Thread: Wheatbelly - Today's wheat is not what you think it is

Has anyone read this book? I've listened to couple audios on it and its sounds quite interesting. The author claims that today's wheat is more of a scientific creation than something we would find in nature. By removing wheat from your diet, you may see many benefits such as weight loss. I've never really removed wheat from my diet so I think I might give this a try just to see what effects it has after the new year.


Here's a part of the book from someone's blog:

Quoting Wheat Belly:
I recognize that declaring wheat a malicious food is like declaring that Ronald Reagan was a Communist. It may seem absurd, even unpatriotic, to demote an iconic dietary staple to the status of public health hazard. But I will make the case that the world’s most popular grain is also the world’s most destructive dietary ingredient.
Documented peculiar effects of wheat on humans include appetite stimulation, exposure to brain-active exorphins (the counterpart of internally derived endorphins), exaggerated blood sugar surges that trigger cycles of satiety alternating with heightened appetite, the process of glycation that underlies disease and aging, inflammatory and pH effects that erode cartilage and damage bone, and activation of disordered immune responses. A complex range of diseases results from consumption of wheat, from celiac disease -- the devastating intestinal disease that develops from exposure to wheat gluten -- to an assortment of neurological disorders, diabetes, heart disease, arthritis, curious rashes, and the paralyzing delusions of schizophrenia.

If this thing called wheat is such a problem, then removing it should yield outsize and unexpected benefits. Indeed, that is the case. As a cardiologist who sees and treats thousands of patients at risk for heart disease, diabetes, and the myriad destructive effects of obesity, I have personally observed protuberant, flop-over-the-belt belly fat vanish when my patients eliminated wheat from their diets, with typical weight loss totaling 20, 30, or 50 pounds just within the first few months. Rapid and effortless weight loss is usually followed by health benefits that continue to amaze me even today after having witnessed this phenomenon thousands of times.

I’ve seen dramatic turnarounds in health, such as the thirty-eight-year-old woman with ulcerative colitis facing colon removal who was cured with wheat elimination -- colon intact. Or the twenty-six-year-old man, incapacitated and barely able to walk because of joint pain, who experienced complete relief and walked and ran freely again after taking wheat off the menu.

Extraordinary as these results may sound, there is ample scientific research to implicate wheat as the root cause of these conditions -- and to indicate that removal of wheat can reduce or relieve symptoms entirely. [...]

I call it wheat belly, though I could have just as easily called this condition pretzel brain or bagel bowel or biscuit face since there’s not an organ system unaffected by wheat. But wheat’s impact on the waistline is its most visible and defining characteristic, an outward expression of the grotesque distortions humans experience with consumption of this grain. [...]
Many overweight people, in fact, are quite health conscious... Most will say something like "I don’t get it. I exercise five days a week. I’ve cut my fat and increased my healthy whole grains. Yet I can’t seem to stop gaining weight!" [...]

Diabetics became nondiabetics. That’s right: Diabetes in many cases can be cured -- not simply managed -- by removal of carbohydrates, especially wheat, from the diet. Many of my patients had also lost twenty, thirty, even forty pounds.

But it’s what I didn’t expect that astounded me.

They reported that symptoms of acid reflux disappeared and the cyclic cramping and diarrhea of irritable bowel syndrome were gone. Their energy improved, they had greater focus, sleep was deeper. Rashes disappeared, even rashes that had been present for many years. Their rheumatoid arthritis pain improved or disappeared, enabling them to cut back, even eliminate, the nasty medications used to treat it. Asthma symptoms improved or resolved completely, allowing many to throw away their inhalers. Athletes reported more consistent performance.
Thinner. More energetic. Clearer thinking. Better bowel, joint, and lung health. Time and time again. Surely these results were reason enough to forgo wheat. [...]

The bottom line: Elimination of this food, part of human culture for more centuries than Larry King was on the air, will make you sleeker, smarter, faster, and happier. Weight loss, in particular, can proceed at a pace you didn’t think possible. And you can selectively lose the most visible, insulin-opposing, diabetes-creating, inflammation-producing, embarrassment-causing fat: belly fat. It is a process accomplished with virtually no hunger or deprivation, with a wide spectrum of health benefits. [...]

So why has this seemingly benign plant that sustained generations of humans suddenly turned on us? For one thing, it is not the same grain our fore-bearers ground into their daily bread. Wheat naturally evolved to only a modest degree over the centuries, but it has changed dramatically in the past fifty years under the influence of agricultural scientists. Wheat strains have been hybridized, crossbred, and introgressed to make the wheat plant resistant to environmental conditions, such as drought, or pathogens, such as fungi. But most of all, genetic changes have been induced to increase yield per acre. The average yield on a modern North American farm is more than tenfold greater than farms of a century ago. Such enormous strides in yield have required drastic changes in the genetic code, including reducing the proud "amber waves of grain" of yesteryear to the rigid, eighteen-inch-tall high-production "dwarf" wheat of today. Such fundamental genetic changes, as you will see, have come at a price.

Must-Read: Wheat Belly







Here's an audio mp3 torrent on this which I really enjoyed. It's just another radio interview but its very clear and the host has some good questions.

http://kat.ph/underground-wellness-w...-t5875805.html



Sometime after the new year when I get intoo BKK or another big town, I plan on getting the book.

I thought it was fairly common knowledge that wheat isn't particularly good for you. My body is certainly much happier without it, but my brain isn't, so I shall continue to imbibe beer and bread albeit having awareness of the consequences of too much of either.

His argument is that modern wheat is the problem. It's kind of like that GM corn but wasn't developed through GM. He says the process that created today's wheat was much worse than GM. It had less control over outcomes. In addition, he notes that there is no testing of wheat as having negative effects by the FDA. It's development into today's product was totally unchecked. The gov't is all about pushing grains on people.


I don't think its commonly accept that wheat is bad for us. For those willing to looking into alternative opinions, it might be more accepted. Governments still push wheat as a healthy food. It probably in everything just like corn. In the audio torrent link the topic of bread and wheat in the bible comes up. He goes into that and explains the difference of today's grains and grains at that time. We live in a new world. For many, that bible link means something. How can it be bad for you God recommends it. Anyways...

To be honest, the FDA are no better than the NRA in being servants for the people. Just another American organisation owned by big business and pandering to big business agenda.

The US government and their bodies have no integrity.

That seems to be the truth. Still the world is getting fatter by the day and the people gaining weight come from all backgrounds. Someday something might just give.

This almost applies to most modern food properties - especially in the West.

So...what's the arguement?
Denial?

interesting, more here.

Wheat Belly Blog | Lose the Wheat Lose the Weight

I'm always skeptical of stuff like this , he points out a problem you did not know you had and offers to sell you a solution - his book ...
Sounds like another low carb, Atkins like diet , dressed up to sell his product.

Perhaps some people are allergic to wheat , but it seems many allergies to things while real , exist only because the person is malnourished and thus are temporary , and the best way to overcome them is to be better nourished , not cut out healthy foods .

I like reading the one star reviews of things on Amazon

Amazon.com: Customer Reviews: Wheat Belly: Lose the Wheat, Lose the Weight, and Find Your Path Back to Health

eg charlie

This is a terribly misleading book. A healthy life for most people means a balanced diet and plenty of exercise. Blaming one of the world's oldest staple crops for rising obesity rates is scientifically unjustified and, frankly, laughable.