want to try once I get further into the diet:

http://www.marksdailyapple.com/primal-blueprint-recipes/#axzz2HxiBJly6

do you have any recipes that you've really liked?

[nivek87]

nice nice.  yeah, he has some really good stuff. we're making one of the recipes posted on there this week.  

 

http://www.marksdailyapple.com/primal-jambalaya/#axzz2Hxk450h9

[Team Avatar]

pardon me for my ignorance, but keto just sounds like an excuse to eat unhealthy foods.  I think the idea that burning fat instead of protein is super cool, but cool in a "I wonder if it works" not an "I should do it forever".  Then again, I'm vegan, and this is pretty much the anti-vegan diet // the most carnivorous of all. 

 

Paleo, on the other hand, seems awesome, and I really want to try and see if I can do paleo-vegan.  I'm concerned with the lack of protein, as my only real source would be nuts.  It would also be interesting to do a paleo diet based on a cavemans diet in a certain region, ie: A caveman who lived in Northeast America.

[bluedeni]

I am trying the Paleo today. I love the George Foreman grill and I usually just cook up a bunch of chicken and beef at once since I am pretty busy. I plan on doing strength training 3 days a week and going on 5 mile walks. I am 6'3 and 270 and want to get down to 220. I carry my weight really good and most people don't guess I am as big as I am.

[scottheisel]

pardon me for my ignorance, but keto just sounds like an excuse to eat unhealthy foods.  I think the idea that burning fat instead of protein is super cool, but cool in a "I wonder if it works" not an "I should do it forever".  Then again, I'm vegan, and this is pretty much the anti-vegan diet // the most carnivorous of all. 

 

Paleo, on the other hand, seems awesome, and I really want to try and see if I can do paleo-vegan.  I'm concerned with the lack of protein, as my only real source would be nuts.  It would also be interesting to do a paleo diet based on a cavemans diet in a certain region, ie: A caveman who lived in Northeast America.

 

I don't think these diets are anti-vegan. I've been eating more vegetables since I've gone on my keto diet than I have in years and years. I consume so much salad/cauliflower/celery/green beans/etc. now along with meat.

[thebiglebowski]

Madie, coffee is fine but caffeine does some stuff that spikes blood sugar. Some say it is ok, some say not. Regular coffee sparingly or decaf as much as you want is probably the way to go.

 

Jake, we've gone back and forth a few times in the vegan thread. If you do this, focus on amino acids, not just total protein. Vegans can get every amino acid they need to build human tissue but it comes in pieces from many different sources. So "just nuts" would probably not be sufficient. Even if you ate a ton of them, you would probably be well over requirement for some and way under for others. Not sure, though. I eat meat (which has every amino acid required) so I don't have to worry about it. Have to research for yourself but that is what you should focus on.

 

And confirming what Scott says, you eat tons of veggies on these diets. They should be eaten with every meal. You just focus on green ones (low calorie, low sugar, high fiber) and leave the others out. You have to have fiber in your diet or you cause your digestive system damage. Crash Davis knows.

[Team Avatar]

It would be fun to build complete proteins with my meals, for sure.

 

I tell myself that I can eat as much of any vegetable / fruit that I want as a vegan, and the keto diet says you can eat as much as you want of any high fatty meat, so it's kind of opposites.

[thebiglebowski]

It would be fun to build complete proteins with my meals, for sure.

 

I tell myself that I can eat as much of any vegetable / fruit that I want as a vegan, and the keto diet says you can eat as much as you want of any high fatty meat, so it's kind of opposites.

 

This is not true. If you eat 5k calories a day on keto or vegan or whatever you are going to put on pounds.

 

Part of keto is that you get a good amount of green, low calorie foods to balance out the high-calorie fatty stuff. Plus, eating fatty foods makes some people feel more satiated, rather than other diets where they end up craving them after a while. But you still gotta have a calorie imbalance. The difference is that on keto diets your body is already in ketogenesis, so when it runs out of calories from daily diet, it is much more prone to use fat stores, instead of still trying to save the fat and sending signals to your brain to eat more.

 

"Eat as many vegetables as you want" is a heuristic. Vegetables are low calorie, so you would have to pretty much try your hardest to eat all day long to end up with a big calorie surplus. If you ate a whole lot of the sweetest fruits all the time, you would get fat. But there is no magic with either diet. Calorie deficit -> lost weight, calorie surplus -> gained weight. It's the law of conservation of energy and there is no escaping it.

[thebiglebowski]

Also, the one website I read about the paleo diet had peanuts listed as "toxic foods". I think being vegan is PLENTY healthy enough and restricting your diet even further is not something I would recommend but that's just my gut talking.

[Team Avatar]

When I said "eat as much fruits and vegetable", I didn't mean it as a rule for the diet.  It's a personal rule I have.  I tell myself to portion out processed soy and sweets - IE I can't eat two pints of soy cream a day, but if there's a veggie platter, I'm going to town.  I also agree with you on paleo-vegan, it'd be ridiculous, but I'm curious.

 

Raw diet is something else I'm curious about, just to see if I can do it.  But then I think of how I can't eat out anymore and I get sad.

[thebiglebowski]

Yeah. I feel ya. I gave up drinking as a weekly occurance. I'll still brew at things like sporting events, concerts, a close friends birthday, etc, but I don't drink anymore just because it's Friday night and I'm bored.

 

So I cut my drinking down to probably less than a quarter of what it was but I probably quadrupled the number of meals I go out for. Helps keep me still hanging out with my and getting out of the house instead of just watching movies all the time.

[BBech]

I try to follow it but some of it seems so hypocritical about what you can and can't eat that is natural.

[thebiglebowski]

I try to follow it but some of it seems so hypocritical about what you can and can't eat that is natural.

 

90s was about red meat and fast food being the worst for you.

 

00s was an attack on sugar and carbs

 

Seems like so far the thing for 10s is that dairy is no good for you.

 

Do what you gotta do to hit your calorie goals and you have won 90% of the battle. Eating a cheeseburger when you are 25 does not cause a heart attack when you are 50, unless it stays on your gut for 25 years. Our bodies are resilient and adapt to what we give them, up to a certain point. It's just like the smoker who quits and 5 years later you can't tell a difference between a picture of their lungs and someone who never smoked. Focus on the big picture, not the minor details (like whether or not a caveman ate something 10k years ago).

[BBech]

I don't. I try not to follow it strictly but use some recipes and shit.  I basically try not to load up on carbs anymore because I used to put away a pound of pasta.  But I had a hamburger today didn't care.  Just trying to get some fat and get below 15% body fat on a tape test.

 

Plus I sort of hate paleo because its crossfags are into it.

[thebiglebowski]

Don't go crazy with the drugs and supplements but when used properly, they help you get over the hills:

 

http://ephedrinediet.org/ephedrine-caffeine-aspirin-the-ec-supplement-stack-vs-the-eca-stack/