QuasiVegan

Had a moment to paste this link to an Iron test you can order yourself

2011-04-05T15:20:00.000-07:00

Iron test you order yourself

What are the symptoms of anemia?

Anemia can make you feel tired, fatigued, weak, dizzy, irritable, short of breath or depressed. With anemia, you may also have pale skin, brittle nails, chest pain, a coldness in your hands or feet, or an irregular heartbeat. Some people with anemia also have a desire to eat ice or other peculiar things, experience sexual dysfunction, or have trouble concentrating or performing mental tasks.

Read on...

I can't keep up this blog

2011-03-06T21:29:00.000-08:00

My life changed drastically on the 12th of February. That morning I got a call from my brother in Florida that my mother was in the hospital. He was vague, but mentioned a brain tumor. I packed for me and my daughter and left San Francisco that evening. I didn't sleep except a few hours on the plane, and here and there in the chair in the hospital, until she got out on Thursday, the 17th of February. She has a Glioblastoma and the bulk was removed on the 14th. Most people die of this within a couple years and it ain't pretty for the person or the care givers. We are going to do the radiation and chemo as this will give her a better quality of life and the down hill journey will be short, otherwise it's a long, drawn out decline. Then again, some people go into remission and some have lived 3-10 years. However, life for the sake of breathing is stupid and painful, so we will not be doing extraordinary means to extend a shitty life. It's been difficult to say the least. My husband has shipped nearly all my stuff and my car is being shipped tomorrow on a truck. He's coming over by mid April after he unloads the rest of our stuff and his.

She's on a modified diet that consists of my vegan cooking but she eats her fish and dairy (not much though) and she likes her sugar. I can't force a strict diet, she's just humoring me. This cancer diet "http://www.healingcancernaturally.com/budwig_protocol.html" has some promise, but I can't make Mom follow it strictly. So I do what I can hoping that quality will be more enhanced. On the days she's on the flax organic cottage cheese she seams sharper. I gave her flax in the hospital and within a half hour she said she was thinking better. Also probiotics, after a week of using a walker and not thinking well, I gave her a huge salad, 1/2 cup of prune juice, a super green smoothie, and 4 times the dose of probiotics and she had a big bowel movement, right after she was not needing the walker and wanted to go back to work. One of the main problems is not so much the tumor, it's the pharmaceuticals. The side effects are fucking horrible, especially the steroid to keep the edema down. This stuff increases cortisol and her muscles have really deteriorated. Plus the Kepra and the Dexamethasone combo has made her weak and she can only sleep 4 hours a day with the aid of Atavin. Honestly if this is the life, then fuck this. She is fairing better because she had a lot of muscle to start and I'm giving her lots of Plant Fusion, super green food, and soon I'm starting her on L-Glutamine, probably 10g a day or more to counter the effects of the cortisol and muscle break down.

We all have an unknown quality and quantity of life left in us.

The red tape is another story, it's fucking evil the Cobra plan and all the paperwork. Plus there will be legal battles because the company she worked for didn't put her on a medical leave of absence, they "quit her". They didn't fire her and she didn't tender a resignation, so she lost her group plan. Really fishy. The Chemo alone is 6,000 per month, every month. This is supposed to be picked up by her Cobra, but we are having authorization issues. It should be approved on Monday. I have never been more stressed in my life, except when my baby was in the hospital for 5 weeks, but that was 5 weeks, this may go on for years.

Hair Loss on the Vegan Diet

2011-02-09T13:49:00.001-08:00

This is all conjecture as there is no proof of any of the stuff I'm going to write here. Definitive nutritional studies of a subculture are not forthcoming in the near future, so we have to wing it to some extent, don't we?

Here's couple basic theories taken from other theories. One of the main reasons I think there's hair loss is low iodine levels due to the fact that the vegan diet can be high in soy which depletes iodine levels. So does raw broccoli, raw brussels sprouts, raw cauliflower, and raw cabbage. You don't need much iodine, but lack of it can lead to hair loss among other health issues. The other thing is that breads and pastas play heavily in some vegan diets, and other diets as well. Pasta and bread are low in l-lysine. Having low levels of that amino can also contribute to hair loss. I didn't know that until yesterday. In addition to that, there's Bromine in a lot of baked goods, Bromine appears to reduce the levels of iodine too. And on top of that, iron levels can be low on the vegan diet, and that too affects hair loss.

Certain nutrients in kelp, such as iron and the essential amino acid l-lycine, directly affect hair growth. Deficiencies in iron and l-lysine can impact hair loss in otherwise healthy individuals, according to Dr. David Rushton at the School of Pharmacy and Biomedical Sciences at the University of Portsmouth in the United Kingdom, in a 2002 literature review published in the journal Clinical Experimental Dermatology. In studies conducted in women, Rushton reported a significant proportion of subjects with hair shedding responded to l-lysine and iron therapy. Kelp's high iodine content may also contribute to claims it can help hair grow. Conditions related to iodine deficiency, such as hypothyroidism and goiter, can cause hair loss and thinning, according to thyroid.org.

Read more: http://www.livestrong.com/article/158317-kelp-for-hair-growth-does-it-work/#ixzz1DV8QKe5N

Now before you go eating kelp, and popping iron supplements, please read the rest of the article so you can avoid having too much iodine. You don't need much. Also, do your very best to get complete proteins so that you are not low on l-lysine.

Here's a link to foods high in iron, scroll down for the veg foods:
http://libraries.umdnj.edu/camlbweb/hrc/documents/IRON_RICH_DIET.pdf

Take vitamin C with your iron rich food to increase absorption. Kale has both vitamin C and iron in it.

http://www.vegfamily.com/whole-family/kale.htm

This is how I personally get iron, l-lysine, and iodine:

Iron: Kale. A lot of it because I love it.

L-Lysine: I look for complete proteins in vegan foods here: http://www.nomeatathlete.com/vegetarian-protein/

Iodine: I use ancient mineral salt with naturally occurring iodine and I eat nori about once a month (I wrap hummus in it and it is so good).

Both Kals Brand and Red Star Nutritional Yeast have excellent protein profiles, in particular Lysine

2011-02-09T13:13:00.000-08:00

Kals: http://www.vitacost.com/Kal-Nutritional-Yeast-Flakes

In this brand, there's 918 mg of Lysine in three rounded tablespoons. There's also a lot of B vitamins. Since I became vegan, I use Red Star or Kals every day. I would have to estimate that I eat about 1/4 cup of it mixed into soups, sprinkled on salads, added to scramble, and also sprinkled on all vegetables. I love the stuff.

Red Star: http://truefoodsmarket.com/nutritional-yeast-large-flake-1-lb.html

You can make soup bases, dips, and sauces with nutritional yeast.

Here's a dip that I make frequently:

1/2 cup of Nutritional Yeast
1/2 to 1 teaspoon garlic granules
1/2 teaspoon more or less of iodized salt. I use the ancient mineral stuff.
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1/8 teaspoon dijon
1/2 cup raw cashews (bits and pieces are dry, but you can work with them if you soak them for a little while in water)
1/8 cup water

Process till smooth.

Spice it up more and add roasted red peppers and/or avocado. I water this down for a salad dressing or soup base. I make a sauce for veggies and thicken it with blended Northern white beans or arrow root. Sometimes I use beans in replacement of the cashews and omit the dijon. I also water down homemade hummus to use as dressings and sauces. Whatever I have around. You can add some (a couple drops) of liquid smoke to this dip, it is wonderful.

Notes from low carbing it and another low carb vegan snack

2011-01-24T12:15:00.000-08:00

So far I made a mistake (which would happen on any diet) and didn't keep up on my electrolytes, so these days I drink an EmergenC packet with water. I was getting charley horses three nights in a row. Thankfully, my husband mentioned potassium and that got me thinking and googling. I immediately felt better after drinking the EmergenC and haven't had the cramps again. Usually I don't get them, but we ran out of bananas and I went a few days without a banana in my protein/green smoothie. We got a bunch at Trader Joe's yesterday, but they are still green. Once they are ripe, I'll freeze them.

As you might know, I'm a plant eater for the health of the animals. Fortunately my body digs this diet filled with greens and beans. I'm eating lots of vegetables, mushrooms, tempeh, and various sauces that I make myself. Once you know how to make sauces, and they are easy to make (especially Asian sauces), then you can eat the same stuff over and over again and not get bored.

However, I like tasty snacks. My new favorite low carb snack is:

1/2 cup nutritional yeast
1/2 teaspoon garlic granules
1/4 cup walnuts or cashews
1 tablespoon lemon juice
Some roasted red peppers
1/4 teaspoon Dijon mustard (optional)
1/4 cup water (use less if the mixture is spreadable)
1/4-1/2 teaspoon mineral salt

Blend in a food processor until smooth.

Spread on a low carb tortilla and cook it in a pan until golden on both sides. I use coconut oil on the pan and lightly salt the pan too.

Then I serve it with fresh avocado and/or salsa. Really good!

I got the dehydrator (as a birthday gift from my Mother) a few days ago and have been, and am still, booked up with design work so I haven't set it up yet. This weekend I'm going to start! I'm excited. You wouldn't know it from this blog, but I'm a web designer/developer at dropSoul.com (just me).

Since I started this new low carb diet about 3-4 weeks ago, I'm down about 11 pounds from where I started. In the last 2.5 years, I lost 60 lbs. gained back 20 lbs., but I was still lifting heavy and eating a lot (too much pasta, but still a lot of protein), so some of that has to be muscle. I would like to get down smaller, but I have more muscle, so even if I lose less, I'll fit my size 4 clothing again without bulge. I dislike clothes shopping. I get all my clothing at consignment boutiques and second hand shops, so I can't re-buy my favorites ever again. I take good care of them and even got natural dyes at Dharma Trading company to re-dye them when they fade. I did this with some blacks in a 5 gallon pot, it works great!

Low carb Vegan Snack Idea

2011-01-06T11:34:00.000-08:00

This is my favorite snack:

Tofu Life brand smoked tofu (http://tofu-life.com/) tastes like gouda cheese almost. It is good even without comparing it to gouda. Since I haven't had gouda in about 6 years now, I can't give you an accurate evaluation either way.

18 g of protein in 1/2 the block (which is all you need, it's really rich)
3 carbs

Flax crackers by Foods Alive (http://www.foodsalive.com/original.php):

6 g of protein
Carb 11 - Fiber 11 = 0 net carbs

Water. You have to drink extra water because the more fiber you have the more packed your intestines will be if you don't.

Once I get the dehydrator, I'm making my own flax crackers and kale/nutritional yeast chips!

What to do with Kale?

2011-01-06T11:30:00.000-08:00

Here's a quick copy and paste job from a Facebook post I made regarding what to do with kale if you don't have a dehydrator (which I'm getting as soon as I return from Florida).

I just clean it, chop it (stems and all) and steam in the following broth:

1 teaspoon ancient mineral salt with naturally occurring iodine
1/4 cup nutritional yeast
1/2 to 1 teaspoon granulated garlic
1 cup of water
1/4 cup minced onion
1 teaspoon olive oil or coconut oil

Then the broth is used as a soup starter, to make a dressing, or drink it.

Another idea is:

Pulse washed, rinsed raw kale (stems and all) in the food processor to release the natural sugars and reduce bitterness. Then add some red and orange veggies too. Carrots and red peppers.

Serve with chick pea dressing I slap together:

1 can rinsed chickpeas soaked in water for 10 min. then rinsed again
1 tablespoon of olive oil
2 tablespoons nutritional yeast
1/4 cup water
1 teaspoon granulated garlic
1/2 to 1 teaspoon. ancient mineral salt with naturally occurring iodine
3-4 tablespoons lemon juice

Process until smooth.

It should be dressing consistency if not, add more water in smallish amounts.

8 lbs! lost in a few weeks: Cinnamon, Lowish Carb, Highish Protein, High Intensity Interval Training...

2011-01-06T08:50:00.000-08:00

I'm heading out to Florida in a couple days so I don't have the time right now to list out all the recipes and the different products I'm using for low-ish carb, high-ish protein, medium fat (or low, it just depends on what works for you and you alone), vegan food. This is not gluten or soy free, but it's mostly tempeh, lots of greens (kale), and my Plant Fusion (a very excellent protein profile without limiting amino acids and has BCAAs to help protect my muscles) protein smoothies.

Here's the recipe for the Plant Fusion smoothie:

1 1/2 scoops of Plant Fusion*
8 oz. Plain Almond Milk
2-4 oz. Cold Water
2 ice cubes
1 tablespoon 3/6/9 Oil
1/2 tablespoon Vitamineral Green super food
1/2 to 1 frozen banana
1 tablespoon (yes, it's a lot) of Ceylon Cinnamon (this is a sweet, not bitter, real cinnamon)

*30 g of protein. I like to get 20 - 30 g per meal x 5 low cal (200-250) meals to make it about 1000 - 1100 calories a day but without hunger due to the protein levels. This is what works for me.

Blend until smooth, scrape the sides. Add small amounts of water to get it to thin out as you like it.

Why Cinnamon?

It provides an excellent metabolism boost among other major benefits. My mother is an RN and has recommended it to people with type 2 Diabetes, they don't have to take insulin anymore. Women suffering from PCOS (like I used to before I lost the weight) have taken it and have conceived afterwards. I feel that cinnamon combined with resistance, high intensity interval training and high plant protein with low-ish refined carbs (I eat all the greens I want) has had amazing results for me.

Cinnamon and Glucose
In a study conducted at the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Beltsville Human Nutrition Research Center, scientists isolated the insulin-enhancing elements in cinnamon in order to determine if they could work effectively with glucose intolerance. The research showed that the phytochemical extracts of epicatechin, phenol and tannin contained in cinnamon helped increase the metabolism of glucose "20 fold." According to Dr. Richard A. Anderson, who conducted the study, consuming approximately ½ teaspoon of cinnamon per day can help balance blood sugar levels, along with cholesterol and triglycerides with no side effects.

In an article published in the American Diabetes Association's "Diabetes Care," a study created by Alam Khan, a postdoctoral fellow in Dr. Anderson's lab, corroborated that cinnamon is able to improve conditions in blood glucose type 2 diabetes. He divided 60 people with the disease into groups, with some taking daily doses of cinnamon and others taking a placebo. After 40 days, those consuming cinnamon showed a marked positive change in glucose levels. Once the diabetics stopped taking cinnamon, their blood sugar levels rose again.

Read more: http://www.livestrong.com/article/110751-cinnamon-glucose-levels/#ixzz1AH8ot0nq

Stress: Vitamin C abolished secretion of cortisol in animals that had been subjected to repeated stress.

2011-01-01T10:46:00.000-08:00

This is not necessarily related to the vegan diet, but since I have been fat for so long and then lost 60 lbs. and then gained back 20 lbs (some of it is muscle, so I think I think 17 lbs. of fat loss would be great for me) I'm keen on sharing what I find that will help lower cortisol levels.

I'm doing similar things to what I did before to lose the fat, but it's not working nearly as well as it did before, in my opinion. Among other things, such as the body's homeostasis, I think the big difference is stress. Think about being in love, deeply infatuated love. I was high for nearly two years and felt zero stress. Nothing. This was when the worst economic problems hit the fan and I lost $8,000 a year from a client who went in the dumper business wise. Yet, it didn't phase me and I was always up and happy. I also got more business to replace it, not as great, but pretty good. It made me realize that if your mind is happy, your body responds, and your life manifests as if God Himself is handing over a silver platter of your needs just as you need it. Trust in the Universe is a huge stress relief, I think.

I'm having difficulty being in a climate (I long for the tropics in my bones) and I'm experiencing personal, work, and faith issues that are stressful to say the least.

Copy and paste job:

http://www.psychologytoday.com/articles/200210/vitamin-c-0

People who have high levels of vitamin C do not show the expected mental and physical signs of stress when subjected to acute psychological challenges. What's more, they bounce back from stressful situations faster than people with low levels of vitamin C in their blood.

In one study German researchers subjected 120 people to a sure-fire stressor -- a public speaking task combined with mental math problems. Half of those studied were given 1,000 mg of vitamin C.

Such signs of stress as elevated levels of the stress hormone cortisol and high blood pressure were significantly greater in those who did not get the vitamin supplement. Those who got vitamin C reported that they felt less stressed when they got the vitamin.

The researchers believe that vitamin C should be considered an essential part of stress management.

Earlier studies showed that vitamin C abolished secretion of cortisol in animals that had been subjected to repeated stress. Cortisol is a hormone released by the adrenal glands in response to stress. Once it gets into the bloodstream, it is responsible for relaying the news of stress to all parts of the body and mind.

Cortisol is the hormone, for example, that triggers the fight or flight response to stress that allows us to spring into action when we sense danger. But like many emergency-alert systems, the stress response comes at a considerable cost.

Among other effects, frequent exposure to high levels of stress hormones exhausts the body's physical resources, impairs learning and memory, and makes people susceptible to depression.

In the animal studies, vitamin C fed to rats undergoing stress prevented the expected increase in cortisol levels. In addition, it prevented the animals from exhibiting the known signs of physical and emotional stress, including loss of body weight.

Totally Tasty Nori and Tempeh Salad

2010-12-31T12:04:00.000-08:00

I just made this up with stuff I had around. I have a lot of stuff around. The family and I wolfed it down. Since I make enough for 6 people, feel free to half this or just use your own judgement on how much to make. The measurements for me are thrown together without measuring, so these are approximate.

Ingredients
2 packages of 5 grain or plain tempeh, broken up
1/2 cup more or less of Nori shredded in the food processor
1 teaspoon of Real Salt (Ancient Mineral Salt with naturally occurring iodine)
2 tablespoons of Nutritional Yeast (with the B12)
2 medium carrots chopped fine in the food processor
1 bunch of scallions/green onions cut with scissors in 1/4 inch lengths (total about 1 1/2 cups of scallions)
1 lime to make 4 wedges
3-4 tablespoons of rice vinegar
2-3 tablespoons (more or less) of Veganaise made with grapeseed oil
1 teaspoon of granulated garlic or fresh minced garlic. (1/8 of teaspoon = 1 tooth of fresh)
1-2 cucumbers sliced for the "crackers"

Instructions:
Cook the tempeh with a sprinkle of the salt and 2 tablespoons of rice vinegar on medium heat. Cook for about 5 minutes. Mix the rest of the ingredients, including the remaining rice vinegar and salt, in a big bowl. If you want to limit salt, you can just sprinkle it on top of the salad that you eat. You can add a little water (1 or 2 tablespoons) to extended the Veganaise, or add a little more or less to your taste.

Serve with fresh cucumber slices to use as crackers. Squeeze the limes on top after you assemble your "crackers".

Warm and Fuzzy Vegan

2010-12-28T19:28:00.000-08:00

If you've been following this blog, you might have noted that I want to find a new label for myself instead of vegan. And here it is: light worker. It's new agey and corny, but it fits me.

Let's point out the obvious: I can't change the world, but I can change myself. I can't even change my husband. So the light I'm referring to is my inner light. Call it God or Self or Source or whatever. It can be defined by what it seeks: love, empathy, compassion, truth and mercy. We all might have different definitions of what those are. My light is readily palpable because I take the trouble to pay attention to it, rather than ignore it. It does not manifest as guilt, but often is mistaken as a "I should be this way". It's not exclusionary and judgemental of other people's perspectives. Everyone is doing the best that he or she can with the tools at his or her disposal.

One of the concepts I've been reading about lately on various blogs by hunters and meat eaters is that life requires death. Of course it does. If there is dark there has to be light. One can't exist, it can't even be defined, without the other. I'm aware that by not eating animals and their products I'm not saving the world at large and it's not without death and exploitation. Even typing this blog on my MacBook Pro required some heavy duty, nasty exploitation. I wish I could be omnipresent, or whatever it is to be everyone and everything, and just make all things my definition of what is compassionate, but I can't. I can only change my self to match up my actions with my inner heart of hearts the best I can without going nuts.

May everyone nurture their own light and have a happy 2011!

Right after I posted this, I got an email from my father in law which included this photo and text:

Depressed people more prone to lowered cholesterol levels?

2010-12-27T15:06:00.000-08:00

This BBC article in 1999 on the link between low cholesterol and depression and suicide is about a large study done by the Finnish. Their twist on it, which is that despite a similar diet by the study participants, those who reported that they felt depressed, had lower cholesterol levels. From what I understand, the lower serotonin levels in the depressed person is somehow linked to lower cholesterol levels in that person.

If this is the case, imagine if you are prone to depression, then you eat a low fat diet with no dietary form of cholesterol (a low fat vegan diet), your depression would likely get worse.

If you are lowering cholesterol because you are depressed and serotonin is low, then one could make the link that Vitamin D levels would be low, since cholesterol is the basic building block of vitamin D. This article on vitamin D and mental illness at the Vitamin D council site is interesting.

The American Journal of Psychiatry indicates that "Several studies suggest that a low cholesterol concentration is associated with a greater than normal risk of mortality from suicide."

If you are vegan and depressed, you could try adding a tablespoon or two of raw, cold processed coconut fat to your diet. I did and though I wasn't particularly depressed, I feel so much better. My hands and feet are warm now (they were cold since moving North), and I feel more awake and more energized.

How much fat is in the brain?

2010-12-20T15:31:00.000-08:00

There's a truncated debate on how much fat is in the brain over at the comments on the JackNorrisRD.com site. It started when I got a figure of 2/3 at the Franklin Institute's site.

No offense, but you have a fat head! About two-thirds of your brain is composed of fats. But not just any kind.
Franklin Institute

This other person by the name of "Name" said that it's more like 1% according to a sheet of information he or she had and then she/he produced more information. This debate of sorts, went on longer than Jack's mostly infinite patience (I mean that) allowed. I was also sloppy with my writing and a little defensive, such as life.

Many sources indicate 60-80% fat. I think the problem is the term itself "fat" and the term "myelin" which is a type of fat.

Most nerve fibers inside and outside the brain are wrapped with many layers of tissue composed of a fat (lipoprotein) called myelin. These layers form the myelin sheath. Much like the insulation around an electrical wire, the myelin sheath enables electrical impulses to be conducted along the nerve fiber with speed and accuracy. When the myelin sheath is damaged, nerves do not conduct electrical impulses normally. Sometimes the nerve fibers are also damaged.

In adults, the myelin sheath can be destroyed by stroke, inflammation, immune disorders, metabolic disorders, and nutritional deficiencies (such as a lack of vitamin B12).
Merck Manuals

"The brain is the fattest organ of the body. Almost two-third of the weight of the human brain is accounted by phospholipids. DHA is the predominant structural fatty acid in the brain..." Medind.nic.in

We are fortunate to have such a complex system in our own body. Weighing two to four pounds, comprised of nearly 60 percent fat and demanding 25 percent of the blood and nutrients from each heart beat, our brain needs and demands special attention. It is now believed that our brains can be shaped for health, that a brain health lifestyle can be incorporated into our own lives, and that a proactive and lifelong brain health lifestyle can help to delay the onset of neurodegenerative diseases.
Paul D. Nussbaum, Ph.D.

Brain Research Institute UCLA:
So argues a UCLA neurologist, who says that the brain's "miles of myelin are a key evolutionary change that may make us vulnerable to highly prevalent neuropsychiatric disorders."

The brain's myelin sheath is the sheet of fat that coats a neuron's axon -- a long fiber that conducts the neuron's electrical impulses -- and is similar to the wrapping around an electrical wire to foster efficient signaling.

Whether it's 1% fat (which seems strange due to the "miles of myelin" quote from the neurologist) or 60%-80%, all I know is that when I added raw, organic, cold processed coconut oil to my vegan diet, I felt so much better and I continue to notice an improvement in my energy levels. I also added a good 3/6/9 oil.

Did you read about the effects of coconut oil on that man with dementia I posted last week? It's quite a story. He was too out of it to have a placebo effect. Mentioning a placebo effect here reminds me of an NBC news story about glucosamine/chondroitin supplementation that I saw at least 15 years ago. One part of the story was of a woman with arthritis and she noticed a significant improvement in her neck, where the major issues were. The other part was about a dog who also perked up and showed reduced inflammation, noted by his (the dog's) veterinarian. Then they brought in a guy who said it was a placebo effect. Which confirmed what I had always suspected: dogs can read and understand the English language. You might want to send your dog from the room when you're discussing a touchy subject.

Here's some more information on myelin:
http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/33614.php
http://www.physorg.com/news143470424.html
http://www.devdelay.org/newsletter/articles/html/84-fat-movement-in-mouth.html

Some image mapping of the brain's myelin:
http://brainmaps.org/index.php?action=viewslides&datid=98

Buckwheat Burgers (buckwheat is a fruit seed) Buckwheat Information

2010-12-20T10:02:00.000-08:00

A quick copy and paste job:
Buckwheat is one of the best sources of high quality, easily digestible protein in the plant kingdom. It has over 90% of the value of non-fat milk solids and over 80% of whole egg solids (Udesky 1992). The balanced amino acid profile and a high level of essential amino acids allow buckwheat to be used in human diets, especially where shortages of lysine and sulfur containing amino acids appear. Source

While many people think that buckwheat is a cereal grain, it is actually a fruit seed that is related to rhubarb and sorrel making it a suitable substitute for grains for people who are sensitive to wheat or other grains that contain protein glutens. Buckwheat flowers are very fragrant and are attractive to bees that use them to produce a special, strongly flavored, dark honey. Source

According to the Nutritional Data site there's 19 g of protein in a cup of kasha (buckwheat) with an amino acid score of 99%. I think a cup is a lot, since it's nearly 600 calories, so 1/2 cup is more like it (9.5 g of protein). In 1/2 cup there's about 53 net carbs. Pre workout food!

If you use half buckwheat flour with your wheat flour, the buckwheat's amino acids will round out the limiting amino acids in your wheat nicely, giving you a nearly perfect balance of the 8 essential amino acids. This particular balance between half wheat and half buckwheat flour is much more closely aligned to your dietary needs even than lean beef!!! It's also rich in many of the B vitamins as well as the minerals; phosphorus, magnesium, iron, zinc, copper and manganese. In addition to this, it's a good oil source of Linoleic acid, one of the two essential fatty acids we must have to be healthy. Nutritionally speaking, buckwheat is a truly impressive food. Source.

Here's the recipe for buckwheat burgers, replace the eggs or flour (for binder) with 3 tablespoons of ground flax with 1-2 tablespoons of water. Replace the oil in this recipe with fresh olive oil or coconut oil.

Buckwheat Burger Recipe.

Soy Free, Gluten Free Vegan Blog

2010-12-19T17:48:00.000-08:00

Check out another Soy Free, Gluten Free Vegan Blog by Aura, one of the readers of this blog. Read her post on healthy fats. Once I start eating sweets again, I'm making her soy free, pumpkin pie!

I am now piled up with work and the holidays. Today the family saw Tron, it was okay. Not great, not bad.

Have a great time with your dear ones this holiday break.

People who consume a diet low in fats and especially low in cholesterol are at risk for depression and suicide.

2010-12-18T13:20:00.000-08:00

I've posted this link to the article at Psychology Today on low fat and cholesterol risks before, but I thought it would be good to post again for emphasis. After eating the coconut fat, my mood and energy improved and I thought I was fine before.

In nonhuman primates, high cholesterol levels enhance serotonin function. They lower levels of overt aggression. And they promote social behavior.

In people and other animals, serotonin dysfunction is implicated in major depression and, independently, with suicide. Serotonin is seen as a neurotransmitter of restraint. It remains inactive until called upon to inhibit some impulsive command, such as, say, the thought of suicide in the face of some extra stress.

In healthy people, serotonin turns on to suppress impulses and keeps them in check. In those whose serotonin system is not responsive, for whatever reasons, it fails to suppress an impulse, resulting in an impulsive act. Like hostility or acting on a suicidal thought.

Low-fat diets are known to alter serotonin function. They might decrease the fats in nerve-cell membranes, impairing serotonin receptors.

Where does that leave you?

Why there won't be much, if any, research on this: Statins are big money, honey (or agave nectar).

Soy Free, Gluten Free, Vegan Blog and Met an Ex-Vegan from that Hippie Commune

2010-12-17T19:30:00.001-08:00

Here's a link to a Soy Free, Gluten Free, Vegan Blog.

Today, I met a woman at the market who lived on "The Farm", that vegan hippie commune in Summertown, TN. She was there for 20 years. She was there when I was there, but I don't remember her. I can only remember the names of 4 people then and she knew them all. I was stoned most of the entire time I lived there. Each house was given a huge bag of pot, and my brother and his friend stole the house stash. Just the three of us would sit at the swimming hole and smoke so much pot. My memory of that time is very, very spotty. I remember the soy creamery, that was awesome!

I asked her a bunch of questions about her health and whether or not many people stayed vegan or vegetarian. She said that she felt like she was sick all the time, like the flu or cold, dragging until she started eating flesh food. She's friends with the farmers here in Sonoma County and gets her meat that way. She actually would be a vegetarian if she felt okay on it. Both her children are vegetarian, mostly, and they are healthy. She said her daughter will eat vegetarian and some fish once in a while, but when she's invited out or over to some one's home, she eats the meat they serve.

Most of the talk with me was about how evil TVP was, which I didn't know. Since I'm going low carb and also trying to lay off the grains and gluten (for the most part), TVP is on my radar again. I use it now and then and eat the non-gmo boca burgers. She was okay about tofu, but not TVP. At her urging I put back the boca burgers and got the Amy's soy free, gluten free, vegan burger. I ate two to get 10 g of protein (still not enough for me). I felt tired, like I needed a nap, right after. More carbs than I want.

She told me there are many ex-hippie commune residents in the Santa Rosa and Sonoma area. One of them is the brother of my friend I used to play dress up with. I remember him when he was 3 or 5 years old. I just looked up his profile at the hospital he has privileges at and he's a vegetarian. This woman said that some ex farm residents stayed with the vegetarian or vegan diet but others were not healthy on it. Before the anti-TVP information she said that her philosophy is not to give diet advice except to tell people to eat what makes them feel heathy, each person is different.

And that was an interesting day at the market.

Black Power Bean Burger Recipe and Santa Rosa Observations

2010-12-16T10:42:00.001-08:00

After all that reading, I gave lots of thought to removing grains and breads and have cut down significantly. I have limited my wheat gluten "meat" to only a few times a week. I also started adding 1-2 tablespoons or less of coconut oil per day 3-4 days back. In less than a week, 3 lbs gone! That includes walking an hour or so each day at 15 degree incline with a 10 lb. bag of cat litter in my backpack. It's the rainy season here, so I joined a gym on a month to month plan. After the coconut oil inclusion, I feel much more aware. I feel warmer too.

(Added later: I also eat something small every 3 hours. This is a small snack such as 10 almonds, or a spoon of peanut butter, one banana, apple, Vega smoothe with lots of ice and almond or coconut milk, or if it's the morning, I'll have an occasional Cliff Builder Bar.)

I'm half Asian and I lived in a tropical climate all my life, it's been very interesting coming up here and experiencing my health take a hit from the lack of Sun/Vitamin D and, perhaps, needing more fat for the colder climate I'm in. I moved to Santa Rosa, California, the home of one of the top Vegan Guru MDs (and a few others just like him) and saw the effects of this totally misguided one-diet-fits all approach and I got rather pissed off. My mother in law saw the most famous of those docs at a restaurant and said he looked pale and sick in person, this was well before I had a falling out with my precious diet. I didn't think much of it at the time. Now, I have other ideas, but he could have had a virus (from not enough D!). Hah!

Enough of that, here's a vegan recipe I made up recently. I also made a quinoa (quinoa is a seed or berry, a pseudo grain) noodle and nutritional yeast/tofu cream sauce, but I have to make it again since I neglected to write it down.

Black Power! Black Bean Burgers

2 cans of black beans, rinsed, soaked for 10 minutes, and rinsed again (I do this if I don't have the forethought to prepare dry beans)
1 small minced onion, sauteed in coconut oil or olive oil or water
3 tablespoons of ground flax (this is the binder, I used to use gluten or oatmeal here)
1/2 cup of chopped parsley (squeeze out excess water)
4-6 tablespoons red star or kals brand nutritional yeast (or another brand with B12)
1 teaspoon cumin
1 tablespoon chili powder
1-2 teaspoons garlic granules or 1 clove minced per 1/8 teaspoon
1 teaspoon of natural mineral salt with naturally occurring iodine
2 tablespoons lemon juice
1/2 cup of chopped walnuts or chopped sunflower seeds, something crunchy
1-2 teaspoons of olive oil or coconut oil
1-2 tablespoons of water if the mix is too dry to form patties.

Makes: 8 burgers, usually.

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F

Saute the onions. Drain the black beans and mash in the food processor, but don't make them into a paste. Combine all the ingredients well and form into patties. Brush each patty with olive oil and bake for 10 minutes per side (or less, depending on your preferences and your oven).

Serve with avocado, roasted red peppers, sliced onions, some garlicky vegan mayo and a mixed greens salad.

Cool Site on Vegan Supplements

2010-12-14T15:37:00.001-08:00

The go to site and brain for me is Jack Norris, but this person who put together http://www.vegan-supplement-checklist.com obviously did a lot of research.

Convinced of my vegan lifestyle, out of respect of animal life, I want to promote veganism on the web.

By looking around on the internet how other people write about their vegan lives I mainly found vegan blogs about vegan cooking. Though it is always useful to expand your daily vegan meals and to try out new ingredients, I find it necessary to cover more on nutritional needs.

There still appear cases in the news of people, mainly vegan children, that do suffer shortage of certain vitamins with all the consequences of this.

A taurine-supplemented vegan diet may blunt the contribution of neutrophil activation to acute coronary events

2010-12-14T15:33:00.000-08:00

After feeling so amazing with the addition of taurine and a teeny bit of raw coconut oil, I decided to do a little looking around for studies on Taurine. Here's one that's interesting: http://www.medical-hypotheses.com/article/S0306-9877(04)00280-4/abstract

Neutrophils are activated in the coronary circulation during acute coronary events (unstable angina and myocardial infarction), often prior to the onset of ischemic damage. Moreover, neutrophils infiltrate coronary plaque in these circumstances, and may contribute to the rupture or erosion of this plaque, triggering thrombosis. Activated neutrophils secrete proteolytic enzymes in latent forms which are activated by the hypochlorous acid (HOCl) generated by myeloperoxidase. These phenomena may help to explain why an elevated white cell count has been found to be an independent coronary risk factor. Low-fat vegan diets can decrease circulating leukocytes – neutrophils and monocytes – possibly owing to down-regulation of systemic IGF-I activity. Thus, a relative neutropenia may contribute to the coronary protection afforded by such diets. However, vegetarian diets are devoid of taurine – the physiological antagonist of HOCl – and tissue levels of this nutrient are relatively low in vegetarians. Taurine has anti-atherosclerotic activity in animal models, possibly reflecting a role for macrophage-derived myeloperoxidase in the atherogenic process. Taurine also has platelet-stabilizing and anti-hypertensive effects that presumably could reduce coronary risk. Thus, it is proposed that a taurine-supplemented low-fat vegan diet represents a rational strategy for diminishing the contribution of activated neutrophils to acute coronary events; moreover, such a regimen would work in a number of other complementary ways to promote cardiovascular health. Moderate alcohol consumption, the well-tolerated drug pentoxifylline, and 5-lipoxygenase inhibitors – zileuton, boswellic acids, fish oil -may also have potential in this regard.

I lied. Here's a great interview on the China Study and its Credibility

2010-12-14T10:43:00.001-08:00

So I'll try to get up here once a week to post anything I run across.

Here's an excerpt from an interview (see urls below) between Chris Masterjohn and Dr. Mercola regarding the China Study and its "conclusion" that a plant based diet is best for everyone. Yes, I am aware that Chris Masterjohn is affiliated with the so-called "darkside", Weston A. Price Foundation, but he's extremely credible and pragmatic because he can see another perspective. When anyone makes sweeping statements, even in the vegan world, I immediately put up a flag. My husband does this, and he's on my shit list. When a doctor here in Santa Rosa says a low fat, starch based diet is the perfect diet for everyone, when there's even ONE PERSON or child with tooth decay (requiring most of her adult teeth to be capped!), that's just simply wrong on all levels. Do right by the fork wielders with honest information and let each one go to the level of plant based diet that is healthy for them.

Chris Masterjohn: ... some people may do better with a more plant-based diet and other people may do better with a more animal-based diet. I do happen to believe that everyone would be better off if they include some animal products in some form in their diet but certainly, there are many people who do well by having the majority of their diet or a vast majority as plant products.

What you find is an enormous selection bias when you look at only one practitioner who’s only treating people with vegetarianism. If you take a practitioner like Dr. Joel Fuhrman, for example, he may be a great practitioner and may have great success with his clients, but if you take someone like that and say that every single person or at least 90 percent of them do fine with less than 10 percent of animal products, do you really think many people who intuitively feel that they do better with animal products are gonna go to a doctor who’s telling them that they should cut out all the animal products and eat at least two pounds per day of leafy green vegetables in their diet? Probably not, so what you see is this enormous bias that’s introduced by focusing on three or more clinicians who are using that type of diet, and completely leaving out all of the other evidence.

http://mercola.fileburst.com/PDF/ExpertInterviewTranscripts/InterviewChrisMasterjohnChinaStudy.pdf
http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2010/12/11/chris-masterjohn-criticism-of-the-china-study.aspx

I didn't have a chance to read Denise Minger's break down of the raw data of the China Study, but this information is highly interesting, she's got charts and photos too!:

http://rawfoodsos.com/2010/06/23/tuoli-chinas-mysterious-milk-drinkers/

How The Vegan Diet Could Be Much Better, The Bible, I'm sorry, Last Post

2010-12-12T21:58:00.000-08:00

Stop promoting a very low fat diet.
Eat fat with your greens.
Look up which veggies are more bioavailable when cooked. Carrots are.
Remove canola oil and ALL vegetable oils except olive oil, sesame oil, coconut, flax, and red palm oil
Banish the raw to salads (with olive oil)
Eat Kelp with your soy.
Add coconut oil to your daily diet. Use it as a spread on your yam, or in your veggies.
Eat natto or take a K2 from natto.
Add red palm oil.
Make sure you get your D.
Take a taurine supplement.
Take a vegan multi from whole foods, if possible, and take that multi with the biggest meal of the day.
Stop eating so much bread and grains.
Combine your beans and rice and use less rice.
Take probiotics and digestive enzymes if you need them.
Take a 3/6/9 blend.
Stop saying it's natural, it's not unless you are from a traditional plant based culture.
Consistently take a chewable B12 as directed.
Listen to all sides of an issue even if it is icky.
Never stop learning.
Question "science" especially if it helps out the Statin manufacturers.
Question "science" when it helps out the meat industry too.

Some of us are extremely lucky to be able to follow this in this day and age where there's supplements to fill in the gaps.

I do want to point out that the supplement business isn't booming because of vegans, it's booming because there's lots of people lacking vitamins and minerals. Many diets these days are not that natural.

What about that thing where God wants us to be vegan in the Bible?
Now, let's say that God wants us to be vegan as indicated in the Old Testament. The Old Testament God would have an issue with eating animals, but He had issues in general. However, in the New Testament, He converts from being an asshole to being compassionate and understanding. Therefore, He knows that we have adapted to eating animals and that some people have to rely on animals for their nutrition. The human being is not as consistent a converter of vitamins and minerals from plants, as other beings. He'll forgive us, that's His MO after all.

My Agenda...
Each of us can only try to do our very best given the information we have before us. This website aims to place more of that information before you for your consideration. I hope that all this information inspires you to learn more about being healthy on the vegan diet, even if takes more effort for some. I also hope that if you are feeling like crap on the vegan diet, that you consult with JackNorrisRD.com. I also want current healthy vegans to stop thinking that this is the One Diet to Rule them All. It is not. Have some empathy for your fellow humans.

Grateful
I am grateful to be a vegan (coming up with a new word for it), it's not only aligned with how I feel about animals, my health/hormone issues went away. I had excruciatingly painful lumps in my breasts. I get my period every 28 days, how's that for an old woman? Pretty good! I am equally grateful to have read the article in VeganOutreach that opened my eyes, finally, to the health issues experienced by former vegans. Plus, the Universe/God confirming that few days later that with the meeting of the tooth decayed current vegan children here in Santa Rosa, California. Besides getting married, perhaps there's a reason why I moved here from Florida? What's interesting is that my husband is the one who met the family and I only had the opportunity to ask the mom about her children's health and teeth on the way out the door!

The more I read about ex-vegan health problems, the more I'm so sorry.
I'm sorry for the health problems they experienced and I'm sorry for being an asshole in anyway in thought, word, or deed to all former vegans and questioning, even slightly, their motives or inner life. WTF do I know?

Listen to your Gut/Intuition
I hope you investigate probiotics and consider taking them. I also hope you read all that you can on VeganHealth.org.

This is My Last Post
I am not a health professional, I'm not omniscient, and I have no magic 8 ball with some special insight into all the infinite variations of how each individual's intestines and genetics work. No one does. Unless you do, then you have no reason to speak about why a person ends their vegan diet. We are all different. There is no Average Man and there is no Average Woman.

Coconut Oil, Ketones, Spring Hill couple's Alzheimer's fight tries boost in brain superfuel

2010-12-12T21:42:00.000-08:00

I don't know how I find this stuff, but this article really is amazing!

Mary Newport, a pediatrician who runs Spring Hill's neonatalogy clinic, scrounges for any Alzheimer's information she can find. Her husband is an accountant who began struggling with numbers in his mid 50s.

Last year, she ran across a report of Axona's clinical trials, well before it hit the market. Not wanting to wait, she began feeding her husband large doses of virgin, nonhydrogenated coconut oil, available at Wal-Mart for less than $7 a quart.

Coconut oil contains a mixture of saturated fats. The liver converts some into ketones. Others float around in the bloodstream, which is why cardiologists usually discourage its use.

The effect on Steve Newport was immediate.

"He said it was like someone had turned on a lightbulb,'' Mary Newport says. "He was alert, smiling, joking. He was Steve again. He was back.''

http://www.tampabay.com/news/health/research/article1024137.ece

They are brain boosters from caveman days that allow humans to survive on nothing but water.

They nurture newborns right out of the womb.

Now ketones — a kind of superfuel for brain cells— are drawing interest as possible treatment for Alzheimer's disease.

In March, a Colorado company began touting Axona, the first FDA-approved "medical food'' for people with Alzheimer's. The key ingredient is a saturated fat that the liver converts into ketones.

Meanwhile, a federal scientist is examining whether ketones might help soldiers think and fight better. He hopes to expand his work to people with Parkinson's disease and Alzheimer's.

Then there is Spring Hill resident Steve Newport. His wife retrieved him from an Alzheimer's funk 14 months ago by loading him up with saturated fats found in coconut oil.

He says he feels "alive again."

This does not mean the promised land is around the corner.

Coconut and other ketone-producing oils can cause diarrhea and cramping. Cardiologists say they will clog arteries.

Still, the science behind ketone bodies is intriguing and caregiver bulletin boards are sprinkled with hopeful anecdotes.

An 83-year-old woman in Connecticut is dressing herself again.

A 62-year-old man in California is cracking off-color puns.

And in Spring Hill, Steve Newport mows the lawn without disassembling the John Deere.

• • •

Red Palm Oil, Udos' 3/6/9 blend, K2

2010-12-12T20:53:00.000-08:00

If you read the article by Christ Masterjohn you'll see that he mentioned a good source of vitamin A is Red Palm oil. More specifically beta-carotene and alpha-carotene. I went across the street to get some, and couldn't find it. I'm going to check with Whole Foods this week.

Check this excerpt from an article about Red Palm Oil by Dr. Bruce Fife, ND:

Carotenes are valuable nutrients and powerful antioxidants. They are also important because our body can convert them into vitamin A, an essential nutrient. Vitamin A deficiency can cause blindness, weaken bones, lower immunity, and adversely affect learning ability and mental function. Vitamin A is only found in animal foods. Such foods, are too expensive for many people. Carotenes in fruits and vegetables can supply the needed vitamin A if an adequate amount of fat is also consumed. Carotenes require fat for conversion into vitamin A. Unfortunately, those who can’t afford animal products often do not eat much fat either. Populations with ample carotene-rich foods available often suffer from vitamin A deficiency because they don’t get enough fat in their diet.

Red palm oil provides a perfect solution. It supplies the needed fat and vitamin A precursors. Red palm oil is the richest dietary source of provitamin A carotenes (beta-carotene and alpha-carotene). It has 15 times more provitamin A carotenes than carrots and 300 times more than tomatoes. This has made it a valued resource in the treatment of vitamin A deficiency. Just one teaspoon a day of red palm oil supplies children with the daily recommend amount of vitamin A. Nursing mothers are encouraged to supplement their diet with palm oil to enrich their milk with the vitamin. Studies show that adding red palm oil into the diet can double or triple the amount of vitamin A in mother’s milk.

The children are not only getting the vitamin A they need but other important nutrients as well. Red palm oil is a virtual powerhouse of nutrition. It contains by far, more nutrients than any other dietary oil. In addition to beta-carotene, alpha-carotene, and lycopene it contains at least 20 other carotenes along with vitamin E, vitamin K, CoQ10, squalene, phytosterols, flavonoids, phenolic acids, and glycolipids. Palm oil is one of the richest natural sources of vitamin E. In addition to ordinary vitamin E, it also contains the highest amount of a super potent form of vitamin E known as tocotrienol. There are four tocotrienols. Palm oil contains all of them. These tocotrienols have up to 60 times the antioxidant activity of ordinary vitamin E. The combination of vitamin E, tocotrienols, carotenes, and other antioxidants makes palm oil a super antioxidant food.
Red palm oil is loaded with so many nutrients and antioxidants it’s like a natural dietary supplement. In fact, it is currently being encapsulated and sold as a vitamin supplement. The oil is also available in bottles like other vegetable oils for kitchen use.

I did get a K2 from natto that comes with a whole foods blend. I also got a 3/6/9 blend by Dr. Udo.

Very Good Information on the ABCs of Nutrition from a very non vegan perspective

2010-12-12T18:51:00.000-08:00

Seriously, the man who wrote this suffered horribly as a vegan, he wrote this wonderful article on nutrition for the Weston A. Price Foundation. I don't care what you think, he's got lots of tips and good information. Some of the stuff on K2 is more updated on my site (a few blog posts ago), the study he sites is older.

ABCs of Nutrition by Chris Masterjohn

Coconut Update I'm in Love!

2010-12-12T16:47:00.000-08:00

Yesterday, I posted something about how wonderful coconut oil was. I first noted the coconut and the inclusion of this Medium Chain Fatty Acid when I read the healthy vegan baby page (particularly how one child just slurps coconut milk down, good baby!) on VeganHealth and from a comment in one of the threads on JackNorrisRD.com site about how he uses Earth Balance, which is made with Palm Oil. Other than noting the inclusion of saturated fat — Medium Chain Fatty Acids — I did't know much about coconut oil nor did I read anything about it. I had a gut feeling about it, so I went out and bought some extra virgin, raw, organic coconut oil. I took two tablespoons about 3 hours before I pasted together yesterday's post about coconut oil and before I read about the numerous testimonials. I particularly noted the amazing fat loss results, especially concerning belly fat. I was a fat vegan, then I became a fit vegan, now I'm a medium fit/fat vegan. Before I read those testimonials, I have to say, with deep sincerity, that I have not felt so satiated and warm with so much energy in a long, long time. I was able work out longer today, think clearer, and I feel bright, more awake than normal. I don't want to use Earth Balance anymore, since I don't like what I know about canola and safflower oil (plus, I avoid most corn — unless explicitly non GMO — like the plague, that's just me). I am replacing my Earth Balance with coconut fat and a little sea mineral salt. I will be making a yam in a few min, I'll let you know!

I stopped eating the eggs last week or the week before. So now I'm an "ex-ex-vegan" Hah! I had a total of 5 eggs in 6 years. I noticed zero difference, except there is a dopamine effect after eating good protein. But you can get a dopamine effect after a banana too. Remember, I take a good bit of D after moving from FL and I also eat whole foods based green smoothies with every essential nutrient from food sources (not isolates). So I would not be the one to notice a difference, but I noticed a difference with the coconut oil. That's huge for me.

6 Ways Mushrooms Can Save The World — This Rocks So Hard

2010-12-12T14:24:00.000-08:00

http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/paul_stamets_on_6_ways_mushrooms_can_save_the_world.html

The difference between a healthy vegan and an unhealthy vegan: the coconut?

2010-12-11T22:17:00.000-08:00

One thing I noticed between healthy vegans on the VeganHealth site and in my own life and the ones who are now ex-vegans: saturated fat.

Here's some information on how much coconut oil rocks! Yes the last link is to a WAPF site and Dr. Mary Enig's work (she's not a dumb ass and her research on a coconut oil should be considered):

http://www.coconutresearchcenter.org/coconut-research.htm
(this page has lots of NIH studies on medium-chain triglycerides — huge eye opener)

http://www.coconutdiet.com/cholesterol.htm
http://thyroid.about.com/cs/dietweightloss/a/coconutoilfife_3.htm
http://trit.us/knowyourfats/coconut-oil-studies.html

Please send me any links you find.

I am probably only a handful of vegans (I'm coming up with a different word instead of a vegan) who do not believe there is a connection between saturated fat and cholesterol and the rise in heart disease. I think that the rise in heart disease stems from eating too many refined carbohydrates and stress (nutritional and other forms). Anyway, call me a nut job. Here's some information, if you have any links to share, please send them to me.

Could sugar, not saturated fat and cholesterol, be the cause in heart disease?

http://www.cardiologytoday.com/view.aspx?rid=63483
http://www.usc.edu/hsc/info/pr/hmm/99spring/sugar.html
http://circ.ahajournals.org/cgi/content/full/106/4/523
http://www.dietitian.com/triglyce.html
http://www.telegram.com/article/20100421/NEWS/100429942/1052

So what if this turns out to be the case? That's we've bought a big lie? That saturated fat and, even dietary cholesterol, is not unhealthy, as long as you stop drinking the sodas and eating the buns? So what! No one was becoming vegan in record numbers anyway, so relax. There's way too much money in the statin business to disprove this. Did you know that research that started this idea was on vegetarian bunnies?

Nothing will change at all, except you might get healthier by adding coconut oil to your diet. Read the http://www.coconutdiet.com/cholesterol.htm page.

The Vegetarian Myth’s many inaccuracies and misleading claims

2010-12-11T19:54:00.000-08:00

The Claim (by Lierre Keith): "...there are no good plant sources of tryptophan. On top of that, all the tryptophan in the world won’t do you any good without saturated fat." And later Keith blames the lack of tryptophan in vegetarian diets for depression, insomnia, panic, anger, bulimia and chemical dependency. (P. 10) In Reality: A cup of roasted soybeans contains nearly three times the adult RDA of tryptophan and a cup of pretty much any other bean will get you between 50-60% of the RDA. Two tablespoons of coconut oil more than meet the adult saturated fat RDA. Nuts, dark chocolate and avocado are all rich in saturated fat.

Click the image to download the complete pdf.

Download the pdf by clicking the image.

Except from IndyBay.org: We don’t need pie to humiliate Lierre Keith. As anarcho-primitivists and Weston A. Price followers condemned all vegans as violent psychopaths after Keith’s recent encounter with a spicy pie this weekend, a handful of animal rights activists were peacefully distributing leaflets that strongly disputed some of The Vegetarian Myth’s many inaccuracies and misleading claims (available below). Her book is a dangerous collection of straw man arguments, poorly-sourced pseudo-science, and outright lies. Discrediting the book will be easy, but it will work best with many people working together. To accomplish this, we have purchased the domain www.VegetarianMyth.com and will soon be launching a closely-moderated wiki (or similar site) to crowd-source the vegan critique of the book.

I thought the vegans who threw the pies were brainless zealots. I am no longer calling myself vegan or quasivegan. I think I will call myself an agent for the vegetable lobby. Come to think of it, where are all those kale lobbyists on Capital Hill?

Lierre Keith Pod Cast, Kick a person in the chin

2010-12-11T18:10:00.000-08:00

This confirms it! I had guess that she was low fat, based on third party information, but now I heard she also was mostly a low fat, macrobiotic vegan. What a horrible thing. Both of the WORST diets invented. So unhealthy. So many ex-vegans. Here's the link to the pod cast:

Lierre Keith Pod Cast

Chin Kicking
Also, can someone kick this person, Vegan Nutrionista in the chin? I posted that she was really irresponsible with her answer, that some vegan diet variations are VERY DANGEROUS, she and should refer that person, who was weak from the vegan diet, to a nutritionist.

No "Average Man" Biochemist: all men need the same vitamins and minerals, they do not need them in the same amounts or the same proportions.

2010-12-11T11:33:00.000-08:00

From Time Magazine:
Source: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,814891,00.html#ixzz17pkDrybZ

Most physicians are convinced that alcoholism is, at bottom, a psychological disorder. Roger John Williams, famed biochemist of the University of Texas, had a different theory. The trouble, he argued might have a physical basis. Now, in Nutrition and Alcoholism (University ol Oklahoma; $2), Williams suggests that vitamins have achieved history's first honest-to-goodness cure in a case of alcoholism, making the patient truly able to take a drink or leave it.
Williams believes that while all men need the same vitamins and minerals, they do not need them in the same amounts or the same proportions. Many human disorders, he thinks, arise because some people (partly because of heredity) need some life-essential substances in far greater quantities than normal diets supply.

No "Average Man." No man was better equipped than Roger Williams to show what vitamins could do. The younger (58) brother of Robert Runnels Williams of B1 and beriberi fame (TIME, April 30), he identified pantothenic acid and helped to discover folic acid, two of the vitamins in the B complex, did pioneering work on several of the others. Along the way, Roger Williams became distressed by the way science tends to deal with the nonexistent "average man," plumped for a science of "humanics" in which differences among men, rather than similarities, would be emphasized.

This Roger Williams is the younger brother of the man who discovered beriberi. That's exciting to me, seriously. All my young life, my mother would teasingly say stuff like "don't eat the white rice, you'll get beriberi." It's no wonder, I've never enjoyed rice and barely eat it. White or brown, not my thing. I learned a lot about nutrition and, strangely, a lot about food poisoning, growing up in my home.

Malabsorption and Theoretical Empathy

2010-12-11T01:25:00.000-08:00

Hello, this post is about malabsorption, which is difficulty absorbing nutrients from food, and vegans who become ex-vegans.

Malabsorption
The definition of malabsorption and symptoms. I'm going to be captain obvious here and point out something: there is such a thing as malabsorption. There is also such a thing as absorption. Vegans are people and they are not exempt from having either of these in varying degrees. If one didn't exist the other wouldn't exist. If everyone had a headache, there would be no headache as there is nothing to compare it with. If this whole page was bold, nothing would stand out. I say this silly crap because I still read really bizarre things from very educated and otherwise bright people just not getting how someone could fail to thrive on the vegan diet. After all, it's just a matter of this or that nutrient, nothing is special about meat. Well, the animal has done all the processing for you, so if your intestines sucketh, there you go! You eat that meat and you get the nutrients out of it because it's coming with the fat and already converted vitamins. Plus, far too many people bought the lie about no fat dressings and low fat diets (VegNews gave an award to a low fat vegan blog). If you've been reading this blog, I've cited many studies indicating that if you eat your food with fat, you absorb significantly more nutrients. Much of the reason why there are ex-vegans, provided they did everything else right, is they were not absorbing enough nutrients from their food for some reason or another.

Theoretical Empathy
This is only directed at some ex-vegans, there have been some, I'm sure, who do not want to eat meat or animal products yet they were feeling like crap on the vegan diet they were practicing. My mother keeps her meat, eggs, and dairy consumption to a bare and practical minimum, at 100% she felt bad. This is something sustainable for her.

I'm only referring to some ex-vegans, the ones who completely flip to the otherside, the "darkside", if you will, evangelizing the doctrine of the Weston A. Price Foundation or another "we are the only true diet there is, so screw you" mentality. (The vegan diet is loaded with those ingredients too.) But what current vegans can't understand the complete flip of philosophy. "What about the compassion and the suffering you know about? How can you eat meat with gusto?"

What I want to point out is the difference between theoretical empathy and genuine empathy: seeing oneself in others. A vegan who has rescued a farm animal, has spent any time with them, and/or relates to them just as one would as their own cat or dog, would go to the end of the earth to avoid eating meat. Supplements here I come! My father in law, Jack, born to a dairyman, had a pig he loved, his family slaughtered the pig for Christmas dinner. (Peace on earth, yeah right!) Jack has been a vegetarian for over 40 years because of that pig. There's a huge difference between becoming a vegan by theoretically thinking about animals, reading about them and agreeing with the the logic behind the ethics, and real genuine empathy because you deeply connect with them as your own fellow beings.

Pain is only a theory until you feel it for yourself. And compassion and empathy are the same way.

A final observation: In the Tao or Buddhism (I can't remember), it essentially says that whatever you push up against with force will push back with equal force. Many "absolutists" do complete flips. Even Buddhists or Taoists know this and have to watch their minds. People end up eating their own words. And for vegans, they end up eating more than words, they end up eating meat. It's as if the toxicity of the militant, in your face, exclusivity, veganazi attitude festers in one's own mind, then it poisons the body.

A Gut Feeling about Genetics, Health, and Adaptation to various diets

2010-12-10T23:47:00.000-08:00

For the last year or so I've had this persistent thought about how flora, our intestinal flora, is very important in our ability to adapt to different diets and how healthy we are. It might explain why some people have celiac, why some people have IBS, why some people are obese, and so forth. And, perhaps why some people are not as healthy on this or that diet.

This was just an intuition. However, today I found this study in Scientific American and I've excerpted the interesting points below:

Genetics in the Gut: Intestinal Microbes Could Drive Obesity and Other Health Issues:
The diversity of germs in the human gut suggests microbiota play a greater role in health than previously thought, even driving obesity and other metabolic conditions

More here: Uncovering the genetic secrets of intestinal bacteria

Excerpts:

Stomach survey
The number of microbes in the human gut was known to be vast, but the 3.3 million microbial genes located in it were a good deal "more than what we originally expected," says Jun Wang, of BGI and co-author of the Nature study. The number was especially surprising given that the microbiota tended to be very similar across the 124 individuals they sampled in Denmark and Spain.

Previous work had scanned for these microbial genes in the past. The largest had created about three gigabases (billion base pairs) of microbial sequences that was trumped by Wang's team, which assembled more than 576 gigabases.

The hefty catalogue is a "big advance" in the field, says Andrew Gewirtz of the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine at Emory University who was not involved in this study. "It really sets in place a framework for defining—in detail—the microbiome," he says. And as Wang and his colleagues noted in their study, "To understand and exploit the impact of the gut microbes on human health and well-being it is necessary to decipher the content, diversity and functioning of the microbial gut community."

More than 99 percent of the genes the group found were from bacteria. "These bacteria have functions, which are essential to our health: They synthesize vitamins, break down certain compounds—which cannot be assimilated by our body—[and] play an important role in our immune system," Wang points out.

Inflammatory mutations
As the prevalence of metabolic diseases continues to increase across the U.S. and many other countries, a growing body of research has suggested that some of these physiological changes might have their roots deep in the gut—not in the human cells but some of the many microbes there.

Emory's Gewirtz and his team tracked the gut microbiota in mice as the rodents experienced different kinds of metabolic disorders, such as obesity and insulin resistance. They bred mice with a genetic deficiency (specifically, the absence of Toll-like receptor 5, or TLR5, which has a hand in immune response) to see how it might change their microbial gut communities and metabolic health—and try to understand the order in which the changes were happening. "It's very much appreciated that obesity is associated with insulin resistance and type 2 diabetes," Gewirtz says. But "which comes first is not entirely clear."

Next genetic steps
Although a fuller grasp of microbial genetics promises to boost wellness even further, plenty of big unknowns remain. Scientists are still unsure just how and when these communities of microbes establish themselves in each person's gut. "Everyone is born sterile," Gewirtz says, noting that colonization starts during birth but that they do not know when it reaches relative stability. Regardless of timing, it means that, "the environment is a big, big factor in determining what someone's microbiota will be like," he adds.

If gut microbiota do play a large role in diseases such as obesity and metabolic syndrome, then a recent past change in these communities might help to explain the expansion of patients—and waistlines—in developed countries. "The genetics of humans have not changed appreciably in the last several hundred years," Gewirtz says. "But several changes in the environment have made it so that the gut microbiota is likely considerably different than it was 50 years ago."

Wang and his colleagues are already attempting to track the composition of human gut microbiota back in time to see if this might be the case. But they have their sights set on even bigger collections of genetic data. "Our dream is to build a library" of reference genomes, Wang notes. He hopes to have 10,000 genomes for bacteria within two years. And, he estimated, as soon as more definitive data about these gut genetics emerge, microbial-targeted therapeutics will likely be quick to follow.

More studies on depression and cholesterol

2010-12-10T22:58:00.000-08:00

Fatty acid composition in major depression: decreased ω3 fractions in cholesteryl esters and increased C20:4ω6/C20:5ω3 ratio in cholesteryl esters and phospholipids

Lowered ω3 polyunsaturated fatty acids in serum phospholipids and cholesteryl esters of depressed patients

Depression and adipose polyunsaturated fatty acids in an adolescent group

Macrobiotic Vegan / Vegetarian Diets Usually Fail

2010-12-10T14:41:00.000-08:00

Too many grains equals not enough Lysine.

Deficiency States and Symptoms Signs and symptoms of lysine deficiency include fatigue, nausea, dizziness, anorexia, irritability, slow growth, anemia, and reproductive disorders. Inci-dence of marked lysine deficiency in the diet is rare in developed countries like the United States. However, certain individuals, such as vegetarians following a strict macrobiotic diet or athletes undergoing frequent vigorous exercise, are at risk for lysine deficiency. Legumes are a good source of lysine for vegetarians.' Alternative Medicine Review Voiume 12, Number 2 2007

Alternative Medicine Review Voiume 12, Number 2 2007

VeganHealth.org has updated the protein recommendations for vegans. We need to pay attention to the legume category, because that's where the Lysine is. You can type in your ideal weight, not how much you weigh, and the chart 3 will give you a good idea of what you need to get. You'll have to scroll down. I suggest taking one Sunday, or whenever, and reading all you can on the proteins page. It is really extensive, because he's detailed, but it's not complicated.

http://www.veganhealth.org/articles/protein#lys

I emailed the makers of Red Star Nutritional Yeast and am waiting on a profile of the amino acids. I had a gut feeling that Nutritional Yeast has a really good profile with more Lysine to Arginine ratio. If this brand below is similar to Red Star, then I was correct.

Quantum Brand Nutritional Flakes
http://www.totalhealthsecrets.com/ENGLISH/catalog/Nutritional-Flakes_875.html

Servings (2 tbsp - 16g) per container: 14
Each 2 tablespoon serving contains:
Primary Nutritional Yeast (Saccharomyces cerevisiae)

Calories 70
Total fat 1g
Saturated fat 0g
Cholesterol 0mg
Sodium 5mg
Total Carbohydrates 7g
Dietary Fiber 4g
Protein 8g

Percent daily values based on 2,000 calorie diet:
Vitamin B1 640%, Vitamin B2 565%, VitaminB3 280%, Vitamin B6 480%, Folic Acid 60%, Vitamin B12 150%, Iron 4%, Zinc 21%, Selenium 32%

Amino Acid Profile Per Serving (from Protein Content):
Alanine - 275mg, Arginine - 330mg, Aspartic Acid - 682mg, Cystine - 55mg, Glutamic Acid - 840mg, Glycine - 242mg, Histidine - 99mg, Isoleucine - 264mg, Leucine - 385mg, Lysine - 440mg, Methionine - 77mg, Phenylalanine - 242mg, Proline - 429mg, Serine - 308mg, Threonine - 253mg, Tryptophan - 66mg, Tyrosine - 165mg, Valine - 264mg.

The Vegan Disillusionment: One Plant Based Diet Doesn't Fit them All and Some Royally Suck

2010-12-09T13:22:00.001-08:00

Yes, the title is a grabber. I could easily replace the word vegan with the name of any diet there if it doesn't live up to the hype and/or the romantic concepts inside one's own head.

I've immersed myself in ex-vegan and ex-vegetarian stories. Besides it being depressing, it has been a real eye opener. What I'm about to write will piss many people off. Too bad.

With the exception of one story of a person with eczema, which could be indicative of Leaky Gut Syndrome or a severe allergic inflammation from gluten (Celiac disease), many of the failure to thrive vegans were raw foodists (can't they call it something else like "Rawganism" — sounds sexy) and low fat vegan or vegetarian dieters (can't they call it something else like "Malabsorptionism"). Also Macrobiotic based vegan diets have their share of ex-vegans. Can't we rename it "TooMuchGrainism" or "PullingYourYangism".

There is also a fair share of ex-vegans who were not only going low fat, but only doing whole foods. This is the advertised "ultimate diet", but it's really unhealthy! Besides the fact that you barely get the nutrients out of your vegetables if you don't eat them with fat, if you don't eat fortified foods (or you don't supplement) you will not get enough vitamin D and other vitamins added to packaged food. These are added because many people, the vast, vast majority being omnivores, don't get the RDA of certain vitamins and minerals. And, there are some ex-vegans who went the whole foods, low fat, and no supplements (not even B12) route. Really unfortunate. There's many variables. I can't cover them all.

I'm not going to even bother with discussing Rawganism or TooMuchGrainism. To me, they both have their good and bad points, but for the most part: WHAT ARE YOU THINKING? Too many grains, no cooked food. Are you stoned? No, you just bought the lie. You're not alone, if that's any comfort now. I wish I could apologize for all the misguided doctors, "prophets", and greedy profiteers, but some evangelicals are very sincere, to quote myself:

Just because the Nourishing Traditions worked for you, it doesn't mean that it is the one diet to rule them all either. But seriously, isn't that the way it is with something so intimate such as diet or religion? Jesus is God to millions of people, they pray to Him, get inner and outer confirmation and feel happy. Telling them otherwise is not going to get you anywhere. They want all the people to share in their happiness and joy they get from a close personal relationship with Jesus. Telling them that people also pray to Buddha, or Allah, or my master, Meher Baba, and also feel the same way and get the same benefits, that would freak them out. They would cover their ears and start singing loudly, in a manner of speaking.

I lied, I will share little story about Rawganism: My mother and I went to a talk at a Florida Voices for Animals Dinner years ago and the guest speaker was a devout raw foodist. This woman used to eat such horrible Standard American Diet food and healed nearly all her ailments by going raw. I'm happy for her. But that doesn't mean one should keep doing it forever. On the way out the door, my mother, an RN who aced her Anatomy and Physiology exams, said that some of the stuff this raw foodist was saying defied the laws of science. From then on out I didn't think much about raw vegan diets. There's only one raw food vegan that I know who looks good and healthy, he's a bodybuilder and eats so much variety and lots of protein. He also makes sure his levels are checked. And then there's Brendan Brazier, he's 80% raw. He knows a great deal about nutrition. The omni gals across the street were raving today about his Vega Protein and how good they felt! So take that a whey! ;-) Punny.

What I am going to discuss is Malabsorptionism (a low fat vegan diet). When a person does not add fat to their veggies and other foods (I suspect), the ability to absorb nutrients decreases dramatically.

Chemistry and Biochemistry of Pigments Group, Department of Food Biotechnology, Instituto de la Grasa, CSIC. Av. Padre García Tejero, 4, 41012 — Sevilla, Spain: Bioaccessibility of carotenes from carrots: Effect of cooking and addition of oil

Addition of olive oil to carrot samples during cooking and before application of the in vitro digestion model had a marked positive effect on the release of carotenes, although the design of the model did not allow the correct estimation of this effect. The higher amounts of micellarised carotenes (80%) were found in the digest prepared from cooked carrots containing 10% olive oil. In general, the inclusion of olive oil during cooking increased the carotenoid extraction and micellarisation in a dose-dependent fashion.

Yo, there's more:

Seven healthy men and women ate salads of spinach, romaine lettuce, cherry tomatoes, and carrots topped with Italian dressings containing 0, 6 (0.2 ounces), or 28 grams (almost 1 ounce) of canola oil on different occasions during a 12-week period. Hourly blood samples were taken for 11 hours after the meal and tested for nutrient absorption.

The study found that only negligible amounts of alpha- and beta-carotene and lycopene were detected in the blood after eating a salad with fat-free dressing. Significantly more of these substances, known as carotenoids, were detected in the blood after eating salads with reduced-fat dressing or full-fat dressings.

WebMD: fat helps the vegetables go down

Here's some more interesting information about adding oils with your vegetables.

Another interesting fact: Since mammals synthesize a small quantity of Vit K2 forms from vitamin K1, then eating lots of green vegetables should provide substrate for some quantity of K2 conversion. However, work by Schurgers [laboratories of Drs. Vermeer, Geleijnse, and Schurgers at the University of Maastricht in the Netherlands] have shown that K1 absorption is poor, no more than 10%, but increases significantly when vegetables are eaten in the presence of oils. (Thus arguing that oils are meant to be part of the human diet. Does your olive oil or oil-based salad dressing represent fulfillment of some subconscious biologic imperative?) — Dr. William Davis, MD

When you don't eat your food with oil, you don't extract the nutrients nearly as well as you could with the addition of fat. Long term adherence to some variation of "Malabsorptionism", I'm conjecturing here, probably builds scar tissue in your intestines, or messes them up in general. Your stool will be bulky, like you didn't digest the food as well. No fat is just like having sex without any lubrication. Not good at all! Yes, it's an analogy that is very effective in getting my point across.

Genetics plays a vital role too, I honestly believe that some people are not cut out to be vegans, they can certainly cut down a lot on their animal product consumption, but they don't make certain enzymes or their intestines are not healthy enough (even with fat), and so forth. This is just my opinion, but it kind of makes since since obviously we are not clones of each other. Some people have type 1 diabetes and some people don't. Recall Don Gorskey, from the Super Size Me movie. He ate two Big Macs a day, for years on end, and had total cholesterol of 140mg/dL.

Here's what I think many of the vegan health failures stem from:

Not Enough Vitamin D
If you don't eat fortified food, get enough sun exposure, take a D supplement with a good dosage for your body weight and age, and/or consume a whole lot of mushrooms exposed to UVB light, you are probably deficient in vitamin D on the vegan diet. Most of the world, according to many sources, is vitamin D deficient too. That's why it's added to many packaged foods. Most of the world is not vegan. However, if you eat a low fat vegan diet, your cholesterol is also low. If you increase your fat, your cholesterol rises. "Cholesterol is the basic building block of vitamin D in humans. When ultraviolet light from the sun hits the leaf of a plant, ergosterol is converted into ergocalciferol, or vitamin D2. In just the same way, when ultraviolet light hits the cells of our skin, one form of cholesterol found in our skin cells-called 7-dehydrocholesterol-can be converted into cholecalciferol, a form of vitamin D3. (source)"

Ideas for Vegans: Eat fortified foods, take a D3 supplement, eat fat and go in the sun for the appropriate amount of time per day. See VeganHealth.org on Vit. D. look in the second column. These are still conservative levels, I take much more. I think that vegans and older people should get a vitamin D test to see what's up.

Not Enough Vitamin K2
If you can't enough of the K1 out of your kale and other vegetables, due to lack of fat, you won't even have a chance, even with healthiest of intestines, to convert this form of K (K1) to the fat soluble version called K2. One ex-vegan had nose bleeds when he was vegan, this is an indication of a severe K deficiency. According to Dr. Alan Inglis, MD: "Vitamin D helps you absorb calcium while vitamin K2 tells your body where to put it - into the bones where it belongs, not the delicate inner lining of the blood vessels that serve the heart." Even if you are eating your veggies with fat, if you take antibiotics, are stressed out, and eat lousy sugar laden food, your ability to produce the bacteria in the human gut to make vitamin K2 is seriously impaired.

Ideas for vegans: Eat natto, apparently sauerkraut has K2 as well (check this), heal your intestines with probiotics, eat your greens with oil, take a K2 supplement.

Not Enough Taurine (or you lack the enzyme — cysteinsulfinic decarboxylase — to make it yourself)
According to Dr. Leonard Smith, MD "Many humans may not regularly produce a high level of the enzyme needed to make taurine". But let's assume that even if you have good levels of this enzyme, and you are eating enough protein to get the amino acids cysteine and methionine, simply due to a lack of fat, you can't get adequate B6 (Vitamin B6 is the master vitamin in the processing of amino acids), Vitamin A, and Zinc. In some sources, I found that to make taurine you need vitamin C, but the majority of sources indicate vitamin A is a key vitamin. Without the fat, the pro vitamin A (beta carotene) is not easily absorbed and you don't have much of chance of converting that to the actual, fat soluble Vitamin A. All three building blocks to make your own taurine, B6, Pro A, and Zinc are in short supply if you are not absorbing adequate levels from your food due to the lack of fat at the time of ingestion. There was a 1988 study that measured the taurine levels, in urine and plasma, of a group of vegans, members of a Seventh Day Adventist college. The study compared the vegans to a control group of non vegans on a standard american diet. The results of the study indicated that the plasma taurine concentrations in the vegans were significantly reduced to 78% of control values. Urinary taurine was reduced in the vegans to only 29% of control values. That's a big difference. I found this study sited on BeyondVeg and I have no reason to doubt it (you can if you want). My interpretation of their work is not so black and white. I would bet good money that traditional diets followed by genetically adapted peoples, such as Asians following their traditional diet that is mostly plants, starch, and very little meat, and which doesn't skimp on the fat, have the ability to produce taurine in good supply for their particular bodies. Germans, on the other hand, who have relied so long on animal sources, would not be as well adept at this. They could adapt over time. This is my opinion, take it or leave it. However, it would explain a lot. I also want to call your attention to the B6 being the master vitamin in the processing of amino acids, even if you are getting enough protein (amino acids), and you are NOT getting enough of B6, you've got a serious problem.

Ideas for vegans: take a taurine supplement and see how you feel. All over the place I read that Taurine is in Brewer's Yeast, but I haven't verified it. I took 2, 500 mg earlier today and I don't know if it's a placebo effect, because the woman at the health food store said to not take it before bed, but good Gawd, I have so much energy and I felt so much more alert within a 1/2 hour or so of ingestion. Freaking great I tell you!

Deficient in Taurine information at Body Ecology

Not Enough Omega 3 DHA (whether the ability to convert ALA to Omega 3 DHA is impaired or for other reasons) or the Omega 3 and 6 are out of balance.
Dr. Mercola says that most of us can't convert the ALA from flax or walnuts, as examples, into Omega 3 DHA. How does he know? Is he pushing fish oil supplements? Anyway, the likely story is that some people are good at it, some are bad, and some are probably in the middle. That is: not the same with all people.

For pregnant women and developing babies, DHA is crucial. It's found in every organ of the body as well as in muscle tissue and in the brain. DHA makes brain membranes flexible and optimizes electrical signaling.

Animal studies show that when DHA is drastically reduced in the brain, processing slows.

"From neuron to neuron, or from the retina to the brain, those signals will still go," says Norman Salem, a neurobiologist with the National Institutes of Health. "But they may be slower and not as intense."

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=15823852

Idea for vegans: Take Omega 3 DHA from algae as a supplement.

Summation

Craving Fish
How the hell did I figure this little story of mine? I really have no idea if it's accurate, but the clue was that I kept hearing that people craved fish after coming off a vegan or vegetarian diet. Fish (oily fish in particular) contain lots of D, Omega 3 DHA, Taurine, Vitamin A, and iodine (which I didn't list above, but its levels are also low in many vegans and vegetarians). Fish also could contain a lot of mercury, check the NRDC site for list of "safer" fish. IMO, Neurotoxins suck even at low levels. I never enjoyed fish even when I ate lamb :-(, so the first thing I went for when I was a pregnant vegetarian was eggs. Eggs also contain a lot of these nutrients. However, if you wish stay as close to vegan as possible, please consult with a vegan RD and take some supplements.

That should be it for the time being. I had to get this off my chest.

Please visit VeganHealth.org, eat some fat, listen to your heart/intuition, pray, and think for yourself! Go to a doctor if you are at risk for heart disease.

Symptoms of malabsorption: http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency/article/000299.htm

The Truth about Probiotics and Your Gut - Yale Studies
http://www.webmd.com/digestive-disorders/probiotics-10/what-are-probiotics

Homemade Almond Cheese Recipe

2010-12-09T08:48:00.000-08:00

I don't know when I ran across this recipe on a forum somewhere. I was looking for alkaline protein sources, it was probably around the time I saw Brendan Brazier.

Almond Cheese
2 cups raw almonds, soaked for 24 hr & drained
1 cup lemon water (90% water - 10% lemon juice)
1 capsule acidophiles
- remove skin from almonds & put in a blender, add lemon water to cover & blend until smooth & creamy, adding more liquid if needed to keep the mixture blending
- put into a cheesecloth lined colander & allow to drain for 1-2 hr. (keep the liquid, it is like a almond sour milk....)
- now put some weight on top to get a firm cheese & allow to ferment for 7-10 hr. then you put it in the refrigerator for several more hours.
- store in airtight container in the fridge & it will last around 2 weeks.
- you can spice it & then you put the spices in the blender in the beginning

The author of the forum marinates and uses instead of tofu or feta. I think it would be great in a stir fry. Looks like a lot of effort to make, but I thought it was interesting.

Original source: http://www.acidalkalinediet.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=3861&sid=e2db00e018e08fdfb60616b8bdb2e4e6

Eating certain foods together helps with nutrient absorption and add the fat already!

2010-12-09T00:57:00.000-08:00

Just a link: http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/foodwine/2008596567_zfoo07salad.html

Excerpt:
"Locked up inside that salad is nearly every antioxidant you've ever heard of," Dr. John La Puma wrote in "Chef MD's Big Book of Culinary Medicine (Crown, $24.95).

If you use fat-free dressing, he wrote, "you're getting less than you could — unless you eat that salad with avocado, or with walnuts or roasted walnut oil, or extra-virgin olive oil or nearly any other good-for-you fat."

The reason, La Puma said, is that the oil makes several nutrients — the lutein in the green peppers, the capsanthin in the red peppers, the lycopene in the tomatoes, even the limonene in the lemon — more body ready for you. "Each of them is optimally absorbed with a little bit of fat," he wrote.

The best way to spot synergy on your plate — and to ensure a nutritious meal — is to make sure it has a minimum of three colors and contains healthful fat (avocado, olive oil or nuts), Bazilian said.

"Food has a way of working synergistically, whether or not it's an outright pairing, so you're not constantly drinking tea and eating spinach. Certain nutrients help each other out."

Vitamin D Home Test and Carbs Troubleshooting my own Diet

2010-12-07T19:31:00.000-08:00

I have read so many different articles on how much D is enough, so I'm not going to even bother. Check VeganHealth.org, he's on the ball. There was even a recent story about how you don't need any at all. That is really odd and dangerous too.

I am going to order a home D test to check my levels and wanted to share this with you:

http://www.zrtlab.com/vitamindcouncil/home-mainmenu-1.html?page=shop.product_details&flypage=flypage.tpl&product_id=4&category_id=1

This is not an affiliate link. No links on this site are affiliate links intentionally (that is I might copy it and paste it without my knowledge). I paste in links without actually linking to many sites so that I don't have a lot of outbound links causing my rank to be affected.

Ahh, so now you know why you have to copy and paste a lot of the links I share.

I personally take a lot of D since I moved from the tropics, Florida, to Northern California where it's been overcast a lot. The improvement took about 1-2 days to see a much better attitude. It was astounding how bleak life was. It's still not as good as it used to be with real sunshine. However, since I am troubleshooting diets lately I figured that my blahness might also be related to the lack of the lavash bread that I used eat in FL. I would eat kale, tofu scramble and lavash and literally drop 2-5 lbs a week! That and some Vega too. It was great and I felt really terriffic. This lavash bread in Tampa is 22 carbs, 20 fiber (net 2 carbs) and I love it. There is nothing like it here. I really like bread, so I've been eating regular low calorie egg/milk free bread. And not only have I put on weight, I am more grumpy and sleepy after a meal with some of that bread. So rather than feel that way, I ordered a lot of lavash to be shipped across country. I know it's not eco-friendly, but I'm getting chubbier by the minute and so WTF. I will learn how to make it myself. I will also bring a lot back in January when I go to FL.

Quinoa Oh How I Love Thee

2010-12-07T14:08:00.000-08:00

How to cook quinoa: http://vegangoodeats.com/2010/04/quinoa-101-red-white-and-black/

Be inspired by this wonderful loaf recipe: http://vegangoodeats.com/2010/04/quinoa-104-american-comfort-food-quinoa-wild-mushroom-spinach-loaf-with-cashew-gravy/

I made the loaf for Thanksgiving and it was the tastiest loaf ever! I subbed with sauteed fresh spinach and I also used oil free sun dried tomatoes but added olive oil and brushed the top with the olive oil. Since it's safe to taste the raw, uncooked loaf, I spice it up as needed with more cumin or garlic or whatever.

Most quinoa preparation recipes, especially the one on whole foods, makes a mushy mess. The the one on this guy's site is da bomb. I changed it slightly though. Instead of using veggie broth or water, I used water and 1/4 cup of nutritional yeast when preparing the red quinoa. I would have eaten it all out of the pot, but I used some self restraint.

And, instead of the gravy recipe he has, which looks mighty fine, I made a gravy out of whipped northern white beans, sauteed mushrooms, caramelized onions, one small drop or two of hickory smoke, and garlic along with nutritional yeast, olive oil, and 1 tsp of better than bullion vegan beefless base and water. I sometimes use arrow root to thicken my gravy, but the beans do the trick most of the time.

This was the second Thanksgiving dinner, about a week later. The first one is where I met the dentally challenged children. Ahhh.

The link between low cholesterol and cancer, depression, anxiety

2010-12-07T13:02:00.000-08:00

Here's some links regarding the link between low cholesterol and cancer, depression, anxiety, and preterm birth and low birth weight if your cholesterol is low while you're pregnant.

http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/cholesterol-level/AN01394
http://ajp.psychiatryonline.org/cgi/content/abstract/152/3/419
http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/138557.php
http://www.heart-disease-bypass-surgery.com/data/articles/130.htm

Some may cover the same, paltry research on this topic. Feel free to send me your links.

I was inspired today to post this because of a comment on JackNorrisRD.com. One commenter related that I took it as a personal affront when I encouraged that guy, via his own blog, to read what I had wrote about the need for cholesterol in some people. He refused because it wasn't peer reviewed scientific stuff. If I had taken it personally, I would have persisted. Instead, I just moved on after I made a witty remark about how that guy's screen name/handle is similar to his attitude. I was just pointing out irony. Geesh.

You see, whether you are a vegan, an omni, or a follower of some cult leader in Texas, if you don't think for yourself you are a waste of my time.

His perspective is that he would read about the need for higher cholesterol levels in some people once it made its way down from on high through the scientific community.

That is an interesting perspective, and one that will never likely happen, here's why:

In one corner we have Big Pharma happily doling out the statins* and when those statins patten's expire they will subject more animals to painful tests and start again. Those are nice, laid back folks those Big Pharma peeps, they never, ever influence policy or pay for research.

In the other corner we have Big AG happily doling out the dead beings pumped with antibiotics (from Big Pharma) and other disgusting things. Those are nice, laid back folks those Big AG peeps, they never, ever influence policy or pay for research or become members of non-profit organizations.

Nearly all of the medical community agrees: saturated fat and cholesterol from animal sources is the #1 reason why there's a high rate of heart disease.

So eat your meat. Take your pills. Watch some guy rant on TV. Get stressed out. Take more pills. Eat some sweets. Die.

Cholesterol need not be dietary. There's some stuff in the WAPF doctrine that you must eat meat and get dietary cholesterol, but that's just wacked IMO. You can raise your own good and bad cholesterol levels with different types of fats. However, there is a genetic disorder called SLOS and people with that require synthetic or dietary cholesterol. It's estimated that 1 in 30 people are carriers of SLOS (that's a lot of people). Is there a vegan geneticist in the house? A magic 8 ball?

In the meantime you've got people on a low fat vegan diet thinking they are doing the right thing by their family. After all this perfect, precious, healthy diet has been filtered down from on high. It's a no-brainer. Right.

Then they get sick and their teeth decay.

Not everyone can have a cholesterol levels of around 100 of the plant mostly diet of the Asians. They are Asians. Check out a healthy German, what are his or her levels? I don't know. But a question like that is not something to dismiss.

Some people like Sarah Palin and some people like Dennis Kucinich.

We are all different.

I like Dennis.

Special thanks goes out to the dude who didn't visit this blog and the reasons why. You are inspirational!

* Statins lower cholesterol and it would harm business if there was a bunch of publicity about how low cholesterol may be harmful to some.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/06/100630121130.htm
New Insights Into Link Between Anti-Cholesterol Statin Drugs and Depression

Fat is where it's at: an interesting comment on Lierre Keith's Vegetarian Myth book

2010-12-07T00:44:00.001-08:00

So I'm at Lierre Keith's site and head on over to Amazon to look at the comments and what do I find but this:

By Joan Howe "joanhello" (Northampton MA USA) - See all my reviews
This review is from: The Vegetarian Myth: Food, Justice, and Sustainability (Paperback)

The author interweaves her deepening political and environmental understanding - looking at the whole picture and realizing that pretty much everything in the supermarket, not just the meat, is produced by methods that make the world a crueler, more polluted and, worst of all, less sustainable place, and that to avoid contributing to the problem calls for much more radical solutions than merely leaving the animal products out of your diet - with her own story of worsening health on a vegan diet followed by recovery when she began to eat meat again. This is where my first caveat comes up: she implies, without coming right out and saying, that her vegan diet was also a low-fat diet. I have also been vegan for long periods of my life (although never the decades that she logged) and it was only during the last one, from 2004-2006, that I experienced the slight beginnings of the back problems she describes. No coincidence: that was the one where I went low-fat as well as vegan and actually lost my ability to digest fat. Fortunately I got an accurate diagnosis promptly, got nutritional therapy to regain my ability to digest fat, and lost the back pain within a year. In the latter half of her Nutritional Vegetarianism chapter, she devotes several pages to challenging the demonization of dietary fat by the mainstream medical community. Nevertheless, she continues to attribute her health problems mainly to lack of meat rather than lack of fat.

It's amazing that such a simple thing such as fat in your otherwise balanced and colorful vegan diet could prevent such an avalanche of health issues. If you eat low fat vegan, you ARE doing it wrong! You don't have to go crazy with the fats, but you need to add it to your salads and greens to get the optimal absorption of nutrients. Plus, add a little to your green smoothie. If you recall the page of healthy vegan kids and their families a few posts back one child loves coconut milk!

Read this whole site or search for "fat" or "fats" in the search bar, when I have time to organize, hopefully I'll have a ton of links on why some fat is good for you, even a little or a little bit more than a little. You have to discern for yourself.

If you are a heart patient see a doc. This site is intended for otherwise healthy people who are not experiencing "hardening of the arteries" as my Momma says. Please visit VeganHealth.org for healthy vegan diets.

The Mission of this Site

2010-12-06T17:17:00.000-08:00

The mission of this site is to present the reasons why there are ex-vegans from a nutritional standpoint. However, sometimes I write from a psychological and/or spiritual perspective because it's really intertwined with the diet for many people.

I may be way off on the deep end or I may have some insight, that's for you to determine for yourself. I was very much shaken and sad to realize that my most beloved diet was not perfect for everyone. I had to address the question: If this is the "One Diet to Rule Them All" then there shouldn't be any ex-vegans?

But there is no diet like that. And there are ex-vegans.

What I want is a place, a resource, where a vegan who is groggy, has nose bleeds, cavities, hair loss, low libido, and so forth can turn to to get some ideas in regular everyday language. Such as: Groggy, foggy, can't concentrate? Check this out vegan dude... Simple ones such as natural mineral salt with the natural iodine, kelp, using oil in your kale salad, cooking your carrots, and other ideas like that. Getting healthy and feeling healthy may come down to something simple. It is that way in coding many times.

People feeling sick or tired need to know that they are not alone and they need a safe place to come to without being lambasted for failing or feeling bad on the most "precious" (using another LOTR term) diet. People who are thriving on the vegan diet sometimes take it as a personal affront if everyone is not thriving on it. Well, sorry to say, once again, "We are not clones of Donald Watson". Yeah, I'm sick of hearing it too.

I am not an expert. No one is an expert if you equate being an expert with some kind of omniscience. You need to discern and determine all aspects of your life and the questions and problems before you. If you want sound vegan nutrition advice, go to VeganHealth.org and JackNorrisRD.com. Why is he better than an MD like Dr. MacDougall? Because he has no monetary gain or reputation (God like status) to protect and his motivations are freaking awesome, that's why! If you are a heart patient, go to a doctor.

Use this site at your own risk. Be mad at me if you want. When I have time in January, I will fix this site up and clean up the writing, or trade with a writer. I'm not a writer, I'm an artist.

Vitamin K2, Saturated Fat and Other Fats, Unhealthy Gut Flora - Major Components Missing In a Healthy Vegan Diet

2010-12-06T11:50:00.000-08:00

When I found that forum post regarding the tooth protocol from Weston Price, as well as reading tons and tons of stories and health articles, it lead me to hypothesise that many vegan health failures stem from these main issues:

1. Unhealthy gut flora or some other intestinal problem which is preventing the absorption of nutrients (which could be as simple as a lack of fat eaten with the food and lack of fat or low fat in the diet, specifically saturated fat*)
2. Lack of oil eaten with the dark leafy greens (which if you don't eat oil with your greens and other food, you can't get the ideal amount of nutrients from them)
3. Too little fat, and saturated fat, in the diet (Yes, I know I've repeated myself.)
4. Not converting K1 to K2
5. Not getting enough of D and calcium, or getting enough, but no K2 which would not do the teeth and bones (or the entire body) any good.

*If you see the healthy vegans and babies a few posts back, did you notice the coconut? I did.

You'll have to read most of the posts on this blog to follow along with the background on these points, I don't want to reiterate all the stuff I've covered over again.

Fat-soluble vitamins are responsible for mineral transport and delivery so intake of vitamin A, D and K as well as saturated fat are necessary. You see you can eat all the calcium you want and it will never get into your blood without A and D. And it will never get out of your blood and into your bones and teeth without vitamin K2. (Activator X turns out to be K2)

Vitamin K2 in particular can significantly lower bacterial count in your mouth, but it can also change your saliva from phosphorous taking to phosphorous bearing. See source at VegSoc Australia

Dr. William Davis, MD wrote about K2 and some of the research: Food sources of vitamin K2. When you read this, and I suggest you read it several times, you'll see how K2 plays a VITAL role in our health and why lack of it (when all other components are there as far as vitamins and minerals from veggies) will make you one unhealthy vegan.

Another interesting fact: Since mammals synthesize a small quantity of Vit K2 forms from vitamin K1, then eating lots of green vegetables should provide substrate for some quantity of K2 conversion. However, work by Schurgers et al have shown that K1 absorption is poor, no more than 10%, but increases significantly when vegetables are eaten in the presence of oils. (Thus arguing that oils are meant to be part of the human diet. Does your olive oil or oil-based salad dressing represent fulfillment of some subconscious biologic imperative?)

--The MK-4 form of vitamin K2 [animal derived] is short-lived, lasting only 3-4 hours in the body. The MK-7 form, in contrast, the form in natto, lasts several days. MK-7 and MK-8-10 [natto derived] are extremely well absorbed, virtually complete.

You can get K2 from a supplement or from yucky natto. Yes, there is natto supplements but there's no mention of whether or not K2 is in those supplements, they just talk about enzymes on the bottle (I just went to the health food store). As you can see from the study at that link, you can increase your absorption of K1 and turn it into K2 by adding fat/oil in your kale salad and I would suggest probiotics because your intestines, to put it frankly, might suck. But to be safe, if you are experiencing any teeth issues, please consider taking a supplement or learning to love natto. You can get the supplement it at Pangea, a very popular vegan shop!

Whatever diet you're on, be sure that you get K2: Vegan K2

Now, I would not get all up in arms and start downing K2. There's got to be a way of checking your levels. If you are a heart patient, go to your doctor.

Anyone want to help me write up a questionnaire for vegans about their teeth?

2010-12-06T10:25:00.000-08:00

I don't want to give the impression that there's a whole bunch of vegans with tooth decay. That is not the case. There is an alarming amount of them, though. The link at the end of this post is a mom at mothering.com asking about healthy vegan teeth. She gets a lot of answers from vegans with good teeth, teeth improvements, but not much detail.

Where do you live?
Do you go outside much?
What supplements do take and how much and how often?
What do you eat consistently?

These are the kind of questions I need. I want them really detailed.

I got my best dental reports last year (actually I can't recall having a cavity in recent years, only childhood ones needed refilling) when I became a kaletarian, that is I ate cooked and raw kale a lot. My intestines work great and they are even better now with the probiotics. Kale has lots of K. But eating it and absorbing it are two different things for many people, the ones with the teeth issues. So this questionnaire would be like trouble shooting to see what people are doing right and doing wrong.

I think some of the health issues can be pin pointed to lack of fat or saturated fat in the diet. I don't shy from coconut and coconut ice cream or sauces with coconut in them.

On an ex-vegan blogLetThemEatMeat.com, Jack Norris, RD of VeganHealth.org and Vegan Outreach said: “Saturated fat can help boost cholesterol and steroid hormone levels if they are low and can improve sex drive – I know of one person who went this route and got his sex drive back.”

This is good because I'm a newly wed! Saturated fat may also help the body take the nutrients from plants too, I have to read more about it. To dismiss the work of a decent guy like Weston Price, who is not like the foundation in his name, is really close minded.

Visit this page: http://www.mothering.com/community/forum/thread/1214954/anyone-a-vegan-and-have-healthy-teeth

Plus, we may very well do better on K2. Natto here I come or a supplement...

Exposing the Lies of the Raw Vegan Diet and Hypocrisy. Dangers of the Raw Vegan Diet from a Vegan who's sick of the lying

2010-12-06T09:57:00.000-08:00

http://www.shazzie.com/life/articles/raw_vegan_children.shtml

These are some excerpts from that page, you must visit it.

This is written by:

Shazzie is the UK's most prolific and popular raw food writer, speaker and chef. She's written four books, two ebooks, published around 500 raw food recipes and is the Managing Director of Detox Your World (Rawcreation Ltd). She is regularly interviewed and quoted in the media on raw food, natural parenting and holistic living. Shazzie lives in Cambridge with her four year old raw daughter Evie.

However, all the while I was researching this information, I saw huge amounts of misinformation being fed to the raw food community. I also saw children with very damaged teeth, stunted growth and developmental problems.

Worryingly, the children of some of those who actively promoted raw food had experienced the worst symptoms. If these children were put on a raw or cooked vegetarian (not vegan) diet, and were given supplements, they caught up. Those who are still raw vegan are still experiencing development and growth issues.

I was most concerned that these "raw food promoters" never, not once publicly stated what had happened to their children. In fact, when other raw parents were having issues with the development of their children, these very same raw food promoters and coaches told them to keep on doing what they were doing. This caused the raw food community to remain oblivious to the dangers of raising children raw.

and

Take these examples:

One mother experienced severe growth defects in her children on the raw vegan unsupplemented diet and resorted to feeding them large quantities of dairy and meat. She has since stood shoulder to shoulder with the other raw vegan dogmatists and writes on raw food forums pretending to be someone else! She says that she has been successful in raising her children raw vegan, yet she clearly hasn't.

The raw vegan child who was severely behind his development schedule and had flourosis. His mother, a "raw food coach" altered his diet (to cooked vegetarian plus supplements, plus some fish in the early days) and he eventually he began to sit, crawl and catch up. Even after this harrowing experience, this coach continued to tell mothers of children that weren't thriving on the raw vegan diet that raw vegan is OK, and to eat more fruit. She has never made a public statement about this experience and continues to be vague about what makes a healthy raw food diet for adults and children.

The raw vegan family in the USA who have several children. The last child wasn't even sitting up by the age of two. All the children are extremely thin and "bird like".

The raw vegan fruit promoter who says all non-vegan children are too tall and so vegan children are supposed to be small.
The tiny raw girl on YouTube who has hardly any top teeth due to visible decay.

This Rocks. A vegan protocol for teeth remineralization and a little bit about Weston A. Price, the person! It's really cool!

2010-12-05T23:48:00.001-08:00

This is a copy and paste from this forum http://www.vegsoc.org.au/forum_messages.asp?Thread_ID=318&Topic_ID=1&start=25

You can get K2 from a supplement. http://www.veganstore.com/now-vitamin-k2/Page_1/939k.html

Dr. Price's "greatest disappointment", as he put it, was that none of the groups he studied was vegetarian/vegan. Going into his research he was sure he would find that such a diet would lead to ideal dental health.

There are several factors to consider when talking about dental health. First, virtually every group that Price studied had nearly perfect teeth, never brushed or flossed and never went to a dentist. So the take home message is that all this cleaning is totally unnecessary given the right dietary nutrients. Think about that every time you brush your teeth and remember what you are doing is only necessary because your diet is some how deficient in something. (But what you ask?)

Second, most dentists actually know very little about tooth mineralization because they were mostly trained in how to fix problems, not prevent them (there's more money in treatment than prevention). Teeth draw nutrients through two basic pathways. Through the root and through the outer surface. The root is nourished by the blood and the surface is nourished by your saliva. (I bet you never thought of saliva as a nutrient delivery system).

For normal mineralization to occur many things have to fall into proper order. Mineral intake has to be adequate and in the proper ratios. Calcium/phosphorous/magnesium/zinc ratios are important as is total quantity. Fat-soluble vitamins are responsible for mineral transport and delivery so intake of vitamin A, D and K as well as saturated fat are necessary. You see you can eat all the calcium you want and it will never get into your blood without A and D. And it will never get out of your blood and into your bones and teeth without vitamin K2. (Activator X turns out to be K2)

Vitamin K2 in particular can significantly lower bacterial count in your mouth, but it can also change your saliva from phosphorous taking to phosphorous bearing.

So the question is can a vegan diet provide all the right nutrients, in the right forms and in the right amounts? I've often wondered this. Let's do an inventory:

1. Minerals--no problem there, vegan diets can be mineral rich and in the proper ratios.
2. Fat soluble vitamins--this get a little tricky. Beta-carotene is not retinol acetate which is vitamin A. BC is pre-vitamin A and has to be converted to retinol acetate in the liver with saturated fat. The conversion ratio is about 10:1 BC:A and is less efficient than that in children, the eldery and people with certain underlying medical conditions.

Vitamin D is another tricky one. Vitamin D3 is what humans make via the sun along with most other animals. Vitamin D2 is found in limited quantities in the vegetable kingdom. Numerous studies have confirmed that D2 is not nearly as useful as D3. (Now there is a vegan version of D3 see earlier post)

Vitamin K is also tricky. So vitamin K1 is part of chlorophyll and is thus available to vegans. K1 is converted into K2 through two mechanisms: bacteria in the intestines and directly in most cell types. However, in the first case, the conversion is very inefficient so dietary K2 seems to be highly beneficial. K2 is rarely found in the vegetable kingdom and then only in fermented foods (ever try natto?)

3. Saturated fat--This is a bit of a problem as vegan tend to have low-fat intake and seem to prefer polyunsaterated and monounsaturated fats to saturated fats. Although coconut oil has made a lot of penetration into the vegan markets and it's almost entire saturated.

So what's the bottom line?

A properly constituted vegan diet can support proper dental development provided it's mineral rich and in the proper ratios, careful attention is paid to consume enough beta-carotene and saturated fat for vitamin A synthesis, get lots of sun for vitamin D synthesis, and eat plenty of green leafy veggies and keep your intestines fermenting properly for K2.

The modern "foods of commerce" Price documented as devastating people's health was devoid of all these things. In addition, sugar, white flour and polyunsaturated oil consumption interferes with many physiological processes and can drive up the need for minerals to make enzymes and vitamins like A,D and C to deal with the oxidative stress.

So in addition to careful nutrient inclusion, you also have to be careful to avoid empty calories.

A note on dental health "success metrics". Dental health should be considered multi-generationally, not in terms of mere years. So you can't look at your 8 year old and say "a vegan diet is producing good dental health". Instead, you must wait twice. You must wait for your child to reach adulthood and have their wisdom teeth come it without any cavities and no need for braces. If cavities occur or braces are needed, then the child has not received proper nutrition (vegan or not). Then you have to wait until your grandchild reaches adulthood and make the same evaluation. Only then will you know if proper nutrition has been in place the entire time. (Yes your parents bad dietary habits are responsible for your poor dental health)

Fluoride is not a human nutrient. There is no such thing as a fluoride deficiency disease. Fluoride can be used to strengthen tooth enamel, but is not naturally present. It is an artificial, industrial, tooth mineral.

Fluoride is one the most pervasive industrial pollutants and is a well know toxin. It is heavily regulated as a toxin everywhere in the world, except in our water supplies and toothpaste. The only reason anyone thinks fluoride is beneficial is because the US government's nuclear weapons program was producing large amounts of it and it was making people and animals sick down wind. Scientists were pressed into service to "discover" beneficial uses for it so that it's truly horrific dangers could be covered up. This has all been well documented through Freedom of Information Act document releases. When you think positive thoughts about fluoride your are being manipulated. If you don't believe me just spend some time doing research on fluoride toxicity or the history of its development.

Finally, the Weston A. Price foundation is a non-profit organization that receives no funding from any food producing groups. It is funded almost entirely from membership dues. It is dedicated to promoting research that supports the conclusions of Dr. Price as outlined in his book "Nutrition and Physical Degeneration". Everyone, including vegetarians and vegans, should read it as it has much to contribute to everyone's conception of diet and eating. The foundation engages in evidence-based advocacy and does not engage in propaganda.

Next Post:

bp, i don't think aariel was saying that vegans have a worse dental record than omnis, merely that it is such a new phenomenom that vegan diets have not been adequately researched in their relation to multi-generational dental health.... she also was quite clear that most modern omni diets don't measure up for a perfect dental diet either....

"The modern "foods of commerce" Price documented as devastating people's health was devoid of all these things. In addition, sugar, white flour and polyunsaturated oil consumption interferes with many physiological processes and can drive up the need for minerals to make enzymes and vitamins like A,D and C to deal with the oxidative stress.

So in addition to careful nutrient inclusion, you also have to be careful to avoid empty calories.

A note on dental health "success metrics". Dental health should be considered multi-generationally, not in terms of mere years. So you can't look at your 8 year old and say "a vegan diet is producing good dental health". Instead, you must wait twice. You must wait for your child to reach adulthood and have their wisdom teeth come it without any cavities and no need for braces. If cavities occur or braces are needed, then the child has not received proper nutrition (vegan or not). Then you have to wait until your grandchild reaches adulthood and make the same evaluation. Only then will you know if proper nutrition has been in place the entire time. (Yes your parents bad dietary habits are responsible for your poor dental health)"

Vegan Tooth Decay and How to Possibly Stop It & Possibly Reverse It

2010-12-05T14:43:00.001-08:00

This is a work in progress, keep coming back and PLEASE give me your feed back. Please ignore the errors and the lack of flow.

You can get K2 from a supplement. http://www.veganstore.com/now-vitamin-k2/Page_1/939k.html

Read the next post by a vegan who follows Weston A. Price the person and lists out a nice breakdown of his protocol. I didn't have the information on K2 on this page here, so I'm pasting some of the next page, read all of these pages:

For normal mineralization to occur many things have to fall into proper order. Mineral intake has to be adequate and in the proper ratios. Calcium/phosphorous/magnesium/zinc ratios are important as is total quantity. Fat-soluble vitamins are responsible for mineral transport and delivery so intake of vitamin A, D and K as well as saturated fat are necessary. You see you can eat all the calcium you want and it will never get into your blood without A and D. And it will never get out of your blood and into your bones and teeth without vitamin K2. (Activator X turns out to be K2)

Vitamin K2 in particular can significantly lower bacterial count in your mouth, but it can also change your saliva from phosphorous taking to phosphorous bearing.

There is an alarming rate of tooth decay on the vegan diet, particularly the low fat and raw diets. And gray or grey teeth on the vegan diet. (I'm using search terms so that vegans will find this page.) The junk food omni diet is crappy for teeth too, but that's besides the point. That omni crappy diet hasn't been touted as the best diet in the world, but the vegan diet has. And it is not for some people.

Now the tooth decay stuff is not some Weston A. Price propaganda, it's a fact. Whether you believe me or not, I don't care.

If you are vegan and suffering from tooth decay, you most likely do not have to start eating flesh to combat that, you might have to start eating eggs and dairy (specifically ghee). However, I think that you have a really good chance of reversing it and keeping your teeth nice and healthy by using olive oil and saturated fat -- yes -- as in coconut oil -- and good sources of dietary vitamin D (from mushrooms and the sun) and calcium (from kale) and other vitamins and minerals, as well as by removing drying ingredients in your teeth cleaning regimen so that your saliva can start healing your teeth, and by using the vegan portions of the WAPF protocol. The link is below. But don't jump the gun, read this entire page and learn and think.

Many VeganGuru MDs will tell you that fat is BAD, BAD, BAD and they are simply WRONG, WRONG, WRONG.

Seven healthy men and women ate salads of spinach, romaine lettuce, cherry tomatoes, and carrots topped with Italian dressings containing 0, 6 (0.2 ounces), or 28 grams (almost 1 ounce) of canola oil on different occasions during a 12-week period. Hourly blood samples were taken for 11 hours after the meal and tested for nutrient absorption.

The study found that only negligible amounts of alpha- and beta-carotene and lycopene were detected in the blood after eating a salad with fat-free dressing. Significantly more of these substances, known as carotenoids, were detected in the blood after eating salads with reduced-fat dressing or full-fat dressings.

http://www.webmd.com/food-recipes/news/20040727/fat-helps-vegetables-go-down

The best fats to eat WITH your veggies (specifically kale), from what I have gathered so far, is olive oil, which contains K and E, avocado and Omega 3 DHA from algae. Make a dressing, use stevia as the sweetener (no other kind of sweetening agent should be used, including fruit).

Avocados provide nearly 20 essential nutrients, including fiber, potassium, Vitamin E, B-vitamins and folic acid. They also act as a "nutrient booster" by enabling the body to absorb more fat-soluble nutrients, such as alpha and beta-carotene and lutein, in foods that are eaten with the fruit. http://www.avocado.org/nutrition/

But olive oil, avocado, and coconut oil, and Omega 3 DHA doesn't contain Vitamin D. Except for fortified food, much of which are grains or juices which not good for your teeth (according to the WAPF protocol and sugar in any form (even fruit), is not good for your teeth) there are very few sources of dietary Vitamin D and none are vegan: oily fish, eggs, cod liver oil. But wait, check this out:
http://mushroominfo.com/wp-content/uploads/Vitamin_D_Fact_Sheet.pdf

The USDA National Nutrient Database was recently updated to incorporate the vitamin D content of nearly 3,000 food entries, including mushrooms. The top three selling mushroom varieties (white button, crimini and portabella) have vitamin D ranging from 1 to 97 percent of the Daily Value (400 IU) per raw 84 gram serving.

How do they do it? Similar to the way that humans absorb sunlight and convert it to vitamin D, mushrooms contain a plant sterol–ergosterol–that converts to vitamin D when exposed to real or simulated sunlight.

That's pretty bad ass!

Depending on your locale, you could make your own D but you need the fat to raise your good cholesterol levels in your diet to have it work in the first place. This is what I have gathered so far about making your own vitamin D, it really depends on your locale and how much melanin is in your skin and your diet:

Duration of Vitamin D Synthesis in Human Skin

Type in your latitude and longitude and other variables to determine how much time. And also take into consideration that the darker your skin, the longer you have to say out WITHOUT sunscreen. You also can't burn yourself. Plus, you are not supposed to wash your body right after, let the D soak in.

Since I moved North of San Francisco, from FL, I'm in bad shape lately. I take 4,000 to 6,000 IU to feel okay, just okay. Since that is way, way, way more than the RDA or safe levels, you have to make your own decisions. We are making a move to FL in a few months since I am truly miserable here. It's slightly better with a light box, but the headache sucks. I have also reintroduced eggs 2-3 x a week because seriously, it is bad! However, with the use of the D3 from the mushrooms, once this dozen (of eggs) is gone, I'm going to stop eating them and start eating more mushrooms in olive oil!

Vitamin D Deficiency: A Global Concern
If you live north of the line connecting San Francisco to Philadelphia and Athens to Beijing, odds are that you don't get enough vitamin D. The same holds true if you don't get outside for at least a 15-minute daily walk in the sun. African-Americans and others with dark skin, as well as older individuals, tend to have much lower levels of vitamin D, as do people who are overweight or obese. Harvard Nutrition Science

Cholestrol is not all bad. Please learn more about it at Harvard Nutrition Science's site:

From Food to the Bloodstream
Almost all foods contain some fat. Even quintessential fat-free foods like carrots and lettuce contain small amounts of this nutrient. That's a testament to how important fats are for life. Fat provides a terrific source of energy as well as a great depot for storing it. It is an important part of cell membranes, helping govern what gets into cells and what comes out. The body uses cholesterol as the starting point to make estrogen, testosterone, vitamin D, and other vital compounds. Fats are also biologically active molecules that can influence how muscles respond to insulin's "open up for sugar" signal; different types of fats can also fire up or cool down inflammation. http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/nutritionsource/what-should-you-eat/fats-full-story/index.html

This link tells you how to remineralize teeth using animal flesh and products, and this one gives tips too. I am just conjecturing that by using some of these techniques and by adding olive oil to your diet, and other vegan sources of fat soluble vitamins such as avocado, natto (Japanese fermented soy beans), and coconut oil, and omega 3 DHA from algae you might very well reverse your tooth decay. But before you click on over, please read further.

First there's getting D in your diet by eating the mushrooms and maybe taking a D3 supplement. There is a vegan source of D3 now, called "Source Of Life Garden Vitamin D3 - 60 - Veg/Cap". I don't know how much you should take, so further research is required here, and then you have to get calcium in your diet and I don't recommend supplements. The WAPF protocol, from what I gather, recommends raw milk with full fat, I recommend kale, but you need the olive oil, so you can absorb the nutrients and make cholesterol in your own body. If you've been reading this blog, you might have discovered that D, calcium, and cholesterol work together, so you need to make cholesterol and that requires fat. Can you see why a zero cholesterol low fat vegan diet is freaking nuts? Crazy freaking nuts! It is not good for teeth and you can't absorbe the nutrients in the veggies as well. And if you listen to a certain Vegan Guru MD in Santa Rosa, CA who doesn't even recommend much, if any D supplementation, you've got a recipe for tooth decay galore and that PISSES ME OFF!

Why kale?

Unlike spinach or chard, kale doesn't contain oxalic acidoxalic acid, which prevents the body from absorbing calcium. Kale is the richest of the greens in the phytochemical lutein. Known mostly for its prevention of eye diseaseeye disease, lutein is now thought to be more protective against cancer than beta-carotein. Kale is also one of the highest sources of antioxidant flavonoids which help ward off heart disease and regulate blood pressure.

Children grow and develop at a rapid rate. Proper nutrition is vital. Kale is extremely rich in vitamin A—essential for visual and immune functions. One cup of kale has as much vitamin C as an orange. It provides as much calcium as the equivalent amounts of cowcow's milk making it an excellent food for vegans.
http://www.vegfamily.com/whole-family/kale.htm

You might also need to include a good source of probiotics in your diet. I just take the freeze dried stuff and I take a lot of it (4 x as much). This has helped me not get bloated or get gassy from lots of greens and my favorite faux meat: seitan (which is a no no on the WAPF protocol). (I recently discovered that probiotics helps people with celiac, I have a gut feeling (no pun intended) that it may help prevent it too, but I don't know for sure.) Also, I take plant enzymes (not the kind that you hear about in raw food). I take plant enzyme supplements which eases digestion and alleviates gas. My favorite is "Say Yes to Beans". I went from 4 million farts (that's an exaggeration, but it's close) to one or two farts. Pretty good. I grew up on lots of animals flesh, man, so by adding these enzymes and probiotics I'm making my guts adept at taking in the plants and hey, I'm growing a rumen (just kidding!).

Read what that link has to say, but, I don't recommend using peroxide in your mouth or any drying agent. Your saliva has healing properties provided you are 1. absorbing the nutrients in your diet and 2. you are not drying out your mouth and 3. you are not listening to nutty Vegan MDs (low fat, phlease!). The protocol on that link (which is nearly identical to the WAPF protocol) recommends removing fluoride. I also don't use it. Some people do. Use at your discretion here. I use only three oils and that is it (I use nothing else): peppermint oil, spearmint oil, and almond oil. I use drops 3/2/1 respectively. With that I took a 6 mm pocket (quoted at 2500.00 for surgery + 900.00 for the bone graft) from an almond or popcorn husk to a 2 mm healthy pocket, and not a zipper pocket (those who know about teeth will know what I mean). I learned about it on OraMD.com and then I just went across the street to the health food store and purchased the oils separately. My hygienist has recommended it to her patients and it's freaking amazing.

So let's combine our brains and let me know what you have found with regards to healthy teeth on the vegan diet. Who do you know who is vegan who has little if any tooth decay and what do they eat. Please share. Let's work together to make a plant based diet the best it can be for everyone.

Disclaimer: Use this information at your own risk. Research for yourself and see what you learn and share it with me.

Factory Farm Map and Big Meat vs Michael Pollan. It's not a porn it's kinda about corn.

2010-12-05T12:53:00.000-08:00

Factory Farming Map

Eat Well Guide

Share this widely. If you're going to eat meat, get it where it makes the biggest difference. Check out Michael Pollan's twitter feed at http://twitter.com/michaelpollan

Big Meat vs Michael Pollan.
http://motherjones.com/environment/2010/11/michael-pollan-backlash-beef-advocacy

Vegan Health Failures

2010-12-04T18:51:00.000-08:00

I'm copying and pasting these stories from a 2007 post called "Dealing with Ex-Vegans" at vegblog these are from the comments from his really silly post IMO. Anyway I'm keeping this here for posterity and research.

groundhog
Hello…
Just like to add my own story here…after years of reading about what might be the perfect diet for humans, and short experiments with such things as macrobiotics, and just plain old vegetarianism, I was very healthy, but constantly reading about health and diet and finally fell into veganism. A few months after that, began eating according to Dr. McDougall’s plan. Right away, my daughter’s ibs improved dramatically, and we were all encouraged. But also right away, I began having similar symptoms to ibs, for the first time in my life. Other McDougallers said this was normal after switching from SAD to McDougalling, just temporary, etc., so I ignored it. Even though the thought never occurred to me that I’d never experienced this with other experiments in diet that I’d tried out previously. Time went along, life was busy, and I got used to ignoring my symptoms, which became worse and worse over the years. By the 10th year of McDougalling (my only McDougall slip-ups were that I never quit coffee for more than a few months at a time, and we would eat out, about once every two or three months, in either Japanese or Indian restaurants, and have vegan dishes with oil added…we ordered a vegan pizza now and then too, but the place where we got that was not into using much oil, so it was much lower fat if it was vegan)– I was 100% vegan for over 10 years, and 99% oil free during that time. My health got so terrible, and I had gotten so used to just ignoring, even denying my problems, and finally it came to the point where I HAD to figure out what was wrong…I was sick each and every day…BAD sick, and looked terrible too. I was starving and eating tons and tons of food each day, thinking this is what McDougall said to do.
After lots of digging and trial and error, and reading over discussion boards of celiac organizations, I discovered, through a lot of difficulty and a lot of TIME, that apparently for me, all of the bread, pasta, grainy foods I was eating abundantly in place of the stuff I’d dropped from my diet had instigated either a gluten intolerance or full-blown celiac disease. It took me 18 months to get back to anywhere near normal, and along the way, during the healing of my chewed up intestines, I became intolerant to some other foods.
This idea, of gluten intolerance or other carbohydrate intolerance, lectin intolerance, etc., doesn’t seem to go over well in discussion with most other cooked vegans. The raw folks are quite open to the idea; however, my attempts at being raw have all been failures. Now I eat fish, lots of fish, becuase I can’t eat soy anymore. Corn is questionable in small amounts. I took up eggs to have somethign to eat, and now seem to have on and off intolerance of them too.
I feel the McDougall diet screwed up my body. I’ve seen others on his message board with things like ulcerative colitis, different autoimmune diseases, diabetes, etc., who didn’t seem to be doing well with either the gluten or other starches or lectins in the legumes, etc. They are usually treated as just not following the rules…there is big denial going on there, and they either get worse by sticking ever more strictly to ridiculously limited forms of the diet, or they disappear from the board.
This is my story of veganism…not only didn’t work for me, but turned me from a healthy person to a sicko. I don’t wanna be militant or angry, but it’s hard to be happy about it. I would have liked hearing a litte bit of warning that so much grain could possibly harm some people…maybe I would have listened to it. I remember my old SAD days of eating, when I was healthy,
happy, and even skinny, and could eat and enjoy whatever I wanted…they’re gone forever now, because I can never eat
anything with gluten in it ever again, and have to be extremely careful about what I eat, have to watch out for other intolerances that tend to pop up out of nowhere, etc. Starch-based veganism is obviously not for everyone…too bad most people find that out after the fact. Now, in addition to having to be careful about my food selection, I also have to wrangle with my own ethical issues over eating fish, but havne’t found out another way to just have enough to eat.

Carla My experience as a raw vegan (9 months)
The Good:
Lost weight (down to a 4/6), improved digestion (for a few months)
The Bad:
BAD mood all of the time, no matter what I ate. Very heavy and extremely painful periods within a month of starting that diet, long cycles.
The Ugly:
Gray teeth (and they are still gray ), hair falling out, increased hypothyroidism, more estrogen dominance, increased ovarian cysts, horribly depressed in the last two months. The teeth part is frustrating because I was blessed with naturally white, straight (w/o braces) teeth and now I can hardly smile because I cant get used to gray, dingy teeth. Now I’m worried about the health of my teeth overall.
That doesn’t make the “good” part sound so good. I broke that cycle when I had salmon and brown rice for Thanksgiving.
Now I eat a diet of humanly raised, grass fed beef, chicken, limited fruits, lots of vegetables and plenty of fats (raw butter, coconut oil) and fermented foods and beverages. I have not gone back to eating grains because of my compromised digestion and gluten intolerance.
I have never been better health wise in my entire life. I’m not longer horribly depressed and suicidal, my weight is still down, I have normal cycles, my thyroid levels are normal, no more ovarian cysts, etc and have tons of energy.
My brother on the other hand, has been vegan for the past 15 years and have done very well. Different strokes for different folks and we should accept that no particular diet works for everyone.

ExVegan#1921892329 permalink
I am an ex vegan. I was vegan for 16 years, had two vegan pregnancies and finally last year I threw in the towel. My oldest child had rotting teeth and my younger had a few cavities so I completely changed their diets. I added in raw milk and raw cheese, local eggs and sometimes fish. My youngest child’s decay has stopped! My children are healthier and happier! They never did get THAT sick, but now they NEVER get sick! I am so relieved. I was a hard core vegan too! I never thought it would come to this, but my children mean more to me than a special diet. I myself have only eaten eggs and dairy in things. I haven’t brought myself to eat meat yet. It’s a long process, and my mind is having to be completely trained to think differently than I have for half my life. I wish I had never gone vegan in the first place! The first years of the diet I was so malnourished because I didn’t know what I was doing. Things got better, but I’ve never felt normal. I have always needed excessive amounts of sleep. I have always supplemented with B12 too.
ExVegan#1921892329 permalink
I just wanted to add, that it’s not just my ex vegan children with the tooth decay. Naomi Aldort has worked with tons of vegan families and said most if not all of them have tooth decay! http://mothering.com/health/child-refuses-healthy-food
This is a serious concern. When I was researching what to do about my children’s teeth and about vegan children, I found more and more vegan children with decay. I found fully grown people who had been raised vegan and raw who have now had children with rotten mouthfuls of teeth! I used to think I had the supreme diet and that I was feeding my children the supreme, life giving diet. Boy was I brainwashed. If you are vegan and considering pregnancy, please think about using animal products at least while pregnant and breastfeeding. Raw milk and local eggs are highly nutritious. You don’t even have to eat loads of it! You can just add a bit in to cover your bases. You might feel better too.

Ex-Vegan permalink
After having been vegan for almost ten years I can say with more experience than most vegans that, for a lot of people, this lifestyle choice is dangerous. I used to be one of those brainwashed people who scoffed at those who couldn’t remain vegan, saying they were ‘lazy’, ‘doing it wrong’ or were ‘junk food vegans’.
There may be situations where people can thrive on veganism, and I’ll never discount that. I do, however, now strongly believe they are exceptions.
I almost died because I was vegan.
There’s no more and no less to that story. I don’t want to get into specifics, because it’s a lot of pain and anguish but in the end I had to begin consuming animal products again. I wasn’t a junk food vegan. I ate very, very well and took supplements. My health went severely downhill after about six years.
I already expect most vegans to take it harshly. It’s like a personal attack on their diet choices, and in some ways it is. Being vegan is dangerous to some, and the dangers of it need to be addressed and clearly stated to those who are considering beginning the diet.

The China Study is Misguided and there is no One Diet to Rule them All

2010-12-04T17:00:00.000-08:00

I keep on saying I don't have time to write, but I can't stop writing. So I'm going to go for it as I can.

I became vegan in January of 2005, ironically the same month and year that The China Study hit the shelves. Here's a short version of my becoming a vegetarian and ultimately a vegan, which was not via the health, ethics, or guilt route. I only heard of the China Study from the Vegan RD in the Florida Voices for Animals about 2 months later:

This has been published on a veg blog, but I did a little editing. ( I just googled myself):

I had two A-Ha moments. In 1987, I read that a certain ethnic group was eating cats in St. Petersburg, Florida. There and then, I stopped eating anyone with eyes. I was the only vegetarian in my family and didn't know anything about PETA or any organizations. I was in my little bubble. Then 18 years passed and I went for a chunk of cheddar. I had not heard the term vegan before, but knew about strict vegetarianism and thought that it was extreme. I had a thought, "I wonder how the cows are treated?" and the Universe answered shortly thereafter. By "coincidence" I met a vegan Buddhist soon after and then I met two AR activists who loaned me the movie Peaceable Kingdom. I saw the footage of the calf being removed from his mother and it felt like I was watching Roots or the Holocaust*. I couldn't do anything about Hitler, but I can stop eating dairy and eggs. I don't even think about it, like the taste buds for both products just vanished. That was 6 years ago. Since then my health has improved a lot. No more lumpy boobs, no more runny nose, barely any zits. At the moment of commitment, the universe conspires to assist you — Goethe

Soon after I wrote the above statement earlier last month, the shit hit the fan. I got my copy of the Vegan Outreach newsletter and that directed me to an interview with Jack Norris of Vegan Outreach by Rhys Southan, at LetThemEatMeat.com. Rhys is an ex-vegan who some current vegans believe to be hell bent on destroying veganism, or something like that. Actually, I think the guy is a truth seeker. He's funny as hell. He doesn't like organized religion and that's exactly what some parts of the vegan movement appears to be. Plus, he was really unhealthy on the vegan diet. He was lied to and that will make some people start a revolution of sorts!

After reading his story, Tasha's story, Chris Masterjohn's story, and lots of stories on Beyond Veg, Mothering.com, and meeting the tooth decayed kid with caps at the Thanksgiving Potluck, and and basically opening up my mind to listening to folks and realizing that my own mother couldn't hack it all the way, I woke up to realize something I wish I would have realized 5 years ago: there is no one diet to rule them all.

The vegan diet has done all right by me and many, many others, but some people it just doesn't work for and they have to be heard and not dismissed and be called spies for the evil empire or something like that. There's a myriad of reasons why vegans become ex-vegans, some could be that they were not so good at getting enough protein (yes, you do have to work harder at it, especially for dudes), some because their intestines are not optimally absorbing pro-vitamins and turning them into fat soluble vitamins, and many others reasons, perhaps genetics. One of the reasons is that many Vegan Guru MDs encourage low fat and that is WRONG WRONG WRONG! I've written or cobbled together a lot of information on why there is failure to thrive, so click around on the blog for the months of November and December 2010 in particular.

The China Study, I honestly don't know what to make of it. Rather than think it's some kind of vegan propaganda, it's more like being seriously misguided. Seriously. If you read my "Ex Vegan Essay" and the "Feeling Better after Eating Meat" post, you'll see more where I'm coming from.

I had excruciatingly painful and lumpy boobs and the pain and lumps went away when I stopped dairy, first the pain, then slowly the lumps went away. I've read and heard from others that their health improved a lot by removing dairy. That alone doesn't make the China Study worthy of being deemed the ultimate diet book for the entire planet, which many, many people think that it is. Perhaps it's just a diet book for Chinese people, or certain people with certain genetic constitutions. I'm serious. We are all different and adaptable to different diets, but we are all not the descendants of people who eat more plants to meat ratio. So the Japanese thrive on their diet and the Inuits thrive on theirs. Provided they don't start incorporating any Western crap food, my bet is that they are just fine. If you read the articles I linked to earlier, that is the case. The Inuits on their high fat and cholesterol laden diet, provided they don't start eating modern high sugar, fructose corn syrup and neurotoxins like aspartame and other crap, they are at low CVD risk. Would they thrive on the Mediterranean diet? No they would not. They would need to adapt and also move to a similar climate, most likely.

When it's "common knowledge" that cholesterol is bad (which it is not) and the ratios of LDL/HDL and triglycerides are freaking confusing, most people, really like simple answers and want others to think for them. Others like doctors or books will do the trick. Never outsource your thinking.

Most, if not all, people yearn and search for external validation that what they are doing is the "right" thing. Being right is effing great. You don't actually have be right, you just simply think you are right and that is good enough. This is on all sides of the diet movement. Just because the Nourishing Traditions worked for you, it doesn't mean that it is the one diet to rule them all either. But seriously, isn't that the way it is with something so intimate such as diet or religion? Jesus is God to millions of people, they pray to Him, get inner and outer confirmation and feel happy. Telling them otherwise is not going to get you anywhere. They want all the people to share in their happiness and joy they get from a close personal relationship with Jesus. Telling them that people also pray to Buddha, or Allah, or my master, Meher Baba, and also feel the same way and get the same benefits, that would freak them out. They would cover their ears and start singing loudly, in a manner of speaking.

People want absolutes and having things be relative is confusing.

When the so called "one diet to rule them all" and its accompanying bible "The China Study" is shown on a deep personal level to not work for an individual, they are shaken to the core. The construct comes down and they have to build another one in order to eat, in order to function. A new form of ethics or reasoning comes in and is developed within that individual. And she will find sources "out there" to validate her new construct. People can't act against their own conscience, they have to build a new construct to operate or they can't operate at all.

I'll leave it at that for the time being.

*I think of animals as sentient beings and that doesn't diminish the status of human beings, but puts animals right up there with them. I would love to clone Donald Watson's herbivorous system and make everyone vegan, but that's not possible. So the word holocaust came to mind at that time in 2005 without any outside influences. Basically seeing that footage freaked me out. When I saw footage of the Jewish holocaust years and years ago, and read Ann Frank's Diary, I was depressed for months and constantly bitching at God. So that's how I am.

The One Diet to Rule them All Doesn't Exist

2010-12-04T14:54:00.000-08:00

This was written by me on JackNorrisRD as a comment and I dig it so much, I'm pasting it here:

Many of the symptoms that ex-vegans have, besides B12, I think can be attributed to lack of fat or low fat and going raw and not getting iodine and also, I think, vitamin D and how that works with cholesterol, that some people need meat (or at least they think they do) and that is pretty much the same thing (thought and need). Plus, I also think we are all not clones of Donald Watson. We don’t have a magic 8 ball, a way of seeing how genetics plays a part and also whether or not these people have good gut bacteria and healthy intestines. There’s so many, many reasons why. When the China Study is touted as the Bible for the One Diet That Rules them All (which there is no such thing) and then when a vegan gets sick, their entire construct gets destroyed. It’s like their Guru (or Beloved Diet) has falling from grace. No joke. It’s a major mind (you know what). Anyway, I will be writing about it in the near future.

So instead of having vegan be synonymous with health, it needs to be better defined. And instead of it being synonymous with morality and ethics, both of which manifest in the mind, it needs to be synonymous with empathy and reduced suffering, not Jainism, purity, or some bunch of cultists.

The “vegans” throwing chili pie in the face of Lierre Keith in San Francisco made no points for animals, they actually caused more people to NEVER consider going vegan.

The Major Importance of Iodine in Vegan and Vegetarian Diets (and people who don't eat fish)

2010-12-04T13:22:00.000-08:00

Since I don't have time to write a lot today or in the near future, here's some excerpts and links about the importance of iodine and giving yourself a cheap, home test. Scroll down to learn more about the home test, but read the entire page and research for yourself too. This is very quickly slapped together.

A study published in Sep-Oct 2003 Annals of Nutrition and Metabolism showed that 25% of the vegetarians, 80% of the vegans and 9% of those eating a mixed diet had low iodine status http://www.healthyeatingclub.org/info/articles/Minerals/iodine.htm

You only need a microscopic amount, but if you don't have it or you are eating raw broccoli, flax, SOY, and other veggies which deplete iodine levels, then you can feel fatigued, lose hair, not be able to sleep comfortably, have muscle weakness and more.

Do not go crazy with the iodine, read and learn. You only need a small amount. I suggest getting it from kelp. Once again: You only need small, microscopic amounts. DO NOT INGEST IODINE directly. That would be very dangerous, you could die or worse (suffering is worse than death). Click for some information about overdose. Think. Pause. Think some more.

From Vegan Health:

Iodine Antagonists

There are components in soy, flax seeds, and raw cruciferous vegetables (broccoli, brussels sprouts, cauliflower, and cabbage) that counteract iodine. These components, called goitrogens, cause an enlarged thyroid gland, also called a goiter. Thus, large amounts of soy combined with inadequate iodine intake can exacerbate iodine deficiency. http://www.veganhealth.org/articles/iodine

From Healthy Eating Club:

Iodine is found in seafood, iodised salt and some vegetables. It is important for essential hormone development in the human body. Inadequate intake of dietary iodine can lead to an enlarged thyroid gland (goitre) or other iodine deficiency disorders. Iodine deficiency is the world's leading cause of mental retardation in children. Iodine is found in seawater, so any type of seafood is a rich source of this element, particularly seaweed (e.g kelp). Despite coming from the ocean, sea salt is not a good source of iodine. Iodised salt is perhaps the most common source of iodine in the Western diet and can provide enough iodine to avoid low thyroid activity. Since an adult only requires around one teaspoonful of iodine over a lifetime, eating fish once a week is enough to fulfil the average iodine requirement.

Iodine is found in foods as iodide. Our bodies need it to make thyroid hormones. The thyroid is a gland in the throat that regulates many metabolic processes, such as growth and energy expenditure. The two main thyroid hormones, thyroxine and tri-iodothyronine, are synthesised from the amino acid, tyrosine, and from iodide.

The thyroid hormones regulate the body's metabolic rate and promote growth and development throughout the body, including the brain. If there isn't enough thyroid hormone circulating in the blood, the brain sends a chemical message to the thyroid gland, which then releases a measured dose of these hormones. If a person's diet is too low in iodine, the brain keeps sending chemical messages to the thyroid in vain. In an attempt to make more thyroid hormone, the gland gets larger and larger. This overgrowth of the thyroid gland is called a goitre.

Long term deficiency can be serious
An enlarged thyroid gland, or goitre, isn't the only side effect of inadequate iodine in the diet. Other symptoms include dry skin, hair loss, fatigue and slowed reflexes.

In the developing fetus, baby and young child, the effects of iodine deficiency are serious, including stunted growth, diminished intelligence and retardation. Lack of iodine is a major problem in developing countries and is considered to be the world's number one cause of preventable intellectual disability in children. Vegetarians may also be at risk of iodine deficiency if they do not eat seafood. Instead they can get their iodine from iodised table salt or seaweed. A study published in Sep-Oct 2003 Annals of Nutrition and Metabolism showed that 25% of the vegetarians, 80% of the vegans and 9% of those eating a mixed diet had low iodine status.

Iodine can be neutralised by certain foods
The value of dietary iodine can be reduced by vegetables from the brassica family, which includes cabbage, brussels sprouts, raw turnip, broccoli, and cauliflower. In circumstances where both large quantities of these foods are eaten and the levels of dietary iodine are marginal, goitre could develop.

Give yourself a cheap, home Iodine test to see if your levels are normal or too low

Why check your iodine levels?
Low iodine levels can zap your energy and make you feel tired, edgy and worn out. Low iodine levels can even prevent you from getting a good night's sleep. Before you go to your doctor with complaints of tossing and turning all night, aches and pains, and just feeling "blah," you may want to perform this self-test.

Because the symptoms of an iodine deficiency are classically identical to so many other illnesses (like depression, stress, chronic fatigue, or fibromyalgia,) many doctors either misdiagnose it or miss it completely and tell you there is nothing wrong.

Why are iodine levels so important?
Low levels of iodine mean your thyroid isn't functioning properly. The thyroid helps balance hormones, regulate heartbeats, stabilize cholesterol, maintain weight control, encourage muscle growth, keep menstrual cycles regular, provide energy, and even helps you keep a positive mental attitude.

Healthy Vegan Children and What They and Their Families Eat

2010-12-03T17:10:00.000-08:00

I was SOOOO happy to see this. There's plenty of healthy vegan children and adults. These people are not removing fat from their diets among other strange things. You have to have fat. If you are vegan for animals, be the healthiest you can be by clicking over to VeganHealth.org to learn more.

http://www.veganhealth.org/articles/realveganchildren

Here's an excerpt:

Jonah's mom enjoyed a nicely varied diet during her pregnancy, including plenty of the following foods: nutritional yeast, flax oil, blackstrap molasses, iodized sea salt, almonds, cashews, macadamias, brazil nuts, almond butter, cashew butter, almond, rice, hemp and soy milks (particularly the "Silk Plus Omega3 DHA" variety soymilk), black, pinto, white, lima, and garbanzo beans, hummus, avocado dips, tofu, tempeh, seitan, tvp, green peas, broccoli, quinoa, rices, whole grain pastas and breads, raisins, prunes, mango, figs, bananas and other fruits and juices, kale, collards, bok choy, spinach and other greens, a wide variety of other vegetables, everything organic as much as possible, as well as a vegan prenatal vitamin daily.

YES. YES. YES. When you visit this page, pay close attention to these regular birth weight, healthy vegan children and parents who are eating the correct way to help animals. When a person becomes a vegan after meeting an animal at a farm sanctuary, or some other empathetic way, they are healthiest of them all. These are the long term vegans who are really quite healthy not just because of their diet, but because their inner most heart is aligned with their actions. They seek out advice, they listen to long term healthy vegans, they learn about nutrition.

They didn't get in to it for purity, they did it for love.

Tooth Decay on the Vegan Diet

2010-12-03T13:42:00.000-08:00

There's a guy with a book called Cure Tooth Decay and he applies the principles of Weston A. Price to cure tooth decay and remineralize teeth. Apparently it works. It is not vegan. The book covers a vegetarian way of doing it, but not vegan. From what he writes about the vegan diet, you can see that he does have bias against it and who could blame him? He has heard his share of stories of tooth decay. And hey, if I didn't meet the family at the vegan potluck on Thanksgiving, I might write him off but he's telling the truth. Now not all vegans have major tooth decay. This is also true with followers of modern diets devoid of fat and/or filled with crap food and too much sugar. But he has a theory that may be that once the body's stores of fat soluble vitamins get used up, and that varies from individual to individual, then perhaps that's when the health issues, such as tooth decay crop up.

He's got some vegan sources of fat soluble vitamins:

Vegan sources of fat-soluble vitamins. Avocado, natto (Japanese fermented soy beans), cold pressed olive oil, coconut oil, some oils in nuts.

http://www.curetoothdecay.com/Tooth_Decay/tooth_cavity_vegan.htm

On this page he has free tips on reversing tooth decay on the vegan diet, but as you read it's not really the vegan diet because Quorn comes up. The person who did manage to reverse included some ghee and eggs in her diet and became a vegetarian. If you are vegan for animals, just don't get all up in arms about his philosophy, just read the nutritional tips and mull them around. No one has the perfect diet, but damn we don't need to be closed minded nut jobs about other people's ideas even if they are not pleasant or even appalling to us. Just be nice and learn, learn, learn.

If you want to maintain a vegan diet or at least not start eating meat again, read his tips on the teeth.

And then there was Lysine and how that works with calcium absorption as well as improves mood, supports people who work out a lot, and so forth

2010-12-03T11:31:00.001-08:00

If you eat a vegan diet high in grains and low in legumes, or eat foods high in L-Arginine and low in L-Lysine, then will you probably not get the amount of L-Lysine you need. This post is very quickly put together but I encourage you, especially if you want to be successful on the vegan diet or a near vegan diet, to read it and learn, learn, learn!

L-Lysine is a necessary building block for all protein in the body. L-Lysine plays a major role in calcium absorption; building muscle protein; recovering from surgery or sports injuries; and the body's production of hormones, enzymes, and antibodies. http://www.bodybuilding.com/fun/southfacts_lysine.htm

Here are the sources of Lysine according to BodyBuilding.com. They are really, really knowledgeable about protein:

Brewer's yeast, legumes, dairy, fish, and meat all contain significant amounts of lysine. Most people, including vegans (vegetarians who also avoid dairy and eggs), consume adequate amounts of lysine. Athletes involved in frequent vigorous exercise have an increased need for essential amino acids.

http://www.bodybuilding.com/store/lysine.html

Quinoa is a great source of lysine. Here are some other sources and information about lysine http://jacknorrisrd.com/?p=1630.

Legumes, quinoa, and pistachios are the only plants foods high in the amino acid lysine. If you are not eating them every day, you might be falling short of lysine needs. Read more at JackNorissRD.com.

The best bet, since legumes is up there on the list at VeganBodyBuilding.com no less, combine your beans and rice to get a complete amino profile or eat beans on the same day as you eat the grains.

Lysine Info:

-Lysine controls herpes virus and outbreaks.
-Lysine is a precursor to carnitine
-can boost human growth hormone.
-can reduce Lipoprotein (a) and protect from heart disease.
-Good immune booster
-increases Glutathione (proximo20)

Quote:
Biomed Res. 2007 Apr;28(2):85-90.
Oral treatment with L-lysine and L-arginine reduces anxiety and basal cortisol levels in healthy humans.Smriga M, Ando T, Akutsu M, Furukawa Y, Miwa K, Morinaga Y.
Institute of Life Sciences, Ajimoto Co. Inc, 1-1 Suzuki-cho, 210-8681 Kawasaki-ku, Kawasaki-shi, Japan. miro_smriga@ehq.ajinomoto.com

Dietary supplementation with an essential amino acid L-lysine has been shown to reduce chronic anxiety in humans with low dietary intake of L-lysine. A combination of L-lysine and L-arginine has been documented to normalize hormonal stress responses in humans with high trait anxiety. The present study was carried out in one hundred eight healthy Japanese adults. The aim of study was to find out whether a week-long oral treatment with L-lysine (2.64 g per day) and L-arginine (2.64 g per day) reduces trait and stress-induced state anxiety and basal levels of stress hormones. We confirmed that, without regard to gender, the amino acid treatment significantly reduced both trait anxiety and state anxiety induced by cognitive stress battery. In addition, we found that the treatment with L-lysine and L-arginine decreased the basal levels of salivary cortisol and chromogranin-A (a salivary marker of the sympatho-adrenal system) in male subjects. These results of this double-blind, placebo controlled and randomized study confirm the previous findings in humans and animals and point to a combination of L-lysine and L-arginine as a potentially useful dietary intervention in otherwise healthy humans with high subjective levels of mental stress and anxiety.

PMID: 17510493 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
Quote:
Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2004 Jun 1;101(22):8285-8.

Lysine fortification reduces anxiety and lessens stress in family members in economically weak communities in Northwest Syria.

Smriga M, Ghosh S, Mouneimne Y, Pellett PL, Scrimshaw NS.

Institute of Life Sciences, Ajinomoto Co., Inc., 210-8681 Kawasaki, Japan.

Lysine is a limiting amino acid in diets based on wheat as the staple. In experimental animals, prolonged dietary lysine inadequacy increases stress-induced anxiety. If observed in humans, such a result would have a strong implication for the relationship between nutrition and communal quality of life and mental health. As part of a 3-month randomized double-blind study, we tested whether lysine fortification of wheat reduces anxiety and stress response in family members in poor Syrian communities consuming wheat as a staple food. In the lysine-fortified group, the plasma cortisol response to the blood drawing as a cause of stress was reduced in females, as was sympathetic arousal in males as measured by skin conductance. Lysine fortification also significantly reduced chronic anxiety as measured by the trait anxiety inventory in males. These results suggest that some stress responses in economically weak populations consuming cereal-based diets can be improved with lysine fortification.

PMID: 15159538 [PubMed - in process]
GABA, the (benzo-like) inhibitory neurotransmitter requires adequate Lysine in order for its conversion from GABA's precursor - Glutamate - to take place.

And to quote a poster on a muscle mass forum, one who likely eats meat:

This makes me wonder. What is happening to our food? We seem to be deficient in everything. We're not getting enough magnesium, taurine, thiamin...Lysine? The list goes on....

Scroll down on this page http://www.traditionaloven.com/tutorials/l-lysine_amino_acid.html and find the list that is titled "Food containing high L-lysine and low L-arginine quantity amount". When you see the list, which is mostly fish at top of the list, then you will see why people who become ex-vegan crave fish if their vegan diet is not filled with sources of L-Lysine.

SOOOO, that's why it's been traditional to combine the grains and the beans. I will go back in time and say "I WAS WRONG" it's better to combine.

If the vegan diet isn't healthy for all people, what about the animals?

2010-12-02T14:25:00.000-08:00

This is still a rough idea, but I'm posting it anyway...

Some of the ideas on this page are out of date due to new information. Please read:

http://quasi-vegan.blogspot.com/2010/12/vegan-disillusionment-one-plant-based.html

Are you vegan? Are you depressed, fatigued, or having trouble concentrating? Any hostility or mood swings? These are symptoms that could be associated with your over all cholesterol being too low or it's associated with not enough Omega 3 DHA. And, of course, the symptoms could be other things too — completely unrelated. I'm not God or an "expert".

I believe that one of the reasons, perhaps the main reason, behind a failure to thrive on the vegan diet might be because the individuals didn't get enough fat, particularly saturated fat (coconut and palm oil) and Omega 3 fat. The low fat vegan diets and the raw food diets are the most unhealthy of them all, from what I found, they had the most instances of failure and some shitty health problems to go along with it. Lack of enough fat is my bet. Some types of vegan diets also don't include fortified foods or supplements. That is a big mistake. The supplement industry wasn't invented for vegans, many people on all kinds of diets don't get the nutrition they need from diet alone. Take your supplements!

Vitamin D is synthesized from cholesterol and Vitamin D regulates calcium absorption and excretion. Calcium is required for your bones and teeth. I hope you know that. Please learn something about nutrition science. Lack of Vitamin D in the diet is what I believe lead to the tooth decay issues that I encountered by reading about and meeting current and former vegans. Lack of Vitamin D might not be as simple as adding the vitamin as a supplement for some people.

The vegan diet has no cholesterol. Don't jump to any conclusions from that statement. Via diet, cholesterol comes from animals and their products, such as meat (chicken too), dairy, and eggs. Since your body makes cholesterol, the common GroupThink is that you don't need the dietary cholesterol. Perhaps most people don't need dietary cholesterol. I don't know. But what if your body doesn't make enough because it's genetically predisposed to dealing with a certain amount of dietary cholesterol? What if you don't fall into the obese or sickly CVD risk category? Certainly it's common knowledge that people have a genetic predisposition to having high cholesterol, therefore the opposite is also true. There's also a syndrome called SLOS "People who have SLOS are unable to make enough cholesterol to support normal growth and development." So it's plausible that there's variations of this.

Yo, check it:

Smith-Lemli-Optiz syndrome (SLOS), in layman's terms, is the inability to correctly produce or synthesize cholesterol due to a low occurrence of the 7-DHC reductace enzyme. Cholesterol is an essential nutrient for every cell in a person's body. It is needed to develop and grow appropriately, thus the reason for developmental delay in those with SLOS. It is a metabolic genetic issue and is estimated that as many as 1 in 30 people are carriers for the syndrome. There is a wide range symptoms and degrees of health, but the majority of those with SLOS can live to adulthood given the proper treatment and careful monitoring for levels of sterol cholesterol and 7-DHC (the latter being the precursor to cholesterol production). Current treatment is to give cholesterol either in synthetic form, or via natural foods such as egg yolk and cream, or a combination of both. A short list of some of the major issues faced by those with SLOS are... (read more about the symptoms)

One thing I do know is that each one of us is not a clone of the other and we all have different genetic constitutions. I am fine on a vegan diet, some people are not. Some people are fine on a Mediterranean diet, those would be the Mediterraneans. The Inuits would probably croak on it. They need their diet.

Eating foods, such as animals, that contain cholesterol is not necessarily a good thing, nor is it a bad thing by itself. Combining those foods with junk food, white food, crappy food, too much food, and high fructose corn syrup and other junk foods and not eating enough plants to meat ratio (having more acidic blood) is what I think is the problem is and that leads to stress and stress leads to inflammation and inflammation leads to hardening of the arteries and so forth. All forms of stress do this, not just nutritional stress. So while I have no degree or peers to review this idea, it's not so far fetched. I read it some where ;-). I could be wrong, I was wrong about the vegan diet being the best for all people. For some people it's good. Others not. For me, it helps me a lot. For a long time I was under the delusion that if it helped me, it would help others. Not all others, just some others. I'm sorry about that.

Be wary of GroupThink from all corners of any movement, vegan or otherwise, and TV pundits and talk radio. Think for yourself about everything. Everything.

GroupThink is on the "other side" too at Weston A. Price Foundation (WAPF) or some other "you need meat" and "soy is poison" group. Soy is not good for some people, my mother had some thyroid issues with it, I don't. You in particular may not need meat, your best friend may need it. For some people it makes no difference at all. This all or nothing about anything, any topic, is really a pain in the ass to me. Like I said before, the need to be right, not actually being right, but the need to be right is on all sides and it's really an interesting experience to sort through to find the truth or something plausible. I see this in myself, so it's easy to recognize.

There are no simple answers and there is also no one size fits all diet. WAPF, vegans, and primal, etc., all have something to contribute, but none of those diets is the "one ring that rules them all". It doesn't exist.

So if I'm saying that some people need meat, what chance do the animals have?

I sincerely believe that over the course of time, the ones who need meat could adapt to more and more plants and less and less meat. Just like the traditional Asian diet is more plant based. They would have to slowly eliminate over the course of years. But in the short term, so you don't go bonkers with some other freaky diet or thinking about food all the time, ethics needs to go and empathy needs to come in to take its place.

If you are vegan and you are empathetic to the plight of animals, know full well your child should not be a victim of your diet. Check your cholesterol for good measure. Take your B12 via a pill you can dissolve. Check your D3. I was an ovo lacto vegetarian when I was pregnant, I craved eggs my entire pregnancy and I ate them all the time! Make sure you are getting D3, there is a plant based version from mushrooms now, but it's 3x as much as from lanolin, get what you can afford and screw purity!

Empathy. Not Ethics. Not a pure diet for all, just some.

I'm a vegan (or Quasi now because I eat D3 from lanolin and bee pollen in my smoothie sometimes and occasionally I eat eggs just so I can call myself quasi.) I eat a plant based diet, 99% vegan, only because I empathize with the plight of animals and (knock on wood) it's healthy for me. I think nothing of it. It's not hard, it's second nature for me. It might be a pain in the ass for you. I don't know. I empathize with factory farmed animals in particular, I also empathize equally, or even more, with the tooth decayed vegan child or adult and the depressed one and the angry one and the foggy one. I hate factory farming with a passion. Factory farming sucks for all of us, not just the animals. (These things such as depression, fog, and tooth decay are also common in omnivorous diets too, so don't get bent out of shape about what I'm writing here.)

Back to Factory Farming:

Residents of communities near hog farms often have increased respiratory problems.23 A number of studies have demonstrated that fatigue, depression, and mood disturbances occur in higher proportions in people living near such facilities.24 A study of one town in Utah found a four-fold increase in diarrhea-related hospitalizations and a three-fold increase in respiratory-related hospitalizations over a five-year period during which an industrial hog farm was constructed and started operating.25 Minnesota's Pollution Control Agency has documented hydrogen sulfide concentrations in excess of World Health Organization maximum exposure standards on properties neighboring industrial hog facilities.26 A 2006 study comparing two rural Iowa elementary schools, one located near a CAFO and one not, found a significant prevalence of asthma in children at the school near the factory farm.27 http://www.sustainabletable.org/issues/airpollution/

So let's get back to empathy. I think that a new movement should take the place of veganism and that movement should be based on empathy and not a one size fits all approach.

I envision something like your own road to living closely aligned with your own, personal and individual empathy towards animals, people and the environment. I'm calling it the Empathy Diet and will develop EmpathyDiet.org. It is also not "the ring that rules them all", but it will rock!

The empthy diet is little bit of the vegan mindset, a little bit of John Robbins, a little bit of Michael Pollan and a whole lot of thinking for yourself and learning about nutrition. You, and you alone, ultimately have your best interests at heart with respect to your health and your feelings towards animals, the environment and the connections between us all.

In the short term, visit VeganHealth.org and get the low down on healthy plant based eating and healthy attitudes too. This site is by Vegan Outreach, which is one of best organizations for factory farmed animals, in my brilliantly informed opinion!

Peace!

Don't outsource your thinking. Think for yourself.

Sharing the Meat, Reduction in Meat, Not Picking on People

2010-12-01T09:50:00.000-08:00

Now that I realize that it's not healthy for everyone to go vegan (see article), it's very reasonable to campaign or to persuade people to reduce 25% - 50% of their animal products. It would not be done from a health perspective, though some people could really use way more green food to meat ratio, but for sharing the meat on this hot, small planet. Also, I HATE factory farming. It's disgusting and, besides my soft spot for animals, what they feed the animals is revolting. People should not eat that (the effects of what is fed to animals on factory farms does end up affecting those who eat animals from factory farms). Plus, I hear, that meat from small scale, family farms tastes better.

Since small scale, family farms can't possibly support all the meat eaters, the way I see the vegan diet now is a way of sharing the earth. I am perfectly healthy this way and it's a way that is deeply aligned with my heart. I'm quite sure there are many healthy vegans and vegetarians who would have no problem with sharing and encouraging reduction. But vegans need to get off of the mountain top. I am more than willing to share the earth with meat eaters, but meat eaters need to share it amongst themselves too. The only way to do that is reduce, hunt, support family farming, do your own farming, and more (though I'm out of ideas at the moment).

I'm sure these ideas are not new. Please provide any tips in the comments and also let me know if you're interested in starting an organization or a grass roots somethingorother promoting these concepts of sharing the meat.

A commenter on this blog reminded me of the slow food movement, now that is a good idea too!

I've never been good at math, so that's probably why this just hit me. Live and learn:

1. Given the vast amounts of omnivores out there, the percentage of vegans is what 1-2% if that?

2. What does it matter if one person goes 100%, since that person is rare?

3. More animals will benefit from more people reducing 25-50% than a few doing 100%.

4. Picking on vegans or people not doing it 100%, which I am so HAPPY to say, I didn't do, is such a waste of time.

5. I've killed a cockroach* or two.

6. Purity is for the puritans, religion sucks!

7. Factory farming stinks so bad. You have to be near it to fully appreciate the stench. I smelled it driving across the country, there are some places that reek! Near the dairy capital in CA, 1 in 6 kids has an inhaler. It is soooo nasty.

Peace.

*Yes I killed a cockroach. I didn't have any cockroach recipes, so it was a waste of perfectly good protein. Actually, I killed a cockroach in FL (there are none in NorCal) and soon after I watched two helping each other out of the cat litter box. From then on, I couldn't do it anymore and would catch and release or just open the door. Better than meditating all day on the cockroach soul, seriously. I think I was a Jain in my last life. ;-)

**Random asterisks.

Author of Vegan Lunch Box is now Quasi Vegan or something like that

2010-11-30T16:30:00.000-08:00

She also came out of the closet and that ROCKS so hard. Really I love honesty and I love, love and truth!

http://veganlunchbox.blogspot.com/2010/11/mirror-image-acorn-squash-supreme.html

And I'm going to be myself and share the comments I made after reading her posting. Please take it in good humor!

God I love honesty and really, who isn't a vagitarian? Vaginas, having one myself, are awesome! They are the reason the world exists. God is cool and all, if one believes in God (which I do) but we all can see vaginas and prove their existence.

My husband likes that I like to share. Gosh, I really wish I could blog like I really think. I have such good comedy routines with nothing to do with food or animals. Last night I came up with one where the new Alien with the probe asks the poor test subject, "Show me your orifice." To which the the test subject replies, "Which one in particular?"

To be totally transparent: My husband actually supplied the line, "Show me your orifice." In a funny, like demon voice and I laughed so hard. It was so funny, then I came up with a scenario.

Anyway, I'm making a quinoa loaf (finally) and I'm starting a large web project. Good to be self employed, eh?

Feeling better after eating meat

2010-11-30T10:49:00.000-08:00

Over the course of about 5 years I hear from all types of people about what they eat. This mostly occurs if I'm wearing a vegan pin or a shirt, then I hear it. I have stopped wearing vegan pins and shirts. I am thinking of taking my shirts that I designed down at VeganofLight.com. They are pretty cool though.

I don't feel better after eating meat or eggs or dairy. So I'm not going to do it.

In the course of the last 5-6 years, I've heard from ex-vegans and ex-vegetarians who absolutely had to eat meat once in a while, some fish or something. My own mother actually used the words "foggy" three years ago when she went vegan. After a month she brought back in eggs and some fish.

About 5 years ago in FL, I had recently gone vegan and I met an ex-vegan. She was vegan for 7 years. She told me she has fish and/or turkey once a week and she feels so much better. You know what I said, "Well that's better than eating meat all the time." (Honestly, thank God for the Vegan Outreach balanced literature.) I figured that she was probably not eating ground flax or something to get her EFAs. Really, I'm not a nutrition "expert" which is fine since I feel that "experts" already know everything.

In the last month, I met five people who were ex-vegetarians or ex-vegans. One at the World Veg Fest in October. The others were in the grocery store across the street and one is a friend in my spiritual faith. Except for one who noticed no difference at all after eating meat again, and the one who I didn't ask, the others said they felt much better. Some also feel slightly guilty, but all invariably do their best to source meat and eggs from much better sources than factory farms and caged hens.

I'm actually sorry they feel guilty, really I am. Some day I really think we will all adapt and feel perfectly zippy on all plants, but right now we are transitioning genetically. That's my belief and I'm sticking to it ;-)

I am happy with all the books and the ex-vegans coming out. It encourages people to think. Thinking for yourself is good. John Robbins is one of my most favorite people in the world, nevertheless you should still think for yourself.

I believe that in order to live on this hot, small planet there will be a mixture of small farms, hunting, plant eaters, and people who have their own chickens for eggs or their flesh. I am more than willing to give up my share of meat, if there is such a thing, to people who are genetically predisposed to needing it or even think they need to eat it. I think they too will adapt to a plant based diet over time, but I don't have a big stick to make them. Do you?

We are not clones of Donald Watson

2010-11-30T09:02:00.000-08:00

I do believe in God, but not religion, and I also believe in the unity of all things, however we are not all genetic clones of each other. I may be perfectly fine on the vegan diet but others are not. Finding health information not supporting the vegan diet and supporting the vegan diet is easy enough. Finding it separated from some kind of "ism" is not possible. That "ism" is the need to be right. Whether you go over to the dark side of Weston Price (who may have some valuable information) or you stay with the beans, not beings, eaters (the vegans), what you will find is that everyone wants to be right. No one is all right and no one is all wrong.

It's common knowledge, or I hope it is, that some people are genetically predisposed to high levels of cholesterol.

Genetics
Some people are genetically predisposed to having high levels of cholesterol. A variety of minor genetic defects can lead to excessive production of LDLs or a decreased capacity for their removal. This tendency towards high cholesterol levels is often passed on from parents to their children. If your parents have high cholesterol, you need to be tested to see if your cholesterol levels are also elevated.

Therefore, it seems only logical that the opposite is true and in that opposite there are varying levels and degrees of SLOS or some other genetic tendency in the opposite direction of low cholesterol and the need for dietary cholesterol. Remember Lorenzo's Oil was discovered by the parents, not by Doctors.

http://health.howstuffworks.com/diseases-conditions/cardiovascular/cholesterol/cholesterol4.htm

http://learn.genetics.utah.edu/content/disorders/whataregd/slos/

Doctors are "experts" and so are well meaning nutritionists. As "experts" they already know everything, pretty much. When some one already knows everything, there's nothing else to know. That's too bad.

Just because it’s not written by an MD (Atkins was an MD and the guy was wacked) or a bunch of wacked MDs then it’s invalid. Lorenzo’s oil was discovered by the parents. That’s the only example I can think of offhand, but I’m sure there are many discoveries out there made by regular old people.

Diet and cholesterol are big money makers for both sides. Everyone wants to be right. We are all not clones of Donald Watson.

The Healthiest Vegan Diet is not a Diet At All

2010-11-29T14:48:00.000-08:00

The healthiest vegan diet is not a diet. It's a live it. It's about life. It's not raw foods, it's not low fat, it's not restrictive (as long as you avoid meat, eggs and dairy). It's done purely from the basis of love for animals and not from ethics, rights, welfare, weight loss, or for any other reason. It won't save the world or the planet, it will simply reduce supply for the demand. Factory farming sucks royally. It's not to be better or purer or higher. It's done from the standpoint of seeing yourself in others, in those others called farm animals. For many of us, once you meet one, you won't want to meat one. Hah! When done from that perspective alone, I really feel that biology adapts rapidly to accomodate the heart of hearts. I really do.

Added later: That being said, even if your heart is all in to it but you can't do it all the way, do not worry or feel guilty, just do what you can. I've got your back and soon the QuasiVegan site will have a logo, so there you go! You can be a member of the club! Everyone needs another logo, right? ;-)

I know and feel that the vegan diet is not the healthiest of diets for everyone, as a diet, and I really believe that some people need meat and some people think they need it. Both manifest the same way: by eating meat. And some people really do feel SO MUCH BETTER and it's not a placebo effect. They are my fellow beings as much as farm animals are. I don't judge you at all. As a way of life, I know I am no better spiritually than a meat eater.

As far as food as food goes, this is what I eat these days:

Almonds, walnuts, lots of kale, fake bacon sprinkled on my salad (or I put a little hickory smoke), carrots, tomatos, nutritional yeast on a variety of things, beans of many varieties but usually lentils and chickpeas, faux meat usually the Artisan brand, tempeh, Gardein, Vega, non-gmo brown rice protein shakes, d3, b12, DHA in algae (why not), home made chickpea and wheat gluten cutlets, beans, hardly any rice, coconut ice cream, Our Daily Red sulfite free (I get major headaches from sulfites) vegan friendly organic wine, probiotics, plant enzymes a few times a week, and that new Diaya cheese which has zero nutritional content and I am guilty of eating too much of it in the last week, but I am not into it anymore. I also use low fat eggless mayo (I prefer nuts for my fat), and the occasional baked good that I make or purchase but those Alternative Baking Company cookies are 600 calories!, and almond milk for the smoothie. I also eat gluten free pasta here and there and don't eat too much of soy or gluten but I don't fear them. I eat 1 banana a day and I love yams once or twice a week with Earth Balance. I feel great on these foods. I ate eggs this past week so I would not be hypocrite when I wrote that "ex-vegan" article.

Oh yes, oatmeal mixed with quinoa with walnuts, cinnamon, stevia and a little brown sugar or maple syrup.

Just like I think that the fear of "meat is gonna kill you" and "cholesterol is evil" are either money making scams or fear tactics, non gmo soy and gluten are not bad either when taking in moderation. I don't care what the anti-soy and gluten people say. One day I would love to see people without an agenda, in myself the most.

Peace!

Another Ex-Vegan: Is the Vegan Diet the Best?

2010-11-29T14:33:00.000-08:00

I am an ex-vegan. (I was when I wrote this.)

If you are 100% vegan, you may think: "I love animals so much; I cry about their scared, sad faces and their violent deaths. The rape of dairy cows and the removing and killing of calves for veal is so evil. Not to mention the horror of how egg laying hens are treated. Laying their own uterus! What did pigs do? Were they Hitler in their last life? It's violent and it's specisim. I want no part of it."

I get it. Is anything less than 100% here worth doing for the animals? Step outside of the passion and the ethics and the righteousness of it for a moment and think: What if some people just can’t hack it at 100%?

Can they still help end factory farming?

I say: Yes, they can!

It's very, very horrible, what we do to other beings and to the earth. I want all creatures to never, ever suffer.

But truth be known: I love people more than cows, chickens, pigs, lambs and fishes and all the rest of the creatures out there. I love truth and honesty too.

Why do I love people more?

Humans have forks.

Yes! The fork wielding humans are the only ones to make a difference in the lives of other, non-human animals.

Here, as much as we should be compassionate towards non-human animals, we also must be compassionate toward humans. Do we love the lion less because she eats gazelles? The lion has no choice, you say? Yes, some humans have no choice either.

Read on.

This is not an erudite essay so I'm going to just go with the flow. Transitions might not be smooth. Fair warning.

I am an ex-vegan. I was a vegan for nearly 6 years and a vegetarian before that since 1987. At the time of this writing, I ate two eggs so now I'm not a vegan. Right!

Up to now, and currently, I have not experienced any major health issues being vegan or vegetarian, personally. When I went vegan 6 years ago, I didn’t lose weight. I gained. Instead of becoming a skinny bitch, I was fat and friendly. I’m still friendly, just not as chubby. I hardly ever see the doctor (knock on wood) and my teeth are fine.

I ate the eggs earlier today to prove a point and to be able to write from that special place of so-called authority that ex-vegans have.

Is the vegan diet the best diet for all humans and is it the most natural?

The vegan diet, or a plant only diet, is not the best or most natural diet for all humans. Although, at some point, it very well could be.

Some humans thrive on it and some don't. Some notice no difference. Some people’s health improves. Mine did. I used to have very lumpy and painful breasts; that is gone. I used have a fair amount of acne and also I’d get colds more frequently. That has improved. However, that is me.

Some people and their children get sick on it. Tooth decay, brain fog, IBS, fatigue, depression and other issues which my previous self (just a week or two ago) thought could be fixed with a supplement or two or three. That is not always true or best.

If I hadn't met a family just yesterday at the vegan Thanksgiving pot luck, 2010 in Santa Rosa, CA, with two children gestated, nursed and raised on a pure, vegan diet with supplements, I doubt I would be writing this now. I might have, but it was literally as if the Universe begged me to write this after meeting this family.

Both children were small but their parents were small too, short, so that didn’t set off any red flags. The oldest, at approximately 9 years old, had a lot of her permanent teeth capped due to tooth decay. Tooth decay! This is what is highly disturbing.

I was wrong. Wrong to believe and to previously assert that a vegan diet is good for everyone.

And so is Dr. McDougall, MD when he says:

In order to minimize your risk of any health problems, I recommend you and your family follow a diet based on starches, vegetables, and fruits. To avoid the extremely rare chance of becoming a national headline, add a reliable B12 supplement. By making this addition to a healthy diet you can’t go wrong, nor will you suffer from any justifiable criticism of your McDougall Diet delivered by well-meaning family and friends. Source here.

From what I understand, this plant based diet he advocates, and has staked his life’s work on and invested his very soul into was “discovered” when he put the sick Polynesians back on their traditional diet and saw their heart disease and diabetes go away. Their traditional diet of starches, vegetables, and fruits healed them.

To think that it’s a diet for all climes and times and all people is misguided.

Yes, I am well aware that he has helped so many people. I'm using him as a device to illustrate a point, so bear with me.

What if he had met some Inuits who were eating the Standard American Diet (franken food) and they had the same diseases (hypertension, heart disease, diabetes), and he found that by eating their traditional diet of marine animal flesh, some tubers, seaweed, and grasses, they reversed their heart disease and other problems? Inuits eating their traditional high cholesterol high saturated fat diet, have very little, if any, heart disease. http://www.cbc.ca/health/story/2001/09/21/inuit_diet010921.html

Then, let’s postulate, he went down to Northern California and set up shop advocating eating seal seal meat, whale meat, and seaweed. Wouldn’t that be misguided?

Yes.

Here’s another one: Let’s say he met some Nanoran villagers, in the West African nation of Burkina Faso, who were eating the franken food crap diet and found that by putting them back on their traditional diet of millet grain, sorghum wheat, legumes and vegetables with a little meat protein and some termites, their health returned. Then he set up shop in NorCal and stated: Sorghum wheat and termites are the answer!

That would be misguided too.

Let’s get back to the tooth decay. First of all, how did I know what questions to ask the vegan mom? I've been reading about a few failed vegans lately and instead of being pissed (well, a little pissed) or holding on to my beliefs like some kind of religion, I mostly wanted to deeply understand. Deeply understand.

Love and understanding never condemn, but seek to help and encourage.
— Meher Baba

I’m only interested in the health issues the ex-vegans experienced. I'm not going to discuss any of the aspects of the psyche that gets wrapped up in the "ism" or religion of it. Essentially the disillusionment and the underlying philosophy when it doesn't meet individual expectations. In fact, I want to state: we don't need another religion.

I learned there is a good amount of tooth decay with children raised on some vegan diets. It happens with some adults, too, after they adopt a vegan diet. Particularly, a mostly raw diet. This is a vitamin D deficiency from what I could gather. Vitamin D helps your body absorb calcium for teeth.

So take a pill, right? Wrong.

Perhaps that works for some, maybe a lot of people, but not everyone. We are adaptable, but we all have different physiology. And it might not be just D, it might be that cholesterol is needed and saturated fat — yes, I said saturated fat — is needed for some people to absorb nutrients in their food.

Did you know that there is a whole host of health problems when your cholesterol is too low. Suicide, depression. Look it up.

Yes, I know Donald Watson, the father of veganism, was a healthy, British man who lived along time. He’s Donald Watson, not me or you.

Some people need saturated fat and cholesterol to keep their intestines operating properly so that they can get the micro-nutrients and vitamins from the plants. I highly doubt they need a massive load of saturated fat and cholesterol, but they do need some. If their own intestines are not operating optimally, they can get these vitamins from animals. Beta carotene, for example, is pro-vitamin A. If you are a healthy bugger (or your guts are), eating some foods, like yams or carrots, will work for you. You will turn the pro-vitamin into the actual vitamin. If your intestines are not working so optimally OR your culture has relied on getting A from animal sources, then it’s highly probable that you will not thrive on a pure plant based diet. You can adapt, but 100% will not work for you. Yes, there is vitamin A palmitate, from palm oil, I was just providing an example of how conversion works.

Some people can’t utilize vitamin K from veggies. Liver is the answer for them.

How did I elicit this tooth decay information from the mom at the vegan gathering? She invited my daughter to the vegan play group. (My daughter is not vegan, she’s ovo lacto vegetarian.) So I asked her how long her children have been vegan, (since birth), she’s nursed while being vegan. How is their health, I asked. They have very few colds, no ear infections, generally healthy. They looked really small to me and waif like, but I know omnivorous kids who are like that too, so it didn’t mean too much to me. Ahh, yes, no ear infections and none of the typical stuff found with kids eating a diet based on junk. I could relate to that. Then I asked about their teeth. Well, her daughter, whom she nursed, had a lot of her teeth rot out. Her second child, her son is much better. They started taking more D3 (not D2) and B12, from what I could gather, during her second pregnancy. Her son still had a fair amount of tooth decay. It was much better after more supplements.

(Incidentally, supplements were not invented for the microscopic proportion of vegans on this earth, omnivorous eaters are also deficient in vitamins too, even though they eat meat, eggs, and dairy.)

I had some tooth decay when I was a kid and adult. I ate liver and onions, meatloaf, steak, chicken, and pork chops as a child. I had meat every night and eggs a lot and cheese, cheese, cheese, and I ate refined sugars and steakums and Oscar Myer baloney. I did not have a lot, just some, tooth decay. Having that much tooth decay to require capping many of her front teeth is a huge thing.

While taking the vitamins (actually D is a hormone) helped the second, nursed child, that is not the answer for all people.

I've seen healthy vegan kids, I don't know if they were nursed or gestated vegan. One was the daughter of a registered dietitian in Florida and she looked half or completely Asian. The other vegan kids were on a hippie commune in Summertown, TN in the late 70s. I lived there briefly. They played outside (D3), ate Nutritional Yeast with B12 in it, and looked strong. The adult males worked in construction all day and the kids were, by appearances and my 12 year old eyes, healthy. I don’t know much more about this commune now, but they have a great cookbook.

Other vegan friends with no reason to lie or to exaggerate have seen entire families healthy and thriving on a vegan diet. However, some are not at all thriving. Their stories are written off and sometimes deleted from the forums. Is this a religion, folks? No!

There are healthy vegans. Quite a lot of them. I am a member of the veganbodybuidling.com forum and I’ve met vegan body builders, so I know vegans can be very healthy and muscular. Above all, the healthiest vegans I know came from the approach of love for animals, seeing themselves in those other beings, and they are not holier-than-thou food police veganazis.

You might be thinking, this woman with the dentally challenged children was doing it all wrong. But the thing is, she and her husband were doing everything “right” on paper. On paper. On paper, communism looks pretty good too.

From my research, I saw with alarming frequency, that most reported health problems occurred with some variations of raw food vegan diets. However, a very low fat vegan diet (with cooked food) also is one that popped up with a good bit of frequency. One raw diet that I noticed was not healthy was long term adherence to the Hallelujah Diet. One raw diet, or almost raw diet, that is NOT nutritionally deficient and is good for Olympic athletes is the Thrive Diet by Brendan Brazier. There is a variety of vegan diets and some are exceedingly better than others. The ones with fat are best and most healthful from what I could gather. Brendan’s uses hemp protein and hemp fat.

Some folks think, that just because the Bible says, and therefore God says, that in Genesis 1:29 to eat plants and nuts and seeds that it’s good enough to be healthy now.

Wrong.

A little information about adaptation explains why. Humans are currently omnivores with lots of herbivorous biological traits. Since the beginning of us, we eat what's around, basically. There was no shipping, fast food, or eating blueberries out of season.

If we could catch it and/or gather it, it was eaten. Inuits eat marine animals, which/who contain lots of fat and cholesterol. Inuits also eat seaweed, berries and tubers and some grasses. This is what is around them. In their environment, the Inuits fatty diet keeps them healthy. It is extremely rare for the Inuit people, who eat a high cholesterol diet and a high saturated fat diet, to have heart disease! This flies in face of the demonized cholesterol stuff we hear about. Last I checked, the Inuits are human beings.

Now let's take an Asian living in a warm climate who eats a diet mostly of veggies, starch and a little protein from fish, perhaps. They are healthy and it is extremely rare to have heart disease.

The Asians would likely have a heart attack or a gall bladder attack if they even ate one Inuit meal.

Both Inuits and Asians are human beings and on paper a balanced, whole foods vegan diet, with b12 supplements, should do the trick.

But it won't.

Humans are not machines.

I would also bet that the Inuits need the dietary cholesterol. What? They need cholesterol? Yes, they need it. It's an essential nutrient for some people.

It’s all about adaptation.

For successful, fast adaptation to a vegan diet, my bet would be on the humans whose ancestry was largely plant based: the Asians. (Like me!) They would fare the best with little supplementation provided they stay in a warm climate. The Inuits would suffer a whole host of health problems with a switch to a diet for which they are not adapted genetically. They would have to do it very slowly. Very slow. But they would adapt, if they moved South.

We are mixtures of DNA from all over the place. We are all different. This little bit of common sense gets lost in the myriad of diet information out there.

That difference extends to how we absorb nutrients and which ones we absorb. By the way, the ability to absorb or convert certain nutrients can be improved drastically through the addition of lots of good flora, or probiotics, from a variety of strains.

What is not a traditional diet for any civilization is a diet based on eating genetically modified, hormone pumped chicken and turkey, cows eating corn and chicken shit and feathers, fish grown in concrete cesspools, and pigs (my favorite) and all the other animals filled with antibiotics and hormones to get them big, fast. Most of these animals don’t see the light of day, can’t play or express their natural behaviors, they are in total misery in their concrete, nasty shit filled, crowded, stressed out, diseased environment. This doesn’t even begin to describe how factory farming is atrocious, systemic evil for the animals and the people who eat the animals.

Also is what is not a traditional diet for any civilization is eating processed crap like processed cheese, deli meat sausage and hot dogs with nitrites, and GMO soy everywhere. And corn. My God, there’s GMO corn all over the place. This stuff is not traditional in any culture, it’s a science experiment gone horribly wrong. This is what I call Franken Food. Let’s not forget, lots of sugar and, far, far worse: sweet poison neurotoxic substances like aspartame. I could go on and on about aspartame’s nastiness.

I forgot to add, that it’s not traditional to consume franken-dairy morning, noon, and night. Some cultures don’t consume much, if any, dairy at all. However, it’s not the lack of dairy or the inclusion of dairy that causes health issues. Remember the termites. That is to say, the inclusion of termites keeps the people in the village in Africa healthy. The termites, by the way, have B12. The inclusion of high amounts of marine animal blubber keeps the Inuits healthy. It's highly probably that the inclusion of clean, natural dairy in a peoples accustomed to it, will derive health benefits from it. The removal of dairy helped me, but its inclusion might help another. There's no cookie cutter diet for everyone.

Whether someone is healthy or not on a vegan diet, I suppose, is a mixture of physiology and attitude, and good intestinal health.

Are your ancestors Inuit? Are they Asian? Before Factory Farmed meat and Franken Food, what did they eat to be healthy and work in the fields? Do you work in the fields? Do you exercise a lot? Are you in doors a lot? Get any sunlight?

People are, by and large, I’m sad to say, herd animals. Sheeple is the term I use. This country outsources jobs but many of us outsource thinking.

Instead of using common sense, looking at what our individual, particular ancestors ate and more importantly what we optimally feel good and thrive eating in our current environment and mode of life, we go running after this diet and that diet as the "perfect diet".

Or we are so appalled at how this world treats animals, we want zero part of that holocaust*.

Or we want to be a skinny beeatch.

What I’ve attempted to address, so far, is that humans are adaptable and the optimum diet for each individual is likely to be a traditional one that their particular ancestors ate taking into consideration current occupation, exercise, and outdoor time as well as locale. Of course this traditional diet didn’t include include factory farmed animal meat or high fructose corn syrup, for example.

Even if your ancestors ate meat, eggs, and dairy, you can still be healthy on a vegan diet. Adaptation is the key to why. While we won’t adapt to factory farmed meat and franken food, we can adapt to eating a mostly plant based diet and be perfectly healthy, by doing it very, very slowly.

Here’s an analogy: Cow’s milk is not something that Asians consume very much. In fact many people are intolerant to it. It’s something we have adapted to eating and we can also un-adapt to it.

If you want to see the end of factory farming, you have to vote with your dollars. You can support your local farmers and get meat, eggs, and dairy from them, hunt, raise your own animals, keep some chickens for eggs, or you can start eating a plant based diet.

If you are not doing well on your current vegan diet, stop and start over again more slowly. Do this over the course of a few years, perhaps longer or shorter depending on how you feel. Another option is just use the minimum animal products that you need to have good health.

My mother, who is Caucasian, is doing fine with a little fish, a little dairy, and some 7 bucks a dozen eggs here and there. She did this over time, not immediately. She is appalled by factory farming.

If your ancestors ate a lot of meat, they likely worked hard all day long outside in the fields. Do you?

Just because you are not in the pure vegan club, doesn’t mean you’re not any less important to the animals. You can make a HUGE difference. Perhaps even more of a difference than a pure, holier-than-thou vegan. Yes, you do make more of a difference than them. They can keep their religion, let’s help animals!

If your goal is to become vegan or quasi-vegan and you feel tons better eating meat, eat it from pasture raised animals fed their natural diets and sunshine and fresh air. And cut back a little per month over the course of a few years. Then you can experience that your own body can adapt to fewer and fewer and eventually no animal products without harmful side effects. And take probiotics too. I think they are under recognized for their amazing health benefits. You need to also make sure that essential nutrients are being eaten and absorbed. So even if you can’t become 100% and only 70% (for example), don’t worry.

That is: even if you have to keep eating a little meat or eggs your entire life, you don’t have to be perfect to seriously stick it to factory farming.

And stick to factory farming we must!

I have adapted to not eating dairy. I stopped producing lactase, I am now lactose intolerant after 6 years as a vegan. I had some cream in some Chai by accident and I got the classic symptoms. My body lost this adaptation because it wasn't necessary. I can get it back too. Your body will adapt to what you want to do: which I hope is eating fewer and fewer animals and their products.

Just because in the West the traditional diet includes pastured animals, butter, cream, and eggs this doesn't mean it will always be that way.

We adapt.

I hope and pray that some day everyone won't eat animals and use them as slaves anymore. Gene Roddenberry of Star Trek hoped so too. And, before him, H.G. Wells wrote:

"In all the round world of utopia there is no meat. There used to be. But now we cannot stand the thought of slaughterhouses. And in a population that is all educated and at about the same level of physical refinement, it is practically impossible to find anyone who will hew a dead ox or pig. We never settled the hygienic aspect of meat-eating at all. This other aspect decided us. I can still remember as a boy the rejoicings over the closing of the last slaughterhouse." — H.G. Wells

Since we are highly adaptable animals, we humans with the forks, we can adapt to veganism or a modified version of it. We won’t ever adapt to franken food and factory farmed meat. It’s prevalence is one reason why there’s so much more dietary related disease. Stress is another factor contributing to the explosion of a number of diseases. That is another topic.

My point is that we can adapt to eating a plant based diet or a mostly plant based diet. It is not wise or healthy to ignore our individual differences and simply drop meat and all animal products without consideration for our individual genetic constitutions. We can adapt to eating mostly plants. Faster for some, slower for others.

I want healthy vegans and partial vegans and meat eaters who don’t eat meat from factory farms!

In closing I want to say:

THINK FOR YOURSELF!

I might be a great person and all, but you must think for yourself. Research all the stuff I’ve written.

*The word "holocaust" is defined as "destruction or slaughter on a mass scale." In modern times, the word is applied most often to the plight of European Jews at the hands of Hitler, but the word was not invented for this event.

Even so, to compare the slaughter of non-human animals to the slaughter of humans is not to degrade the deaths of humans but to dignify the deaths of non humans.

This is a was said by Dan Piraro in his blog comments. Dan is the absolutely brilliant cartoonist behind Bizarro. He’s a vegan who has not suffered from brain fog or any diminished neuron activity, the man is a genius.

Take your freaking B12

2010-11-29T14:27:00.000-08:00

I hope that most vegans, quasi-vegans, and vegetarians know that you must get a reliable source of B12. There’s B12 analogs in some algae and other plant sources, but it’s not the real deal. You are harming more animals (farm animals) by getting sick from a B12 deficiency. A sick vegan harms animals by not representing the vegan diet in good health. Better to not be a vegan. Really. It's that annoying to me! It's a bacteria, you can probably get it from your own poop, but seriously it's much better to get a supplement. Put it under the tongue and let it dissolve.

This is an excerpt/quote from VeganHealth.org):

Halstead et al. (8) reported that some Iranian villagers with very little animal product intake (dairy once a week, meat once a month) had normal B12 levels. None had megaloblastic anemia. Their average B12 level was 411 pg/ml which was quite high considering their diet. The authors speculated this could be because their diets, which were very low in protein, allowed for B12-producing bacteria to ascend into the ileum where the B12 could be absorbed. They also speculated that because they lived among their farm animals and their living areas were littered with feces, they picked up enough B12 through contamination.

Halstead et al.'s 1960 report was in contrast to Wokes et al.'s 1955 report (9) in which numerous British vegans were found to have neurological symptoms of B12 deficiency.

Conclusion

It is possible that some vegans can ward of overt vitamin B12 deficiency, and even mild B12 deficiency, through B12 production by bacteria in the small intestine. However, this is an usual condition, especially in Western countries, and should not be relied upon, including by raw foodists.

Links:

http://www.ajcn.org/content/8/3/374.abstract & http://veganhealth.org/b12/hcy#alzhttp://www.veganhealth.org/b12/int#iran

Some of the links used for my hypothesis

2010-11-29T11:19:00.000-08:00

Genetics of eating and its relation to obesity.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11931714

Traditional Inuit Diet Protects Inuits Against CVD, but including SHITTY FOOD does not: http://www.cbc.ca/health/story/2001/09/21/inuit_diet010921.html

Low Cholesterol Health Risks:
http://www.ctds.info/low_cholesterol.html

Low Cholesterol Increases Cancer and Death Risk
http://www.wellnessresources.com/health/articles/low_cholesterol_increases_cancer_and_death_risk/

http://www.jigsawhealth.com/resources/cholesterol-symptoms

I will add more as I have time.

More stuff about adaptation, genetics, and diet

2010-11-29T11:07:00.000-08:00

Excerpt: Furthermore, the diet-related genes also appear to have evolved faster than other genes — protein and promoter sequences of these genes changed faster than expected, possibly because of adaptation to new diets.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/01/080130092139.htm

Excerpt: Similarly, scientists hypothesize that the reason people from central and northwestern Europe and some parts of Africa are able to digest lactose, while many adults in most of the rest of the world are lactose-intolerant, is that these areas have a long history of dairy farming. According to the report Diet and Health: Implications for Reducing Chronic Disease Risk by the Committee on Diet and Health, a research arm of the National Research Council (National Academy Press, 1989), the gene for lactase persistence [ability to digest lactose] conveyed a survival advantage to people in dairy farming cultures in which milk products were a primary source of nutrients. Over the generations, this gene proliferated in the population because people who were able to absorb milk as children and young adults were either more fertile or less likely to die early.

Clearly, our genes have a major role in determining the nature of our responses to the foods we eat and, in turn, our health. So the question raised by D'Adamo's book and other recent books that have promoted highly individualized diets is this How can each of us figure out the diet that will be best for our unique genetic selves? The answer lies in a true understanding of our genetic heritage, both ancient and modern.

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0820/is_n242/ai_19945125/

Low cholesterol: depression and anxiety!

2010-11-29T10:29:00.000-08:00

There was Tasha who felt SO MUCH BETTER after eating meat and instead of thinking "oh placebo effect" I thought what if her genetics were adapted to dietary cholesterol and what if she needs it. No plant food has cholesterol. Cholesterol is the building block of vitamin D. Think people!

http://www.jigsawhealth.com/resources/cholesterol-symptoms

and

http://circ.ahajournals.org/cgi/content/full/92/9/2365

http://naturalhealthnews.blogspot.com/2008/11/low-cholesterol-risks.html

(The AHA doesn't come right out and say that low cholesterol has serious health risks. I think the whole "cholesterol is a bad, bad evil" is a money making scam in MANY respects.) However, you NEED to research stuff your self and come to your own conclusions about everything. Knee jerk reactions don't help people or non-human animals.

Here you go:

Symptoms of low cholesterol include:

Depression and anxiety – There is compelling evidence that shows that low cholesterol levels can be used as a marker to identify depression and anxiety.2 Additionally, after childbirth a woman’s cholesterol drops dramatically. It is now suggested that low cholesterol may be a causative factor in triggering postpartum depression.

Mental impairment – Symptoms may include suicidal ideation, increased aggression and propensity to violence, and impaired brain function.

Stroke – Although it is well known that high cholesterol can cause a stroke, it is equally true that excessively low cholesterol can also trigger a stroke.

Vitamin D deficiency – Vitamin D is actually formed by exposing cholesterol found in the skin to sunlight. Cholesterol is the basic building block of vitamin D in the human body. Therefore, low levels of cholesterol can lead to vitamin D deficiency. And once you’re deficient in vitamin D, the body’s ability to absorb calcium becomes impaired, something which leads to brittle bones, fractures, and osteoporosis.

Cancer – Vitamins A, E, and K are fat-soluble vitamins transported by cholesterol. These powerful antioxidants fight free radicals in the body, and offer protection against cancer. When cholesterol is low, these vitamins also become deficient in the body, entertaining the possibility of an increased risk of cancer.

Heart disease – Studies are now showing that women with excessively low levels of cholesterol have a greater risk of mortality from heart disease than women with high cholesterol levels. This suggests that cholesterol should always be in balance for optimal health: never too low and never too high.

Health effects of high total cholesterol include:

Atherosclerosis, heart disease and stroke – Cholesterol build up can lead to hardening and narrowing of the arteries, which restricts blood flow to vital organs such as the heart and brain.

Insulin resistance – When you repeatedly eat a diet high in refined carbohydrates, the cells become overwhelmed by excess glucose, and they stop responding to insulin. Insulin accumulates in the blood. High insulin levels then trigger the production of cholesterol and triglycerides. As cells become more resistant to insulin, cholesterol and triglycerides continue to go up, increasing your risk for diabetes, heart disease, and blood vessel disease.

Note: Cholesterol levels that are either too high or too low can also occur without the presence of any visible symptoms. Untreated cholesterol imbalance can negatively impact physical and mental health, and potentially reduce your lifespan.

How Cholesterol Works

2010-11-29T08:13:00.000-08:00

Excerpt:

http://health.howstuffworks.com/diseases-conditions/cardiovascular/cholesterol/cholesterol4.htm

Genetics

Some people are genetically predisposed to having high levels of cholesterol. A variety of minor genetic defects can lead to excessive production of LDLs or a decreased capacity for their removal. This tendency towards high cholesterol levels is often passed on from parents to their children. If your parents have high cholesterol, you need to be tested to see if your cholesterol levels are also elevated.

And if some are predisposed to having high levels, then some are predisposed to having low levels. And they may very well need dietary cholesterol. Since Cholesterol is a big money making business, it’s hard to find information to support my theory precisely. I'll post the other information I found about this as I have time.

Homeostasis and my Hypothesis on genetic predisposition for some people needing animal products and how they can adapt

2010-11-29T00:17:00.000-08:00

I think because of my vast amount of research on weight loss, or rather, fat loss, and hanging around the vegan body building forum as well as building muscle, losing fat, and then having periods of staying the same (homeostasis), the theory of adaptation seems like common sense to me. There's so many tricks like varying your calories by 100 per day, having a carb fest on the weekend, and other ways to keep your body from adapting to the calories your taking. It also adapts quickly to the type of exercise, that's why muscle confusion and changing your routine is one way to keep the burning going. So is interval training and not just the same speed of biking and running. Lifting weights is the most important to getting a faster metabolism for life. Just doing aerobic will cause you to mess up your metabolism in the long term. You lose muscle doing only aerobics, especially if you are not eating enough calories to support it. So just blowing off my hypothesis is not a good idea, it really makes sense. Well, at least it does to me.

Separate the Vegan from the Ism

2010-11-28T21:57:00.000-08:00

The worst thing we could do for animals is make a religion out of the vegan diet. Especially if the aim of the vegan diet is to end or reduce animal suffering. I've studied many religions, not from the perspective of a seeker, but out of curiosity. Religion sucks! Seriously. It's the cause of so much suffering! Therefore a nice separation of church and state would be just lovely!

Animals couldn't give one shit if I ate eggs a few days ago, but I were to be a veganazi that would turn off many more people from reducing or eliminating animal products and that would suck for animals and their vaginas! So please, STFU and start helping animals, be kind to omnivores and understand that whether it's genetics or just taste, they need to feel welcome to help end factory farming.

The need to be right

2010-11-28T09:38:00.000-08:00

When the need to be right is placed behind being compassionate to all beings (especially towards the humans with the forks), then the animals will benefit.