Paleo without needing to loose weight.

Puddleglum · 11 April 2019 at 6:34PM

I'm a coeliac, cannot take dairy and pre diabetic to boot. Like you I have auto immune problems and maintaining weight is a bit of a challenge.

I find that coconut oil is really useful in providing enough calories to keep weight up. More useful to me than olive oil and avocado oil in recipes.

Good luck.

lessonlearned · 14 April 2019 at 12:20AM

BananaRepublic wrote: »

Potatoes aren’t really fattening anyway, it’s the way they are cooked that can make them calorific. I once knew someone with some gut missing who needed to eat lots of fat, and his doctor advised curries. I’m fond of coconut milk, which can be added to soups and sauces. It can be used like cream to make pasta sauces, unconventional but tasty IMO.

I Can't speak for Maddie but many people, myself included, who need to follow a paleo diet for health reasons also have to avoid foods from the nightshade family. White potatoes belong to the nightshade family.

You said in an earlier post that the paleo way of eating was a "fad diet". It isn't. It is about as natural and as close to the original Stone Age diet that our distant hunter gatherer ancestors ate as you can get.

In the grand scheme of things farming and growing crops is relatively new to humankind's evolution and there are a lot of people who have digestive systems which simpy cannot tolerate grains.

There seems to be some evidence which suggests that people with Type O blood (the oldest blood group going back to our cave people ancestors) function better without grains and that they maybe lacking certain digestive enzymes which causes them problems.

I agree that potatoes in themselves aren't especially fattening however Type 2 diabetics are also advised to avoid eating too many white potatoes because they are high in starch and can cause blood sugar levels to spike.

I suffered with stomach problems for over 60 years. No amount of medication ever seemed to help. A couple of years ago I decided to see a nutritionist. Best thing I ever did.

I now follow a largely paleo/plant based diet with just a little bit of dairy. I also take a daily probiotic to ensure that my microbiome is well balanced and that my gut flora is healthy.

If I stick to the regime I remain healthy, if I don't then I get sick again. I am well, pain free and no longer need medication so for me a paleo diet has been a huge success.

The good thing is that if you do have to avoid certain foods then there are usually substitutes, like my earlier example of butter bean mash instead of mashed potatoes.

There is a much wider range of "free from" foods nowadays so sourcing gluten free wheat based products, lacto free dairy, vegan foods etc is now much easier and cheaper than used to be the case.

BananaRepublic · 16 April 2019 at 1:21PM

lessonlearned wrote: »

I Can't speak for Maddie but many people, myself included, who need to follow a paleo diet for health reasons also have to avoid foods from the nightshade family. White potatoes belong to the nightshade family.

You said in an earlier post that the paleo way of eating was a "fad diet". It isn't. It is about as natural and as close to the original Stone Age diet that our distant hunter gatherer ancestors ate as you can get.

In the grand scheme of things farming and growing crops is relatively new to humankind's evolution and there are a lot of people who have digestive systems which simpy cannot tolerate grains.

There seems to be some evidence which suggests that people with Type O blood (the oldest blood group going back to our cave people ancestors) function better without grains and that they maybe lacking certain digestive enzymes which causes them problems.

I agree that potatoes in themselves aren't especially fattening however Type 2 diabetics are also advised to avoid eating too many white potatoes because they are high in starch and can cause blood sugar levels to spike.

I suffered with stomach problems for over 60 years. No amount of medication ever seemed to help. A couple of years ago I decided to see a nutritionist. Best thing I ever did.

I now follow a largely paleo/plant based diet with just a little bit of dairy. I also take a daily probiotic to ensure that my microbiome is well balanced and that my gut flora is healthy.

If I stick to the regime I remain healthy, if I don't then I get sick again. I am well, pain free and no longer need medication so for me a paleo diet has been a huge success.

The good thing is that if you do have to avoid certain foods then there are usually substitutes, like my earlier example of butter bean mash instead of mashed potatoes.

There is a much wider range of "free from" foods nowadays so sourcing gluten free wheat based products, lacto free dairy, vegan foods etc is now much easier and cheaper than used to be the case.

If you wish to follow the 'Paleo' diet, by all means do so and if you benefit from it, that's good. But you do need to be aware that many if not most claims made about the diet are false. For example it is certainly not 'natural' whatever that may mean, and it certainly is nothing like the diet eaten in Paleolithic times before farming was invented.

For example, it includes almonds, and yet the kind that were eaten back then were toxic due to high arsenic levels. Similar statements are true of countless other foodstuffs. In fact many foodstuffs were not even around then, at least not in Europe, as tomatoes, chillis, French beans, squash and so on originate from the Americas.

I'm not saying don't follow the 'Paleo' diet, but if you choose to do so, at least do some research, and understand that although it may help you, most claims are unsubstantiated or downright false.

As for following a plant based diet, you may well benefit from omitting certain foodstuffs, and in general we (as a group) do need to eat more healthily, and reduce processed foods from our diets. If by natural you mean free from processed food, then yes that is good, but most of us can happily eat grains and starchy foods.

maddiemay · 10 May 2019 at 9:15PM

Thank you all for comments, read and considered.

Briefly, I have a whole list of chronic conditions, some very serious, all treatable at present. A fully qualified Doctor, for many years within the NHS, now private, but very free with information to help those that for various reasons (cost, geography, her lists being currently full) are unable to consult with her, suggests what has become known as the Paleo way of eating may be helpful for some if the things that ail me.

I too get very annoyed with much of the information that is touted as being the only way to lie and eat, when so much is far from correct.

I am finding a way that seems to suit me, which is lowish carb, eating as much variety of foodstuffs as possible to be kind to my gut biome, high quality protein, many colours of fruit and veg, but sadly at present not very much in the way of pulses and beans (hopefully that may change in time).

Paleo without needing to loose weight.

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