Dear readers,
I didn’t provided a direct e-mail address here because I was worried that I would be inundated with e-mail questions rather than posts that could be viewed by others for educational purposes.
For those who want to contact me directly for other purposes such as invitations to speak, research collaborations, etc., all you have to do is post a comment and indicate in it why you are seeking my e-mail address and I will reply directly to you. If you don’t want your comment posted here, please state that clearly in your note, otherwise I will post it with my reply.
I also want to extend an apology to the other Jay Wortman, the Oracle consultant in Belgium, who has been kind enough to forward me the inquiries that found their way into his inbox.
Dr. Jay
could i do this diet ??? I have congested heart failure, but need to lose some weight . I have had a couple of surgeries in the last 2 years
Dr Jay’s Reply:
I think this kind of diet would be beneficial but I hesitate to recommend such a significant dietary change to someone who has a significant medical problem, especially one that requires a lot of medication, unless you did it under medical supervision.
I just finished watching the programme airing and was delighted with the results of your study group. Congratulations! I would like to learn more.
Currently, I’m reading up on a program from the UK, Fatburners. It too uses science to answer questions on obesity, thereby preventing individuals from digging the early grave via fork and spoon. It acknowledges the importance of EFAs and the need to get rid of the refined carbs.
I look forward to hearing from you.
Pina
Dr Jay’s Reply:
I am not familiar with Fatburners so I cannot comment in detail. Getting enough omega-3 and making sure you don’t get too much omega-6 would be important regardless of what else is involved. Ditto for cutting carbs. In my journey these last few years, I have also learned that adequate salt intake is important and that a magnesium supplement may be needed. One can’t eat too much protein or you will feel ill and it may generate an insulin response sufficient to retard fat burning. I haven’t written a book yet but it’s on the to-do list.
I am 31 years old and now live in a small town in Southern Alberta. I have struggled with my weight for most of my life. Puberty really began to show I would have a struggle. We moved around a lot as my Dad was a grain merchant and loved to transfer through the Alberta Wheat Pool. We traveled by car to visit family on a very regular basis which meant eating on the road and every gas station we passed was an opportunity to get “snacks”. My father has had a weight problem all his life, while my mother started to change during “The Change”. My brother has ADD and is very active! All muscle and sinew…figures! My heaviest was 305 pounds during labor, and I was an average pregnancy…only gained 35 pounds! Good grief. When my son was born I was quite ill and joined FA (Food Addicts in Recovery Anonymous) which works on the 12 step program. The basis was no flour and no sugar. I lost 150lbs in 13 months but regained it in a couple of years. While still slim I began to Manage the Herbal Magic Weight loss center in Lethbridge, Alberta. We expanded and I also managed the one in Medicine Hat, Alberta. When I quit, I became very depressed and ate, gaining my weight all back within six months. In depression and desperation I had my stomach stapled. I lost 70 pounds and regained at least half of that because I live on junk food…I don’t puke it up. With this surgery I have a very difficult time with protein and would have to address that in order to follow your program. I would be very interested in joining your group to lose weight and maintain it. I am at a point in my life where I must make a lifestyle change; I should mention that I am at a point in my life where I WANT to make a change. Would you be interested in working with an over-educated professional weight loss teacher that eats everything but her own words?
Dr Jay’s Reply:
From the history you provided, it seems to me that you would achieve
significant weight loss using a low-carb approach. However, I don’t do
individual counseling for weight loss outside of a research
environment at the moment. In your case, I suspect you could succeed
without much in the way of counseling support. I’m guessing that
motivation is probably the big item there and that has to come from
within. I also think that peer support is a good way to go if you can
round up some others who want to try it with you. For guidance I
usually recommend people get an Atkins book and stick to the induction
phase. You can also get a lot of info if you read everything on my
site. Good luck!
Dr.Jay, hello and thank you for delving into food as fuel from the perspective of inheritance, historical physiological memory and metabolism.
As I watched CBC’s presentation of your study in Alert Bay, I harked back to my visit to the Great Northern Arts Festival in Inuvik. During a ten day art and culture infusion of music, dance, Inuvialuit art making, the local women prepared ‘country food’. On the menu were, Moose, Caribou, Arctic Char ~ along with greens ( market salad) breads and sweets. I found that eating a large portion of wild game & salads sufficed for 2 main meals each day.. lunch and supper.. for breakfast, bacon and eggs..and a little toast.. Carbohydrates seemed to fade from interest ( for me ) because a BALANCE was struck for my ‘Celtic Wanderer’ metabolism. I felt great!
When I travel and camp, I eat a simple diet, mainly due
to my notion of NO COOKING in wilderness.. so I eat canned sardines, smoked oysters, fruit (bananas & apples) and rye crackers. Soy cheese and soy milk. Seeds and nuts.. sunflower, cashew, peanuts ~ raw and unsalted. Now, at home, baked salmon fillets with a little salad dressing replace canned fish.
I welcome further discussion with you.
Anna
Dr Jay’s Reply:
Sounds like you learned a good lesson from those wise Inuit elders. It is unfortunate, though, that their wholesome nutritious country foods are now served with refined foods from the south. I think the closer they can stick to their traditional ways of eating the better off they will be in terms of obesity and the associated chronic diseases.
Hi Dr Jay!
My husband and I are interested in giving your diet a try but wondering if tofu, beans and lentils are allowed also what fruits are prohibited.
Thanks and looking forward to hearing from you:)
Dr Jay’s Reply:
In the study diet we didn’t include any of those foods. We suggested to people that when they wanted to start trying fruit again that berries would be allowable, the darker the better. In you case, the key issue would be whether you have started to develop insulin resistance or not. Since we don’t have a simple test for this and, unless you are starting to show high blood sugars, the best proxy for this is to look at your cholesterol levels. If your HDL (good cholesterol) is on the low side and your triglycerides are on the high side, that is a pretty good indicator of insulin resistance. In this case, you would need to significantly cut carbs, including lentils, beans, etc to get the maximum benefit from this type of diet. If not, you should do well on a less restrictive regimen. Good luck!
This is less comment, more inquiry.
I’ve been in the food service most of my days. An overactive curiosity has kept me dabbling into research here and there regarding the foods we eat. Over time though, the fog of general acceptance has lifted, bringing me to rethink my entire background in fine dining. The institutional practices that lumber along at an elephants pace beside ominous present day conditions are disheartening at best. Once you understand the engine that drives trends and desires in the food industry, and if you possess good conscience. You will eventually reach a certain point that presents two directions. You make a decision to stay on the path, whose security is an illusion, or you opt for a departure from present day “knowledge”. Whose security is decidedly less “secure”.
As for myself, cooking for celebrities and the uber-rich has become a community that I’ve happily decided to close the gate on. I’m presently looking around now for the new gate to open.
The “idea” behind your work with the coastal native peoples and the results of the work itself would serve well to inspire those that govern our public institutions and the food and beverage directors from every aspect of the food industry as well. Change will come about and those in charge will indeed redirect once an educated wave of public popularity washes ashore.
I’d like to be involved in some way. It is a good cause and the right thing to do.
Our dieticians and nutritionists lack something. So few of them are cooks. Nutrition is far more that the proper alignment of dietary needs. The science of chemical breakdown is lacking if the art in juxtaposing those fundamental elements and presenting them properly is ignored.
I wonder if you could use someone skilled at manipulating foods. The idea behind dietary change is made all the more appealing if it actually tastes as good as the idea behind it. Especially if that can be achieved using local available resources that have been either forgotten or as yet undiscovered.
It’s good to see this work being done.
Dr Jay’s Reply:
Yours is an interesting perspective. I’ll contact you and perhaps we can chat sometime about the possibility of a collaboration.
Hi Dr. Jay I just watched your work on CBC this morning. Great job. I am a holistic exercise and lifestyle coach. It is time for this information to be commonplace. Have you seen the work done by Weston A. Price? If not, this information could be a big help to what you are doing. I study under the C.H.E.K institute, much of the work we do focuses on similar principles. It would be great to align forces and spread the word of holistic nutrition/whole food movement. I have posted a few books that you might have read or gone over in the discussion section. It is really exciting to see this work being done. There is a project a friend and I are working on that might be right up your alley.
GREAT JOB!!
In Health,
Dax Wilcox
Holistic Exercise / Lifestyle Coaching
Hello again Dr. Jay. I have intitiated an offer to organize a “My Big, Fat Diet” challenge in a nearby aboriginal community here in Southern Ontario. It would be great to see all sorts of community groups organize similar efforts, a sort of MBFD goes national, maybe international! I’m sure you’ve had other people express an interest to organize something similar in their own communities. If my proposal gets to the next stage I would like to be able to contact you directly for advice. For example, would you be willing to become involved in any way, would I have permission to use the title “My Big, Fat Diet”, get troubleshooting advice from you, advice on the nuts and bolts of setting up an evidence-based study, pehaps avenues for some funding ,etc. Be sure that I’m not doing this for my direct profit in anyway other than in terms of community service and to perhaps advance my name as an RMT in the area and maybe get a referral or two. As you know from my previous letters that I’m very passionate about debunking the cholesterol/heart disease hypothesis and I would love to buy you and Gary Taubes, the man who ignited my interest, a drink someday if ever I get the chance. So, please contact me if you wish to give me any advice on how to set up something similar to your Alert Bay study. -Fred Cory, RMT fhcory@eagle.ca
Dr. Jay
I contacted a friend in Red Lake, Minnesota and I am sending her your DVD. — Her name is Karen Good.
I told her you are looking for a United States counterpart. — I hope it works out.
Red Lake is the only closed reservation in the United States.
Dr. Jay’s Reply:
Thanks for that. I have been looking for an opportunity to work with a Native American tribe and have spoken to some but so far nothing has come together.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hU5RJh4vEcI
Dr. Jay’s Reply:
Cool video. Makes you feel like you were there. I liked the C&W band, too.
I am curious what can be done to get more traditional foods onto the menu at the hospital. I started a position as the Food Service Dietitian and am interested in accessing traditional foods for our residents in Alert Bay. Just curious if you had any suggestions? Rainbow McBryan RD
Dr. Jay’s Reply:
I think that is an excellent idea and that the hospital in Alert Bay would be a perfect place to try this. As you know, they have a food fishery there that distributes fish to the community. That would probably be a good place to start. I would suggest you contact the band administration to find out who is in charge of the food fishery and see if they would provide an allotment to the hospital. Something else you might consider would be to talk to the families of individual patients to see of they would supply food for their family members. I think it is an idea that would be very much supported in that community. Good luck with that!
Hello
I just read through your introduction, and found it very interesting. I am curious if you have found any answers to why dietitians oppose the diet. Your proposal is compelling…i will just mention the biggest barriers in my mind. First, i get frustrated that people equate carbohydrates with simple carbohydrates. I say YES to cutting out white flour, pasta and rice, and YES to cutting out sugar and juice. I have been exposed to SO much research that supports the consumption of whole grains, legumes, and fruit and vegetables (antioxidants, phytochemicals, benefits of soluable fibre such as cholesterol and blood sugar lowering, benefits of insoluable fibre like decreased colon cancer). Wow, if the population followed guidelines of not eating the foods listed above (which you also suggest avoiding), i think we would see similar benefits. In addition, it is difficult to promote an animal based diet with all of the concerns of how unethically, or unhealthily (check out commercial production of chickens and you wont want to eat them anymore:) animals are raised these days. Not to mention that the planet cannot sustain people eating an animal based diet.
I DO applaud what you are doing…does it have to be all or nothing? I understand that people find “no carbs” simple, but I’m not sure that is the right message?
And yes, we need to work on the Dietitians of Canada (as well as other professional medical associations) to take a serious look at their sponsorship and how this affects their practices and recommendations.
Thanks for listening, “one of those” 🙂
Dr. Jay’s Reply:
Thanks for your note. I must confess that I am still puzzled at the entrenched position taken by many, if not most, of your colleagues. There seems to be a great reluctance to consider the growing body of evidence pointing us away from the conventional wisdom on diet. I surmise that, unlike the training I received as a physician where I was taught that things would change over time and that I had to keep reading the scientific literature to keep abreast of new developments, dietitian training seems to foster a different approach, one that produces people very fearful of change and certainly fearful of stepping outside the rigid boundaries set down by their professional organizations. I’m not saying that my colleagues are perfect, either. I find it amazing that when other physicians see first hand how dramatically better a patient can get by using a low-carb diet for diabetes, cholesterol, and blood pressure, many of them seem to shrug it off and continue on practicing according to the clinical guidelines. This incurious response is also something I find puzzling.
Yes, you can get significant improvements by following a diet like the one you suggest, devoid of the highly refined carbs but still relatively high carb. It appears that there is a benefit as you move down the scale both in terms of amount of carbs and the glycemic index. This is why Walter Willett developed the concept of glycemic load which incorporates both into one index. I also think that if the general population followed this kind of dietary approach, we would see a marked reduction in obesity and related chronic diseases. Having said that, we also need to consider the historical evidence which suggests that our ancestors were healthier on a meat-based low carb diet rather than an agrarian high carb diet in the days before all the refined foods were upon us.
At the same time, it is quite clear to me that once you have developed insulin resistance, you must minimize carbs or live a life on numerous medications. Whatever is the essential defect underlying insulin resistance and the related conditions which are many, it does not appear to get better when you restrict carbs. The conditions, like obesity, diabetes, hypertension, and dyslipidemia, will get better while you avoid carbs but will return if you start eating them again. People with conditions associated with insulin resistance should be managed as though they have carbohydrate intolerance in the same way we manage other food intolerances, like celiac or lactose intolerance.
In terms of the ecological sustainability of a low-carb diet, remember that the alternative is not high protein but, rather, high fat. The fat can come from a variety of sources including plants (eg. olive oil). On the other hand, perhaps the alternatives are a large global population supported by an agricultural system producing mainly carbs and experiencing high rates of chronic disease or a smaller global population eating a meat-based diet experiencing a much better health status.
Thanks for raising these issues.
Dear Dr. Jay,
You are absolutely right-on in all you say here about carbohydrates – and thank goodness someone in the medical community is waking up and bothering to say something.
I am a physician myself, having recently finished residency, and lost significant weight a few months back on a low-carb diet. I would never have believed it was so easy, and I’m embarrassed to say that it was my boyfriend who lifts weights who urged me to try this diet – I had always been fed (no pun intended) the party-line about low-fat being the way to go. I now realize that eating fat doesn’t make you fat – just as eating a turkey doesn’t turn you into one (well, sort-of).
One amazing thing I have discovered: I work at a major university in the student health clinic and have many vegetarian students who come in complaining of fatigue, low energy, dizzyness and a host of other symptoms. They’re always convinced that they’re anemic – and some are – but more commonly, they’re suffering from a reactive hypoglycemia caused by the enormous amount of carbohydrates that many vegetarians eat. Vegetarians often consider themselves among the healthiest eaters, yet ironically, they are often the biggest consumers of carbs – just a fancy word for “sugar.”
I’ve tested several patients with an oral glucose tolerance test and confirmed that they are, indeed, hypoglycemic during this symptomatic “attacks.” I’m not immune to this myself – I went out last night and ate what for me is now an uncharacteristic amount of simple carbs – and it is now 5 AM and I’ve been unable to sleep most of the night thanks to palpitations and a racing heart. Will I never learn?
“Big Sugar” is a terrifying documentary on the alarming extent of power wielded by the American sugar lobbyists; in it, it documents how nutritionists and sugar promoters collided at the 2004 Geneva Summit on Obesity, over the optimal level of carbs (sugar) in the human diet. Although the nutritionists requested the carb level be set at 10%, this was over-ridden by the lobbyists who were pushing for more like 70% (!) – it later turned out that the entire conference had been paid for by the sugar industry.
I simply cannot promote Canada’s food pyramid and I even found myself defacing a poster the other day which had been tacked up in the waiting room by a nutritionist urging students to avoid “fad diets” like Atkins and Sugarbusters. Well, I didn’t deface it exactly – but I did write “is not a fad diet” after Sugarbusters! I have read every one of these books and let me ask you: how can a book that urges people to cut down on sugar be bad? And why is it that anyone who writes a book on diet is automatically promoting a “fad”?
Well, enough of my rants – this email was really just to say how much I support and appreciate the stance you’ve taken on this very-neglected issue. As physicians, people look to us for advice, and I’m afraid most doctors are giving patients very poor advice when it comes to weight-loss, diabetes and health in general.
Keep up the great work!
Dr. Jay’s Reply:
Thanks for your encouraging note. It gives me hope that change is possible. I think our profession made a mistake when we relinquished our interest in the therapeutic value of nutrients for the mad pursuit of pharmaceutical molecules. I recently gave a lecture to a graduating class and asked them how much instruction they had received on obesity in their four years. The answer – two hours! Amazing when you consider that no matter what specialty they practice, this will be the most common pathological condition they will encounter. I think it speaks, not only to our pursuit of magical (pharmaceutical) solutions to preventable problems, but of the complete failure of the conventional approach. Most docs know it is a waste of time to counsel a patient on weight loss. It simply doesn’t work. This is why we pay lip service to “lifestyle change”, yet put everyone on metformin and a statin practically on the first visit. This is why the leaders of the American Diabetes Association, when talking about the future of diabetes, envision a “poly-pill”. I attended the last Canadian Diabetes Association conference and found the program completely devoid of any reference to carbohydrate restriction as a potential therapy. At the panel that discussed the nutrition portion of their just-released clinical practice guidelines, I asked whether they had looked at the growing body of literature on carb-restriction, and if not, why not, and if they had, why they hadn’t made a recommendation endorsing the diet as was done in the recent ADA guideline. They couldn’t understand my question! After repeating it a few times they said the issue had been relegated to the obesity section. I then spoke to the author of that section and he had some vague excuse for not having made any reference to it there. Meanwhile, at various sessions when I would challenge a speaker for neglecting this option, the audience would applaud when I would get brushed off. It made me feel some kinship with Ignaz Semmelweis. All this to say that I think it is vitally important to inform ourselves through the literature and to use what we learn to help our patients and to raise our voices so that others may eventually learn the value of this approach. It sounds like you are well on your way. Godspeed!
Dear Dr. Jay,
Thanks for your reply.
That you were able to speak to a graduating class at all is encouraging – if we are able to reach medical students before they graduate and begin residency, this would be a potential avenue for real change.
As it is, I can’t get any of my colleagues to even consider that what they’ve been taught about diet might be wrong – no matter what “the evidence” says to support it. It’s so frustrating – I’d say you wouldn’t believe it, but you probably would!
Fortunately, what I say behind closed doors to my patients is my business, and perhaps I can help effect change one person at a time. That fact that all my patients are university students (presumably being taught to think for themselves) is encouraging.
Perhaps the next time the crowd applauds when you get brushed off you can tell them a little story – about a doctor who dared challenge the mainstream by postulating that ulcers were caused by ulcers instead of stress. That doctor, Barry Marshall, stood at the front of a lecture hall while his colleagues laughed at him and then walked out. Decades later, he would stand at the front of a lecture hall once again – this time to receive the Nobel Prize. You might ask them to consider what part they would play in that story – the part of the trailblazer or the part of the laughing crowd (no one likes to think of themselves as part of a crowd)!
Here is a heartening interview with Dr. Marshall which chronicles his struggle to swim against the tide of mainstream medicine:
http://www.achievement.org/autodoc/printmember/mar1int-1
Let me know if I can ever be of assistance to you in getting this message out – I have learned that there is often strength in numbers, and that having an “MD” behind our name grants us a certain privileges and credibility (albeit, not always deserved), and I intend to use that credibility in the best ways I can.
Prior to medicine, I worked for more than 10 years as a professional writer, so I have some talents in this area; you are certainly an excellent writer in your own right – have you considered a book on this subject? I have several excellent contacts in the publishing industry, having worked in it for many years.
I can tell you that I would certainly have stood up and supported you at the Canadian Diabetes Conference – I’m one of those people that just has to say what I have to say – and fortunately, I usually say it well. At any rate, let me know if I can help – I work at Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario, on the other side of our Big Fat Country.
Do you know that phrase: “You can always tell the pioneers – they’re the ones with the arrows in their backs”? I like that. And I’d sure rather have one in my back than be caught slinging one.
All the best to you in your efforts.
Jennifer Rae
jennrae66@gmail.com
Oops – I meant ulcers were caused by bacteria instead of stress – but you probably knew that!
Fear of the “unknown” usually accompanies conventional wisdom and it’s safety net and pecking order, where like minded people often gather and congregate in there likeness. — Be it beliefs or addictive and destructive substances and behaviors! — To step out of that perimeter is to draw the wrath and rejection of many, if not all of these followers. — If the importance were not so great we would simply let them have there way!
Dr. Jay’s Reply:
Thanks for your continuing support. I guess some of us have to leave the comfort zone and take our lumps in order to make the world a better place.
Good Morning Dr. Wortman,
It was a great pleasure and an honour to meet with you in Winnipeg at the Fort Garry Hotel. I forgot to mention to you that when you agreed to meet with me, I burst into tears. Don’t ask me why, but I do believe that the God was telling me that something profound was about to happen in my life regarding the management of diabetes.
I have one question that may be of interest to all of your readers. Regarding articial sweetners, do you think that the sweetner “fools” the brain then sets off a chemical reaction in a diabetic’s body?
Dr. Jay’s Reply:
I hope your diabetes management has improved since we met. Your question about artificial sweeteners is a good one. The major benefit of avoiding carbs is that your need for insulin drops and you body produces less insulin. For many of us, the presence of insulin makes it hard to get the fat out of the fat cells so it can be burned. As long as we keep the carbs low, this is no problem. However, there is evidence that we have been conditioned to produce insulin, not only when carbohydrates enter our gut, but also when something sweet hits our mouth. For some people, the sweet taste of an artificial sweetener may be enough to cause a little surge in insulin. For those of us who have a very low threshold of tolerance for the effects of insulin at the surface of the fat cell, this can mean problems in burning fat and losing weight. I have recently cut out chewing gum as I think it was causing me to slowly put on a bit of weight. It seems to be working.
18/2/08 I was present. Thank you. my husband has metabolic syndrome is 49. I have have had huge health problems directly linked to difficulty with tolerating carbs. I am 44.
Our lives have changed for the better. The gift of health is the most important thing. Your courage is appreciated.
I cannot find words adequate to express my gratitude
Dr. Jay’s Reply:
Thank you for your support. I do get discouraged at times and comments like yours help to keep me going.
Great spirits always encounter violent opposition from mediocre minds — Albert Einstein.
Dr. Jay — Your Documentary is in Red Lake and White Earth both, right now. — Why don’t you pound on those drums a little bit and see if you can get this thing rolling. — If it’s OK for me to say this. — Respectfully!
Dr. Jay’s Reply:
Thanks for your continued support. If you knock on enough doors, eventually one will open.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ngyfJBiSo0
Dr. Jay,
Do you ever do any seminars that a person could attend, if so, when and where. I am writing from Northern Alberta.
Dr. Jay’s Reply:
I do a lot of public speaking but it is mostly at First Nations oriented events. If I am invited by a First Nation community to give a presentation, I am usually able to do that. Sometimes I do other public speaking aimed at a general audience. Perhaps I can start posting these events on this site so that people can attend. I don’t have anything planned in Northern Alberta at the moment, however.
You have done your part Dr. Jay and you continue to do your part, magnificently. — It’s up to the world to pick up on this! — I say they will!
“Hybrid Carbohydrates” — The sugar content in our fruits and vegetables and grains have been hybrid to about a hundred fold.
Yup! — Add milk to that and our typical american diet comes in with these kind of numbers.
The trace amount of alcohol in lets say an orange, is lets say insignificant! — A cup or a pint of Vodka on the other hand is very significant!
One is natures, one is mans!
I was at an Elder’s Gathering in August of 1989 at Wikwemikong Manitoulin Island, Ontario. There I met an Ojibway fellow named Dan Pine from Garden River, Ontario and Maheengun, an Ojibway from Northern Wisconsin. Both were in their nineties then. They both spoke of a blood sickness that would come upon our people. They encouraged the attendees to go back to their traditional diets and to leave the Whiteman’s diet alone. This would come upon all our peoples and he mentioned long time ago, the foods from the animals and plants, berries of our elders’ time would bring back the purity of the Anishinabe blood. He spoke of teas and medicine of the old people and how this way of the elders used to help live longer years. Now , he said the people do not live very long on this earth. I now believe that old man of the things that he talked about one week I was present at that gathering. I did a native show on Vancouver Cooperative Radio CFRO on his message in late 1989. I had a recording of his message but have lost it somewhere in one of my numerous moves from another city.
It has been 20 years later and I have metabolic syndrome. I am eating foods that I get from the local store.
I probably have to move to northern BC to access the moose and deer that I ate regularly as a child in Northwestern Ontario. Fish for breakfast, lunch and supper. Handful of berries for summer snack. We were so poor, we did not have the foods like salads, greens and milks. I started residential school and I believe that is where all my health problems started. My vision got fuzzy and got glasses at eight years old.
I could type for two hours and not even touch on the whole gist of what I am trying to say. I would like to change what I am going through, but do not want to battle with any Doctor about my health. I have had a problem finding a GP that will work with my odd views about traditional health, diet and teas and medicine.
My blood sugar came down after 7 days of refusing to eat foods that I thought were not good for me. Those foods were foods that I never saw on my Mother’s cabin table, so I refused to eat them. Now, I am doing okay and want to connect with someone who also believes that our traditional way to diet and living is the answer to alleviating our blood sickness. Thank you so much for the work that you do.
Pineshi
Dr. Jay’s Reply:
Thank your for sharing your story. I agree that the introduced foods seem to have caused most of the health problems and that the traditional diet was a healthy one. Your instincts in terms of what foods to avoid seem to be good if this approach is able to correct your blood sugar. Since it is very hard for most people to adhere to a traditional diet nowadays for lack of sufficient traditional foods, it is important to consider which market foods to use in place of the traditional foods. If you consider that there was very little starch or sugar in the traditional diet, that is a good place to start in terms of eliminating market foods. This is what we did in the study at Alert Bay. We allowed only market foods that were similar to the traditional foods. We included various non-traditional meats and sources of fat along with non-starchy vegetables. If you are doing something similar, I am sure you will find your health will improve. If your doctor objects, you might point out that the American Diabetes Association now includes a low-carb diet as a valid way to lose weight. Most doctors respect the guidelines issued by these big scientific authorities. Good luck!
Dr. Jay:
I am the audiologist who was at your table when you spoke recently in Guelph. I am now down 14lbs since that night but have plateaued. You mentioned some exotic oil I need to get going again. Que’ce que?
May I have a copy of your powerpoint to educate the dieticians who remain naysayers?
Best Regards,
djb
Dr. Jay’s Reply:
Good to hear of your success. The oil I referred to was oolichan grease. It is produced by coastal First Nations and historically was a major source of calories in their traditional low-carb diet. It is not commercially available and the oolichan fishery itself is dwindling to the point the local demand is not being met. One of my colleagues recommends mixing 2 parts butter with one part olive oil and one part canola oil to approximate the fatty acid profile of oolichan grease. This concoction can be used for cooking and as a topping for things like steamed vegetables. The main point is that, if you are not burning off body fat, you need to meet you energy requirements with fat from your diet. The other thing is that you need to make sure you are minimizing carbs. I find the lower I go, the better I feel. I am at the point where I no longer eat nuts.
I will see if I can e-mail my slides to you. Sometimes the file size is too large.
Dr. Jay
I genuinely believe that this is very important for us to read and understand.
http://www.rd.com/living-healthy/why-low-carb-diets-arent-the-answer/article49515.html
It shows plainly why this mentality is so extremely difficult to overcome.
The depth of carbohydrate/stimulant addiction is immeasurable. — As are it’s effects.
Hello
My husband and I have been carefully following your plan monitored by our Family doctor. We remain so thankful to you every day. It has been over 3 months now. Weight loss in total is almost 50 pounds between us. I have not suffered from viruses like I usually would have all winter One cold that went quickly away and now Influenza and the Stage where I usually get pneumonia is breaking up after only 24 hours. This is remarkable.
Hubbys BP is 120/ 66 was 198/110 or 180/90
I could go on and on and on Thank you so much
Please Email me your slides . Julian is technical and although I am a RN and heard your lecture in Febuary he still is full of questions that I answer , however he would benefit greatly from the slides.
At his work now many of his friends are on your diet and getting off their BP and diabetes medications.. They cant belive the change in him and now are taking advantage of it too. I have purchased the DVd My BF diet and lend it out to whomever I need to /shoud they express interest. / lisa.zilio@rogers.com
Taanshi, Dr. Jay,
I have heard you will be coming to Saskatoon to speak at the North American Indigenous Food Symposium in June. Is that right?
Eekoshi pitamaa.
Heathee
Dr Jay’s Reply:
Yes, I am speaking at the symposium after all. I will be doing the lunch-time session on Friday. I hope to see you there.
Dr. Jay
I haven’t heard one word from the people I sent this too. — There is a chance that each of them looked at it and then put it on a shelf instead of showing it around to a lot of people and getting there opinions on this.
So no fire got lit.
It’s 100% impossible for any group of people to not pick up on this.
If I ever get rich enough I will buy hundreds and then thousands of copies of this and send them to every tribe in North and South America.
The Tribes are at a great advantage in comprehending this that we people that originated from other continents do not have.
I would estimate that about one tenth of one percent of all Native, both North and South Americans have even heard of this.
That means that something like 99.999 percent have not heard of this.
We got to do something about this.
I’m not going to get rich anytime soon.
I can buy a dozen copies and send them around when I go back to work in a few weeks but that’s not enough.
We got to bust this thing open.
It’s a sin for something this powerful to sit idle.
Wanna know why were on the moon!
http://thebunnellfarm.blogspot.com/
Taanshi, Dr. Jay,
I am pleased to tell you that my husband and I have started the BFD (Big Fat Diet)! I am very much hoping to see his cholesterol levels and weight drop. I am normal weight but am eating with him both to support him and to see if the BFD helps my ADHD symptoms. I am hoping it will and that I will physically as well. I will let you know how things go….
By the way, Paul Chorney, the Community Liason of Manitoba Food Charter, called to ask if I thought you would be interested in coming out to Manitoba to speak. I told him that you seemed open to speaking engagement but since you work for First Nations and Inuit Health that a joint invitation with a First Nations group might make things easier. Also, I told him that it is my understanding you have been invited to speak at the North American Indigenous Food Symposium in Saskatoon in early June. He will be attending and hopes to speak with you about possibilities then….
Eekoshi pitamaa.
Heather
Dr Jay’s Reply:
I have been neglecting my blog in recent weeks and overlooked the invitation to the Indigenous Food Symposium unfortunately. It sounds interesting. I think both the type of diet and the whole issue of food security are becoming topics of vital interest to First Nations.
In general, if I am invited by an Aboriginal organization I can usually come to discuss these issues. If it is a non-Aboriginal organization I can sometimes manage it as well. Much of it depends on my calendar.
Good luck on the diet. I will be interested to hear whether it has an impact on the ADHD.
I am buying a dozen copies of your documentary and I wish it could be two dozen copies when I get payed here in two weeks. I am going to start handing them out and asking that they be returned to me after they look at them or I be able to come and pick them up. I will continue on with this until I get some help and a group formed and some home meetings going on, or at the library meetings. Then I am going to do more and more of the same thing only more and more of the same thing until this thing takes all the way off on it’s own. — Then I will continue on and on, on my end until the day I die, which won’t be anytime soon, and then I am going to leave it for my children and grandchildren to carry on.
I swear!!!
Obama and Oprah would die to have this if they only knew!!!
“This has got to be seen and heard and that is the only thing that is holding this up.”
You are not a fool off on a tangent and a rant and I am not a fool off on a tangent and a rant.
The substance in your discovery and the substance in your documentary are unequaled and unparalleled and paramount by any standard.
It’s so damn big that nobody can see it, that’s all it is!!!
We’re going to make it happen!!!
Clickety click as the lights come on!!!
Dear Dr. Wortman: In April my family physician, Dr. Martha Macdonnell, recommended that I, a Type 2 diabetic, read your blog and try your food plan. Within 10 days I was able to stop taking my Metformin and I haven’t looked back. You can’t imagine how excited and grateful I am to be a diet controlled diabetic. My question is this: Although my blood sugars are very stable during the day, they are higher in the morning after fasting than I would like. Usually high 6’s or even 7.1 or 7.2. I have monitored closely what I have for dinner and whether or not I have a snack before bed (snacking is recommended by the diabetic nurses). Nothing I do seems to make a change. When I was taking Metformin, my fasting blood sugar was always quite low. I hope this won’t come under the category of “prescribing medicne” but I am wondering if this was common when you did your research project, or if you would have any advice as to what foods may or may not be a good snack for later in the evening. Thank you. And I hope in time the Canadian Diabetes Association will pay attention to people like me (I am writing them), as they still promote Canada’s Food Guide.
Dr. Jay’s Reply:
You are very lucky to have Dr. Macdonnell as your physician. She is a very dear friend and an excellent doc.
It is not uncommon for morning fasting sugars to remain a bit high for awhile after you start a low-carb diet. This is because of glucose produced by your liver during the night. It seems to take longer for the liver to catch-up as you start to correct your metabolic problems by cutting the carbs. I would give it a while longer before considering medication.
I recommend snacking on protein and fats. For a bed-time snack, my favourite is my low-carb ice-cream. On the other hand, as you adjust to the low-carb diet you should find your need to snack goes away. On a high-carb/CDA type diet, you need to keep eating carbs to keep your blood sugar from bottoming out. Their suggestion to snack is because it is better to spread out the carbs to keep the blood sugar from spiking too much. You won’t have that problem on low-carb. In fact, you should find that your appetite has dropped significantly and you don’t feel the urge to snack at all.
Good luck with it all and please pass on my greetings to Dr. Macdonnell when you see her next.
I’ve been successful on a vLC diet and enjoyed your documentary very much. Can you provide an update on how the villagers in MBFD are doing now? Hopefully the conventional doctors & nutritionists haven’t persuaded them to go back to high carb low fat “healthy” eating.
Dr. Jay’s Reply:
I am overdue for a visit to Alert Bay but the people I have seen recently are doing well. I think some have fallen into their old ways of eating and have regained some or all of their weight. I saw Greg Wadhams a couple of months ago and he was still doing well. One of the problems we had was that a much larger number of people changed their diet than the few who signed up for the study. This was a problem only in the sense that we weren’t geared up to measure the impact that was having in the community at large. I am looking at ways of doing this retrospectively and hopefully will have some data to show that there was, in fact, a lasting effect. Stay tuned.
Dr. Jay, I realise that you are too busy to read this all the time but this is a particularly good one.
http://thebunnellfarm.blogspot.com/
Thanks!
Dr. Jay
This is important or I would not be bothering you.
I am writing a very powerful book online with chapters added occasionally until it’s finished.
The Title, Forward and Prolog are posted right now as we speak.
It will read from the bottom up as it is posted daily on my blog rather than from the top to the bottom like it should be read, I will no doubt do this properly on it’s own web site later on when it’s finished, making it easier to read!
It’s a bunch!
Please visit and take a quick look, Thank you.
Tom
http://thebunnellfarm.blogspot.com/
Babo Hannah Productions
The Bunnell Farm . com
Tom Bunnell to Mary.Bissell
Show details 8:50 AM (18 minutes ago) July 1, 2009
Mary
What would you say about a film company that made a wonderful documentary about an unknown discovery by a doctor in Canada and his cure for the Worldwide AIDS Epidemic that is killing millions of people and that was actual and real and not the wishful thinking on some eccentric but the actual cause and the actual cure for AIDS, and then this film company “sits on it” except for whatever momentum it builds after the initial release, waiting for it to catch ahold while millions of people die needlessly because they do not know about this cause and cure for AIDS because the film company does not realize what they have or the need for or how to promote it and get the word out.
Dr. Jay’s discovery regarding sugar and carbohydrates and health is much larger than a cure for AIDS would be and will have a much greater impact on this worlds health and population than you could ever imagine.
You don’t want me for free and I pay all expenses and ask for nothing in return, ever. So please find a way to get this word out on your own or hire somebody to do it for you.
This will eventually ignite on it’s own because it is so actual and real and you have presented it so beautifully but the months and years lost to lack of exposure is incredible and unforgivable!
Thank You, Tom
—
Babo Hannah Productions
The Bunnell Farm . com
Dr. Jay
Please see todays post.
http://thebunnellfarm.blogspot.com/
I am copying from TV and handing out thousands of DVD’s of My Big Fat Diet to everyone, everywhere.
Celebrities included.
Every tribe in America and Canada and South America will receive several copies each.
Sales of the actual documentary should go through the roof when this thing catches hold.
PBS and Frontline will no doubt wake up too.
eBay and Amazon and YouTube will also be included as well as MySpace and the other internet sites.
All world organizations will receive several copies.
(They are not nearly the quality of the genuine but the message is all there.)
Thank You
Tom
Dr. Wortman:
I am new to your site, having discovered it through a link provided for a commentator on the New York Times’s recent feature “Diabetic Voices.” I am very excited to learn about your project with the Aboriginals (although I think I may have heard about it before when I was helping my college son with a speech he was giving about “Good Calories, Bad Calories” – which tells you that seeking correct, scientific nutritional advice is a family affair!) My family has a significant history of metabolic syndrome, insulin resistance, and Type II diabetes, although I find nothing in our family tree to explain ethnically why that is the case: Grandfather – leg amputation and died within months; Father – died of congestive heart failure at 69 and was nearly blind with diabetic retinopathy; sister with obesity issues and high blood pressure diagnosed as Type II at age 48; brother (not overweight) had severe mood/energy swings and began to think he had chronic fatigue and/or “was crazy!” (he’s a character); daughter weighed 320 at age 16, lost 150 pounds, but now struggles with bulimia; son treated with Ritalin for ADHD starting at age 13 and experienced problems with substance abuse (self-medicated with marijuana); I struggled to keep my weight down all my life following a low-fat, low-calorie diet with exercise but had progressively worse reactive hypo-glycemia, gastro-intestinal problems, and alternating hyper-anxiety and “brain-fog.” Just before Christmas of 1999, I was shopping in a bookstore when “The Carbohydrate-Addicts Diet” jumped off the shelf. I read the symptom checklist and I had them all! (My brother, coincidentally, had the same experience half-way across the country.) I changed my diet, as did my brother and sister. As my children grew older, they made similar changes. Most of us are doing miraculously well and I consider Robert Atkins, Gary Taubes, Richard Bernstein (and now Jay Wortman) to be my heroes – they all literally saved my health and life. My sister is one of those who still struggles. I am not sure why she can’t lose weight or get good control of her blood sugar. I may suggest that she write you so you can perhaps get an accurate sense of what medications she takes and and a better analysis of her diet. (Her doctor is useless; he puts her on every diabetic medication known and adamantly claims she WILL be on insulin within 10 years) I know she is strictly low-carb, but perhaps she is not getting enough fat? My weight is pretty stable, maybe a bit higher than I like, although at age 56 I look OK. My concern is that when I gain a few pounds, my insulin levels may be elevated. My family doc doesn’t include insulin levels in her routine blood work. She is concerned about my cholesterol – LDL is 140, HDL 89. The HDL has been as much as 20 points higher. My triglycerides, however, are 51, so I’m not terribly concerned. I am post-menopausal which I understand can cause HDL levels to drop. My last fasting blood sugar was 88. (I only go to the doctor every three years or so, but my partner is a retired physician so I do get good medical advice, and he completely supports my low-carb lifestyle) I take no medications and ride a bike and jog as much as 10 hours a week.
I did start snacking on peanuts the past few years, and wonder if that is what I’m “doing wrong.”
I hadn’t intended to write so much, but wanted to share my story. I am some what of an “activist” for the low-carb lifestyle, but it is a tough fight. Just yesterday, our local paper had a story suggesting that eliminating smoking and red meat, exercising, and eating fruits and vegetables would reduce American medical costs by 75%. The “no-red meat” thing is the hardest thing to fight. I can’t find any valid scientific evidence against eating red meat, but I do get a bit concerned since “everyone says it is bad.”
What is your take on that?
Thanks again for your blog and willingness to engage with us who are truly seeking the “truth” about diet and nutrition.
Peggy A. Holloway, Omaha, NE
Dr Jay’s Reply:
Thank you for sharing your story. Although you don’t have an obvious ancestral link that is identified with these problems your situation clearly illustrates the fact that genetics have a lot to do with susceptibility. I am glad to hear you and your relatives figured this out and that most of you are benefiting from the low-carb approach.
A couple of specific comments: I have had slightly elevated LDL at times and I don’t worry too much about this as along as my HDL is relatively high and triglycerides are low. We know from the studies by Cassandra Forsythe and Jeff Volek that LDL particle size tends to shift to the more healthy range on low-carb. Although this isn’t routinely tested for, if HDL/triglycerides ratio is looking good and you are eating low carb it is probably safe to assume the LDL is of the healthier variety.
I find that my sensitivity to carbs is high enough that I am better off avoiding nuts. Remember that peanuts are actually legumes. They do contain some carbs. If you are eating sufficient quantities and you are especially sensitive to carbs, it can have an effect. I felt better when I stopped eating them altogether.
When I read your story of all the problems you and your siblings have had and how things seem to be much better on low-carb I have to say I am not too surprised. It is looking like a whole range of health problems from weight to mental health are linked to metabolic syndrome and we know from good research the metabolic syndrome gets a whole lot better on low-carb. It stands to reason that other conditions linked to metabolic syndrome should improve, too. I hear anecdotal stories about things like mental health improvements but, so far, I haven’t seen any studies. There has been one paper written by a professor at the University of Toronto which argues, convincingly in my opinion, that major depression should be considered part of metabolic syndrome. All this to say that you and your family seem to have a particular sensitivity to carbohydrates that is manifested in many different ways and that the obvious therapy is carb restriction.
Thanks again for sharing your story and good luck with the diet.
Dr. Wortman, I just saw your documentary on The Lens tonight on CBC.
It’s wonderful work, especially as it relates to First Nations and the problems with diabetes. Congratulations to you.
Research shows that the Transcendental Meditation Technique also helps control diabetes and a new research study is underway in the US with the Winnebago First Nation, related to this. I work with the David Lynch Foundation Canada, which may be looking for a research partner to study the effects of this form of meditation to control diabetes in First Nation’s communities in Canada. Are you interested in research collaboration?
As a Metis health professional, you might be interested in attending a conference in Iowa at the end of September called the American Indian Sustainable Conference. You can find out more at:
http://www.americanindiansustainableconference.org/
There are a number of First Nation’s people from Canada attending the conference, including a group from BC.
There is a heartfelt video link on the site called “TM and Diabetes Among Native Americans”, which you might enjoy.
Dr Jay’s Reply:
Thanks for your comment. I had a look at the video on TM and Diabetes. I have no doubt that stress is a significant factor in chronic disease and that something like TM, which can lower stress, should be beneficial. I also think that someone who gets into TM, because of the commitment it requires, is also going to be more likely to comply with other aspects of their treatment. I expect the research will validate this. I would be happy to be involved although I am sure you understand that my focus is primarily on diet.
The conference looks interesting but I expect to be on parental leave at that time which means that my usual funding sources for travel and meetings won’t be available to me (I am still be accepting invitations to speak at meetings where the organizers cover expenses).
My interest in diet extends to issues related to food security, as well. I think the whole question of sustainability is becoming very important for everyone these days and that populations or communities that are disadvantaged in the current economic environment will be truly in harm’s way as the global economic system starts to self-destruct. I think First Nations communities need to start looking at food security and energy security which are inter-related. Fortunately there appear to be lots of people who get this and efforts to raise awareness are underway and I sometimes get invited to the discussion.
Hi again:
I posted another comment after your new entry from yesterday,not realizing that you had replied! Thanks!
I will remain a devoted follower of this blog!
Peggy
Oh – one more thing!
I stopped eating nuts two weeks ago, and my small deposit of subcutaneous fat (good old “love handles”) has visibly diminished. Even my SO has noticed!
So, thanks for mentioning the issues with nuts ( and yes, I know peanuts are legumes – which I usually don’t eat, so I don’t know why I became complacent about the peanuts).
It appears that even with significant exercise, I am absolutely
carbohydrate intolerant – so I will stick to my steaks, eggs,
and green veggies – not a bad way to eat for life!
I don’t have a DVD player and don’t see where I can by the book. Is there a book ? I am a good cook and in spite of the huge amount of info available I cannot find a basic list of what foods are ok and what not so I can just make up my own recipes. Where could I get a list? I love this blog and am counting on making use of this diet.
Dr Jay’s Reply:
There is no book yet. I hope to write one soon as I get that question all the time. I recently gave a lecture to a bunch of doctors and that was one of the first comments. So, clearly there is a need. My dilemma, aside from finding the time, is that there are about a zillion new diet books published every year so it is hard to make a go of it. I think I will try, however, this doesn’t solve your more immediate problem.
Some people need to have everything spelled out for them in terms of exactly what foods to eat and when. This is why the Atkins books, for instance, include recipes and daily meal plans. Other people can simply learn which are the foods to avoid and then can eat everything else. If you are the creative type, it can be fun to develop your own recipes and to experiment with different foods. When we showed the documentary to the people of Alert Bay, many people in the audience got up and said how much fun it had been to go on the diet for that reason.
In the most simple terms, all you have to learn is which foods contain carbs. That means any foods that have a significant amount of starch or sugar. That means both naturally occurring food or those that have been manufactured. For example, a chocolate bar is a manufactured product that obviously contains a lot of refined sugar and should be avoided. Not so obvious is the fact that a piece of pineapple also contains a lot of sugar even though it is a natural product, a fruit, that is supposed to be part of a healthy diet. Same with starch. Pasta is made from refined flour and is high in starch so is to be avoided. But so are potatoes, which are vegetables and, as such, are supposed to be part of a healthy “balanced” diet.
So, it can be a little confusing if you are new to the concept of a low-carb diet. The internet offers lots of good information on this. I would encourage you to use google to find out the carb content of any type of food. I recommend finding a “carb counter”, too. You can sometimes find them in booklet form at bookstores but there is also one on the Atkins.com website. Go there and on the home page, use the search to find “carb counter” (once you find it, you can download a pdf so you don’t have to keep searching for it). This will list the amount of carb in many types of food. The numbers you are interested in are those in the “net carbs” and the quantity columns. This will guide you in terms of how much carb a portion of food contains. You want to stick to foods with very low numbers in the net carb column.
I expect you will quickly learn which foods contain carbs and will need to use these kinds of resources less often over time.
Good luck with your diet plans.
Pingback: rezezapyf
Saw your show on Aug 18… Amazing. I decided to try it.
ONE MONTH and WOW is all I have to say.
Before After
======== ========
Weight 251 234 (-17 lbs)
Blood Pressure 125/85 105/70 (WOW!)
Triglyceride 1.46 0.85
Cholesterol 5.17 4.12
HDL 1.04 1.00
LDL 3.47 2.73
HDL/LDL Ratio 5.0 4.1
HS-CRP — 0.8
WHY does the medical community continue to push a low fat / high carb diet when it’s OBVIOUSLY killing people?
Dr Jay’s Reply:
Thanks for posting your results. It is encouraging to see how well you have done. Those improvements are consistent with what I have seen in the many studies and from anecdotal reports of individual cases.
A couple of observations:
I expect you may see a rise in LDL. Most of the research shows either a slight rise or no change in LDL. It is unusual to see a significant drop. At the same time, HDL usually goes up which can cause total cholesterol to rise above normal, too. If this happens, the ratios are usually in the healthy range but some physicians will interpret these as harmful developments. I don’t agree.
Firstly, LDL on its own is a weak indicator of cardiovascular risk. There have been studies that correlate reducing LDL with improved CVD risk but these results are obtained by statin drugs. It is becoming clearer that statins may deliver their benefits through their anti-inflammatory effect rather than through changes to LDL levels. On top of that, we now know that the size of LDL sub-particles is the important thing. What has been found is that sub-particles that are small and dense increase the risk while the light fluffy variety are healthier. Statins don’t change the sub-particle size but cutting carbs does. So, if your LDL is high and you are eating a very low carb diet and your other markers like triglycerides, HDL and CRP look good, I certainly wouldn’t worry about the LDL. Nor would I consider a statin which, unfortunately, is the knee-jerk response in many cases.
Your HDL number has not gone up which suggests to me that you may be avoiding saturated fat. This is not necessary but the fear of fat is highly ingrained now, so many people will try to do low-carb and low-fat. You can probably maintain that for awhile as long as you are losing weight and burning off your stored body fat. However, once you weight loss reaches a plateau, you will need to increase your fat intake in order to remain on the diet. Increasing protein is not a good option as too much of it will make you feel quite unwell. I would expect an increase in your fat intake, particularly saturated fat, would drive your HDL up (a good thing) but as I said earlier, may also increase your LDL and total cholesterol numbers which appears to be not a bad thing as long as you are keeping the carbs very low.
The blood pressure numbers are interesting, too. A couple of things contribute to this. When you stop eating carbs your kidneys stop retaining salt. This release of salt in your urine will take fluid with it, something called diuresis, which will lower blood pressure. There is also another factor in play linked to the role of fructose. The metabolism of fructose in the liver generates uric acid which not only predisposes you to gout but also interferes with the regulation of blood pressure. Taking fructose out of the diet, which is what happens on low carb, helps to restore normal blood vessel function. This, along with the diuresis, can have a significant effect on blood pressure to the point that people on anti-hypertensive medications have to be very careful with low carb and usually have to discontinue their meds. This blood pressure regulatory mechanism is also involved in erectile dysfunction so I would expect that people who have experienced that problem can probably save on Viagra, too!
Good luck with the diet!
Humm… my table didn’t display very well in the post above. But the good news is my HDL/LDL ratio rolled back from borderline to normal and my BP went back to how it was in High School. Not bad for a 49 year old!
Oh and incase anyone wonders… I’m caucasian (don’t let the nickname fool you – long story) So yes, this diet also works for non-natives. We are all the same on the inside.
Dr Jay’s Reply:
I fixed the table for you.
You are right about the effectiveness of the diet across ethnicities. What the science is telling us is that the disorders associated with insulin resistance will respond to this kind of diet. It happens that insulin resistance occurs at a greater rate in some populations, including Aboriginal populations, but the benefits can be obtained by anyone who has this problem.
My son is 15 years old and has always been overweight. He is 6 foot 2 and 290 pounds. He fully participates in PE at school, plays on several school teams and played water polo (6 hrs a week) for several years. He has been tested for diabetes and it is negative. I also asked to have his metabolism tested and I’m told it is fine too. We eat healthy low fat meals high in protein and veggies and low in starches. Any pasta, bread or rice we have is whole grain. Any pop we have is diet pop. He only has one glass of fruit juice a day as a maximum.
Something needs to change for him but I have no idea what it is. I don’t want to just put him on a ‘diet’ not knowing what the problem is as he will just gain the weight back again. I have asked professionals for help over the years and they all tell me to leave him alone and he will lose the weight as he goes through puberty. His diet is good and he gets enough exercise so he is ‘fine’. He has stretch marks on his belly! That doesn’t seem fine to me.
Do you have a study he might be able to participate in? Is there something else he should be tested for? Could it be an intolerance to a certain kind of food?
I’m looking for some advice please
Julie
Dr Jay’s Reply:
We are planning a study at the BC Children’s Hospital for kids who have metabolic syndrome. From what you have described, your son might qualify. If you are in BC, I would recommend the Endocrine unit at BCCH where they will be able to assess him and, once the study starts, possibly include him.
Without clearly figuring out why your son is overweight, it is difficult to prescribe a corrective regimen. Having said that, I cannot imagine that he would be harmed by the type of diet discussed here. There was an old diagnostic technique that doctors used to use to determine if a dietary intolerance was behind a medical condition. It was called an “elimination diet”. You eliminate the food that you think is problematic. If the symptoms go away, you add it back into the diet. If the problems reappear, you have your diagnosis. In effect, a low-carb diet can diagnose an intolerance to carbohydrates. If the diet works and the excess weight and related problems like high blood pressure, high blood sugar, bad cholesterol, etc go away and then, if they return when you resume eating carbs, you essentially diagnose a carbohydrate intolerance. Nobody else thinks of it this way, as far as I can tell, but I have seen it so often that it seems obvious to me. You might consider the possibility that your son has this problem. I would certainly suggest you get the sugar out of his diet as a start, and that includes any fruit juice. Be sure to read labels as they sneak it into everything these days.
Hi
I am just getting started with nocarbs. Just 3 days now. I am 53 a history of high blood pressure along with the rest of my family on both parents side . I am Caucasian ok I can say it…and .obese and have been most of my life. I did lose 40 pounds 2 years ago then quit smoking and have gained 60 lbs since. I live between 2 large reserves and think I can be a motivator for the rampant health issues that plague our community. My wife is a type2 diabetic and on the no carb change with me. I am an LPN so I will be monitoring our B/P’s and her blood sugars as not to fall out as we are both on meds. Hello to all fellow no-carbers and Thank-you Doc. Best to you and your family.
Dr Jay’s Reply,
Good luck with that!
Dr. Wortman,
I want to go on a high fat, low carb diet. I have not found on this website the guidelines of the diet that the Alert Bay participants were given.
Could you please tell me what oils and/or fats you recommended or would recommend to subsitute the oolichan oil?
How much oil/fat should I eat?
How much protein?
How much low glycemic vegetables?
Did you only permit vegetables that were 15 or less on the glycemic scale?
Are all vegetables at 15 or less ok on this diet?
Please help me with this. Thank you so much – your study gives me hope
Hannele.
Dr Jay’s Reply:
My colleague, Dr. Steve Phinney, recommends using a mixture of 2 parts butter, one part olive oil and one part canola oil. Store it in the fridge and use for cooking and on veggies. You can add garlic and spices to make a savory spread, as well. I use lots of oils and fats. I recommend people let their appetite guide them. When you cut carbs, it appears that normal appetite regulations is restored and you will find you eat less because you feel full. For protein, I also suggest eating what pleases you and stopping when you are full.
For vegetables, the study diet might be a little more restrictive than actually needed. I generally recommend people eat as much non-starchy veggies as they want. Remember, avoid root vegetables as this is where the starch and sugar gets stored. You can use a little onion for flavour, ditto garlic but avoid potatoes, carrots, beets, etc. Also, remember that corn is actually a grain – to be avoided.
If you are eating other vegetables, it is wise to consult a carb-counter to check to make sure aren’t contributing too much in the way of net carbs.