Hi, I just found your blog. Very interesting

I'm curious...on average, what percent of your patients follow a vegan diet?

Cheers,
Kristen Suzanne

Interesting. Do you think the same applies to potatoes? I know that french fries are a major downfall for many people.

Dr Davis,

If your patient had a fasting blood sugar of 122 she was most certainly fully diabetic, and her post-meal blood sugars, with carbs were likely in the high 200s.

So the problem with that cracker might not have been that wheat is addictive but that in a person with diabetes the blood sugar spike caused by eating carbs causes relentless overwhelming physiological hunger.

If that is understood, it is much easier to stop the cycle. If people interpret the physiological hunger as emotional--a personal weakness--it is much harder to deal with.

But most importantly, this woman needed to be monitoring her post-meal blood sugar spikes no matter what she was eating. Had she seen the spike, she would have understood why she was so hungry, and if she was able to flatten that spike, she could have avoided the regain.

I do not believe wheat is addictive, and I also believe VERY strongly after ten years of dealing with a low carb diet that if a person does not learn how to deal with the occasional off-plan day, and the resulting physiological hunger, it is only a matter of time until they DO crash off the diet.

I've seen it far too often. People go two or three years on the diet and then, because they haven't learned how to go on and off it, they fail dramatically.

So rather than demonizing wheat or carbs, let's put some effort into teaching people how to deal with the inevitable hunger that results from creating a high blood sugar spike so that they can lose their fear of carby foods and maintain the diet for many years.

P.S. I learned this lesson the very hard way--three years of perfection, total regain, and now heading into year 6 of doing much better because I can go on and off the very low carb diet without regain.

--Jenny Ruhl

Hi, Jenny--

Thanks for your comments. I agree with your observations on her blood sugar.

However, I strong disagree with the "wheat is not addictive" idea. I would warn you that it is dangerous to extrapolate broad truths from your single, personal experience. I have witnessed this in over 500 patients now. It is not true for everybody, but it is very true for many. Wheat products are unique. They also exert peculiar and exaggerated effects on lipoproteins, particularly small LDL. Even without the addictive quality, if you watch lipoproteins, you will see large effects just with elimination of wheat, effects that extend far beyond blood sugar.  

I suspect that you do not have a wheat addiction. The comments from people who are spared this pattern are incomprehension or opposition. But, for some people, it is like a cloud lifted. And it is largely specific for wheat.

I have to second Dr Davis opinion on wheat. I have found that eating any type of wheat -  even the 100% Bran crackers suitable for diabetics gives me a insatiable hunger. I don't get the same effect from eating a comparable amount of carbs via starchy vegetables or oat bran cereal

Peace

Joe E O

I didn't think it was possible, but after seeing it, believe my mom is a wheataholic.  She has avoid wheat     a # of times, and each times she has done so she lost weight, and her blood pressure dropped nicely.  Unfortunately she has not been able to stick with the diet.  She goes  back to her old wheat eating ways and the weight came back.    

This morning I heard mom and dad got into a somewhat heated debate over a bran muffin mom was eying.  Never thought I would see the day a bran muffin caused an argument.

Totally agree with you doc. We see a major wheat addiction problem with several of our patients. Not all of them, but a substantial percentage really struggle giving it up. There's some info "out there" on gluten exorphins - have you ever looked into it?

Darcy

Wheat protein contains a number of opiod peptides which can be released during digestion. Some of these are thought to affect the central and peripheral nervous systems.

When I gave up gluten, I felt much worse for a few days. This is a very common reaction in those who stop eating gluten cold turkey.

Anne

I have low carbed since 03 and thought I was a master, no wheat passed these lips. Then one Christmas they did and since then, 06 I struggle to stay on my low carb clean program, I wish I had never 'fallen" off the wagon.

Eating wheat was the trigger as it triggered cravings for me............ that were worse than in my "fat" yrs.

I liken the addiction is same as drugs or booze, to me its no different. I come from a background of numerous alcoholics, diabetics and have nursing and psychology background.I am diabetic. I can see both things play a role with me, but have to say that to me wheat is like an addiction.

I believe these soft comfort foods  escalate the bg, also signal to our brain the soothing of any emotions and very quickly we become psychologically and physiologically addicted to higher carb foods like wheat.

Our first food is pablum, baby biscuits, the brain learns quickly this sweet soft food is soothing and quickly we become addicted to this.

When I am really stressed my "drug" of choice is wheat products, yet I am educated, I know the drill yet my body craves something with wheat.
Its an addiction to me, I have control of this addiction and craving if I keep my bg within normal so struggle with living with this insight.

Sometimes my bg goes up after bigger low carb meal but doesn't provoke cravings as much as having just a cracker or 2 while I am out..it makes me want to have more..I can identify 110% with Claire.

chick

Well, I had such a strong craving to wheat that I switched to rice products, thinking that anything would be better than wheat. But I became just as addicted to rice as wheat. In fact, I don't even miss wheat products because there are so many rice products. I imagine if more baked goods were made of corn, instead of wheat or rice, then I'd be addicted to that. I agree there is a wheat addition for many, but for me it's the sugar high or the temporary good feelings I derive simply from eating a flour product.

Vita

I just saw an interesting piece of research suggesting also that artificial sweeteners have an effect on the brain that triggers sugar/carb craving. This was in rodents; anyone aware of human studies? Certainly nothing the makers of splenda or nutrasweet are going to fund . . .

Dr. Davis,

I've been thinking about your response to my earlier comment, and wanted to raise a couple more issues.

Though I cited my own experiences in the comment, I've been active in online discussion groups for both low carb diets and diabetes for almost a decade now. And what I've observed over this period is that people who are low carbing who do NOT have diabetes or who have diabetes controlled only by a low carb diet are almost always the people who report "wheat addiction. "

But what is fascinating--and was a real "Aha!" for me, is that hundreds of people with diabetes active online who gauge what they can eat by measuring their blood sugar after meals and eliminating blood sugar spikes, even mild ones,  with a combination of diet, safe meds and insulin do NOT report this wheat addiction issue, and most interestingly, they do manage to eat small amounts of wheat without going off the rails.  Most of them do not eat more than 120 g of carbs a day and many eat far less.  

The only thing people with diabetes do report occasionally about wheat is that wheat ramps up heart burn.

But people with diabetes have access to drugs, including insulin, that can flatten blood sugar which people without it do not have. And many of us find that even though we did not think our blood sugar spikes were that bad while controlling on diet alone--I sure didn't--when we add appropriate drugs we realize that we were experiencing a lot of hunger and that with the right meds it abates dramatically.

This, not only my own experience, is why I believe that wheat addiction may really be pointing to blood sugar spiking and the related relentless hunger. Wheat is among the very fastest carbs--much faster than rice or most forms of cooked potatoes. This must not be underestimated.

You say people who haven't experienced wheat addiction cannot imagine it. But what I'm saying is that people who have not experienced blood sugar-related hunger can have NO idea how overwhelming it can be and how it can push a person into a binge that is very hard to end. The two may be more related than you think. When I was controlling with diet alone wheat always made me terribly hungry. Add a bit of meal-time insulin timed properly and suddenly  wheat is just another food.

Over my decade of watching people try to do the Low Carb WOE without blood sugar meds I have seen that very very few people are able to stick with the diet for more than 5 years and that the binge that gets out of control is all too frequent.

So I think anyone who is trying to help people with their carb issues HAS to address the problem of teaching people how to get back on plan when they go off and how to deal with the hunger that comes from unaccustomed blood sugar spiking. Even if wheat addiction turns out to be a true physiological problem, people ARE going to eat wheat eventually, and if they panic and believe that they are now helpless in the face of their addiction, which is the kind of thinking that the addiction model tends to encourage that isn't helpful!

So rather than build a fear of food  it is much more skillful to give people the tools they need to get back on track after they eat something that kicks up physiological hunger. This involves a combination of physiological and psychological tools.

The people who succeed long term on the low carb diet do appear to be hose who learn how to get back on after they go off.

And what I have learned in my years online is that the people with diabetes who have controlled carb intake very well for very long periods of time are those who take a more relaxed approach and have learned how to recover from overdoing it. That is why over my own decade of eating LC, I've moved from a very strict to a much more flexible approach that does not demonize any food on keeping a flat blood sugar no matter what is eaten.

I am hearing recently from quite a few medical professionals who have gotten religion about cutting carbs over the past few years, and I'm very glad they have, but I think there is a certain extremism that we all go through that is an obstacle to making it through the decades of tight control we need to preserve health.

I'm very glad that you do take the positions you take, my comments are mostly directed at making it possible for your current patients to continue their success a decade and two or three decades hence!

Isn't if possible that wheat can be addictive, raise blood glucose. cause antibody reactions, damage organs and syetems and worsen lipids? That does not mean that everyone who eats wheat will have all or any of these reactions. There are hundreds of complex proteins in wheat. It makes sense they could cause multiple effects.

I have an antibody reaction to wheat (gluten) and do have to watch out for the smallest crumb as it will make me ill.  Before I went gluten free, wheat was my favorite food. I craved it constantly. Perhaps this craving was related to increased blood glucose (BG) levels as I have found out that starches and sugars cause BG spikes. I have been able to  level them out with diet alone so far. I will never find out what wheat would do to my BG. As a person who is gluten sensitive, wheat is my enemy.

Approximately 1% of the population has celiac disease - this is an autoimmune disease cause by wheat and other related grains. A growing number of doctors are saying that non-celiac gluten sensitivity affects at least 10% of the population.

Jenny,
You say "people ARE going to eat wheat eventually".

Why do you think this is?  Why not just avoid wheat?  If a diabetic can eat wheat because they are medicated doesn't that mean without medication wheat causes too many cravings.  So for us un-medicated lot its probably better to avoid wheat.

(BTW I like your blog).

Dr. Davis,

  I share your feeling that wheat is unique.  My opinion comes from researching and comparing different pre-industrial populations throughout the world.  Many of them eat high-carb diets and do just fine, but as soon as you throw wheat and sugar into the mix, they become overweight and unhealthy.  The story has repeated itself over and over again throughout history, and I've posted about it on my blog several times.

I sometimes speculate on why this may be.  I have two ideas: first, the lectin wheat germ agglutinin (WGA) has an affinity for the leptin receptor, and can be found in the serum of some people.  It competes with leptin for binding at the receptor.  Overweight people are typically leptin-resistant.  I think you can understand the implications!  This hasn't been demonstrated in vivo.

The second mechanism is through damage of the upper intestinal tract.  Gluten (and possibly other wheat toxins as well) is probably not good for anyone, and Celiac patients are probably just one end of the spectrum.  Innate immune responses are observed even in non-Celiac patient gut biopsies challenged with gliadin fragments.  The upper small intestine is intimately involved in regulating satiety and insulin release/sensitivity through hormone release and vagal signals to the brain/liver.  Thus, immune activation and/or frank damage could pervert these signals.

Jenny: "Even if wheat addiction turns out to be a true physiological problem, people ARE going to eat wheat eventually,"

This sounds like saying that people are going to drink alcohol, even if they know they are alcoholic. Smart people would eliminate a food if it caused them to suffer cravings and frequent binges. Many people should realize they are addicted to sugar, and milk. For example, anybody who routinely gobbles down a pint/quart of ice cream in a day or two. Those people should never eat milk/sugar. You are right that many of them do, or will, but this is self-delusion, like an alcoholic saying "just one" drink, then stopping at five.

"The people who succeed long term on the low carb diet do appear to be hose who learn how to get back on after they go off."

Change low-carb to alcohol-free and see if that theory still applies. I think if a food causes cravings and binges, it should be eliminated for ever. Some people can eat junk food in moderation, or they can binge on it and not become fat, because they have a fast metabolism. That should not imply that junk food is healthy or that people need to learn how to recover from a binge. They need to fortify their diet with nutritious, satisfying food, so they don't have any inclination to binge. Bingeing is caused by deficiencies, IMO. You don't binge or have any interest in bad food when you are eating right.

I have a carb addiction myself and I agree with Jenny.

The reason I say I have an "addiction" to carbs is because of my experience when I did a low-fat diet for a few years.  If I had a bad day, extra pasta seemed to make me feel better.  If I couldn't sleep, a bagel would knock me right out.  This is not a "normal" reaction to carbs; this is more how people use alcohol than carbs.  For *me*, carbs are like a drug.

Every time I go off low-carb, when I go back on, I have horrible cravings, headaches and feel sickly for a few days.  It's exactly like a withdrawal process.  The misery of going through induction again is often what keeps me *on* my diet, not wanting to feel that way.  It's not just that my bg will be high for a day or two if I cheat, but that I'll feel like crap for several days.

So I low-carb, but not *very* low-carb.  Around 60-80g/day most of the time, which lets me have small servings of fruit and my preferred grains, barely and buckwheat, and a low-carb tortilla now and then.  This is as low as I can go long-term which is why I don't do seriously strict low-carb ala Bernstein; this is what I can live with.

But I do cheat sometimes.  The longer the cheat, the longer I feel like hell when I go back on low-carb.  I can "afford" to cheat once a month for *one* meal and get back on low-carb with only a day of feeling minorly poorly, but if I "cheat" for a whole day, I feel badly for 2-3 days before being OK.

I also agree with Jenny about managing cheats.  This is the deal... I'm just not ever going to agree to never, ever eat a cracker again!  I don't even *like* crackers that much, but if I have to *never* eat them again, I'm going to be craving them immediately!  I'll be having dreams about Ritz and thinking about Saltines all day and start fantasizing about Sociables instead of sex!  

This is actually why I *do* plan to "cheat" once a month.  Psychologically, I can't deal with "never", but I can deal with postponing for a couple weeks.    Having cheated LOADS of times is how I *know* I can "afford" it for exactly *one* meal per month without going off the wagon or screwing my bg up too badly.  

It's not specifically about wheat for me.  I tolerate low-carb tortillas 2-3x/week in my normal diet just fine without falling off the wagon.  I can use a bit of wheat flour or cornstarch to thicken a dish without any problem - if it's little enough over a bunch of servings.  

Conversely, ANY type of carb can cause me to fall off the wagon - potatoes, sugar itself, even fruit.  Once the straw that broke the camel's back for me was tangerines, a normally healthy food, but not so much if you're diabetic and on your third one.  

For me, it's about insulin resistance (IR).  When bg is elevated, the pancreas keeps producing insulin in an attempt to reduce bg.  Meanwhile, the high bg itself increases IR, so in spite of the insulin, very little glucose enters the cells.  In short, you have both insulin-induced hunger *and* a cellular-level hunger occurring.

If you give in to your hunger and eat, bg rises, therefore increasing insulin and further reducing it's effectiveness.  

With your cells not getting fed, you're fatigued and weak too.  So you not only overeat and get fat, but are "lazy" also.  

It's a very, very vicious circle that you can only break by cutting the carbs and going through withdrawal until your bg is controlled again.  

For me, the type of hunger I feel on a high-carb diet is literally painful, it can wake me from sleep.  It takes a lot of willpower to ignore that, which is part of what makes reinducting so difficult (besides that it feels awful).  

On the other hand, on low-carb, hunger is a very minor feeling that I can easily ignore all day if I'm busy or distracted.  It's a whole other ballgame.  

I know some people have very specific wheat issues, such as gluten intolerance.  

But I don't see anything in your description of this lady's problem from the cracker that distinguishes it from problems I've seen other low-carb folks suffer from potato chips.  Like Jenny, I've been on low-carb forums and newsgroups for years.  I can't even tell you how many times someone comes back after being gone a few months or years and sheepishly admits they fell off the wagon and gained back 100 lbs.  It doesn't have to be wheat that kickstarted the binge, could be sugar, potatoes, corn - like I said, for me personally, once it was tangerines.  

Wheat is a very pervasive carb source due to baked products, so it's *often* wheat that causes the problem.  But I bet that lady could've had the same reaction from a chocolate candy bar.

There's an old saying: "If you fail to plan, you plan to fail." Why eat foods that cause even a day of less health and quality of life? You say you can't deal with "never" eating another cracker, but do not really like crackers. I haven't eaten any crackers in years. If you have to eat grains, there are better foods like sprouted breads or yeast-free sourdough from a health store. Why not eat those instead of crackers? The foods you "can't live without" are probably the foods you need to avoid. If crackers disappeared from the face of the Earth, you wouldn't die the next day from stress. You'd simply eat other foods. Why's it so hard to do that? Pretend there's no such thing as crackers, cookies, or other baked goods. The world is not going to end if those foods go away forever. Neither are you.

Even at 167 lbs--still overweight--Claire looked great. She glowed. She'd already dropped nearly 2 1/2 inches from her waist. She felt lighter on her feet, discovered energy she thought she'd lost 10 years earlier. Her blood results matched, with dramatic shifts in each and every pattern.

I have just joined the Track Your Placque Site.  I take fish oil daily, 3200 EPA/1600 DHA.  At this dose my AA/EPA score is 2.14.  When I had LDL electrophoesis done, my pattern was A pattern and I was not on the fish oil at that time.  I am wondering whether it would be better to have an NMR test or a VAP test, or both?

Hi,
In general, I prefer the NMR. However, the electrophoretic test you already had should provide more information than just breaking your LDL pattern down into types "A" or "B". The real numbers to pay attention to are the LDL subclasses III and IV. Add up those numbers to determine how much small LDL you really have (in percent). Anything more than 10% we regard as sigificant.

Is there any reduction in triglycerides from taking flax seed or other non-EPA/DHA sources of omega-3s?

Thank you.  The report is broken down into the various LDL subclasses.  This information is helpful.

Mike-
No, unfortunately not. Only fish oil exerts the sort of triglyceride and lipoprotein correcting effects that we need.

Dr., what do you think of Krill oil? Is it better than "regular" fish oil?

We've actually had a fairly extensive conversation on this question on the Track Your Plaque Forum. Fish oil is tried and true, and the advantages of krill oil--purportedly containing less pesticide residues (no less mercury since fish oil does not contain mercury) and virtually pure DHA--are not fully worked out. However, if you choose to give it a try, let us know what kind of results you get.

Evidently the only nutrition/health reading she does is her own copy.

I was reminded of a story after reading your blog today.   I can't verify the story but it's wise nevertheless.  A baseball fan encountered one of the all time greats and Hall of Famer, Stan Musial.  Fit and trim throughout his life, the fan asked him, long after his baseball career was over, how he maintained his weight.  He replied, "I exercise everyday."  Still curious, the fan inquired further, "What exercises do you do."  Musial replied: "I push myself away from the table."  Many of us could learn from that simple wisdom, myself included.  Keep on blogging Dr. Davis, it helps us stay "mindful."

Terry,

Not sure how seriously your comment was intended, but it misses the boat.  It's the TYPES of food we eat that are killing us.  Smaller quantities of Reduced Fat Bacon Toaster Scrambles and AHA "Heart Healthy" Count Chocula won't save us.  See Eat To Live by Joel Fuhrman, along with Dr. Davis' own remarks on this.

Wow! Thank you, so much for that link! That farm is only a few towns from us! We'll be sure to check it out!

Interesting experiment.  I certainly know that wheat was held in very high regard by Robert McCarrison, Weston A. Price, and others that witnessed entire populations thriving off of wheat.  The Maycoba of Northern Mexico (Mexican Pima) would be another example.  

This has always left me with some cognitive dissonance about the wheat issue, and a strong feeling that wheat intolerance in the modern world was a result of weak intestinal strucure and altered gut flora caused by non-wheat factors (such as refined sugar, nutrient-poor food, etc.).

Just curious if you plan to sprout it first. Can einkorn be tolerate by people with Celiac?

I'm looking forward to the results.

Is this a religious or Christian blog? (Serious question.) I don't follow the reasoning that if something is mentioned in the Bible it wouldn't be unhealthy. Lots of things that people ate or practiced in the ancient world were very unhealthy.

Nothing like a little hands-on experimentation -- I like the spirit.

Being in the Bible isn't much of a recommendation, IMO.

It'd be interesting to see the results of your wheat test there.

What about the other ancient wheat, Emmer? I think it can be found in Italian  pasta form, called Farro.

Very interesting and important angle to speak about since those questions comes up very often... especially the "but we have been eating wheat for millenniums"... now we have a good answer! Thank you!

Recently, I have discovered bread that is made from sprouted grain. How healthy this bread is relative to whole grain bread I do not know. The only store I can find this bread at is Trader Joe's.

Short of growing and milling your own eikorn wheat, is there a viable option for the rest of us?  Is there an acceptable commercially-available (i.e. found at larger grocery stores) product like hard red spring or buckwheat that would be a better alternative with fewer of the downsides of the more traditional wheat flours?

Looking forward to the results!  Thanks for the great content.

MH

I look forward to the report, both on how the bread turns out, and how you react to eating it.

Fascinating. I will be very interested to hear what your experiences with this experiment will be.

A quote from http://www.hort.purdue.edu/newcrop/proceedings1996/v3-156.html

"The gluten of the einkorn accession had a gliadin to glutenin ratio of 2:1 compared to 0.8:1 for durum and hard red wheat."

If that means anything.

Our preliminary studies have not determined that all types of einkorn can be universally tolerated by those with gluten intolerance.  Please use caution if you have celiac or some form of gluten intolerance.  On the plus side, Einkorn is one tasty, healthy grain…it just doesn’t yield as much as modern (hexaploid) bread wheat, so agribusiness is reluctant to plant it.  I'm posting studies about the health benefits of einkorn and including all findings on my website at einkorn.com.  I'm very interested to see how you like the taste

Hi, Catherine--

No, this is not a religious blog.

I raise this issue because I hear this from patients.

Stan said exactly what I was going to say: There are insufficient experiences to know whether the gluten sequences in einkorn will activate the celiac response.

Eli Rogosa tells me that she also has seen several celiac people tolerate einkorn.

However, none of this should be construed as a clinical study.

Stoning people to death and slavery are in the bible, how can they be bad?

*rolls eyes*

Lately this blog has really become hit and miss.

To neolithic humans wheat must have seemed to be a miracle food. It could be stored for long periods and transported long distances. They could grow it, store it, or trade for it. No longer did they need to worry every day about finding something to eat. They could wait out the winter with full stomachs and calm minds, and some small portion of the population could freed from food production. To do what? As it turned out art, culture, religion, scholarship, everything we think of as civilization.

They may have even noticed that their primitive neighbors, who still hunted and gathered wild plants to eat, were larger and healthier. If they did, they probably regarded the greatly reduced fear of starvation and the ability of at least some to have some leisure probably seemed like very worthwhile tradeoffs.

It is only very recently- this century, even for advanced civilizations- that worrying about what you eat has been an option.

Thrasy--

Excellent perspective.

No doubt: Agriculture permitted specialization of occupation and the trappings of culture to develop. Wheat facilitated this cultural evolution.

Did it come at a price?

Great post. Thanks for the open-minded approach. Nonzero, I think you're missing the point. Dr Davis isn't saying that something must be good because it's in the Bible, but he's saying that some people do ask that question, so it's appropriate that he should try to answer it.

For you and me, perhaps he could just as easily ask: "Wheat has been used for millennia and has been the foundation of great civilizations; perhaps we shouldn't be too hasty to conclude that it's bad?"

Weston A Price also observed that traditional cultures that consumed wheat did so after the wheat was soaked & sprouted or fermented in some way.  These processes are rarely used anymore and certainly not on a large commercial scale so the question isn't simply whether wheat has good or bad effects, but what has been done to it as well.

Would you please clarify what exactly you mean by "we will eat it and see what happens"? Are you going to do a blood test after consuming the bread?

The things one finds in the bible...Check this:

In  Genesis  , Chapter Four, Eve bears Cain and Abel. 'And Abel was a keeper of sheep, but Cain was a tiller of the ground.' That 'but' in the middle of the sentence is the first clue to disapproval. This disapproval is confirmed by verses three to five. Abel and Cain bring offerings to God: Abel of his sheep and Cain, the fruits of the ground. God, we are told, had respect for Abel's carnivorous offering, but He had no respect for Cain's vegetarian one.

Thrasy - I believe you're incorrect about the leisure comment.  Hunter/gatherers have been shown to have had far more leisure time than agriculturalists - it's just that they didn't need the trappings of society, since they did not produce anything that required customers.  And the oldest art in the world definitely existed before farming did...

My biggest concern with wheat is we are eating the seed and not the product of the seed. If you take a look and think about what a seed it makes sense.
The seed is a body shield/ armor to protect the information inside to ensure the plant continues to survice. Now we are taking that very complex material made up of many proteins such as Lectin that they body simply can not digest, so it aggravates the lining of your digestive system.
Not only does it not get absorb, but it also creates a auto-immune response as well as prevents nutrients the body is trying to absorb.

regardless if you can tolerate ancient strains of wheat over current strains, what is the value add that you can't get from a normal diet of meats, veges, and some fruits eaten seasonally?? what is so special that u think u need to have wheat in ur diet in the first place?

The good and bad aspects of grain as a product of agriculture are thematic in the early Old Testament. Remember that Cain and Abel are one generation out of the Garden of Eden. Adam and Eve were gatherers until the fall; the first sin is plucking the forbidden fruit. At the time of the fall, God is the first to kill an animal, and at the same time, institutes agriculture through a curse upon the ground.

When Cain kills Abel, it's the first murder. Why can't the farmer and the cowboy be friends? Because the farmer always wins.

It's grain that saves Jacob's family of herdsmen when Joseph convinces the Egyptian pharaoh to stockpile reserves for times of famine. After the Egyptian enslavement, the Israelites are gatherers during the Exodus, but gathering manna doesn't satisfy them, so God later sends quail. But their goal is the land of milk and honey, an agricultural land -- a land that is only wrested from the Canaanites through violent, genocidal warfare.

The food cleanliness restrictions of the Mosaic law center on avoiding foods contaminated by the cursed ground (i.e., cloven hoofs exposed an animal to the ground, but chewing cud is cleansing, so cows are okay but not pigs; similar distinctions apply to seafood).

The association of the adoption of agriculture with war and oppression is an aspect of the story of the fall as well as the Exodus story (even later, King David is a shepherd) -- the writers of the Old Testament side with agricultural development, urbanization, and the advance of civilization, but they also show a deep cultural awareness of the cost.

The theme never goes away; in the Christian New Testament, Jesus is both the Lamb of God, and the Bread of Life: the sacrifice of Cain as well as the sacrifice of Abel. In short, there many reasons to think that the Biblical story isn't simply that wheat is the best thing since sliced bread, even if Biblical wheat had a better effect on blood sugar.

Judging by the number and severity of Western diseases ancient Egyptians had, I would not be in any hurry to mimic any of their dietary patterns. That said, I encourage patients to give up the grains altogether. Without any nutritional pros and quite a number of cons, the continued use of grains is only a matter of custom and addiction; neither of which contribute to health or longevity.

Dr. C

myths are often centered around varying methods of food production and often change as methods change.  A hunter gatherers religious myths will be much different than an agricultural society's myths. I think that bread is mentioned in the bible because it is primarily a collection of myths of an agricultural society.

After decades of worsening hip pain, I stopped eating any wheat about five days ago, and am now pain-free.  Before, I could barely rise from my chair and could barely walk!  Now I rise up quickly and stride off with no thought of restriction.  I had abandoned weekly hard sprints last year due to the hip pain, but I may try again.  I had been eating two slices of sprouted, fermented whole wheat, and about two or three additional servings of other whole wheat products such as muffins, etc, each day.  I dropped the wheat after reading the recent post about a 25-year old man who gave up wheat with similar results.

"I don't follow the reasoning that if something is mentioned in the Bible it wouldn't be unhealthy. Lots of things that people ate or practiced in the ancient world were very unhealthy."

Can you cite any examples staple foods of that time that were unhealthy? Wheat, maybe, but the awful foods of our modern times were not invented yet. I doubt we'd have the Diabetes and heart-disease epidemic if people stuck to a Biblical diet from a young age onward. Lentils too are a food that is mentioned in the Bible and (unlike Wheat) it has a negligible effect on my blood glucose.

"
And Jacob gave Esau bread and pottage of lentils. And he did eat and drink, and rose up, and went his way.  Genesis 25:34"

I wonder if the large amount of fiber in the lentils might have reduced the hyperglycemic effect of the bread.

Genesis is one of our oldest history accounts written down from oral history that is much older. In summing up the large trends of the sweep of history as they knew it then, you can see them refer to the primal world and the original tribe in the garden of Eden and supported by nature but man, who decided to live in cities and who embraced knowledge and rules of society and agriculture, was considered to be "cast out" and God condemns them saying that Childbirth would now be painful etc.

Now match that with what we know about the skeletal degradation of the Egyptians compared to the people a few hundred mile up the Nile still living Paleo and it fits.
The story of Cain and Abel with God accepting meat and rejecting grains is consistent.

These are our oldest stories, and as an likely Atheist, I think they correlate in an interesting way.
http://www.amazon.com/Book-Genesis-Illustrated-R-Crumb/dp/0393061027

Dr Davis,
It's sad that you have patients that ask such inane questions. I can't believe there are people living in this century with such outdated belief systems. It must be difficult to deal with.

Hi Dr. Davis,  I can't wait to hear about your results from the einkorn grain you plan to make into bread!  I sure do hope it turns out well!  If it does then I will buy some and make bread at home and also turn it into  pastry floor to make deserts since I am a baker as well.

Looking forward in great anticipation to the results of you experiments!  Thanks so much for your efforts in locating it!!!

Sincerely,  Meredith

As Thrasy pointed out, clearly there were bad effects of the early grains.  The stature changed for one thing.  And longevity for another.  I guess I don't understand the primes of your research here.

Ya know what? I like you; you're a scientist/scholar in the classical sense. You dig into an issue and keep digging and searching until you find the answers, no matter how complex or simple.

In the 1950's-60's the highest compliment we could pay someone was to say "You're cool". Well, you are. hehe. (Don't blush, we know you're old as the hills, just like me.) Keep up the good work Doc.

The question I'd to find answers for are:

Is all wheat bad, ancient einkorn and emmer included? Or, is modern wheat that emerged in the last 40 years bad, while its predecessors were no worse than other carbohydrates like rice and potatoes?

Because wheat is a readily-digested carbohydrate source, it is at least on a par with other carbohydrates. The question is where, how, and why it accumulated these other potential adverse characteristics.

well it might not be an issue according to this news about wheat fungus;

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=virulent-wheat-fungus-africa

Trev

homemade bread? Sounds good!

Fascinating comments. Bill's research is exciting for all.  Thank you Bill!

Years ago I found wild wheat growing in the Galilee when I was hiking. As an artisan baker and seed-saver, I began collecting, growing and baking with the vast biodiversity of heritage wheats, most of which are on the verge of extinction!

Modern wheat is bred to be dependent on agrochemicals,  an empty harvest. In contrast, ancient and heritage wheats have evolved over millennia to have high nutritional value, are well-adapted to organic systems, have deep roots that absorb organic nutrients and are tall for good photysynthetic activity.  

As for baking methods, sprouted, sourdough einkorn bread is delicious and full of life. I offer baking workshops and sell small amts of heritage grains so folks can grow your own.   Folks are welcome to visit our 12 acre seed conservation farm and bakery.   Email: growseed@yahoo.com

Green Blessings,
Eli Rogosa

I used to buy TJ sprouted "flourless" bread, too, thinking it was a good choice for my grade school aged son, who was the only person in our family still eating bread.  I only bought 1 or 2 loaves a month for him, which he would consume within a few days (bread *is* an easy to prepare item for kids), so some weeks he had no bread or wheat at all.   I began to notice there was a marked difference in his behavior and moods when he ate bread vs the weeks when he didn't.  He had difficulty concentrating and quickly became frustrated with difficult tasks (whether schoolwork or something fun, but difficult,  like building a complex Lego structure).  I paid attention to his behavior and moods and other factors and determined the "sprouted" bread was a significant trigger.  

Nearly all TJs whole grain breads have added gluten to boost dough performance and (rising and softer texture).   Truly fermented sourdough breads (with a long fermentation) are probably a better choice that simply "sprouted" wheat (who knows what "sprouted"  means with commercial bread anyway?), because long fermentation partially breaks down the gluten protein, which is difficult for humans to digest.  Sprouting merely neutralizes the phytate/phytic acid anti-nutrient content, but does nothing to the high gluten content of the wheat and added gluten ingredients (which are added to nearly any "soft" whole wheat bread as a dough enhancer).      

My son didn't exhibit the negative behaviors when he ate a true sourdough bread that was long fermented  (many sourdoughs are imposters with sourdough flavoring or only weakly fermented for a short time).  I purchased that locally made bread at another "natural food store", not TJs.

Nonetheless, for the past year+ we are a wheat and gluten-free family now, after my son and I tested positive with Enterolab for anti-gluten antibodies and other indications that gluten was provoking an undesirable immune response (as well as two copies of HLA genes that predispose to gluten intolerance and/or celiac and in my son's case, also fat malabsorption).

I used to buy a lot of our food from Trader Joe's.  I still shop there regularly, but mostly for simple foods and ingredients for meals I prepare at home with local CSA subscription produce, meat puchased in bulk (or wild game from my sister the hunter), and "back yard"  eggs I buy direct from the producers.  Too much of TJ fare is still highly processed food that is little better than the stuff at the conventional supermarkets.  

Also, someone mentioned Weston A. Price valuing wheat as a food.  True enough, but again, the point is that wheat has changed dramatically in just the past few decades.  The wheat of Price's time is not what is commonly available now.  Also, Price advocated freshly ground whole wheat.  Is commercial bread likely to be made with freshly ground wheat, or warehoused, fumigated, long-distance trucked stale flour that was ground who-knows when?

think of the healing humans, but not of blogging

My father was working in Detroit in 1980 and 81, arguably the center of America's anti Japanese car hatred at the time.  I can remember when he came home he would tell stories of the destruction of Japanese cars that auto workers did.  If you drove a Japanese car in Detroit at that time, I got the impression  that there was an excellent chance the auto would be crashed into on purpose while sitting at a stop light or someone at night possibly might take a sledge hammer to the hood or windshield.

Many people have a hard time handling change. What happened with Americas auto employee's rage over competition from Japanese car isn't much different than you see in the stock market, I believe.  People have a tendency to believe something will last forever.  They don't want to believe that events tend to occur in cycles.  Even when all evidence seems to point toward an event happening, they  find reasons to ignore it, and later act in disbelief when it occurs.        

Times have been good for many health care professionals.  But the writing seems to be on the wall that change is coming.  Hopefully, I am guessing it will, inexpensive heart disease prevention will play a larger role in the future.  The results prevention bring are too good to ignore.

Thanks for subjecting yourself to these experiments!  Very interesting.  I have a friend who reacts poorly to wheat but tolerates spelt.

Wheat is eaten everywhere in the world. I'd hope GM crop scientists design a variety which can solve this problem.

If I am not mistaken, corn is also the result of the domestication of wild grasses existing some 8,000 years ago. Fooling with mother nature put us on a collision course with consequences.

My concern is that the body could be reacting without symptoms. Could  these ancient grains cause inflammation even though there is no obvious reaction? I have lived 7 years without gluten and have no desire to add it back to my diet. Before I eliminated gluten I was very ill. It is not worth the risk to me.

Dr. Davis,

In your experience, in terms of small LDL and the like, what's better: a high peak of 150 that's brought down relatively quickly or a lower peak, but extended over a longer duration?

Thanks,
David

Anne--

Please don't interpret these casual observations to mean that we should eat einkorn.

My goal with this little experience is to gain an understanding of where along the way of wheat's 10,000+ year human consumption history did things go wrong.

It seems to me that humans could have gotten away with eating einkorn much more freely, with fewer health problems than with modern wheat. I still would like to know where the extreme adverse effects were acquired, however. I suspect this occured in the 1960s and 1970s with the hybridization experiments conducted in Mexico. more on that later.

Anon--

No data. I suspect that the high peak is worse, but that is based on no formal data.

FODMAPs comprise a monosaccharide (fructose), a disaccharide (lactose), oligosaccharides (fructans and galactans), and polyols.

In one study, as obese people lose weight, the balance between the Firmicutes and the Bacteroidetes changes - the latter increasing in abundance as an overweight person gets slimmer.

Fructans, found in wheat, are fermented by bacteria in the large intestine into short chain fatty acids.


Besides human metabolism, the digestion of wheat is also affected by how it is metabolized by the particular intestinal flora inhabiting a person.


Sources:

Evidence-based dietary management of functional gastrointestinal symptoms: The FODMAP approach

An obesity-associated gut microbiome with increased capacity for energy harvest


Food tables: fructose



Fructose in the diet appears to be even more dangerous in the presence of trans-fats.


Source:

High Levels of Fructose, Trans Fats Lead to Significant Liver Disease, Says Study

"The investigators found that mice fed the normal calorie chow diet remained lean and did not have fatty liver disease. Mice fed high calorie diets (trans-fat alone or a combination of trans-fat and high fructose) became obese and had fatty liver disease.

"Interestingly, it was only the group fed the combination of trans-fat and high fructose which developed the advanced fatty liver disease which had fibrosis," says Dr. Kohli. "This same group also had increased oxidative stress in the liver, increased inflammatory cells, and increased levels of plasma oxidative stress markers.""

Your experience with einkorn and emmer is interesting. They do not seem to cause you the problems that wheat does, and that evidence supports the theory that they are less harmful than wheat.  But the same evidence makes another theory equally plausible: that foods such as wheat harm you through pathways that form only through repeated exposure.  Under this theory, einkorn and emmer could be just as harmful as wheat but, being novel to your diet, haven't had enough time for their pathways to form.

It would be interesting, then, to learn what happens if you were to incorporate einkorn or emmer into your diet more regularly.

This abstract would seem to support your view that it may be a modern phenomenon.

Journal of Medicinal Food
Effects of Short-Term Consumption of Bread Obtained by an Old Italian Grain Variety on Lipid, Inflammatory, and Hemorheological Variables: An Intervention Study

http://www.liebertonline.com/doi/abs/10.1089/jmf.2009.0092

Michael

Naturopath David Getoff recently did a podcast on this subject, it is worth listening to: http://naturopath4you.com/mp3s/Gluten%202010%20Final.MP3

Just wondering if you have experimented with fermenting the wheat or sprouting wheat and then drying it to make bread. I've read  that making bread through this method helps celiac problems and wondered if there is a connection  since soaking and/or sprouting neutralizes the phytic acid and supposedly aids in digestion and keeps blood sugars from rising as much.

Wondering if there is a difference in European wheat types verses American. I have illness, vomiting and nausea when I consume wheat here in the US. But when I tried it in France, Germany and Switzerland, I did not have any problems. I thought it might be the way US wheat is processed, but it might be the wheat type, as well.

Thank you,
Janet Creamer