I have just read the attached article and the reason that I am including it for others to read is the part that states that in parts of the world that do not have a Westernised diet there is no obesity but more interestingly 'no disease!!'
A coeliac's diet without bread, cakes and sugars ... etc sounds like a really good choice and if these parts of the world have no disease then they most certainly do not have coeliac disease.
It's a small article so worth a read .. I wonder if we all stuck to this way of eating whether all of the other symptoms that are often interwoven with coeliac disease would disappear in us all? Now that is a lovely dream - don't you think?
When I was first diagnosed there was only long life bread available and flours(which I didn't use) I wasn't keen on the bread so hardly ate any of that. You could buy the odd biscuit/cracker from H&B but nothing in supermarkets. My diet was just fresh fruit/veg/meat/fish. I also had milk/cheese and butter.I also eat chocolate. My gut recovered quite quickly and really well and I didn't suffer many problems at all. I find that eating processed GF cakes/biscuits upset my tum so this article does make you wonder.
The first time I ever came across anyone with Coeliac Disease was in the 1970's and she complained bitterly about the bread that she was given which was only available in cans. She told me that it had taken 13 years before she had been diagnosed with the disease. By the time that I first met her, her health was quite good. Now looking back I wonder if much of that was due to the fact that so very few 'grain-type' products were available and much of a coliac's diet was fairly basic.
Another very interesting realisation is how much our intestines and their 'occupiers' have relationships to our health and fitness. I expect there will be many more studies done on this line of thought ..
If you have not read it already I would recommend Gary Taubes book "The Diet Delusion" (UK), "Good Calories, Bad Calories" (USA). It's a big book! It looks at the science behind current dietary advice, the role of big business in food, and also at the effects on societies that moved to a western diet of refined flour/sugar. As your article says, the effects on health were disasterous - diabetes, high blood pressure, heart problems, diverticulitis etc etc.
I've not read that particular book yet, Penel but I have read "The Obesity Epidemic" by Zoë Harcombe, which sounds along similar lines to it.
It seems we are all pushed into eating things that are bad for us from a very early age and worst of all our parents have always been led to believe that much of it is good for us and crammed full of nourishing things.
I have reached a point where I don't ever yearn for bread, cakes and biscuits - which proves how very addictive they are because I used to visit the supermarket and think how lovely something was and how marvellous it must taste - and yes - I more than often would buy it. So it is lovely not to want things like this anymore. Occasionally, I will make a cake using gluten free flour but it doesn't bother me if I have a second slice - even if I enjoy the first slice - I don't feel compelled to have more. It is a wonderful freedom.
I think that we are possibly causing many illnesses by over processing basic items - this is well worth a read ..
And a little on the same site about fats - the only fats that are naturally solid are butter and lard - if anything else is all but runny then it is processed - thank goodness that I am a butter fan and after reading this, I always will be ..
I agree about the freedom from addiction. Before going gluten free I virtually lived on pitta bread and also had a major jaffa cake habit - given the chance, I could eat the entire packet. But I've only bought gluten-free bread a couple of times and haven't once wanted to buy gluten-free jaffa cakes.
It's amazing how it just disappears. It took quite a long time, though - my craving transferred to crisps but that seems to have gone now too.
I've just started reading another Gary Taubes book, Why We Get Fat, which is, I think, a much shorter version of the other one (the polemic but without the in-depth science).
I agree I rarely eat gf cakes, biscuits, bread and the only thing I buy in the free from aisle is soy and Worcester sauce. My husband keeps trying to get me to make gf bread but actually I don't miss it and bread that I have to fill with calories from eggs, oil and add xanthan gum to doesn't seem a good idea to me. There are lots of really good things to eat which are naturally GF and I just eat those. My only sweet treat is home made meringues and pavlovas and I now only eat those if I am having people to dinner.
Lol! Mia you sound so much like me. I have noticed that I eat far more nuts and almonds than I used to and I really enjoy Greek full-fat yoghurt both of which no longer appears to cause me to add on the pounds, so I suppose that weight gain must purely be linked to grains.
Hi Lynxcat another interesting article. And I smiled at this comment by you in your original Blog:
''I wonder if we all stuck to this way of eating whether all of the other symptoms that are often interwoven with coeliac disease would disappear in us all?''
And I thought you really ought to read Back to Eden ccok book by Jethro Kloss:
He was laughed at by many who said he was a well meaning crank But he says in here (written nearly 100 years ago) that in the future hospitals would be full of people with diet related illnesses because of their ''modern'' diet, full of processed foods. And was he right or was he right?
And instead of using sugar he would blind bake corn twice to turn it into corn dextrose.
Interestingly after reading other replies to this blog, I did not like the processed gf foods and I ate a naturally gf diet and within 3 months I had gone from being very anaemic to feeling really well. So even tho' I eat bread and cakes sometimes I make my own with naturally gf ingredients and don't use refined sugars. And last week I had a blood test and my Dr took my blood pressure and just said it was very good and my weight is spot on and then he said I'm not even going to bother asking how you feel as you look incredibly well!
So to me the important point that your blog highlights is, we are what we eat.
I'm currently reading "Pandora's seed" by Spencer Wells. He studies human genetics and show evidence that humans were healthiest before agriculture began 10,000 years ago. It isn't until recent times that life expectancy has caught up. It's also interesting that virtually all of our communicable diseases come from our close association with animals when we domesticated them for farming 10,000 years ago.
I agree that an ancestral diet has got to be the way forward more best health and current guidelines on diet just don't make sense.
Is a good article about modern milling processes and the problems it causes. I wonder if we would have developed coeliac disease if our diets had only included stone ground flours. It also makes me wary of gluten-free flours produced by pressure rolling!
Coeliac Disease was born before modern milling processes Karri - it began around 10,000 years ago. It began when man first started to farm and grow grains. Grains are simply bad for humans. We have very weak digestive systems and only one stomach. To effectively process grain, in any form, a mammal requires two stomachs like those of a cow.
Although coeliacs have the worst possible effects that grains cause when ingested there is evidence to say that even grains whose outer layer has been removed causes problems in otherwise unaffected people. As well as this tough outer layer that people are now encouraged to eat as in 'whole grains' there is the problem created by the inner part of the grain as well - this causes inflammation.
There are so many articles and studies concerning how damaging grains are to the human population but I am including just one. This link explains in a short article ..
I wonder how many of us have Googled the Wikipedia information on Coeliac Disease - it's quite a good read and if you scroll down to History has what they believe is probable coeliac events ..
Content on HealthUnlocked does not replace the relationship between you and doctors or other healthcare professionals nor the advice you receive from them.
Never delay seeking advice or dialling emergency services because of something that you have read on HealthUnlocked.
Type 1 diabetes & coeliacs
Diagnosed Coeliac & Confused
Coeliac Disease and Levothyroxine for Hypothyroidism
