Questioning the Diet

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nick
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Questioning the Diet

Post by nick »

So I have been posting my experience with the Wai diet on another health board and some of the long-time members who are familiar with the Wai diet have given me their critique of it.

It has been interesting because they ask good questions about the theory behind the Wai diet. It has made me take a closer look at it and this has helped in my understanding of it because I have to go back and re-read certain chapters and forum posts. In general, most of their comments are directed against the diet.

They say that the protein level is too low, that dental problems could arise and that Wai's theories aren't even solid. The whole theory of cooking causing diseases is non-sensical in their opinion and that Wai has no proof of this.

Anyways, here are some of their comments:

nick is highlighted in bold


The more protein you intake the more nitrogen has to be converted
into ammonium (very toxic) which is then converted to urea (less
toxic) then excreted.


The body quickly adapts to compensate for this on a ketogenic diet.
Wai Genriiu is skimming biochemistry texts and cherry-picking data
to support her views. There is no danger from a ketogenic diet, if
you eat enough fat. If you eat lean meat or avoid fat, I guarantee
you will have severe health problems. The increased ammonium on a
ketogenic diet is healthy, because it neutralizes acidic compounds
and helps maintain proper mineral balance.

People have repeatedly thrived on diets composed of mostly animal
fat and protein. More protein MAY be harmful by itself, if nothing
else is changed. It may be harmful if you are not in ketosis. But
it's not a problem if you raise fat and lower carbs to compensate.

http://wilstar.com/lowcarb/kidneys.htm
http://www.lowcarb.org/ketosis.html

The reason modern diets are unhealthy is not because they're high
in fat (35%). It's not because they're "high" in protein (12%). I
wouldn't even call them high fat or high protein. They're high in
carbs (53%). More calories come from carbs than fat. There's less
protein than anything else. High-protein (above 30-35%) may cause
problems, if there's not enough fat to balance it.
nick
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Post by nick »

About High Fat and Protein Diets


Your brain and muscles primary energy source is sugar. Of course your body can utilize fat for energy but why would you work against your body like that?


The body adapts to run on what you give it. It can produce 10% carbs
from fat and 58% carbs from protein, through gluconeogenesis. So why
would you assume that we are working with our body to eat the normal
high-carb, high-fat, low-protein diet? Maybe you are working against
your body by eating too many carbs. In nature, carbs would only be a
seasonal indulgence. At the least, I think you should follow more of
a cyclic-ketogenic diet (a.k.a. Anabolic Diet) - very low carbs from
Monday-Friday and high intake 1-2 days on weekends. Eating high carb
all the time raises indicators of aging and poor health.

Your brain needs sufficient sugar to insure the uptake of amino acids which is proactive in serotonine production. Mood swings, brain fogginess and a loss of energy can and might happen.


Once again, all the brain's needs can be provided by gluconeogenesis
even with no carbs. Examples: Eskimos and several other tribes. The
body does not need carbohydrates at all, but we are propagandized to
think that we do. Afterall, so many businesses depend on selling us
high-carb foods and ignoring our dietary history.

Health boosting? Energy boosting? Your brain and muscles need the sugar to stay energized. Sure fat has more kilocalories compared to sugar, but if you keep your sugar level constant and stable then you'll be fine regarding your energy level. Fat is slow burning while compared to sugar which is a fast burn.


It's impossible to keep sugar stable without fats, esp while eating
simple sugars like fruit and honey. If you want stable energy, you
want slow burning fuel like fat and MAYBE complex carbs. Surely not
fruit sugar and honey, which make you crash and burn quickly. This
blood sugar roller coaster of balancing your sugar will most likely
fail. You'd need constant medical supervision to keep glucose level
balanced while eating frequent carbs. All those carb meals will be
destroying your teeth and bones. Eating fat with carbs does not cut
the overall glucose load. It just slows it down. Insulin secretion
is also increased with carb-and-fat meals.

http://www.foodandhealth.com/cpecourses/giobesity.php
nick
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Post by nick »

http://www.absoluteacneinfo.com/diet/glycemic.html

"To determine the reason behind the mysterious absence of acne and acne
related issues, a team of researchers studied 1,200 people, including 300
teenagers, in New Guinea and 115 people, including 15 teenagers, in a remote
section of Paraguay. The study was conducted over a two year period of time
and during that time span, the researchers failed to detect even so much as
one minor pimple among the total 1,315 people studied."

"The study noted that the participants in the study ate only natural foods -
what they were able to hunt, gather or grow themselves. No refined foods,
which are a common staple in the Western diet, were found in the diet of the
research participants."

So much for Wai Genriiu's claims that acne results from dirty protein and
pinched off sebum canals. None of the tribes were raw-foodists. Primitives
without acne move to civilization and develop acne when they start eating
modern refined foods. Modern diet and lifestyle is the main contributor to
acne and other health problems. These problems simply did not exist among
traditional peoples following natural diets and lifestyles. Nor did those
peoples have noticeable dental decay and deformity.
nick
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Post by nick »

About Acne

How is dirty protein not a form of impaired elimination?

There is no mention of "dirty protein" in the scientific literature.
It's a loaded term invented by Wai. Meanwhile, she thinks it's OK to
eat junk food, as long as it's low in protein. Explain how that can
possibly be healthy? In my experience, junk food impairs elimination
far more than cooked meat, fish, eggs, and vegetables.

The dirty protein is in a form that takes more time to fully breakdown to be utilized.

There is no evidence that cooked protein is less fully digested than
raw protein. In fact, the evidence shows that it is digested better.
Maybe Wai's problems with cooked food result from other factors. She
just picked up the raw dogma and ran with it.

So cooked food makes it harder to properly and fully eliminate (also read utilize) the protein, which can cause acne.

Where is the proof that it is harder to utilize cooked protein? I
have cited a study that cooked eggs are 91% digestible, while raw
eggs are 51% digestible? Raw food is harder to digest and utilize.
You need a better hypothesis for why her diet relieves acne. You
also need to show that her diet has all the required nutrients in
a USABLE form. I say her diet is an artificial construct with no
basis in reality. It's as fake as the junk food she eats.

What about refined foods is so unhealthy or acne causing

That's such an ignorant question, I wouldn't know where to begin.
It's obvious you haven't read any of the links on the group web
site, or any of the books mentioned from time to time. Refined
foods are unhealthy, because they rob the body of nutrients. It
is irrelevant whether they "cause" acne. You seem to think that
anything that "causes" acne is bad and unhealthy, while anything
that reduces acne is good and beneficial. That's the attitude I
attributed to Wai, which you tried to deny it. But now your very
own words are confirming that you agree with it.

What about the fact that you went on the diet and this did clear your acne?

Clearing up acne at the expense of dental decay and/or diabetes
and/or osteoporosis is not a good trade-off. This is why nobody
takes Wai seriously, because her ONLY criterion for health is
having as little acne as possible. One must ask if it is worth
the health risk to pursue this beauty obsession. Are you making
progress (tolerating more foods), or painting yourself into a
corner (sensitivity to foods)? Wai has put the cart before the
horse. The goal should be overall health, not clear skin. Her
diet creates and maintains weakness and rigidness.
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Post by nick »

Ok. Well, I still get breakouts when I eat cooked food. I don't
fear it and worry about it, so it must not be a mental thing. When
you went off the diet, did you start breaking out again.

You cannot blame cooked food as the main reason; you have to focus in
the context of your actual diet or health situation, which perhaps it
is not optimal. Start experimenting with other health strategies and
you will probably discover that cooked food as the culprit of acne,
overeating, vascular diseases, cancer, dementia, Alzheimer, ADHD,
constipation and all the diseases of humanity. is nonsense. As I said
before, I didn´t start breaking out when I went off the diet, but
again, I improved other aspects of health like the emotional, getting
more sunshine, intermittent fasting and others.


Ok. I don't necessarily agree with every point they make about
cooked food. But they do make some strong points and connections, right?


Connections don´t mean cause and effect. Health is affected by
numerous factors in which ¨overcooked food¨ may play a role in
certain circumstances, but you have to see the whole picture. A raw
food diet definitively does not decrease aging rate. According to
Wai, raw honey doesn´t contain appetite enhancers, opioid peptides,
heterocyclic amines, beta-carbolines, damaged protein and fats (by
the Maillard reaction). I challenge you to eat lots of raw honey per
day and see what happens with your glucose, insulin and other tested
aging biomarkers, which have proved to be much more related to aging
rate than cooked food. Obviously that a raw food diet like Wai´s is
generally a natural diet, so you are avoiding refined foods, and
probably you will not eat so much sugars as if you eat doughnuts,
pastries, cakes, etc. which also contain partially hydrogenated oils
and other ¨mutant¨ components.

I'm on the Wai Diet, and I did a search through the posts about Wai Genriiu. Just to clarify, Wai doesn't recommend 2-3 ounces of animal food (chicken yolk and rawfish). When first starting to eat the eggs, you need to start with small amounts to gradually build up your immune system to the bacteria. Specifically for the acne sample diet, she limits the intake from animal food to 50 grams of yolk/fish. This is because too much protein can cause breakouts.

Then maybe breakouts are natural, since humans have thrived on meat
for millions of years before the invention of agriculture. Maybe the
acne is a symptom of weak constitution and poor elimination, not of
protein in general. Did Eskimos have acne or cellulite?

But after two weeks, you can easily increase the amount of raw animal food, up to ten yolks or more, depending on how much you need protein wise. Even with fish, you can increase the amount. So they don't advise too little protein as some posters have mentioned. Regarding the acne sample diet, they are strict in the rules, but after it you can increase the animal food and advise most to do so.

Ten yolks is only 30 grams of protein. It's widely acknowledged, even
by conservative health organizations, that people need more than that.
Athletes and body-builders may need 5-8 times that much protein. Also,
it's dubious advice telling people to only eat the yolk, throwing out
half the egg. This advice is based on pseudo-science. Wai claims that
eating raw egg white will cause deficiencies. That has not been shown,
except when people ate ONLY raw egg white for long periods. Anecdotal
reports from Aajonus, Dr. Joseph Mercola, myself, and others here can
debunk the risk of eating WHOLE raw eggs. The yolk balances the white
and compensates for negative effects of the white by itself.

Another big misconception by a poster was that Wai uses clear skin and only clear skin as a measure of health. That is false. She never made claims that a clear skin is the only sign of health, just that her diet is an elimination diet for acne sufferers. Her diet does work for acne, if done properly. It doesn't work for hormonal acne, but can help to some degree.


I didn't say she used only clear skin. I said she judged health based
on acne, cellulite, and weight. She calls her diet the "No Acne, No
Cellulite, No Overweight Diet," as if those were the only meaningful
indications of health. She also ignores other potential causes, like
not exercising and poor elimination. I think that acne is a symptom
of poor health and a weak constitution, but getting rid of acne and
cellulite is no guarantee of a stronger constitution.

The diet took about 3-4 months for it to clear my acne. For most it works rather quickly (two weeks, sometimes 3 or 4), but for some it takes 3-4 months.


The benefits come from eliminating harmful foods, not from any special
qualities in the foods eaten. Over time, the diet will produce severe
deficiencies IMO. And Wai's argument that Brazil nuts have the highest
quality of any protein is highly questionable.

I did lose some wieght, but mostly fat and some muscle. I'm skinny so that didn't help but as long as you keep your sugar-level stable you can maintain your wieght and it took me some time learning to listen to my body when it needed energy (fruit).


I'm not convinced that fruit sugar, nuts, and olive oil are an ideal
energy source. I prefer meat, whole eggs, and saturated fats.

http://www.mercola.com/2002/aug/17/saturated_fat1.htm



The one area where you have to be sure is making sure that your fruit is ripe, as too much acid can cause dental problem. I went to a dentist and he told me that gums were swollen, and that there was some erosion and that it would get worse. So now I check to make sure that my oranges are ripe or just a little bit overripe. This definitely is essential and I can notice the difference as the acids made my saliva thicker and caused some mucus stimulation which wasn't comfortable living with.

I think that too much fruit will cause dental problems, regardless of whether it
is ripe or not. And eating lots of nuts has also been associated with bone and
dental problems. See BeyondVeg site info on raw diets.
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Post by avalon »

Too early for me to take all that in, OY!

But:

http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/fact ... lic-amines

Gives a pretty good description of 'dirty' protien. That eating medium well to well done meats makes one three times more likely to develope stomach cancer- over those eating rarer...

I'm afraid everything i've read also states fruits and fruit juices are good at promoting tooth decay.

Best wishes,

Avalon
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Post by avalon »

More on cooking! Doesn't mention raw though.

http://www.americancancersocietypromote ... ction.html

still a good read.
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Oscar
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Post by Oscar »

Hehe, funny. Is this always the same guy answering? I suppose not. Is there any diet all these guys propagate?

Anyway, I'm not sure if you're looking for answers or that you already know. I'll just take out a few comments.
Once again, all the brain's needs can be provided by gluconeogenesis even with no carbs.
The body adapts to run on what you give it. It can produce 10% carbs from fat and 58% carbs from protein, through gluconeogenesis.
True. I could write this answer in dutch, and you could hire someone to translate it for you, so you would be able to understand it. Writing this in english makes you understand right away though.
So why not give the body/brain what it actually needs, instead of using the gluconeogenesis detour?
What about refined foods is so unhealthy or acne causing
That's such an ignorant question, I wouldn't know where to begin.
It's obvious you haven't read any of the links on the group web
site, or any of the books mentioned from time to time. Refined
foods are unhealthy, because they rob the body of nutrients.
Since the person answering can so readily identify ignorance, I guess he knows ignorance from really up close... ;) Anyway, refining isn't good (I don't know all the details yet), except for sugar(s). With sugar we only need the molecules it is refined to. So there is a difference in refining sugar and fat/protein.
Meanwhile, she thinks it's OK to eat junk food, as long as it's low in protein. Explain how that can possibly be healthy? In my experience, junk food impairs elimination far more than cooked meat, fish, eggs, and vegetables.
Of course it's all junk food, but what does he mean by 'impairs elimination'?
Over time, the diet will produce severe deficiencies IMO.
You can't really produce deficiencies I think ;), but what deficiencies?
Wai claims that eating raw egg white will cause deficiencies. That has not been shown, except when people ate ONLY raw egg white for long periods. Anecdotal reports from Aajonus, Dr. Joseph Mercola, myself, and others here can debunk the risk of eating WHOLE raw eggs. The yolk balances the white and compensates for negative effects of the white by itself.
Off the top of my head I don't think Wai claims that. Only that eggwhite contains inhibitors for vit. B8 (biotin). IMO one could easily eat the eggwhite too, since the amount of biotin in the eggyolk is a lot, even with the inhibitors. But eggwhite doesn't have a lot of nutrients, and it doesn't taste good.
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Post by Cairidh »

meaty man wrote: Ten yolks is only 30 grams of protein. It's widely acknowledged, even
by conservative health organizations, that people need more than that.
Athletes and body-builders may need 5-8 times that much protein.
Tell that to this raw vegan body builder: http://www.thegardendiet.com/shannon.html

He eats raw fruit, veg, nuts, seeds, oils, honey, celtic sea salt, water.
That's it. No dehydrated food, no cheating items most raw vegans eat.
(I know people aren't really vegan if they eat honey, but they call themselves that).
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Post by Cairidh »

Image
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Post by Cairidh »

*Cairidh comes to after staring at the screen for hours*
avalon
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Post by avalon »

I went on a 10 day juice fast and it changed my life!
That's how it happened for me! A juice fast changed my life.

Then I found y'all!
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Post by RRM »

Nick,

Im not sure; would you like me to address one of the issues you've raised?
If so, which one?
nick
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Post by nick »

I have some questions that need some clarification.
Here they are.
Thanks.
It's impossible to keep sugar stable without fats, esp while eating
simple sugars like fruit and honey. If you want stable energy, you
want slow burning fuel like fat and MAYBE complex carbs. Surely not
fruit sugar and honey, which make you crash and burn quickly. This
blood sugar roller coaster of balancing your sugar will most likely
fail. You'd need constant medical supervision to keep glucose level
balanced while eating frequent carbs. All those carb meals will be
destroying your teeth and bones. Eating fat with carbs does not cut
the overall glucose load. It just slows it down. Insulin secretion
is also increased with carb-and-fat meals.

http://www.foodandhealth.com/cpecourses/giobesity.php
I don't think he gets the point that with this diet you only eat as much as you need perhaps a little less or a little more. But the point is that you don't overeat.

Fat does slow down the absorption of sugar, right?
Also, I remember reading that you said that balancing with fat will decrease the spike in the sugar level. So basically fat has two affects on the sugar level, one more direct and the other indirect (slowing of absorption).

He also he thinks that insulin secretion is somehow not healthy in terms of this diet. He says that blood markers such as insulin level are healthier on a fat/protein diet.
nick
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Post by nick »

There is no evidence that cooked protein is less fully digested than
raw protein. In fact, the evidence shows that it is digested better.
Maybe Wai's problems with cooked food result from other factors. She
just picked up the raw dogma and ran with it.

Where is the proof that it is harder to utilize cooked protein? I
have cited a study that cooked eggs are 91% digestible, while raw
eggs are 51% digestible? Raw food is harder to digest and utilize.
You need a better hypothesis for why her diet relieves acne. You
also need to show that her diet has all the required nutrients in
a USABLE form. I say her diet is an artificial construct with no
basis in reality. It's as fake as the junk food she eats.

I think he is wrong mainly because the way protein digestibilty is calculated. As you have mentioned and as I have read in the official DRI book, protein digestibility is measured by how much nitrogen intake compared to the nitrogen excretion rate which is then compared to a protein free diet.

In the DRI book it is mentioned how someone may consume sufficient nitrogen (protein) but still lack essential amino acids. I'm waiting for his reponse to this fact.

He says raw egg protein has a lower digestibility but that says nothing about amino acid content and its absorption.

Why don't they calculate it to amino acid requirements?
Is nitrogen measuring just sufficient enough?
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