In addition, eliminating wheat from your diet actually enhances B vitamin absorption. It is not uncommon, for instance, for vitamin B12 and folate, along with levels of iron, zinc, calcium, and magnesium, to increase with removal of wheat, since gastrointestinal health improves, grain phytates are removed, and, along with it, nutrient absorption goes up.
Eliminating wheat may be inconvenient, but it is certainly not unhealthy.
SCHEDULE YOUR RADICAL WHEAT-ECTOMY
Thankfully, eliminating all wheat from your diet is not as bad as setting up mirrors and scalpels to remove your own appendix without anesthesia. For some people, it’s a simple matter of passing up the bagel shop or turning down the sweet rolls. For others, it can be a distinctly unpleasant experience on par with a root canal or living with your in-laws for a month.
In my experience, the most effective and, ultimately, the easiest way to eliminate wheat is to do it abruptly and completely. The insulin-glucose roller coaster caused by wheat, along with brain-addictive exorphin effects, make it difficult for some people to gradually reduce wheat, so abrupt cessation is preferable. Abrupt and complete elimination of wheat will, in the susceptible, trigger withdrawal phenomenon. But getting through the withdrawal that accompanies abrupt cessation may be easier than the gnawing fluctuations of cravings that usually accompany just cutting back—not much different from an alcoholic trying to go dry. Nonetheless, some people are more comfortable with gradual reduction rather than abrupt elimination. Either way, the end result is the same.
By now, I’m confident you’re attuned to the fact that wheat is not just about bread. Wheat is ubiquitous—it’s in everything.
Many people, on first setting out to identify foods containing wheat, find it in nearly all the processed foods they have been eating, including the most improbable places such as canned “cream” soups and “healthy” frozen dinners. Wheat is there for three reasons: One, like sugar, it tastes good. Two, it stimulates appetite. Three, it’s a cheap filler that provides the appearance of plenty at low cost. The latter reasons are not for your benefit, of course, but for the benefit of food manufacturers. To food manufacturers, wheat is like nicotine in cigarettes: the best insurance they have to encourage continued consumption. (Incidentally, other common ingredients in processed foods that increase consumption, though not as potent as wheat’s effects, include high-fructose corn syrup, sucrose, and cornstarch.)
Removing wheat does, without question, require forethought. Foods made with wheat have the inarguable advantage of convenience: Sandwiches and wraps, for example, are easily carried, stored, and eaten out of hand. Avoiding wheat means taking your own food to work and using a fork or spoon to eat it, or re-creating sandwich bread with non-grain ingredients (as in the recipes in this book) and filling with bacon, lettuce, and tomato. It may mean you need to shop more often and—heaven forbid—cook. Greater dependence on vegetables and fresh fruit can also mean going to the store, farmers’ market, or greengrocer a couple of times a week.
However, the inconvenience factor is far from insurmountable. It might mean a few minutes of advance preparation, such as cutting and wrapping a hunk of cheese and putting it in a baggie to bring along to work, along with several handfuls of raw almonds and vegetable soup in a container. It might mean setting aside some of your spinach salad from dinner to eat the following morning for breakfast. (Yes: dinner for breakfast, a useful strategy.)
People who habitually consume wheat products become crabby, foggy, and tired after just a couple of hours of not having a wheat product, often desperately searching for any crumb or morsel to relieve the pain, a phenomenon I’ve watched with dry amusement from my comfortable wheat-free vantage point. But once you’ve eliminated wheat from your diet, appetite is no longer driven by the glucose-insulin roller coaster of satiety and hunger, and you won’t need to get your next “fix” of brain-active exorphins. After a 7:00 a.m. breakfast of two scrambled eggs with vegetables, peppers, and olive oil, for instance, you likely won’t be hungry until noon or 1:00 p.m., maybe even 3:00 to 5:00 p.m. Compare this to the 90- to 120-minute cycle of insatiable hunger most people experience after a 7:00 a.m. bowl of high-fiber breakfast cereal, necessitating a 9 o’clock snack and another 11 o’clock snack or early lunch. You can see how easy it becomes to cut the 400 or more calories per day from your overall consumption that results naturally and unconsciously with wheat elimination. You will also avoid the afternoon slump that many people experience at about 2:00 or 3:00 p.m., the sleepy, sluggish fog that follows a lunch of a sandwich on whole wheat bread, the mental shutdown that occurs because of the glucose high followed by the low. A lunch, for instance, of tuna (without bread) mixed with mayonnaise or olive oil–based dressing, along with zucchini slices and a handful (or several handfuls) of walnuts will not trigger the glucose-insulin high-low at all, just a seamless, normal blood sugar that has no sleep- or fog-provoking effect.
FASTING: EASIER THAN YOU THINK
Fasting can be a powerful tool for regaining health: weight loss, reduction in blood pressure, improved insulin responses, accelerated reversal of type 2 diabetes and fatty liver disease, longevity, and improvement in numerous other health conditions.1 Fasting quickly and dramatically reverses insulin resistance, the process underlying so many modern health conditions.
For the average person eating a typical American diet that includes wheat, however, fasting is a painful ordeal that requires monumental willpower. People who regularly consume wheat products are rarely able to fast successfully for more than a few hours, usually giving up in a frenzy of eating everything in sight.
Interestingly, elimination of wheat makes fasting far easier, nearly effortless.
Fasting means no food, just water (vigorous hydration is also key for safe fasting—even better, lightly salt your water, as you need salt during a fast), for a period of anywhere from eighteen hours to several days. People who are wheat-free can fast for eighteen, twenty-four, thirty-six, seventy-two, or more hours with little or no discomfort. The ability to fast, of course, mimics the natural situation of a hunter-gatherer, who may go without food for days when the hunt fails or some other natural obstacle to food availability develops.
Brief, intermittent fasting—best undertaken no sooner than four weeks after you have endured and completed your withdrawal from all wheat and grains—can be used to break a weight loss plateau or accelerate reversal of conditions such as type 2 diabetes, fatty liver, and autoimmune conditions.
The ability to fast comfortably is natural; the inability to go for more than a few hours before crazily seeking calories is unnatural.
Most people find it hard to believe that wheat elimination can in the long run make their lives easier, not tougher. Wheat-free people are freed from the desperate cyclic scramble for food every two hours and are comfortable going for extended periods without food. When they finally sit down to eat, they are contented with less. Life…simplified.
Many people are, in effect, enslaved by wheat and the habits and schedules dictated to them by its availability. A radical wheat-ectomy therefore amounts to more than just removing one component of your diet. It removes a potent stimulant of appetite from your life, one that rules behavior and impulse frequently and relentlessly. Removing wheat will set you free.
WHEATAHOLICS AND THE WHEAT WITHDRAWAL SYNDROME
Approximately 40 percent of people who remove wheat products abruptly from their diets will experience a withdrawal effect. Unlike opiate drug or alcohol withdrawal, wheat withdrawal does not result in seizures or hallucinations, blackouts, or other dangerous phenomena, but it can nonetheless be unpleasant.
The people who suffer through withdrawal the most are usually the same people who experienced incredible cravings for wheat products. These are the people who habitually eat pretzels, crackers, and bread many times a day as a result of the powerful eating impulse triggered by wheat. Missing a snack or meal causes
distress: shakiness, nervousness, headache, fatigue, and intense cravings, all of which can persist for the duration of the withdrawal period.
What causes wheat withdrawal? Depriving the brain of wheat gliadin–derived exorphins triggers an opiate-withdrawal syndrome (that can be mimicked, by the way, by administering an opiate-blocking drug such as naltrexone). The moodiness, nausea, headache, and incapacitating fatigue are reminiscent of withdrawal from morphine or OxyContin. Years of high-carbohydrate grain eating also makes the metabolism reliant on a constant supply of readily absorbed sugars. Removing sugar sources forces the body to adapt to mobilizing and burning fatty acids stored in fat cells instead, a process that requires several days to kick in (four to six weeks for full ramp-up, as athletes often discover). However, this step is a necessary part of converting from fat deposition to fat mobilization and shrinking the visceral fat of the wheat belly. (Atkins diet aficionados call this process “induction flu,” ketogenic diet followers call it “keto flu,” reflecting their incomplete understanding of the process.)
There are a number of ways to soften the blow. The first is to taper wheat gradually over a week, an approach that works for only some people. However, be warned: Some people are so addicted to wheat that they find even this tapering process to be overwhelming because of the repetitive re-awakening of addictive phenomena with each bite of bagel or bun. For people with strong wheat addiction, going cold turkey (shall we call it cold noodle?) may be the only way to break the cycle. It’s similar to alcoholism. If your friend drinks two fifths of bourbon a day and you urge him to cut back to two glasses a day, he would indeed be healthier and live longer—but it is virtually impossible for him to do it.
Second, if you believe that you are among those who will experience withdrawal, choosing the right time to transition off wheat is important. Select a period of time when you don’t need to be at your best, e.g., a week off from work or a long weekend. The mental fog and sluggishness experienced by some people can be significant, making prolonged concentration and work performance difficult. (You should certainly not expect any sympathy from your boss or co-workers, who will probably scoff at your explanation and say things like “Tom’s afraid of the bagels!”)
Because at least some of the weight lost during this initial phase of wheat elimination involves loss of inflammatory edema (water retention), it is important to hydrate more than usual. I have actually seen people pass out during the first week from inadequate hydration. It is also important to salt your food to compensate for the urinary loss of salt that results when the gliadin protein of wheat is eliminated and insulin blood levels drop, both of which reverse the sodium retention of prior grain consumption.
This is also not a time to exercise. Try to jog or swim, for instance, and you will feel awful, like trying to be active during the flu. You will not be able to exercise to any substantial degree and it will be counterproductive if you try. Casual activities, such as a neighborhood walk or leisurely biking, can usually be accomplished, but don’t push it. And don’t feel guilty for interrupting a routine of, say, your three-times-weekly five-mile run. Pick up after the withdrawal process is over and you will discover how much easier it becomes, especially after the four- to six-week conversion to heightened fat mobilization.
Not everyone experiences the full withdrawal syndrome. Some don’t experience it at all, wondering what all the fuss is about. Some people can just quit smoking cold turkey and never look back. Same with wheat.
While wheat withdrawal can be annoying, and even cause you to snap at loved ones and co-workers, it is harmless. I have never seen any genuine adverse effects, nor have any ever been reported, beyond the transient effects described above. Passing up the toast and muffins is difficult for some, charged with lots of emotion, with chronic cravings that can revisit you for months and years—but it is good for your health, not harmful.
SHOULD YOU OR SHOULDN’T YOU GO KETO?
It’s a popular question, like should you or shouldn’t you get a rose tattoo on your whatever.
The ketogenic diet is growing in popularity. And that’s great, because engaging in a ketogenic diet can teach you many important dietary and health lessons. Being ketotic or being on a ketogenic diet simply means that, by reducing carbohydrate intake to very low levels (typically no more than 20 to 30 grams net carbs per day) and increasing fat (not protein) intake, a natural physiological response called ketosis develops. Instead of “burning” carbs and sugars for energy, the body turns to stored fat, a process that yields ketones like beta-hydroxybutyrate as a side product. Ketones themselves can also serve as an energy source, especially to brain and muscle.
Because we eliminate the most obnoxious carbohydrate sources of all—wheat, grains, and sugars—the Wheat Belly lifestyle can indeed yield intermittent ketosis, though achieving ketosis is not required to enjoy all the benefits. You can, however, simply further reduce carbs and increase fats from, say, meats, butter, and olive oil, to spend more time in ketosis, which can modestly accelerate weight loss and reverse conditions such as type 2 diabetes and fatty liver, and can also be used to break a weight loss plateau. You will know that you are in ketosis when your breath develops a fruity, acetone-like smell, or you can monitor ketones by finger stick checks for beta-hydroxybutyrate or by urine dipstick checks for acetoacetate.
But it’s not all roses with ketosis. While ketosis is a natural physiological state, just like the stress response, being in ketosis for more than a few weeks invites trouble, just as chronic stress exerts unhealthy long-term effects. Part of the reason is that, by slashing carbs, you have cut intake of prebiotic fibers dramatically, a situation that leads, over time, to dysbiosis and small intestinal bacterial overgrowth. Over years, this leads to reversal of initial metabolic benefits, weight re-gain, constipation, diverticular disease, and increased risk for colon cancer.
We know with confidence that long-term ketosis leads to trouble because there are thousands of kids who have been on ketogenic diets for years, as this diet is effective for reducing the frequency of intractable grand mal seizures.2 Unrelenting, repetitive seizures that are unresponsive to drugs are dangerous and can result in injury and irreversible brain damage. Put a child on a ketogenic diet and seizure activity is reduced by 50 to 80 percent—but kids also stop growing, undergo dramatic increase in calcium oxalate and urate kidney stones (very unusual for kids), experience reduced bone density, and become constipated; there have even been cases of cardiomyopathy (impaired heart muscle and heart failure) and sudden cardiac death.3, 4, 5 Some of the latter tragedies may have been caused or worsened by the outdated practice of supplementing the diet with corn oil, which is awful, of course, as well as the confounding effects of seizure medication. But unanswered questions remain: Why do children on the ketogenic diet stop growing, experience bone thinning, and encounter other health problems? I don’t believe that we can simply dismiss these concerns.
Part of the solution may be just to address bowel flora with prebiotic fibers and other efforts. But it remains to be seen whether there are additional issues to address. I fear that long-term adherence to ketogenic diets invites long-term complications, including a surge in colon cancer.
So it’s fine to put this normal, physiological response to work and be ketotic on a ketogenic diet—just don’t do it for more than a few weeks while maintaining efforts to cultivate healthy bowel flora throughout.
NO GOING BACK
Yet another odd phenomenon: Once you have followed a wheat-free diet for a few months, you may find that re-exposure to wheat provokes undesirable effects, ranging from joint aches to asthma to gastrointestinal distress. They can occur whether or not withdrawal happened in the first place. The most common re-exposure “syndrome” consists of gas, bloating, cramps, and diarrhea that lasts for six to forty-eight hours. In fact, the gastrointestinal effects of re-exposure to wheat in many ways resemble that of acute food poisoning, not un
like ingesting bad chicken or fecally contaminated sausage.
The next most common re-exposure phenomenon is joint aches, a dull arthritis-like pain that usually affects multiple joints such as elbows, shoulders, and knees that can last up to several days. Others experience acute worsening of asthma sufficient to require inhalers for several days. Behavioral or mood effects are also common, ranging from low mood and fatigue to anxiety and rage (usually in males), and occasionally suicidal thoughts.
It’s not clear why this happens, since no research has been devoted to exploring it. My suspicion is that low-grade inflammation was likely present in various organs during wheat-consuming days. It heals after wheat removal and promptly re-ignites with re-exposure to wheat. I suspect that the behavioral and mood effects are due to exorphins, similar to what schizophrenic patients experienced in the Philadelphia experiments.
I ATE ONE COOKIE AND GAINED 30 POUNDS!
No, it’s not a National Enquirer headline alongside “New York woman adopts alien baby!” For people who have walked away from wheat, it can actually be true.
In those susceptible to the addictive effects of wheat, all it takes is one cookie, cracker, or pretzel in a moment of indulgence. A bruschetta at the office party or a handful of pretzels at happy hour opens up the floodgates of impulse. Once you start, you can’t stop: more cookies, more crackers, followed by Shredded Wheat for breakfast, sandwiches for lunch, more crackers for snacks, pasta and rolls for dinner, etc. Like any addict, you rationalize your behavior: “It can’t really be all that bad. This recipe is from a magazine article on healthy eating.” Or: “I’ll be bad today, but I’ll be better tomorrow. I’ll even exercise an extra thirty minutes.” Before you know it, all the weight you lost is re-gained within weeks. I’ve seen people re-gain 30, 40, even 70 pounds before they put a stop to it.
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