Originally posted by Dr. Davis on 2015-07-25
on the Wheat Belly Blog,
sourced from and currently found at: Infinite Health Blog.
PCM forum Index
of WB Blog articles.
Jennifer overcoming the mental health impairment of grains
You may remember Jennifer from her story describing her first 3 weeks on the Wheat Belly lifestyle: https://drdavisinfinitehealth.com/2015/06/wheat-and-grains-make-you-sick/
Jennifer now provides us with an update on her progress:
“The difference 9 months makes. The top two are from last year. The bottom two are 4 weeks ago and 2 weeks ago. I wanted to give you an update.
“I am still dealing with some underlying health issues, however doing much better. I no longer have to take a slew of prescriptions –no Symbicort, rarely have to take nasal allergy spray or Zyrtek, have completely titrated myself off of psych meds (MDs had me on 5 or 6 psych meds for a decade, rather than checking my thyroid and checking underlying health issues that I discovered on my own).
“I now only take one script and that is for hypothyroidism (I suspect Hashimoto’s, as it runs in the family)–levothyroxine. I am by no means completely healed BUT I have hope and know I am on the healing path. It is nice to no longer be shackled to my prescription medicine cabinet as it was HUGE. When I started solving gut issues and thyroid issues, my mood has become so much more stable. Along with the thyroid hormone, I supplement with magnesium/potassium, selenium, iodine and have been trying ashwangandha for a bit more energy and mood stability.”
Jennifer’s experience highlights an important issue: the improvements in mental health with wheat/grain elimination and with normalizing thyroid status. As many Wheat Belly followers have learned, wheat/grain elimination is a powerful means of reversing several common mental health conditions and unhealthy emotions, particularly depression, the mania of bipolar illness, impulsivity and abbreviated attention span of attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and autistic spectrum disorder, anxiety, anger, paranoia and auditory hallucinations of schizophrenia. This is not to say that everyone with depression or autism, say, will experience dramatic relief, but many do–and there is never anything to lose by following this lifestyle to observe whether such benefits develop.
Jennifer’s experience also highlights how the Wheat Belly lifestyle is not just about weight loss. It is about restoring the human dietary experience back to the way it was supposed to be before we got sidetracked by this huge mistake of incorporating the seeds of grasses into the human diet, made worse by the fiddlings of agribusiness and “official” advice to pack the diet full of them. This lifestyle, so much more powerful than any “diet,” even impacts mental health, something cutting calories or counting points could never do.
Incidentally, Jennifer should also explore the T3 thyroid hormone issue, as many people with persistent depressive symptoms, not to mention struggles with weight loss or other residual hypothyroid symptoms, respond to including the T3 hormone with their T4. This is easily accomplished by replacing the levothyroxine (T4) with a combination preparation such as Nature Throid or Armour Thyroid, or simply adding liothyronine (T3) to the T4.
