Thoughts on wheat?
I was doing some reading for continuing education credits this week and came across some research stating that the wheat we eat today is contributing to the obesity epidemic, not good for us, etc. Maybe I'm behind the times (as this was from spring 2012), but this is the first I have really heard of the specifics regarding why wheat isn't good.
I know some folks on EN don't eat gluten and have mentioned it clearing up other health issues. I am embarrassed to say I never really gave it more than a cursory glance...partly because I can't imagine giving up my simple carbs (crackers mainly)!
I can't put my original source in here, but this is an article I found with the general gist (perhaps not quite as strictly scientific).
I'm curious if there are others out there who are gluten-free and thoughts in general. I haven't had a chance to do a lot of research, as there are always two sides to every story, it will be interesting to see if there are studies that didn't come to these same conclusions.
Comments
I gave up gluten this past August, right after IMNYC and our trip to Disney (I NEEDED a post-race funnel cake in the Magic Kingdom!). My reasons were completely unrelated to digestive health - I knew that wheat/gluten was inflammatory (but at the time I didn't know WHY), and I hoped that cutting it out of my diet would help me heal ongoing injuries and avoid future injury. I started by reading Robb Wolf's "The Paleo Solution." It's heavy in some places - very thorough when it comes to the science behind the exact compounds in wheat and the effects they have on your body hormonally - but he's also very entertaining. This book was enough to convince me to give going gluten-free a try (Paleo is another story - I would say I am "Paleo-lite." I haven't given up rice, beans, quinoa... ). I didn't find it nearly as difficult as I expected, but then again, I rarely ate bread, and pasta wasn't that big of a deal to for me to let go of, either. Pizza has been the most difficult for me to give up (but I do have the occasional pizza with a gluten free crust).
Within a few weeks I noticed that I was no longer having headaches (and I LIVED for Excedrin! I ALWAYS had a headache!) and I was sleeping better than I had since I could remember. I wasn't even expecting these results... Then Hurricane Sandy hit, and we left town for John's parents' house in Pittsburgh. The night we arrived, they ordered pizza, and I ate it. I figured, oh well... "emergency circumstances." The following day I had a KILLER headache. I continued to eat gluten for the next two months, and totally reverted back to how I had been before. Frequent headaches, terrible sleep, more aches and pains... just... blah. So I gave gluten up again as of the New Year, and John joined me. He read Wheat Belly, as a few EN'ers suggested, and I am about halfway through it right now. After that I plan to read Loren Cordain's "The Paleo Answer." The more I read, the more convinced I am that wheat, in its current genetically modified form, is horrible for us.
I also 100% agree with Rachel that it makes no sense to give up wheat and replace foods that you were eating with processed, "gluten-free" foods that will continue to elevate your blood sugar and wreak havoc on your body.
Definitely read more about it - that's really the best way to understand it and make an informed decision for yourself! I would love to summarize everything I've read that has convinced me to give it up, but I'd probably forget half of it and get the other half wrong! ;-)
I'm definitely interested to hear what others have to say!
Some people are allergic to wheat... Celiac disease.. The only way to find out is to be tested.
Some people are gluten intolerant or sensitive and the only way to find out is to cut gluten out of your diet... and see how you feel... Many report better... I have cut gluten out for a couple weeks and noticed absolutely no difference...
In General I think gluten free has gotten a little carried away lately and is somewhat faddish. Big Market for gluten free....For instance my local Portland Pie Pizza Company advertises gluten free cheese. Now I'm not sure but I dont think any cheese has gluten in it but what they really mean is it is dairy free or vegan cheese.
There are many gluten free alternatives and most would place them higher on the health nutrient scale anway like brown rice, sweet potatoes, quinoa, buckwheat , millet, amaranth....
Cant hurt to try it to see how you feel........... Tim,
Have been gluten free for over 5 years. Always had skin rashes, diarrhea, headaches, stomach aches etc.... Took gluten out and low and behold I feel much much better. No skin rashes, diarrhea, headaches, stomach aches or bloating. I agree with the two ladies - if I would not each a muffin then why would i eat a gluten free muffin. I also do not eat dairy and corn and have taken sugar out of my diet, except in the form of gatorade and gels during long training. NOTE: I had stomach issues my whole life and suffered from iron deficiency until I took gluten out.
I have also been doing alot of reading and it appears that meat can cause acidity in the body which can cause inflammation, so I have decided to take all meat except fish out of my diet in the hopes o combating it.
http://www.amazon.com/Wheat-Belly-Lose-Weight-Health/dp/1609611543/ref=sr_1_11?ie=UTF8&qid=1357953307&sr=8-11&keywords=wheat+belly
Now keep in mind, the guy who wrote this book is waaaaaaay far out on the wacky bell curve, and I read it with that particular lens. The main concepts are that wheat was the same 2,000 yrs ago as it was 1,000 yrs ago as it was 200 yrs ago as it was in the 1940's... but all of that wheat is extremely different than wheat is now after all of the genetic modification. The 4 ft tall "amber waves of grain" are no longer. Wheat now has ~10x the yield as it did 100 yrs ago by having bigger and more seeds than ever before and the fall off the chaff easier to make harvest quicker. These heavier seeds would bend and break the older taller chaff, so they modified that to be stronger and shorter so now almost all wheat if "dwarf" wheat. Unlike animals, this wheat added chromosomes every time it was modified so it basically has many multiples of the number of chromosomes that it used to have. Long story short, wheat looks nothing like what it used to on a genetic level. It actually shouldn't even still be called wheat. And since it was modified in such a short period of time, our bodies didn't have nearly enough centuries to also adapt. Many people's systems can't handle this form of wheat and this might be expressed in the increase in the number of people with extreme cases like celiac disease and many much softer symptoms like headaches, etc.
Since wheat is so much more abundant today, it is now used as a filler and binder in most processed foods, so going gluten free forces people to eat less processed stuff which most reasonable people would say is healthier. Even the delicious glaze that is on the Salmon at my local place I get lunch likely has wheat in it.
Another thing that the book claims is that wheat products cause massive spikes in blood sugar. This blood sugar spike induces an insulin response which leads our bodies to store this excess energy as fat and then causes us to crash again and feel very hungry about 3 hours later to start the roller coaster ride all over again. So this newly created high nutritional content and high yielding wheat may be great news for people starving in poor and impoverished countries, but it is making normal people who aren't starving, well, fat. He claims that the "heart healthy" diet is horrible for us and that all of these "healthy whole grains" are actually a big driver in the increased cases of obesity and diabetes.
Full disclosure, I also recently watched the documentary "Forks over Knives" and they think whole grains are fine and they blame all of this generations woes on the fact that we eat meat and dairy products, so who the hell knows... But they also agree that all of the highly processed foods are generally bad for us.
The reason I was willing to give the gluten free thing a serious try was that I saw a lot of parallels between wheat and "Recreational Sugar" after my couple yr personal experiment with that... see this thread if you want that long story: http://members.endurancenation.us/Training/TrainingForums/tabid/101/aft/10610/Default.aspx But basically most of us are "addicted" to wheat products. Also that gluten is an inflammatory agent. And that it causes spikes in blood sugar. So I mentally agreed with myself that I would give it 10 days first to see if I could solve the "logistics" problems of eating "gluten free". If that was a success then I would extend it to 30 days, because that's how long they say you need in the book to see the effects (2 weeks might not be enough). And to be honest, I was trying this mostly to lose a little weight because I don't have any of the gluten sensitivity symptoms, but if I got some unintended side benefits than great.
This post is getting long, but I'll share a short story. I went to my absolute favorite hamburger place for a lunch the other day (Ted's Montana Grill has the best burgers ever). So I went and instead of getting the delicious 2,500 works burger and fries I got a delicious 1,500 calorie loaded salad with grilled chicken (no croutons), bacon, cheese, tomatoes, avocado, etc, with olive oil and red wine vinegar for dressing. I was absolutely stuffed when I left and ate approximately 3x the calories I eat on a normal day. However, I likely only ate ~2/3 of the calories I would have eaten if I wasn't eating "gluten free".
They have a saying in the Wheat Belly book that if you are eating Gluten Free to lose weight then you should not eat anything "Gluten Free"... So basically don't eat some other form of highly processed "Gluten Free" food or some corn starch substituted pasta of bread that will cause the exact same blood glucose spike and Insulin response that the similar wheat based product causes. Instead, eat a big omelet for breakfast, snack on nuts and fruit all day, eat lots of vegetables and simple meats and also cheese, etc. When I pair that with cutting out "Recreational Sugar" sounds like a pretty simple equation for getting healthy and losing some weight... I can tell you that I have eaten all day every day for the last 10 days or so and have not been hungry at all for more than even a few minutes and I'm down almost 5 lbs.
Jury's still out for me, but I'll keep you all posted.
That said, there can be lots of reasons to eat less "wheat" which can be a stand-in for a carb-heavy diet, as well as standing in for gluten. John makes an excellent point about this.
I strongly believe that as far as strictly weight control goes, a calorie is a calorie, and it matters not a whit where it comes from. I know of no scientific evidence to contradict this, within the non-extreme limits. But that is ONLY strictly from a weight control standpoint. Eating certain diets can lead to poor nutrition, and others (such as sugar spike-heavy ones) can make it very difficult to control the amount you eat. If you want to explore that aspect of things, you will want to learn about the glycemic index, which is quite related to what John is talking about. (Higher glycemic index = faster digestion = bigger/faster insulin response) In terms of the glycemic index (meaning how the sugars are processed and how quickly), a slice of white bread, an equivalent number of table sugar calories, and a medium sized plain baked potatoes are very, very similar. The bread additionally has some gluten (protein), and the potato has a few vitamins. The bread may have some vitamins if made with vitamin enriched flour. But in reality, they just aren't that different.
Personally, I try to follow more of a Mediterranean style diet and I am a strict vegetarian; I'm trying to cut down on some of my carbs because they had gotten out of hand...but mostly from a portion perspective, not because I think there's any evidence that they are poisoning me. I also try to choose more carbs with a higher glycemic index than I once did.
@Rachel, Jess, Brenda- Great to hear you have all reaped the health benefits! I'm with you guys on cutting out the sugar too. If I can convince my SO to go along, I may trial it for a couple weeks and see how it goes to be healthier in general and see what comes of it.
@John- Thanks for your thoughts and experiences! I too have read Forks Over Knives and in a similar vein, realize that we each need to make our own food decisions. As I mentioned before, as a weight loss/eat fewer processed food effort, it may be a good experiment of my own. More than sugar, I definitely have a weakness for simple carbs.
@William- I agree, the science is stretched. Like I said, I couldn't post the lecture I was reviewing for work, but this article seemed to support some of the same general claims, minus any scientific validity. However, even among the science world, it's never a good idea to take someone else's interpretation of the info at face value. I work with the obese population daily and found some of the claims interesting. It is important to note that in the lecturer also pointed to the increase in fructose and unsaturated fats in our diet as big culprits of chronic diseases (nothing occurs in a vacuum). I will check out Wheat Belly and some of the sourced articles while giving a "less processed food" diet a trial and see what happens.
When I saw my mother at Thanksgiving we talked about some wheat sensitivities that are not uncommon in my family, and we talked about the benefits of a whole food diet (which is what I was raised on). She recommended that I cut out Gluten for a period to see what would happen. After a week or so of thought, I decided to do a little test, and gave up Gluten for two weeks. The results were wonderful. I easily dropped 7 lbs, and my gut didn't hurt anymore. My son actually noticed that I wasn't as cranky anymore.
I got the flu over Christmas week, and that is when I really decided that enough was enough! I went back to my "If I can't find it in nature, I won't eat it" way of eating, with one addition, the elimination of grains. So starting on New Year's Day I went cold turkey giving up grains, refined sugars and processed foods. I eat like a Queen, and don't feel deprived at all, and...I'm back down to 119 lbs with lower body fat. Hunger, tiredness, bloating, stomach pains, crankiness and depression are all gone.
This is what I knew, and rediscovered, works in my body. Everyone is individual, and not everything works for everyone. It really is amazing what some foods can do to some people.
Wow Antonia, love hearing about your success.
My thoughts have been influenced by a doctor who wrote a dietary book about the foods we eat today. I forget his specialty or the name of the book, probably because I eat wheat.
Anyway, he said we don't really get the benefit of wheat as those that package the products containing wheat suggests. When wheat is in anyway crushed/ mashed processed it is no longer ... wheat. Wheat bread for example has no benefit over white bread. A real wheat bread is thick and hardy.