Cave woman food

South Australian chiropractor Dr Janah James lost an INCREDIBLE 30+ kgs simply by eating paleo food (as in paleolithic… as in what our cavemen ancestors ate, i.e. protein, fruit, veg, seeds and water) and has started recorded her meals in an amazing blog. Here’s a sneak peek from her.

Pictured: Janah’s healthy cocoa dip! = just blend 1 banana, 1 – 1 1/2 avocado,  150g raw organic cocoa powder, 2 tbsp maple syrup and dash cinnamon!

“Being a chiropractor, with good knowledge on nutrition, biology, chemistry and physiology, I was well outside the healthy weight bracket for my age and height, and I knew it. For someone who is in the wellness industry, that is a quite an embarrassing predicament to be in. My husband, whilst slender, works in I.T. and was drinking a lot of soft drinks and energy drinks which I knew were detrimental to him, just not visibly so. Part of what I know as a chiropractor is that prevention is better than cure. This applies to all things that affect the body and prevent us from expressing ourselves at our optimal health. I also knew that I would really rather not get to the point of ‘needing’ to be on handfuls of medications by the age of 50. Somehow it seems like there are few people who are not on at least one regular medication by 50.

Three years ago a drug-free future was looking more and more unlikely for me. As a young woman with PCOS (a syndrome which throws all sorts of hormones out of whack, leaving me with a vastly increased risk of developing heart disease, type two diabetes and breast cancer, not to mention all the other chronic diseases that tag alongside obesity) I had been given the usual advice: Eat less, exercise more. Great. Thanks. Don’t you think I know that mantra? Don’t you think I’ve TRIED it? Of course I had! And it didn’t work, not in the long run. It is a starvation diet, I now realise, and is quite simply unsustainable.

So I would try some other version of the same mantra. One ‘specialist’ (an ObGyn) even told me that two hours of exercise every day, 7 days a week was what I simply ‘had’ to do to lose the weight and reduce the symptoms of PCOS. I can tell you from a chiropractic perspective, that amount of exercise is NOT what my joints and body needed. Other than engaging in what I believed was a ludicrous amount of exercise, I had tried what I was taught was ‘being healthy.’ It hadn’t worked. “Now what?” I thought. Not to mention my concerns that, as I got older, surely this requirement for energy expenditure would have to increase as my metabolism slowed. Or so I was led to believe happens as we age. Truth is, it’s not or metabolism that slows down, rather that our insulin resistance goes up.

What changed three years ago? In hindsight, I realise that I started by thinking globally and then acting locally. Firstly I started using Enjo to clean my house. It’s actually embarrassing to admit that what first got me using Enjo was the speed of the cleaning process and the results it got, rather than the somewhat more impressive fact that it was chemical-free cleaning. And yet, that seemingly small change taught me to think of the environment more and to treat it with respect. As a result of this change in thinking, I decided to go back to what I knew made me feel good, to think about my body as my local environment into which I no longer wanted to put any nasty synthetic chemicals.

Secondly, the symptoms of my PCOS were becoming quite troublesome and the risks it carried with it were concerning. I was having to breath in to do up my shoes, my fatigue and hunger were back, and my periods were non-existent. Something that had helped me feel more vital in the past was the Anti-Candida diet. I had followed it in my early teens after my grandmother cured her leukaemia by changing her diet. I first tried it when I was just 11 years old . My Nana had started it three years earlier and was certain it would resolve the vertigo that I was suffering from at the time. I had been hospitalised for 10 days and put on steroids as the doctors in Malaysia could not work out what else to do. The diet resolved the problem just as my wise Nana had thought it would. I should have realised then the ultimate and life changing impact that our nutrition has on disease. It evidently did make some impression on me. Ultimately this experience did, in a roundabout way, lead me down the path of wanting to be a chiropractor. I learnt that modern drugs and medicine aren’t always the only answer, and not only that, they don’t always get it right.

Nana never took a single drug given to her. Instead she changed what she nourished herself with, and a few months later returned to the Doc who exclaimed “Wow! I have never seen those meds work so effectively and so quickly – your white cell count is back to normal – in fact – better than most your age!” To which she replied “That’s funny because I never took a one of them. I flushed every last one down the loo and changed my diet instead.” She is still going strong, 21 years after her initial diagnosis in which she was told “You should make it to the Sydney 2000 Olympics unless something else bumps you off on the way.”

So, three years ago, after hitting breaking point I returned to what had made me feel healthier in the past. The Anti-Candida Diet. I had done it from the age of about 11 to 13 for various reasons. However, once again, I found it to be restrictive in a social sense, as it makes one a virtual outcast at social occasions. You’re either ‘that person’ who isn’t eating or brought their own ‘weird food’. Or if you do eat ‘normal food’ you’re then ‘that person’ hiding in the corner emitting unpleasant bodily gases because your body is no longer used to wheat, yeast, dairy, sugar or alcohol.

After a few months of being ‘that person’, albeit feeling much better and starting to see the scales go down by about a kilo each month to six weeks, I switched to the more simple gluten-free approach. This seemed so much easier, and as far as I was concerned, I was still feeling and seeing the health benefits. I was still occasionally having some wheat while I was out, if there was not an appetizing alternative. It didn’t seem to affect me that much. My level of gluten intolerance only led to bloating, reflux, and emotional depression and bowel upset for a few days. I also got itchy skin and skin discolouration, which I have now worked out is also a wheat-induced response. I didn’t know that’s what was causing it until I read Wheat Belly by William Davis MD and totally eliminated wheat.

I should mention that at the start of 2011, the first step in the bigger change in our diet was reading a book by Gary Taubes, Why We Get Fat and What To Do About It. It completely changed our approach to our diet. By diet I don’t mean some crash-course, crazy and unsustainable starvation/weight-loss plan. That behaviour doesn’t make anyone healthier, even though it might make them less heavy. By ‘changed our diet’ I mean we have permanently changed the types of food that make up our nutritional rainbow. After reading that book and changing our approach, and later reading William Davis’ book Wheat Belly; Lose The Wheat Lose The Weight And Find Your Path Back To Health, my weight loss sped
up, with a total of 17 kilos lost in just 10 months. The other lifestyle changes described above that we had made saw me lose 14 kilos over 24 months to begin with. But once I read those two books and was actually able to understand the science behind fat metabolism, I was able to select foods based on what their chemical impact would be on our bodies.

Our approach to food is now much more on the low carb paleo/primal approach. Think hunter-gatherer, early nomadic human type diet – before agriculture really got its fire burning. For us, this means a diet high in natural fats and high in copious leafy greens, moderate in protein, low in starch and very low in sugar. That’s what we aim for anyway.

Previously we were shopping from the hideous, fluorescent, impersonal ‘super-chains’. No wonder we were uninspired. Whilst we did have lots of ‘vegies’ (not certain I agree with them on their definition anymore) we still consumed a fair bit of sugar (hidden in processed foods like sauces and baked beans etc.) and still a lot of carbs (albeit in the form of brown rice, rye, muesli etc.) You see, the awful Catch 22 about the grains and processed food diet is that you’re already lacking in energy, so you think “I’ll save myself some time and get the ready made sauce/soup/meal, then I won’t have to waste time in the kitchen preparing food and then I can just get along with the rest of my days tasks, before flopping into
bed.” But trust me – processed foods don’t save you any time because they steal it all back from you by not actually providing your body with healthy nutrients for repair, or fuel for energy. Sneaky! But you won’t work it out until you start eating whole foods and realise you need three hours less sleep a night, and you wake up refreshed and alert, and keen to get up early to cook a protein and fat rich breakfast!

My breakfast now is usually an egg stack – consisting 2-3 of eggs, bacon or speck in layers with mushrooms, cherry tomatoes, porcetta, Spanish chorizo, ham or other cured meats, with avocados and, if there is any, a side of leftover greens from dinner the night before. When I was still having dairy I would top it off with a few pieces of fried Cheese Curd. Delicious and satisfying from 6:30 am to about 2pm… or later. Depends on whether we ate dinner the night before or not. Who misses bread when you can have a breakfast like that every day and still lose weight and feel fabulous?! Not me! I have since decided to cut dairy and see what benefits I feel, as there are a lot of convincing arguments for avoiding
dairy as well. I do find cheese to be an excellent fuel source that doesn’t raise my blood sugar, but the casein protein is potentially causing an intolerance in my system still.

Lunch is a protein and fat snack, such as twiggy sticks and almonds. Hubby Luke will have this with cheese, cucumber, celery and tomatoes. I find I am generally not hungry. If I am, another favourite is a heap of greens and salad. If I do have salad, I make sure to include fat and protein in the form of almonds and olive oil, fresh lemon juice and again some chorizo along with a spoonful of coconut oil. A point on not being hungry – there is this funny thing that happens when you feed your body good quality, energy rich food; it lets you know when you actually need to eat, and you don’t really get hungry anymore. So I only eat when I am actually hungry, and stop eating when I am feeling full – which I can actually sense now because I don’t feel bloated from wheat. Now, if I eat wheat, within minutes I feel bloated, and then in about 10 minutes I feel like I have been punched in the gut. Then for the next few days I make good friends with the toilet – if you catch my drift.

Now I also find there is no need to keep eating regular meals to ‘keep your blood sugar steady’ when you aren’t eating foods that spike your blood sugar! Out of interest last year I did a 26 hour fast – with only two instances of feeling slightly hungry, which subsided in minutes after drinking some more water. Chances are I was actually mistaking the sensation of thirst. There was no dizziness, loss of concentration, hunger pangs, foggy head or anything you would think would happen when fasting. Our brain can use ketone bodies for fuel, and since I was already in a state of ketosis i.e. using fat for fuel as opposed to glucose I didn’t suffer any ill effects. (Ketosis is a perfectly ok state to be in – we are not talking about ketoacidosis which is of course very different).

Most weeks we find ourselves not needing dinner at least two nights a week. Talk about helping reduce world hunger – don’t eat grains and you simply end up eating less! More food to go around! If however we do eat dinner, it’s always some combination of fat, protein and lots of leafy greens. And this is where quality counts so much more than quantity. We choose only high quality GRASS FED meat. Grass fed
stock have high levels of Omega 3 Fatty Acid’s (cardio and neuro protective fatty acids) and in the correct ratio with the inflammatory Omega 6. Fats found in grain fed stock are the reverse – and therefore pro inflammatory. As such, the meat portion of our meals are usually grass fed beef, lamb pork or chicken thighs skin on, mussels, delicious Spanish blood sausage any other meat we can find at the Adelaide Showground Farmers markets. We always couple it with lots of fresh leafy greens, and any other non root vegies that are in season at the time. We have taken to eating the stunning purple carrots for the time being, after all – they are real, whole food… even if they are a root vegetable. Root vegetables are higher in starch, which readily raises blood glucose levels due to the way that human biology works. So, where it is convenient for us we try to avoid them as a general rule. But purple carrots taste awesome and provide us with essential nutrients that wouldn’t be in our diet otherwise
(due to their purple colour). We try to ‘eat a rainbow’ when it comes to vegies. It ensures the best exposure to as many nutrients as possible.

We have found our dietary changes have given us more vitality, clearer skin, clearer thinking and clearer digestion. We love the amazing variety that seasonal vegetable stalls provide us. Our dinner guests love the varieties of veges that are slightly unusual – things you just can’t get at a so called ‘super market’. Things like those purple carrots I was just talking about, kale, feijoas and fractal broccoli to name a very small few. It sure makes the meat and 3 veg approach to eating so much more interesting! We recently purchased a ¼ cow and whole lamb with the request to ‘leave as much fat on it as possible’ (certainly got some shocked looks with this request). This has made things even easier to stick to and a whole lot more cost effective.

We try to stick to the 90/10 rule, but at times that slips to more 80/20. In an ideal modern world, we like to try to keep to consuming a ratio of 90% food that nourishes and provides fuel for repair as well as for play. The other 10% is food for the tongue/endorphins. Since humans are (unfortunately) wired to love sweet things, we still have the occasional sweet tooth. Again, we stick to making our sweet choices at the ASFM market too. With our new approach, when we have treats, we make sure they are really delicious, good quality, made with love and made from scratch which we get one item to share and only on Sundays. This also gives us the joy of looking forward to picking out just the ‘perfect’ dessert for the end of our weekend.

If you want to know more about how I have changed my lifestyle to now revolve around the foods that humans evolved to eat which have helped me lose over 30 kilos all up (14 kilos over the first two years and then 17 kilos in 2011 since understanding human physiology, cutting grains, increasing fat and veg, and decreasing all processed food), then follow me on twitter : @DrJanahJames. I am currently preparing several newsletters for our clinic which will be made available online about every four months as I write them.

In short: Yes – excess calories can be damaging to your health. But excess blood sugar is worse. And you know what, if you stop eating the things that cause an excess in blood sugar, then you don’t want to consume the excess calories.

My new mantra is: Eat less processed crap, avoid those so called ‘healthy whole grains’ and eat more naturally occurring fats, move well and regularly, and take the time to think well; about yourself and about the world around you. Your body and your community will thank you for it.”

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Category: Sex and wellbeing