Low-carb diets DO work and here's the reason why
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http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/a...reason-why.html |
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I'm glad there's finally someone saying that a LC diet is good - but the advice about fiber making a big difference really needs to die. No matter how much you try to make it sound like all those grains and legumes won't raise your blood sugar significantly, they're still 70-80% starch, which means that raising your blood sugar is exactly what they'll do. At least he says that the presence of fiber only "reduces the blood sugar spike". So instead of having white toast with a bowl of frosted flakes spiking your blood sugar up to 350, substituting whole wheat toast and a bowl of oatmeal might only spike it to 250. Not exactly a win, in my book. If you don't really have any kind of blood sugar issues - if you show zero signs of metabolic syndrome, then this advice is probably fine... for the time being. But if you're showing any signs of metabolic syndrome, or if following this advice eventually results in showing signs of metabolic syndrome, you're a lot better off skipping the grains, legumes, and minimizing even the low sugar berries. Quote:
We've discussed resistant starch before - Except in the cases of young, healthy people who show absolutely no signs of any kind of blood sugar problems or metabolic syndrome, this effect seems to be rather pointless, since it still creates a blood sugar spike, just not as high as the freshly cooked starch. It's in the same class as filtered cigarettes being "healthier" than unfiltered cigarettes. The jury is still out on whether or not there's really any benefit to feeding the good bacteria in the lower intestine, and whether or not we even need all that good bacteria if we're not overloading our digestive system with carbs. Cooking rice with coconut oil will also change how quickly the starch from the rice is absorbed, whether or not it's been made resistant by cooling and reheating. Too many variables involved in all this, and most of it is really only applicable to the young and 100% healthy, not to those who are already having problems. |
I'm trying to get my fiber from non-starchy vegetables.
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Here is what Dr. Richard K. Bernstein has to say about fiber:
http://www.diabetes-book.com/dietary-fiber/ Appendix A: What About Dietary Fiber? from Dr. Bernstein’s book “Diabetes Solution” © 2007 by Richard K. Bernstein, M.D. WHAT ABOUT DIETARY FIBER? “Fiber” is a general term that has come to refer to the undigestible portion of many vegetables and fruits. Some vegetable fibers, such as guar and pectin, are soluble in water. Another type of fiber, which some of us call roughage, is not water soluble. Both types appear to affect the movement of food through the gut (soluble fiber slows processing in the upper digestive tract, while insoluble fiber speeds digestion farther down). Certain insoluble fiber products, such as psyllium, have long been used as laxatives. Consumption of large amounts of dietary fiber is usually unpleasant, because both types can cause abdominal discomfort, diarrhea, and flatulence. Sources of insoluble fiber include most salad vegetables. Soluble fiber is found in many beans, such as garbanzos, and in certain fruits, such as apples. I first learned of attempts at using fiber as an adjunct to the treatment of diabetes about twenty-five years ago. At that time, Dr. David Jenkins, in England, reported that guar gum, when added to bread, could reduce the maximum postprandial blood sugar rise from an entire meal by 36 percent in diabetic subjects. This was interesting for several reasons. First of all, the discovery occurred at a time when few new approaches to controlling blood sugar were appearing in the medical literature. Second, I missed the high-carbohydrate foods I had given up, and hoped I might possibly reinstate some. I managed to track down a supplier of powdered guar gum, and placed a considerable amount into a folded slice of bread. I knew how much a slice of bread would affect my blood sugar, and so as an experiment, I used the same amount of guar gum that Dr. Jenkins had used, and then ate the concoction on an empty stomach. The chore was difficult, because once moistened by my saliva, the guar gum stuck to my palate and was difficult to swallow. I did not find any change in the subsequent blood sugar increase. Despite the unpleasantness of choking down powdered guar gum (which is often used in commercial products such as ice cream as a thickener), I repeated this experiment on two more occasions, with the same result. Subsequently, some investigators have announced results similar to those of Dr. Jenkins, yet other researchers have found no effect on postprandial blood sugar. In any event, a reduction of postprandial blood sugar increase by only 36 percent really isn’t adequate for our purpose, since we’re shooting for the same blood sugars as nondiabetics. This means virtually no rise after eating. *To complicate things somewhat, a 1998 report in the Journal of Clinical Endocrinology and Metabolism demonstrated that salt restriction in nonhypertensive type 2 diabetics reduced insulin sensitivity by 15 percent. A prior article in the American Journal of Hypertension found a similar effect in hypertensive individuals. Another study of rats, published in the journal Diabetes in 2001, found that this insulin resistance cannot be reversed by the insulin-sensitizing agent pioglitazone. Dr. Jenkins also discovered, however, that the chronic use of guar gum resulted in a reduction of serum cholesterol levels. This is probably related to the considerable recirculation of cholesterol through the gut. The liver secretes some cholesterol into bile, which is released into the upper intestine. This cholesterol is later absorbed lower in the intestines, and eventually reappears in the blood. Guar binds the cholesterol in the intestines, so that rather than being absorbed, it appears in the stool. In the light of these very interesting results, other researchers studied the effect of foods (usually beans) containing other soluble forms of fiber. When beans were substituted for faster-acting forms of carbohydrate, postprandial blood sugars in diabetics increased more slowly, and the peaks were even slightly reduced. Serum cholesterol levels were also reduced by about 15 percent. But subsequent studies, reported in 1990, have uncovered flaws in the original reports, casting serious doubt upon any direct effect of these foods upon serum lipids. In any event, postprandial blood sugars were never normalized by such diets. Many popular articles and books have appeared advocating “high- fiber” diets for everyone—not just diabetics. Somehow, “fiber” came to mean all fiber, not just soluble fiber, even though the only viable studies had utilized such products as guar gum and beans. In my experience, reduction of dietary carbohydrate is far more effective in preventing blood sugar increases after meals. The lower blood sugars, in turn, bring about improved lipid profiles. A recent food to join the high-fiber trend is oat bran. This has gotten a lot of play in the popular press. A patient of mine started substituting oat bran muffins for protein in her diet. Before she started, her HgbA1C (see Chapter 2) was within the normal range and her ratio of total cholesterol to HDL was very low (meaning her cardiac risk ratio was low). After three months on oat bran, her HgbA1C became elevated and her cholesterol-to-HDL ratio nearly doubled. I tried one of her tiny oat bran muffins after first injecting 3 units of fast-acting insulin (as much as I use for an entire meal). After 3 hours, my blood sugar went up by about l00 mg/dl, to 190 mg/dl. This illustrates the adverse effect that most oat bran preparations can have upon blood sugar. This is because most such preparations contain flour. On the other hand, I find that certain bran products, such as the bran crackers listed in Chapter 10, raise blood sugar very little. Unlike most packaged bran products, they contain mostly bran and little flour. They therefore have very little digestible carbohydrate. You can perform similar experiments yourself. Just use your blood glucose meter. Beware of commercial “high-fiber” products that promise cholesterol reduction. If they contain carbohydrate, they must at least be counted in your meal plan and will probably render little or no improvement in your lipid profile. Fiber, like carbohydrate, is not essential for a healthy life. Just look at the Eskimos and other hunting populations that survive almost exclusively on protein and fat, and don’t develop cardiac or circulatory diseases.* |
My take on fiber is pretty simple. Eat my whole vegetables and I will get my fiber.
While eskimos dont have a fiber rich diet, they did eat the stomach material of the carabou/reindeer. I wonder if they got stomache aches or did they eat this frequently enough to not get stomach aches?? I know when eating bread gave me stomach aches, I stopped eating bread. THis makes me think they would stop eating the lichen obtained from the reindeer.......unlesss....... the lichen was already pre digested by the reindeer. ...... I am not Inuit by heritage but Northern Erupoean/ Mediteanean....a long history of eating off the land and the seas. I also wonder if the inuits only lived in the far north or did they migrate to follow the herds....... did they come down in to Canada and Alaska which are snow free for a few months of the year..... Also what was there flora made of???? In ANimal Science we know that the GI adapts to new foods slowly.... so any food can work, if introduced slowly. The population of microbes will adapt to their new foods, and the % of each type will change based on their food. If the Inuit ONLY eat meat, then the microbes they have are adapted to a meat diet. In South AMerica a newly discovered primative group have been studied-- they have 32 types of microbes. Many that do not exist in NA--thought to be gone due to diet and antibiotics and steriled foods. |
I think the lichen does get pre-digested by reindeer & caribou. I've read several diaries & accounts of John Franklin's first disastrous expedition (overland to the Mackenzie delta in ~1825). The Brits who ate the stomach contents were healthier as they got Vit C, others thought it too gross and avoided it. On the return trip south, they ran out of food and all the caribou had migrated away, so they were making soup out of boot leather and one was scraping lichen off rocks. He had done OK on caribou-digested lichen, but eating it straight made him vomit for several days and die.
Inuits in Canada mainly live(d) in the far north traveling by water or dog sled and eat seals & sea birds and use seal blubber to cook with - just lay it on the ice and light it. They sometimes came farther south in winter and interacted with First Nations people following caribou herds northward. FNs tended to stick to vegetated areas as they were used to cooking with wood and eating land animals and fish. |
Lichen is poisonous raw?
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The progress could also be as simple as Something contaminated the lichen, or it didnt agree with him and for either reason he started vomiting. Severe vomitting upsets the minerals in the body. Given the state of the health of the men at this point in their journey....not that difficult to tip the scales a bit more until the body crashes. |
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Go for crickets and grass hoppers--- no spiders. ONly 4 legged insects. We are not ruminants--Im betting lichen is very lignin filled. Dont have time rightnow to check.WIll try later tonight..... |
There aren't any crickets or grasshoppers when the daytime high is -10 degrees.
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I once heard about the idea that fiber was first pushed as good-for-you by industry since bran was primarily waste at that time, and lots of it too. What better way to solve that problem but to make people eat it. I mean, we already eat bread, it's a small leap to eat bran too. On this forum we're quite aware that bread ain't actually food for us, it makes us sick and fat. So, it's only a small leap to be aware of bran in the same way too, even though it may not make us sick or fat, it certainly ain't food either.
Maybe that idea about fiber/industry/waste ain't true, but let's see where it goes anyways. Next, we get another idea tacked on that says fiber slows down digestion, BG spike is lower, good-for-you again. Then, we get another idea tacked on, says fiber fills you up, eat less, won't grow fat, good-for-you yet again. Somewhere in there, another idea pops up, whole wheat, whole grain, good-for-you again. Maybe it's all bogus, but at least it pushed out the first idea about fiber/industry/waste in a sort of fake-genuine kinda thing. Oh no, that first idea ain't true, it's this new idea that's true. See? It's just more scientific-y and more truth-y and more wholesome-y and more good-for-you-y. Maybe. Next, we get this brand new idea about a different kind of fiber - resistant starch. Gut bugs, gut health, good bacteria, butyrate, colon cancer, metabolic effects, etc. Good-for-you yet again. That's a whole lotta scientific-y stuff right there, Bob, it must be true or at least true-ish. But now there's a problem. We're all discussing fiber and resistant starch and all that jazz as if we fully accepted at face value the premise of good-for-you, or at least the premise of scientific-y-ness. Even I, arguably the most cynical of us on this forum, sometimes catch myself arguing the pros and cons of fiber and resistant starch. I mean, come on, do we have to call up Gary and ask him to write a book on fiber too? He's done a great job with carbs and fat. It just occurs to me that's not a bad idea, not bad at all. I'm guessing there's not enough material on fiber to do a whole book. But an article for the NYT, you bet. Ima suggest that to him. Not that we're friends or anything, anybody can talk to the guy, he's quite open to that kind of thing. OK, so what was my point again? Ah, yes, fiber and resistant starch is most probably by all measures 100% pure unadulterated genuine BS. I've debunked it at length in other threads already, with for example the butyrate thing where oxygen is required to metabolize it, and oxygen is supplied by the blood, and BHB (which is basically butyrate) is produced by the liver and sent down the bloodstream right along with the oxygen from the lungs, all of which reach all the cells in the colon just fine, so any claimed benefit from resistant starch in that regard is literally of exactly zero value to anybody at any time from now to the end of universe, ever. Ever. Or for example the fiber thing where bran specifically doesn't give us any kind of nutrition whatsoever (therefore ain't food), and instead has the ability to take out certain minerals like calcium by binding to phytic acid contained in the bran, thereby making any claim about its benefit entirely false, to the end of the universe and yada yada. But that's just my take on it. |
Martin, I think you put that very well. I really enjoyed reading your post. :)
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This is perfect! While he's at it, he can also start working on debunking the resistant starch nonsense. Or maybe that'll require some more poorly conducted research by the "scientific" community first, so he has plenty of ammunition against it. But definitely another whacko trend for him to go after. |
Martin, as a fellow cynic, I get the feeling that this fiber obsession is merely a leftover from the "healthy whole grains" mantra when someone said, "Oh, you get healthy fiber too!" It then became a trend and it's been with us ever since. Eating very little fiber has done nothing to my regularity (I know, TMI), and, as far as I can tell, my health.
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