Eye-Opening

It happened first when I first read about meat factories. And it happened again when I read a bunch of Michael Pollan's books. Well, it's happening again. My eyes are being opened in regards to the food we eat and our health. This time as a result of reading "The Paleo Solution:The Original Human Diet" by Robb Wolf. You know that I've been doing the whole 30 days of eating paleo thing, well I wanted to read up more on it, and read some reviews about how this book explained it all but in a down to earth way (in other words, a little less technically for those of us without a science background). So I downloaded it onto my kindle and as I lounged around the house yesterday feeling pretty crummy, I read it.

Can I just say, "Wow"?

Wow.

Reading this made me want to run to my kitchen and throw out anything and everything with gluten in it. Seriously. I wouldn't be that drastic, at least not with Erik and the kids--they'd need more time to get use to the idea, but I'm more than ready to pull the plug, for myself. I wasn't really surprised to learn that all the federal suggestions/guidelines/etc are so completely off of what our bodies genetically need. I was interested to find out how our bodies digest and use protein, carbs and fat. And how what we eat has a huge influence on our health. I mean, I've known that what you eat determines health for a while--starting a couple years back when the naturalpath had me change my diet to help my cholesterol. But now it's all so much clearer to me really how big of a difference it makes. It's like a puzzle in which I've slowly been putting the pieces together. I can almost see the whole picture now.

Some of the pieces include...

-Back when I thought I had PCOS and did a bunch of reading on ways to help it, I discovered that a low-glycemic diet helped with some of the symptoms.
-Then when I went to see the naturalpath, and she had me go on a low-glycemic diet to help my cholesterol--which seemed soo weird. I thought to help cholesterol it would be all controlly of meat/fat intake, but it was more limiting of bread and dairy.
-And then again when I sought weight-loss advice from my regular doctor and she suggested trying to cut out gluten and dairy (remember, just last spring when I did that whole "gluten-free" thing?) and increasing healthy fats.

While reading this book, I realized that it's all connected. And unfortunately, it's all related to eating a "standard American diet". No wonder it's referred to as S.A.D..

I have some more reading to do on the subject, and I definitely have questions, but for the most part, I am sold. I'm going to finish my "thirty-days" and probably even start the workouts recommended in this book (I was looking for something different to do anyways). And depending on how I feel at the end of 30 days and what else I learn, I will act from there. I casually mentioned to Erik last night about thinking it might be worth it to stop eating grains and he wasn't thrilled. And Kera wasn't either when I casually asked the girls this morning what they'd think of not eating toast and cereal in the morning. It would be a tough sell, I think, which is all the more reason for me to be sure myself first.

If you are interested in your health and how it relates to what you eat, I would highly recommend reading this book. It is eye-opening!