Download a transcript of this episode
Topics
1. [3:35] Atkins Causing Diabetes
2. [13:11] Mitochondrial Disease
3. [16:57] Marijuana
4. [26:07] Gaining Back Weight
5. [35:26] High-Fructose Corn Syrup
6. [43:58] Dysphagia
7. [47:46] Long Term Risk of High-Dose Fish Oil
8. [52:04] Antiphospholipid Antibody Syndrome
Questions
1. Atkins Causing Diabetes
Jay Says: Hey Robb, I was talking to a friend the other day and she mentioned that after 15 years on Atkins her aunt developed type 2 diabetes and she and the doctors blamed it on Atkins. I pressed her for more info but that was all she knew. This seems weird to me given that a lot of people reverse type 2 diabetes on low carb diets. Can you speculate, given the limited info I could provide, on how one could get diabetes from a low carb approach? If it’s not actually possible can you speculate on why someone would attribute Atkins to diabetes?
2. Mitochondrial Disease
Steven Says: Robb, Love the show. Tried to get some questions answered before but no luck. I guess they were touched on too many times or just not interesting enough so I thought I would ask something else. A colleague’s wife has Mitochondrial Disease (Cytochrome c oxidase deficiency or Complex 4) which affects everyday movement. On top of that it affects what she eats and high fat meat is almost impossible to digest. Is there any study, research, or data that shows positive effects of the Paleo diet on mitochondrial disease?
3. Marijuana
What are effects of smoking or ingesting marijuana?
please and thank you!
I am a snowflake
—
Just had a quick question about THC. Are there significant negative long term effects of smoking? I use a vaporizer so I know I eliminate the negative effects of tar. From doing a basic google search I see a wide variety of opinions, although there seems to be some credible evidence that marijuana has negative affects on memory and brain function. I am mostly paleo just havent eliminated the dairy yet. (Still trying to get 70’s buff) As far as other goals I would like to live to be 120 🙂 How will the use of a vaporizer over the years affect this goal? Should I quit? I am secretly hoping you will tell me that as long as I am using a vaporizer I will be fine. Hope you get to this question thank you for every thing you do you have changed/saved my life!
4. Gaining Back Weight
Liam Says: Hi Robb, first of all can I say I’m fairly new to your podcast but have been spending 6 hours a day listening to episodes (I’m a truck driver) and have been loving the acquisition of knowledge and the all round comic banter. My question; I am a former up and coming elite level shotputter who has leaned down to around 195lbs (from 275lbs) at my lightest. Currently going through the whole triathlon/running fad and actually enjoying it. I am toying with the idea of making a comeback to the shotputting and would like to know your thoughts/advice on how I would go about bulking and regaining some of the lost muscle mass whilst utilising paleo. I have heard you speak alot about the direction of goals (ie, bulking vs leaning) and I’m well aware that to bulk and maximise gains there will be a degree of fat gain with this. I’m hoping paleo will help me maximise these gains whilst minimising fat gain as compared to the old carbs, carbs and more carbs bulking. Any thoughts/tips?
5. High-Fructose Corn Syrup
Dave Says: Hi Robb, Just a quick question today. I loved your recent take down of Brian Dunning’s ‘Gluten is fine’ podcast; I have found a few of his podcasts to be pretty lean on decent research. He has also done one on HFCS where surprise surprise, he basically says they ain’t so bad and are certainly no worse than other naturally occurring sugars.
Everything I have read says the exact opposite; care to quickly comment on this?
Thanks!
6. Dysphagia
Crystal Says: Thanks for the podcast and all of the great information. I just finished a 6-week Paleo Challenge at my gym, and I busted past a plateau I had hit several times over the past few years. I lost four inches in my waist (with seemingly no effort) and gained almost 50 pounds in my back squat. It’s almost like this stuff works.
Now that I’m done bragging about my own results, I’ll ask my question. My mom is having problems with Dysphagia (difficulty swallowing). Her doctors have been of little help. I know little about the condition but was wondering if this is one of the many things that can be helped by eliminating grains from the diet. My mom is 60 years old, and this problem has gotten worse over the past few years. She often ends up relying heavily on liquid food, as anything that requires a lot of chewing is very difficult for her to get down. Would a Paleo diet help with this issue? Can you recommend any research on this topic?
7. Long Term Risk of High-Dose Fish Oil
Eric Says: Robb, I’ve been using your fish oil dosage recommendations from the fish-oil calculator, and listened to Dr. Barry Sears’ video on omega3, but find these doses pretty high in light of some long term studies. The short term studies show a lot of benefits, but long-term use seems to point to some risks: what do you think of some of these studies?
I’ve been eating a couple raw brazil nuts along with my fish oil to try and add in some selenium in the mix.
Are Chris Kresser and Chris Masterjohn off base here?
http://thehealthyskeptic.org/when-it-comes-to-fish-oil-more-is-not-better
http://thehealthyskeptic.org/the-fish-vs-fish-oil-smackdown
http://www.westonaprice.org/know-your-fats/2021-precious-yet-perilous.html
8. Antiphospholipid Antibody Syndrome
Nathan Says: Hi Robb. I recently read your book (loved it and so did my wife) and I have been following the paleo lifestyle for almost a year now but was sort of 80/20 about it. I recently stepped it up to the strict 30 day challenge and have had great results. Enough about me…My question is for a good buddy of mine who I’m trying to convince to give paleo a shot who has a blood disease called Antiphospholipid Antibody Syndrome. He is 38 now and had his spleen removed in 2002 as a result of his white blood cells thinking his red blood cells were foreign (due to the antibody). Prior to that, a third of his colon was removed due to a blood clot on the bowel. Consequently, he is on blood thinners (Coumadin) which blocks vitamin K, so if he eats too many greens with vitamin K, he is more prone to clot. He also has trouble absorbing iron (they are not sure why so he takes a supplement ). I have already told him to remove grains, legumes, etc.. from his diet but my question is do you have any insight on what he could take for his iron and vitamin K issues? My concern is if he’s not going to be able to eat enough vegetables following the paleo way of eating. I think he’s just taking some run-of-the-mill multi-vitamin.
I just did a quick search on the internet for Vegan diet curing diabetes after I heard the question about Atkins causing diabetes. The paragraph below is the highlight from the first article that came up on Google. This guy Dr. Barnard apparently has written books on the topic.
“Blood-sugar levels are controlled by “locks” in muscle cells that are turned by insulin, the hormonal “key” that allows blood sugar into those cells. Diabetes develops when the locks are clogged with fat and the key can’t work–a condition called insulin resistance. If you can lower dietary fat, unclog the locks, and reverse insulin resistance, you can reverse diabetes.”
Neal Barnard, MD, is an adjunct associate professor of medicine at George Washington University School of Medicine and author of several books, including Dr. Neal Barnard’s Program for Reversing Diabetes (Rodale, 2007), which presents a low-fat, vegan diet as a unique and groundbreaking solution to the problem of diabetes.
Read more: http://www.care2.com/greenliving/can-a-vegan-diet-cure-diabetes.html#ixzz1IehE8nAF
By the way I posted this to put a light on how easy it is to be told the complete opposite approach to nutrition. This guy is phd and for most people that is enough to make him believable.
It seems like family and friends think that I am a crazy person because of the way that I eat. Even though I’m healthier than I have ever been after eating like this(lost 40lbs and ever single indicator in my bloodwork has headed in the right direction in the last year) They say things to me about getting colon cancer and that I am missing out on tons of nutrients because I’m not eating a rounded diet by cutting out “healthy whole grains”, beans, and fruit most of the time. Oh well I hopefully if I keep doing my thing and they keep doing theirs they will come back and ask some more questions about what it is I’m doing again.
Sonic: These “clogs” are called beta oxidation. It is how we burn fats for fuel. You can’t burn carbs if you’re burning fats but that is completely besides the point since if your liver is working it will go in there. Diabetes develops when the liver becomes insulin-resistant.
PhD! Okay then, heh.
Anyway we could get an edited version of the podcast that cuts out the cursing? I live smack dab in the Bible belt. I have a hard time recommending the podcast to those that aren’t fans of swearing. A lot of ladies I work with just will turn it off. I don’t care about the cursing but there are lots of people around me that will use it as a barrier to entry for the great content in the podcast. It is hard enough to get them past the Evolutionary Biology and then on top of that the cursing. It is about impossible to recommend it to some I know. Broader audience now I suppose.
I know, they should just deal with it. Need to put the reasoned big boy pants on. But I believe it doesn’t hurt to ask.
A solution I had to do is rebrand it in my sphere of influence. It has turned out making me learn a ton about the science behind it. I try not to call it Paleo with everyone and focus on the science the community has taught me. Depending on the person I can filter what information to give them but get to the same conclusion. I know that it cuts out the Evolutionary Biology to do that but I care about my friends health. I still point people here but I just can’t do it in all cases or without throwing in warnings of language. But I really would like to recommend the podcast to folks.
So if possible, could we get an edited version?
Whether I call it Paleo or not when I speak to people I know, this stuff has changed my life. Even if we do not get an edited version, I will continue to look forward to my Tuesday morning podcast download. Thanks for all you do.
Clive-
Most shows are pretty mellow, some require some zing. I just don’t know what to tell you on the evolution thing…we need to censure the information that will save these people’s lives? Occasionally, the world feels like a no win kinda place!
Man, I didn’t want to be that guy. Totally understand passion leading to the zings. I totally wasn’t asking to censure the evolution thing. Just trying to give context to where I am in this world. (bible belt) Only curious about he cursing thing. Wasn’t asking to censure the evolution. I totally know you can’t please everyone, just asking about getting an edited version of the podcasts to share with folks around me who will totally flip it off when they hear it. I have listened to every single podcast and am just eager about sharing with those around me. But knowing they have a world view that doesn’t jive with some stuff, thought I would ask. #thatguy. This stuff will help them but I guess if they can’t look past some things then I can’t help that. It is what it is.
Appreciate you writing me back.
And I am not censuring the Evolution stuff because I don’t agree with it. It is just not on the top priority of things I speak about with folks who I am around. Their world view will totally shut it off when I say that. Again, just giving context. They see the results in my life and it peaks their curiosity. I don’t want to be a parent to them and protect them from everything.
Anyways, just something I am working on. Work in progress. Thanks again.
You bet!
Jimmy Moore had a nice blog post on the whole Paleo/religion topic, might be worth a read. Btw-you are not “that guy” I just want things to be “easy”.
Clive-ve
No worries, you are NOT “that guy”. I’ve just had some trying timess behind the scenes and some days I think doing computer programming would be preferable to trying to help people, build a business where people can have a JOB and silly stuff like that.
Religion is just a touchy subject for me on the best of days anyway…not good stuff from childhood and I can get cranky.
Just asking from a former English/Philosophy/Religions major perspective – what does swearing have to do with God? I know a lot of people who take offense to use these dictionary words and depending on the audience should the speaker then change his tone. If Robb was addressing a Harvard board he would probably sound well educated and versed though I wouldnt put it past him to drop verbal judo strikes by using a certain type of language or screaming “Stay out of the F**King SUN!!” when he gets to insulin.
But getting back to the point – language and God dont have much in common. Remember God, through his intent, changed the language of man so we would never agree or communicate correctly or effectively. The language originally spoken by those who are “closest to god” wouldnt even be anything like english. Think more Arabic or other dead languages. Just saying because I get this a lot because I too talk like a sailor.
While you’re right about this, that doesn’t matter in the eyes of many staunch Christians, especially down here in the Bible Belt (where I also live). Some of them won’t get past it and will simply turn it off. Just the same as if you were an atheist, you probably would turn off a podcast by a southern Baptist minister if he started in on Creationism or something, even if the overall theme of the podcast was something you were interested in. If you haven’t already bought off on the Paleo idea, it can be a tough sell when you get into the evolutionary biology aspect of it. Throw in some cursing and that’s enough for plenty of hardcore Christians (I’m thinking specifically the older crowd), to completely dismiss the idea. I know from experience. I spent 5 minutes explaining some Paleo ideas to a friend once only to hear him say “you know they’ve never actually found a caveman, right?”
So I totally get where Clive’s coming from, but personally I like that there’s some swearing in Robb’s podcasts. It shows passion and it adds some personality and edge to what could otherwise be some dry information at times. Clive, I suggest getting some good audio editing software and give them your own censored versions (I suggest Audacity – it’s free).
Hey snowflake guy here,
Thank you for touching on marijuana, I was also really interested in smoking’s affect on sleep. If i am feeling a bit stressed from the day, in the evenings bedsides some PS, and natty calm, i will smoke to relax and help fall asleep. I have read it can significantly diminish your time spent in REM sleep, and thus rep havoc on recovery.
Any opinion?
thanks!
Yea, no bueno for deep, restful sleep.
Hi Zach,
To answer your question (from personal experience), I find that marijuana can help with sleep – I sleep deep and never have a hard time going to sleep for 8 hours or more after I’ve smoked, and I feel rested when I wake up (except I guess if I’ve done a crapload of JiuJitsu in the last week and my body is wrecked, LOL)! I live in California and have a medical marijuana prescription, and typically use home grown marijuana daily (only the finest via a volcano vaporizer to minimize lung damage & maximize lung capacity). Especially if I have stomach pains, nausea, sore muscles, or any other sort of ailments – I will just use THC to take care of everything – it’s nature’s medicine as far as I’m concerned [I don’t take any over the counter or pharmaceutical junk, not even aspirin]. I find MJ pairs well with a Paleo lifestyle, assuming you minimize the damage by eating oils/butters and using a vaporizer as often as possible instead of smoking combustible carcinogens.
However, everybody is wired differently and what might work for me might not work the same for you – the only way you will really know is by listening to your own body.
I do find that alcohol on the other hand does not agree with me as well and can disrupt my sleep much worse.
Thanks,
Jason
Very hard to hear Greg on this podcast.
Really? hmm.
Yes, your audio levels are back down. Full volume on Iphone with buds and I could barely hear Greg and you were way low. With Podcasts from other sources I run the volume 50% to 75%.
Actually, I’ve found that your podcasts are significantly lower volume than most. When listening with my earbuds, I have to crank the volume to 100%, and even then sometimes I struggle to hear all the details.
Please consider setting your levels higher in general. I know there are tools to re-normalize to a set volume. I’m happy to help you do research if you don’t have a dedicated audio guy.
Thanks!
My thoughts on this sweet podcast:
1. It is quite possible to develop diabetes on a low carb diet if it is a low carb diet done poorly. What the Atkins crowd has historically failed to do is address the nuances of nutrition and simply fell back on the “it’s all good if it’s low carb” approach. They could have gotten lots of omega 6, could have ran into a serious calcium excess/magnesium deficiency, could have screwed up their flora, could have developed leaky gut and endotoxemia from Atkins shakes and stress. There are plenty of explanations and I don’t see it so far-fetched that some people just go on a low carb diet but turn their brains off.
Can you get diabetes on Atkins? Yes. Will you get diabetes doing everything Dr. Eades tells you to? Hell no.
Also I agree with the notion that it might be from a glucose tolerance test.
Still, don’t tell me that conventional bacon, eggs and peanut butter every day with little or not fish and little or poor quality oxidized fish oil + cellular magnesium deficiency can’t cause diabetes. There is paleo and then there is faileo. There is atkins and shatkins. You get it.
2. Kitavan style exactly! I tried that style of eating once. Meh, needs more animal fat and cow brains. But you gotta do what you gotta do.
3. Drugs are chronic toxins and if you only consume them infrequently you will be fine. Just don’t try to make it your life. It’s like switching around your vegetables. Monday: Weed. Tuesday: Acid. Wednesday: Mushrooms. Thursday 2cb. Friday: DMT. Saturday: Get crunked. Sunday: pray to Jesus (opiate of the masses!). It’s fool-proof.
4. How much
5. We need to push the idea that if someone is blatantly wrong and admits that they are wrong, then it is far more laudable than if they just stick their fingers in their ears and go “lalala”. At the same time we need people to challenge everything and hold out into we are past the point of reasonable doubt, but since these things are potentially dangerous if they do turn out to be unhealthy we need these people to make their posts and discourse public and give equal weight to the opposing arguments. Some lunatic is going to be in his little corner of the web praising corn oil and some poor unknowing person is going to believe them. That’s why we need to make the counter-arguments public.
7. I eat salmon every day for 3g of omega 3. Done and done! I like the new Robb Wolf fish oil calculator. Omega 6 has plenty more wrong with it than just messing with the tissue HUFA and causing inflammation/ oxidative stress. It is a carcinogen and messes with thyroid signaling. So we really do want to keep it on the lower end no matter what.
8. A couple of podcasts ago you guys mentioned colustrum. I have found that I can get away with a lot more if I use a sort of colustrum/gelatin approach. Of course we don’t want to be damaging ourselves in the first place but from my observations it really helps.
This might be the answer to diabetes on Atkins. Peter at Hyperlipid ran a post a while back about low-carb/high trans-fat fed rats that developed diabetes.
http://high-fat-nutrition.blogspot.com/2011/02/144-solution.html
If the aunt in question ate several of those trans-fat laden Atkins bars a day it might explain where her problem originated.
While I agree that the Atkins bars have many flaws, being “trans-fat laden” is not one of them.
Exactly.
Really?? I’ve never acutally picked one up to look at the nutrition info. I’m going by Poliquin’s statement that all of those bars contain gobs o’ trans fats.
Gob…is that in nanograms or picograms?
Greg and Robb- great podcast! Especially the bit around the 35 minute mark where Robb goes Honey-Badger on High Fructose Corn Syrup and then challenges Mr. Dunning to a sabre-duel at dawn.
As a follow-up to the first question about the Atkins diet:
My grandad moved to a new town after he retired and, 15 years later, he passed away. Was his death caused by moving house?
Greg – “whilst” is pronounced “why-lst”/”wh-aisle-st”. Barbarian.
Robb and Greg- Liam may well be from the UK, Australia or New Zealand but if he if “definitely from a British colony” he could also be Canadian. Or American (I believe there was some form of War of Independence around the 1770s. I recall there is a fair bit of paperwork resulting from it.)
Tane-
when are YOU coming on the show?
Right after you run a PSS in London.
Robb and Greg,
This was a great podcast, as usual. With regards to the first question, pertaining to how the Atkins diet SUPPOSEDLY gave this woman’s aunt diabetes, I have to say that I find such a claim as dubious as you guys do. Carbohydrate restricted diets are nutritionally antithetical to producing the metabolic environment to where diabetes could arise. It would seem that this lady’s aunt was never really on the Atkins diet, or any other low carb variant for very long, or that her doctor is part of the Dean Ornish and Neal Barnard crowd – a group of people that will blatantly distort the evidence in order to promulgate a vegan agenda.
The notion that a diet low in animal fat (i.e. a vegetarian or vegan diet) is a better dietary strategy to prevent diabetes is just nonsensical. All you have to do is look at the country of India to dispel this vegetarian myth. India has the largest percentage of vegetarians in the world, mainly because Hinduism, the predominate religion in the country, when practiced strictly, mandates vegetarianism. Even the non-Hindu portions of the population, such as the Christians and Muslims, only relegate meat to a side dish – never using it as a main entree, as done in the west. Hence, you have a large test population in India to see if there is any truth to the claim that vegetarianism leads to lower rates of diabetes. So what is the verdict? Quite simply, Indians, as a population, have a greater propensity for diabetes than those in the west, and diabetes is more prevalent in India, and rising at an alarming rate.
Ostensibly, part of this results from the fact that since people in India eat little to no meat, they must get most of their caloric intake from carbohydrates – mainly in the source of rice, and secondly from some bread such as roti or chapatti. I know the deleterious effects of such a diet that is restrictive on meat and excessive in carbohydrates; because I am an Indian myself, and have seen the ravages of diabetes affect my own family and my own community. Nearly 1 in 4 Indian adults I know, over the age of 45, has some blood sugar problems, indicating they are border line diabetic, or are a fully blown diabetic.
It is just criminally negligent to keep peddling the lie that a carbohydrate rich vegetarian diet is what will ameliorate the diabetes epidemic. Nothing could be further from the truth. Thank you, Robb and Greg, for combating this vegetarian propaganda.
-Lawrence
All jokes aside, the marijuana question actually brings up an interesting topic. I think it’s pretty feasible that Paleolithic man would’ve participated in recreational smoking. Of course, any form of smoking is bad for you, and this would bring up the topic of “not making a historical reenactment.” But considering the brutality of their lives, it’s not too crazy to say that they would’ve enjoyed the occasional joint. Then again, I’m no Anthropologist, so I could just be blowing smoke out of my ass. (No pun intended.)
Yea…lots of room for hypothesis on this I guess!
Wait… are you SURE you’re not an Anthropologist?
Is it just me, or was the volume pretty low on this one? :o/
Nope. It has long been a problem and this podcast was particularly low.
Yes, I also found the volume way too low on this one. I could barely hear Greg on some of the questions.
I was on the road, we will keep tinkering.
Hey Robb-
As per my earlier comment, I did some research. Dan Benjamin of 5by5 networks runs Levelator on all his podcasts. It’s free, and as long as you record to uncompressed audio (AIFF/WAV), it should be a no-brainer (drag-and-drop) to use. All the level detection is automatic. Runs on Windows and Mac.
http://www.conversationsnetwork.org/levelator
Yes, it adds one step to your podcasting process, but it should even out any differences between your home setup and recording on the road.
I found your statements about nutritional needs changing with age quite fascinating. Is there a typical cause of such changes in the body?
What specifically are you talking about?
I think Jeremy means from your anecdote on VLC Paleo working great for you 10 years ago, but then didn’t quite work the same anymore. I think Robb meant there’s some individuality to this, and age MIGHT be a factor.
Hi Robb/Greg,
I plan on ticking the full marathon off the bucket list this year. what is your take on following the crossfit endurance protocol to train for this? If not that, any other training suggestions you could point me too? would like to complete this without cannibalizing all muscle tissue
Um…DRIVE the marathon? I like CFE, I like Power Running (lift, sprint, run long). Sorry man, that’s all the excitement I can muster for the marathon, it’s like considering golf or NASCAR for me.
hahahah!!! yeah… should be interesting 😀
Robb,
Why do you recommend Power Snatch/Clean as opposed to the full Oly movements for BJJ type supplement training? I know you’ve mentioned the power movements a few times for supplemental training.
Thanks
The full variiants irritate my knees. I do like full squats for ROM development, but I see the PC/PS to be plenty for an athletic population, and even within that, the PC being plenty.
Hey Dr. Wolf!
Just wanted to ask a couple quick Q’s while I am reading through the digestion section of the book right now actually and having problems with it at the same time…crazy.
Anyways for about 2 weeks “doings” in the bathroom have been unpleasent and mainly of the watery kind. Nothing solid happening here. So im trying to knock out CF games workouts and other workouts and just dying – performance – recovery – burning and fatigue – etc. KStarr does a post about testing for dehydration and wouldnt you know it! Ive got sand in my veins it seems. So I narrow down the way I have been feeling to 1) stomach problems 2) absorbtion problems 3) dehydration.
In researching home cures for stomach problems of this kind people are either recommending strange 1)herbal cures 2) 8 tsp sugar 1 tsp salt 20oz water or 3) BRAT or BRATTY Banana Rice Applesauce Toast (Tea Yogurt). WTF?? I literally spent time looking at bread aisle today saying “youve got to be kidding me?? This causes inflammation but everyones touting it as the cure for this problem and I have done it before as well (this was the go to back in the day). So I left with some bananas and applesauce and yogurt acidophillis, coconut water, almonds. Still no fix to the problem.
So Finally the F-ing question: Why is this the recommended cure? How would it work? Is there a paleo cure to hot butt?
Thank you
XOXO
Chris,
I had the same exp for 3 wks..diahrrea, blew my training out of the water. Saw a GI who was no help. I stopped all milk products and coffee. Took alot of probiotics, colostrum, l-glutamine. I made soup out of stock bones, ate the marrow…and meat on the bone and eventually my GI calmed down and back to normal now. STill going easy on coffee and recently a little ice crean which is like heroin to me!
Chris Kesser has some good info on this as well.
Barbara
Thanks for the reply Barb.
Robb silence on the issue has concerned me…… 😉
I took the BRATTY approach and narrowed it down to BAY. This seemed to work the best really on top of taking antibiotics, coconut water, almonds, eggs, Nuun. I stopped all other supplements and coffee until everything resumed to normal. Oh i also did rock 2 cups of oatmeal (which I immediately got bloated and pain from). As of now things are ok (2 days in). I was just curious as to how and why this BRATTY approach would work (and has worked for me in the past) with gut irritants used as a method to stop/help the problem?
I get over 2k emails a day…it’s a bear to stay on top of this.
In no way was I taking a stab at you coach. I remember how busy you were back like 2 years ago so I just keep multiplying everything by 1000 as your outreach grows. I was just interested in the case this problem came back as my body doesn’t feel 100% and I’m doing these freaking games wods. Maybe you could use more moderators. I’ve got time on my hands so just let a brother know. There could be a degree of questions; simple ones answered by simple mods, advanced geeky ones answered by you etc etc. Just something to think about…..
You’ll notice that my post had X’s and O’s and that’s all I’ve got for you sir, hugs and kisses… stay beautiful.
Chime in anytime amigo! Also on the message board.
That’s alot of emails from just six listeners. Ah, the good old days.
No doubt, hugh?
Dude! Awesome episode!
Atkins causing diabetes: Could be that the diabetes only shows up when taking an oral glucose test and is otherwise irrelevant. Were there any other symptoms – independent of such tests – that led to diagnosis? I’d want to see a1c and food log. (Note: I’m not a doctor.)
Marijuana: I’m curious about the health effects of non-smoked THC. For example, a butter infusion or a space cake. Ignoring the sugar and gluten in the pastry of course. Not something I’m going to try anytime soon, because: [1] It’s illegal here and I have a strong aversion to prison, [2] it’s a long way to Amsterdam, and [3] from watching how others behave, weed seems to make people stupid. Or is it that losers are unusually attracted to weed? Either way…
My bad, Rob.
I had no idea so I had to go ask my coworker the details on what type of Mitochondrial Disease she had.
No worries!
I was so happy to hear a question about mito at all! I submitted a question a while back about my son, who has a Complex 1 deficiency. We are told that the type of fat doesn’t matter at all, that he can have trouble with any of them, since it’s the beginning of the ETC and where they all enter his system. He takes carnitine, which I thought helped the digestion of the fats he does eat, but I’ve been led to believe that Paleo would not be an option for him. His doctor insists that high-carb, low-fat is the best choice for him. Any thoughts? I just want to give him the best chance to live a long healthy life with this very pernicious disease. Thank you!
It’s kinda funny, you can tweak Paleo foods yo meet any macro requirement! What can’t we use hood food?
It’s the fats that scare me. I’m told that “too much” fat can be awful for him, but nobody can tell me what too much is. I’ve seen him very sick, and I’m scared to do something that could hurt him. Does the carnitine aid fat digestion? Could you give me an example of what low-fat paleo would look like? Thank you!
Interesting HFCS chat. Would you mind posting some of the studies showing a moderate consumption of hfcs causing horrendous issues as you mentioned when someone is in eucaloric or hypocaloric conditions? I’ve looked at many of the studies which are on mice/rats, which is suspect due to the very different DNL pathway in those animals and different carb metabolism, and most of the human studies seem to be using absurd dosages like 130g of hfcs per day, which I don’t think anyone would call a moderate intake, 20% of calories from hfcs, again, not realistic/relevant or people having straight fructose (almost impossible to do in the real world). So I don’t want to be seen as a skeptic for the sake of it, but at the same time, I haven’t seen a lot of relevant human studies that suggest that a moderate consumption of hfcs (say 30-50g fructose per day) would cause such problems?? Cheers.
Frank-
No, and that’s not what I’m talking about. Be skeptical, but dismissing HFCS as “not a problem because it’s pretty much like sugar” is just damn silly. For many people theere is no “moderate” intake…that is the damn problem. All the folks who split hairs on this topic (interestingly) do not WORK with people trying to fix this stuff.
People do not live in a metabolic ward. Disrupt appetite suppression in a free living person and these caveats of hypo/isocaloric states go out the window.
So you don’t have those studies? Do you have studies on 30-50g of fructose causing appetite disregulation?
I know that many people don’t do moderation well, but as you were saying on a different topic in the podcast, don’t let perfect be the enemy of good. Matt lalonde says people shouldn’t be eating fruit, to me that seems excessive as I haven’t seen negative consequences of 30-50g of fructose per day, which would be a few serves of fruit? (I know this is a slight side-track to the hfcs discussion), but I think fruit restriction is excessive, especially given the lack of data on the harm of moderate consumption of fructose. To many people giving up grains/legumes/dairy is a huge leap, but even fruit?
I do work with people trying to fix this stuff (personal trainer), and I see fast results with stricter approaches, but I also see lots of bingeing, self-loathing and less long term success with people that are very rigid in their approach, rather than taking a more moderate and long term lifestyle based approach.
Frank- one question for you: do you work with people yo make your living?
Yes, I make my living as a personal trainer. Now can you answer my questions?
Squatchy, I know people consume huge amounts of HFCS and this causes problems, and I know studies where they feed people large quantities of HCFS cause problems, but I don’t think an alarmist approach of saying it’s bad regardless of dose is the way to go, ditto for fructose. Again, I think telling people not to eat fruit is making perfection the enemy of good. I’m certainly not suggesting for any of my clients to drink sodas.
Frank-
I start overweight clients with the basic idea yo limit fruit. But I’m also generally limiting carbs, so not too surprising. If we get good forward progress, fine, if not, I tighten things up. If I train people 1-on-1 they dint get soda, juice etc if body comp goals are concern. If they don’t comply, they get fired. I charge a lot, but I get very good results. So, is it alarmist! Sure, call it whatever you want, but it makes sense with regards to neurochemiatry and basic substrate partitioning.
So a few questions for you: what role does fructose play in hepatocyte glucokinase expression? How is this expression varied across populations? How might glucokinase expression alter substrate dynamics in the liver, what might that mean for Leptin and insulin sensitivity?
I also don’t give clients soda or juice, but the fruit deal I still don’t get? I’m not talking about 5 serves of fruit per day, but for most overweight people fruit (if any) is probably one of the healthiest things in their diet, and completely throwing it out seems crazy. I spend half the time explaining how meat won’t cause cancer, fat won’t make people fat, weight training won’t make them bulky, but to explain away a few serves of fruit seems like a tall order? Yes there’s plenty of papers on leptin and insulin resistance, leptin and fructose, and on and on. However, I still haven’t seen any suggesting a moderate fructose consumption (30-50g/day) causing any of those issues? Can you please point me to some? If there are none, I see a few serves of fruit boosting compliance through having a quick and portable snack, having one less thing to defend and having more variety in the diet for long term compliance. It’s like saying lower carb diets have a benefit, so everyone should eat zero carb, because if less is good, zero must be better, right?
Not to mention if they’re regularly depleting liver glycogen through exercise and already in a caloric deficit, refilling liver glycogen to improve satiety should be fine. Even Dr Lustig, one of the biggest anti-fructose guys I’ve seen says fructose for exercising populations is a whole different ballgame, due to the depletion of liver glycogen, he also has his patients eat fruit because it has fibre, but avoids liquid sources of fructose. And he endorses whole grains, so you can make of that what you want.
I just posted a comment on Robb’s facebook page… Sugar is sugar is sugar. I have recently started working with a trainer (he has won some figure competitions and owns a local gym). Of course, the diet came up in our initial meeting and he suggested I stay away from fruit if I really want to get lean. He also recommends 1gram of protein per pound of body weight per day. (I am struggling with that)
A little back history, I have been following the Paleo diet since Jan 18 this year (a newbie still) and rapidly lost about 14% of my total body weight. When I relaxed on fruit (mainly ate berries and melons), the weight loss stalled. After my meeting with the trainer, I restricted the fruit to one or two servings a week, and the old bod started going in the right direction again.
The proof is looking in the mirror.
130g of hfcs a day may sound absurd, but that’s only two 20oz sodas, which is nothing for a lot of people these days
Folks that are on the Atkins diet may be unknowlingly consuming large doses of transfats. Transfats will raise triglyceride levels and that intern will induce insulin resistance? I read that somewhere, can’t recall where, eventhough it was a hypothesis it sort of makes sense. May go hand in hand with the whole metobolic syndrome scenario? Any thoughts? Or am I way off?
People are NOT eating themselves into diabestes on Atkins via trans fats. Keep in mind, most of the crap that is associated with transfats is refined carbs.
Robb, I’m with you on the PWO sweet potatoes. I look forward to finishing workouts so I can get my japanese sweet potato on too, yellow and purple are so freakin good!
Just a comment on the sound level of the podcast. I listen to several podcasts during the week while driving to work and it seems that the Paleo podcast is the only one where I have to turn both my MP3 player and car stereo up to full volume to hear the podcast. I don’t have this issue with the 8 other podcasts I listen too during my commute.
Thanks for keeping the podcasts coming every week.
Robb/Greg,
Have to get you some feedback on the training podcast (72 I think). Thought it was awesome. If you guys get enough questions on that topic, I think it would be sweet to do one of those a month or one every other month.
I especially liked the quote “Lift some weights, be jacked, don’t suck.” That’s a t-shirt in the making for sure.
I’m going to try adding the sweet potatoes after training to see if I can keep the weight I gained from GOMAD this last go around… Will monitor results.
-Jim
Hi Rob,
Hope its not too late for a question. I’ve been doing low carb for nearly 3 weeks after noticing that my HDL levels were crashing despite running 30 miles a week and eating 5 fruits/vegetables a day for fiber (as per advice I got from a nutritional consultant hired by my health care provider). Since going low carb I feel better, have lost weight and inches (despite cutting back on the running) and am looking at ways to make it a sustainable lifestyle rather than a diet. I’m on a version of atkins I guess (without the bars and shakes) since I only eat what I prepare at home, all meats (but NOT deli meats just stuff I grill or fry at home), fish twice a week, sardines, some dairy, leafy greens (mostly spinach or green lettuce with olive oil and vinegar), the odd non-starchy veggie (1/2 cup), a few almonds and walnuts, and a few berries here and there. I’m in ketosis and am probably getting no more than 20g of carbs on any given day, on average. I supplement with a generic brand multi-vit and the odd fish-oil omega 3 capsule. I guess I’m close to eating paleo since nothing I buy is processed and my dairy intake is minimal (a few spoons of half/half in my espresso, a few slices of hard cheeses, though I’m a big fan of kefir) but my chief reservation about paleo and my question is this: why the focus on “lean meats”? It’s not that I always seek out fatty cuts but I do find that increasing fat intake balances my carb reduction better than lean proteins and intuitively one would think that our paleo ancestors didn’t know jack about “lean”.. they ate their meat as they found it and probably ate the fattier first. Even the inuit would warn Europeans not to eat too much lean meat lest they get “rabbit’s diseases” in early spring when the game had litte fat on the bones. Can you explain why lean? Is this honestly central to the paleo scheme or a CYA in case the “saturated fats cause heart disease” crowd is right and you’d rather not get sued? (which personally I don’t believe they are right but that’s neither here nor there). Thanks for your time.
Alex-
Have you listened to the podcasts? I’ve gone over this many times. Short answer, most people need to lean out and loose weight, lean helps limit n-6 and total cals. Keep in mind our approach is different based on athletes vs weight loss..
Not so much on topic Coach but I just wanted to know if you have seen this and whats your take on it. I think I fluxuate between the groups the talk of and for me its a matter of just getting used to the schedule. I also wonder because for The Machinist I believe Bale said he didnt sleep and altered his diet to near nothing – still getting uber thin. Does eventually the cortisol mechanism turn off perhaps?
http://finance.yahoo.com/family-home/article/112502/why-people-can-run-on-little-sleep-wsj
Robb,
In the podcast before this you were talking about shoes.
I need an alternative for my VFF that is viable for everyday life.
You mentioned you rock Asics Tigers – which model have you found is best (there are few of them….)?
J
If you’re looking for an everyday barefoot type shoe heres a couple of links to check out
http://birthdayshoes.com/review-new-balance-nb-minimus-life
http://www.vivobarefoot.com/us/mens.html/
Thanks for addressing my question (dysphagia).
No, my mom has no had her gall bladder removed. However, I think she has always had general digestive issues. Over the past few years, it has developed into this chewing/swallowing issue. Her doctor thinks it’s all in her head. Anyway, after seeing my results with Paleo, she has at least decided to cut out grains and dairy for a month. I hope she’s able to comply – her husband has a horrendous diet, so it will take a great deal of commitment on her part. She at least agrees intellectually that she needs to give it a shot for a month. I hope she sticks with it!
BEST PALEO SONG EVER!!!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xvkv8v87uhU
TITLE: DEAD ANIMAL ( Do I need to say more)