Please note that I waited until AFTER the holiday feasting to talk about Gluten! If you have weight or health concerns, it’s not too late to make another New Year’s Resolution. My recommendation, and that of more and more doctors and other health professionals worldwide, would be to eliminate wheat from your diet. If you are really serious about getting healthy, add sugar to the list.
Have you noticed how many gluten-free products are showing up in your bakeries and grocery stores? Add that to your realization that with each generation Americans are getting heavier, less healthy and more prone to diabetes.
Since learning that I am gluten intolerant, I have beome increaingly interested in finding the cause. I was led to Dr. William Davis’s new best-selling book “Wheat Belly” and took it with me to the International Lymphology Congress in Sweden last September. I shared a room with Carol Johnson, OTR/L, the technical advisor and design consultant for JoViPak.. Neither Carol nor i could adjust to the time change so instead of sleeping, she sat up in bed and knitted a baby sweater while I read “Wheat Belly” out loud.
No one explains the gluten phenomenon better than Dr. Davis. He is a preventive cardioloigist who sees obesity daily in his practice and was determined to better understand weight gain, including the midline fat buildup, and its connection to heart disease, diabetes and the immunological and neurological disorders, i.e. celiac disease, rheumatoid arthritis and dementia. As medical director of an online heart disease prevention program, “Track Your Plaque,” he makes a very convincing argument for eliminating wheat products from our diet. He points out that bread is no longer the sturdy staple of our ancestors: today’s wheat has been genetically altered to provide processed-food manufacturers the greatest yield at the lowest cost . . . at the expense of our health. The back cover of his book is a real attention getter. It shows two pieces of whole wheat bread (which we have all been taught is healthy food) with the caption “eating two slices of whole wheat bread can increase blood sugar more than 2 tablespoons of pure sugar.” If you are one who follows the Glycemic Index (the comparative blood sugar effects of carbohydrates) you will find it interesting to note that white bread is 69, whole grain bread 71, yet a Snickers candy bar is only 41!
Everyone I know who has read the book and has chosen to eliminate wheat from their diet, including Carol and myself, are amazed at the changes they are experiencing; rapid weight loss, recovery from intestinal woes, reduction in overall cholesterol and LDL counts, cessation of skin conditions, i.e. psoriasis, oral ulcers and hair loss; even a reduction of inflammation and rheumatoid arthritis pain. I lost 8 pounds in the first three weeks and my muffin top disappeared! Needless to say, this is a New Year’s resolution I intend to stick with. Both Carol and I feel so much better and are grateful for Dr. Davis’s commitment to find the source of so many of our present-day health issues.
If you would like to listen to a Dr. William Davis pod cast, you can go to www.bengreenfieldfitness.com, Click on pod costs and search for Episode #176, The Shocking Truth About Wheat. (Note: You will have to wade through a lot of fitness information before you hear Dr. Davis, but it is worth the wait.) As a lymphedema therapist, I was particularly interested to hear that Dr. Davis noticed his patients had a significant reduction in lower extremity edema once they eliminated wheat from their diet. Do I need to say more?
To Your Good Health,
JoAnn



