Pain, Pain, Go Away!

Something has happened to me that, judging by comments on certain blogs, isn't supposed to happen to those of us who follow a low carb, high fat, high nutrient diet. I got sick--so sick that I've missed three days of work in two weeks and finally saw a nurse today. Diagnosis: sinus infection. This doesn't mean I don't think my dietary changes haven't helped. I've had many sinus infections in my life and this one doesn't feel nearly as bad as the others: I don't feel congested and I'm not in pain, I've just been tired and coughing for a week and a half. I feel like I have a stubborn cold. Previous sinus infections left me feeling tired for months; I'll follow up on how this one goes. I credit the lack of congestion to dropping wheat . Just a few weeks ago on Dr. Davis's Heart Scan Blog, I remarked that I'd had no seasonal allergies this year . (A few others echoed the comment.) And as the nurse talked to me, I wondered how many mid...

Do you like come-from-behind-to-snatch-victory movies? Do you like road trip movies? Buddy movies? Documentaries? If you do, you may like Fat, Sick and Nearly Dead, a movie in which financial entrepreneur Joe Cross seeks to lose weight and cure a rare skin disease through a two-month juice fast. Do you enjoy testing your critical thinking and debunking pseudo-science? If you do, this movie will give you plenty to chew on. My criticism isn't of Joe Cross or his friend Phil Staples--I admire their strength of will and Cross's compassion for Staples, who was just an acquaintance when he called Cross for help from halfway around the world. Nor am I critical of their break with nutritional orthodoxy or the short-term results they achieved: they both lost 90 pounds or more, their hives disappeared, their energy increased, and their blood pressure and cholesterol improved. They either reduced or quit medications (including prescription prednisone for their hives--that's the ...

Dr. Richard Feinman remarks in a recent post that saturated fat is now called "solid fat (the USDA thinks that 'saturated' is too big a word for the average American) and the American Heart Association and other health agencies are still down on solid fat." I guess that means I can safely eat coconut oil this time of year, since it's sitting in an 80-degree house and has taken on a liquid state. If I need to put away any leftovers fried in coconut oil, I'll be sure to reheat them first.

Low-carb and paleo/primal diets have a reputation for being expensive: meat and cheese (especially if you buy pastured, grass-fed animal products) are more expensive than bread, beans and potatoes. But as I posted last year, it doesn't always work out that way in real life. (Last year, I calculated that because of my low-carb diet, I was spending a few dollars more on groceries, but cut my medical spending to zero . I haven't recalculated my food bill this year, but I've spent nothing on doctors or prescriptions in eighteen months. And I'm still using minimal skin care products--yet my skin looks and feels the best it ever has.) If your diet is causing health problems such as acid reflux, tooth decay, diabetes or hypoglycemia, stomach upset, low mood (in some cases), or weight gain, you have to consider doctor visits, dentist visits, counseling, bigger clothes, medicines and time lost from work as part of the cost of your diet. Do some figuring, and you might find tha...

"...you're allowed green salad with your lunch and dinner. Yes, even though this first week of the diet is called a carbohydrate-free diet and lettuce contains a tiny bit of carbohydrate....Given the amount of carbohydrate in these two salads, what happens in the body is approximately the same in 99 percent of dieters as if no salad had been eaten. So why not eat those salads? They are a lifesaver. To eat just protein and fat without the garden-fresh crispness that salad provides is a drudgery. So I thank the Lord that greens contain so little carbohydrate. Those salads make all the difference between a diet that's aesthetic, appetizing, human, and one that's an uncivilized drag." --Dr. Robert Atkins(1) Dr. Atkins also said, "A patient christened the [Atkins Diet] the steak and salad diet--and that does rather sum up the plot of it."(2) So much for low carb diets in general and Atkins in particular being all-meat diets. Most people I see commenting onlin...

Yesterday as I put my lunch in the refrigerator at work, I noticed a bunch of unfamiliar people in the break room. One of them, Pepe, started in: they were there for the health fair, they would check your cholesterol, the sugar in your blood, your height, your weight, and it would just take six minutes. A coworker asked him if he'd ever considered a career in sales. Just for blog fodder, I participated. They really were fast, and one even found me at my desk (in an office nearly half the size of a city block) after the tests were finished. My HDL cholesterol was 65--up from 42 from a year and a half ago, and up from 57, where it was last year when I'd been three months a low-carb diet . A level over 60 is considered good. I haven't taken any medication to make this happen. I went on a low-carb diet and eliminated wheat. I also take vitamin and mineral supplements in addition to a high-nutrient diet. What impressed me more, though, was that the nurse (and Cigna) said that bl...

"Just because plants can't scream and run doesn't mean they want to be eaten. And just because they don't have teeth or claws doesn't mean they aren't fighting back." -Lierre Kieth, The Vegetarian Myth, p. 148. Ms. Keith is referring to chemicals in grains that can wreak havoc on human intestines. But the phrase came to mind today when I passed too close and too fast to Ilse Krohn Superior, the rose shown, and then dug out a thorn embedded in my leg. (Yes, roses are food--deer browse them, and wild roses set hips, or fruit.) Ilse Krohn Superior: 1, Lori, 0.