A little over a year ago I set out to learn all that I could about ancestral health. I read a few books, a million blogs, and spent many hours doing internet research. The Caveman Diet, The Hunter Gather Diet, Paleo, Primal, Anti-inflammatory, Anti-aging– all of these diets made a lot of sense to me and have at least one thing in common– how our ancestors ate, in turn setting the stage for our genetic make-up. I created a way of eating, for myself, my family, and anyone else who was interested based on the many things that I learned all based in ancestral health. Over the last 16 months I have gained so much knowledge about how sugar, grains (which includes gluten), and dairy effect the human body. I put the research to work. As part of my new routine, I was given one cheat day a week. On this day I was allowed to eat anything and everything that I wanted after breakfast. This idea, given to me by Tim Ferris, author of a fantastic book, The Four Hour Body, was brilliant! When you eliminate grains, sugar, and dairy from your diet you quickly also eliminate most things that we, as Americans, keep as staples in our diets. Understandably, at first, you feel pretty deprived. That’s where cheat day comes into play. Knowing that cheat day is right around the corner helps tremendously to keep you on the straight and narrow. I don’t think I would have been able to get where I am today without the security blanket of cheat day at the beginning. Although, I had my doubts–at first I was actually scared of cheat day. I thought I would ruin my whole week of clean eating in one day. However, I really believed in the science that backed the idea of this awesome day. In doing many experiments, Tim Ferris figured out that spiking caloric intake once a week (when sticking to this said plan all other 6 days of the week) actually boost metabolism through a host of hormonal changes. I was convinced, so I set out to eat clean and have my cheat day too. Weeks and then months went by and big changes happened to my physical and emotional self. As time continued on, I stopped wanting those really bad junk foods on cheat day. So, here I am, 16 months later happily letting go of my security blanket known as cheat day. My cheat days used to consist of doughnuts, pizza, hamburgers and fries, ice cream– lots of ice cream! and a slew of whatever else I could get my hands on. Most of the time, by the end of the day, I was totally sick. Even so, every week, I went back for more because It was awesome knowing that I could do that and seemingly NOT ruin all my hard work. It also allowed me to eat “normal” around others and at social gatherings as I transitioned to this new way, even if it was for just one day. The option was nice. It served its purpose– brilliant! Cheat day got me through those tough weeks and months at the beginning of this huge change that if I would not have had I would not be in the excellent health I am in now. I would not recommend going about this transition any other way, unless you are just a glutton for punishment. I have now been sugar, grain, and dairy free for about 80% of the last 16 months and it feels better than anything I have ever done for myself. Oh! how cheat day has evolved. Here I am, having gluten free hot cereal with an apple in place of doughnuts and ice cream on “cheat day.” I don’t really care so much about all that junk food I used to want on cheat days in the past. I’m over it, my body did what it was supposed to do, it has adjusted to this clean diet– i just don’t crave those terrible junk foods anymore. That being said, don’t get it twisted, every blue moon I want pizza and doughnuts and I have been known to indulge, just not on a weekly basis anymore. Amen! Now, lets touch on gluten. It’s super trendy right now to be “gluten free.” I saw a program on the news this morning that was “debunking” the myths on gluten. It did hardly that. As in usual TV fashion, they danced around the subject. Most unsuspecting viewers would have probably walked away with the wrong message. However, I will say that the media is starting to report on all of this new science, but unfortunately they are not fully there yet. The long story short is that gluten is bad. Why? It is derived from wheat, barley, and oats in which we, as humans, were not made to digest. Some people have a severe reaction to gluten, other wise known as an allergy, where as others show no physical signs of an allergy; but that does not mean it is not harming you. This is the jist of what I have learned: Grains, which include wheat,barley and oats, among other bad things cause inflammation levels to rise in the body which in turn causes uric acid levels to rise. Over time, this becomes a breeding ground for cancer, diabetes, heart attack, stroke, gout, and arthritis to name a few. Over many years of bombarding your system with not only grains ( to include gluten) but sugar, and dairy products as well, on a regular basis, keeps your body inflamed and puts you at a higher risk to develop these popular diseases. Food manufacturers are jumping all over this by stocking the grocery store shelves with gluten free foods. There are a few problems with most of these foods; they are packaged processed foods, they are usually higher in calories than the regular gluten ridden ones, and loaded with carbohydrates. Carbohydrates affect your body in the same way sugar does; it causes inflammation, that we are trying to stay away from, to rise. My advice is to stick to anti-inflammatory foods six days a week and allow yourself one cheat day with the long term goal in mind to become adjusted and not need that security blanket of cheat day any longer. Here are some examples of anti-inflammatory foods: Meat, fish, veggies, nuts and seeds, dark berries, dark beans, and plain Greek yogurt. Slow and steady wins the race!
