home a pizza and, once again, despite my knowing that I shouldn't, I ate a couple of pieces. I was sick for two days. The pain in what I think was my transverse colon was so bad I thought I might have to go to ther emergency room. Before I ate the pizza I had never gone grain-free that long before. I did this after reading Robb Wolf's book.
I AM CONVINCED. No more wheat for me! Please, Lord, give me strength.
LV said:
What don't I experience! I typically avoid wheat (and gluten for that matter) as I'm pretty sure it makes me sick, but when I slip (or someone else slips me some) I end up with massive amounts of joint swelling and tenderness, diarhea, cramping, gas, bloating and brain fog. I'm absolutely miserable. Just that alone is enough to keep me off gluten. I have RA, so if I have repeated exposures I'll have a flare which SUCKS!
A carpenter wouldn't build a house using just his bare hands. You shouldn't stumble your way through nutritional blunders without the proper tools to guide you.
Pretend I'm a mad food scientist. I'd like to create a food that:
1) Wreaks gastrointestinal havoc and cause intractable diarrhea, cramps, and anemia. 2) Kills some people who consume it after a long, painful course of illness. 3) Damages the brain and nervous system such that some people wet their pants, lose balance, and lose the ability to feel their feet and legs. 4) Brings out the mania of bipolar illness. 5) Amplifies auditory hallucinations in people with paranoid schizophrenia. 6) Makes people diabetic by increasing blood sugars. 7) Worsens arthritis, such as osteoarthritis and rheumatoid arthritis. 8) Triggers addictive eating behavior. 9) Punishes you with a withdrawal process if you try to remove it from your diet.
I will develop a strain that is exceptionally hardy and tolerates diverse conditions so that it can grow in just about any climate. It should also be an exceptionally high yield crop, so that I can sell it cheaply to the masses.
Now, if my evil scheme goes as planned, I will then persuade the USDA that not only is my food harmless, but it is good for health. If they really take the bait, they might even endorse it, create a diet program around it.
Dag nabit! Such a plan has already been implemented. Another evil food scientist already beat me to the punch. The food is called wheat.
Diabetics experience long-term health difficulties, including atherosclerosis/heart attacks, peripheral vascular disease, hypertension, cataracts, kidney disease, neuropathies, male erectile dysfunction, osteoarthritis, and colorectal cancer. They also die, on average, 10 years earlier than non-diabetics.
In effect, diabetics compress their lives into a shorter period of time. They experience all the "complications" of aging at a younger age. People without diabetes, of course, can develop atherosclerosis, cataracts, kidney disease, etc., but they tend to do so later in life compared to diabetics.
One index of the rate of aging (but not chronologic age itself) is hemoglobin A1c, or HbA1c, a "moving average" of glycated hemoglobin, i.e., glucose-modified hemoglobin. Blood glucose glycates hemoglobin linearly and irreversibly; measuring HbA1c thereby provides an index of the last 60 or so days average blood glucose.
To put HbA1c values into perspective:
Average HbA1c of hunter-gatherers: 4.5% Average HbA1c for Americans: 5.6% American Diabetes Association definition of diabetes: 6.5% or greater American Diabetes Association definition of adequate control of diabetes: 7.0% or less
Why do diabetics age faster? There are likely several reasons. One important reason is glycation, as indexed by HbA1c. Glycated proteins in the lens of the eye causes cataracts. Glycated proteins in cartilage leads to arthritis. Glycated LDL particles (apo B) leads to atherosclerosis. Glycated nerve cells causes neuropathy. And so on.
If glycation underlies many of the phenomena of aging, then we might surmise that:
1) The less you glycate, the slower you age. 2) The more you glycate, the faster you age.
Therefore, the higher the HbA1c, the faster you are aging.
What foods increase HbA1c? Carbohydrates. That bowl of slow-cooked, stone ground oatmeal? A one-hour after-eating blood sugar of 170 mg/dl is common. Your doctor says that's okay because it's below 200 mg/dl and you don't "need" medication yet.
