Surviving the Medical Meltdown (14 page)

Funding flows to those whose ideas reinforce the consensus opinion – right or wrong. So, although we have known for decades that ingested cholesterol does not per se raise blood levels, business has too much money riding on low-cholesterol foods to admit that fact. Additionally, we know that lowering cholesterol has not diminished mortality from heart disease. It has changed the pattern of disease but has not lowered overall mortality. Although perhaps – and this is still a perhaps – statin drugs (the most common cholesterol-lowering medicines) have decreased heart attack rates slightly, death from heart failure has gone up. And there is good physiology to explain this effect, adding credence to the point. We also know that many people who experience heart attacks have cholesterol in the normal range.

The fact is, cholesterol is extremely important not only because your brain is made of it but also because it is converted to neurotransmitters and – as I said earlier – sex hormones. The idea that low cholesterol is desirable and improves longevity is not true. Lowering changes the pattern of disease. We know that “oxidized” cholesterol – in other words, damaged cholesterol – is bad. But in the absence of damage through oxidation to the cholesterol particles circulating in the blood, it appears that higher levels of serum cholesterol are better in many ways. The biggest issue is what cholesterol does for the brain. The Framingham study of diet shows that cholesterol levels were proportionally related to verbal fluency, attention, reasoning, and other cognitive outcomes. People with cholesterol above 240 did better than people whose cholesterol was below 200.
¹⁹

According to Dr. Perlmutter in his excellent book
Grain Brain
,
the
Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease
recently published research from Mayo Clinic on older people, their diet, and their brain function. The study found that people whose diet was highest in good fats had 42 percent less chance of cognitive impairment; in other words, brain dysfunction.
²⁰
And I remember him saying at a lecture I attended that people who for some reason had very high levels genetically, in the 350 or higher range,
never
got Alzheimer’s – or at least he had never seen it happen in those patients. Butter does not seem to benefit the brain (although it does not appear to harm it), but fish oil, olive oil, flaxseed oil, and walnut oil were beneficial. And coconut oil is very good. Parkinson’s disease is also related to low cholesterol.
²¹

SO WHAT SHOULD I EAT?

It is impossible for me to summarize all the studies and footnote all the recommendations I am making. I designed this eating regimen based on a lifetime of interest in the subject, combined with a sophisticated medical education and a recent fellowship in integrative and complementary medicine through the American Academy of Anti-Aging Medicine. In the reference section you will find books that are highly footnoted that go over the science in grim detail – some of which we have discussed in this chapter. But you have the power of common-sense observation, so I challenge you to just look around at the people you know and what they eat.

In a nutshell, the caveman and you were meant to be meat eaters, eating a diet consisting of meat with its fat, nuts, berries, and vegetables. To quote my hero, the late Jack LaLanne, “If man made it, don’t eat it.” Here are my guidelines for an optimal diet:
²²

1.
Start with a low-carb diet. If possible, 10 percent or less of your calories should come from carbohydrates. At least keep carbs below 30 percent, but shoot for the lowest you can manage.

2.
Eliminate all forms of wheat.

3.
Limit milk to one cup daily, but yogurt, cheese, and other forms of milk products are good.

4.
Do not eat “low-fat” anything. Low-fat products contain thickening agents that are the worst forms of carbohydrates. Eat full-fat milk, full-fat yogurt, etc.

5.
The only oils that should cross your lips are the naturally occurring omega-3 oils: meat fat, butter, olive oil, coconut oil, palm oil, and fish oils (or PEOs). I allow myself occasional mayonnaise, which does contain soy oil. I have discovered that in eating man-made foods, it is best to pick brands that have been around for decades rather than new products. The older ones have better and simpler ingredients. Add a little coconut oil daily to your diet. I either put a dollop of it on a cracker, or I make a dessert using full-fat coconut milk as outlined in
Grain Brain
.

6.
When eating meat, it may be best to eat grass-fed meat or wild game, but that is not always possible or financially feasible. I try to make up the deficiency in grain-fed beef by supplementing with conjugated linoleic acid (CLA). Eat chicken without hormones, and limit cured meats. Organ meats are especially nutritious and healthy.

7.
Fish is great, but there are several things to keep in mind. First, bottom-feeding fish and shellfish may collect heavy metals, so they shouldn’t be a huge part of your diet. Second, farm-raised fish does not contain natural goodies such as omega-3 fats and also may have heavy metals due to the runoff from the land into the fish beds. In general, a varied diet avoids over-accumulation of toxins and heavy metals.

8.
Eggs are nearly perfect human food. If you can raise your own chickens, do so – it’s a lot of fun and produces the very best eggs you will ever eat. If not, get home-raised eggs from your neighbor. If you can’t do either of those, try to get omega-3 eggs or eggs from free-range chickens.

9.
Eat lots of cruciferous vegetables – broccoli, cauliflower, Brussels sprouts, cabbage, kale, etc. Vegetables, in general, should fill the part of your plate not filled with meat and fat. Although most vegetables are healthiest with the least amount of cooking, it turns out that tomatoes actually become better with canning and cooking. The nutrients in them become more available to the body with processing.

10.
Modern fruits are hybridized to have too much sugar. So generally, the best fruits are berries or low-sugar fruits, such as old-time apples (like Winesap, Jonathan, or Alexander), pomegranates, kiwis, etc. The idea of eating five servings of fruits (or whatever the latest mainstream mantra is) is patently wrong. It will add weight. Nutritionally, you will do much better eating vegetables.

11.
Nuts are a good snack – specifically walnuts, pecans, almonds, and Macadamia nuts. Peanuts are not as good but can be eaten in small amounts.

12.
Drink fresh, clear water. Get off all soda pop. Recently, a University of Iowa study linked diet soda consumption to increased cardiac death in women. While this may be just a marker for an unhealthy lifestyle, all the cola drinks have something bad in them. Also, I actually don’t think a power drink in the morning in lieu of coffee for a little caffeine boost is bad. These drinks have sucralose and no phosphoric acid (which is bad for bone), and they add taurine (an essential amino acid) as well as other nutrients. I would limit them to one or two a day, however. One of the best drinks for a little flavor is green tea. Green tea is an antioxidant and anticancer drink. It has been shown to work better on prostate cancer than some cancer treatments. Also, it is associated with improved weight loss in people on diets.

13.
The question always arises, “Should I eat organic foods?” In my opinion, “Organic” is a label that has lost quite a bit of meaning. If it really meant that organic foods were grown without using chemicals and had a really low
level of toxins, then maybe. But the definition has been morphed by agribusiness and politics, and it is almost unintelligible. For the small-potential but ill-defined benefit, you will pay a high premium. I don’t pay it. I try to grow as much as I can in my own garden, buy good-quality food, and wash things carefully before eating. I avoid additives and GMO (genetically modified) foods as much as possible. There is a great deal of controversy about GMO foods. I didn’t used to be concerned about GMO foods, but my personal experience with gluten has opened my eyes to the possibility that a genetically modified food may contain harmful and unique substances in proportions not present in the ancient parent plants. The foods my pioneer ancestors ate were very different from the foods most of us eat today. For example, modern hybrid apples feed our cravings for sugar and carbohydrates. Probably one of the hardest addictions to overcome is our addiction to sugar. It seems we have an inborn desire for that sweet taste – probably as an adaptation for foraging. Even bacteria will swim upstream in a sugar gradient to get more sweetness, and they can’t be accused of having a “sweet tooth.” So it is not surprising that we humans have modified our foods to satisfy inborn cravings.

In sum, health is 90 percent diet related. Past generations suffered from scarcity of food, but the food they did eat was
real
and compatible with the human body’s genetic blueprint. There is much evidence that the diseases of modern civilization – diabetes, stroke, heart disease, and cancer – are in large part due to our diet. And it is not just overeating. It is eating substances that look like food but in reality are like Frankenstein – artificial, manmade, and unholy creations that even bacteria will avoid. If we are to optimize our health and lifespan, we need to consciously reestablish the eating patterns of our ancestors. We need to literally “feed our genes” what they were meant to have – nutritious, natural, clean foods using the guidelines above.

9
PREPARING YOURSELF: EXERCISE

T
here is a general misperception that exercise is the key to losing weight and that to be effective, exercise must be vigorous and/or extreme. But exercise is not the key to losing weight. Although the more muscle you have, the more calories you burn and the easier it is to
maintain
weight, the compelling reason to exercise is to optimize fitness for the future.

I once read an ex-Soviet discussing America. He said that if America were to have an economic collapse similar to Russia’s after the fall of the Soviet Union, Americans would not fare well. Russians were accustomed to foraging for necessities even in good times – normally walking miles a day. In contrast, Americans were so out of shape they would be unable to survive this and would “blow out” their knees. He is probably right. Just sit in a public place and count how many healthy and fit-appearing people pass by – very few. In fact, recently I made a similar observation at a Walmart where I was sipping ice tea and waiting for a friend.

Exercise does two very important things. The first, improving your cardiovascular fitness, is what most people associate with exercise. The second, and intimately related, is that it increases strength. In the world of tomorrow, I anticipate more need for manual labor.
We may need to grow our own food, carry things without as many gasoline-powered automobiles to help, and build things without the power we are accustomed to. I hope I am wrong, but if I’m right, this will require functional fitness – that is, strength and coordination. And this means muscle.

There is a funny ad that is supposed to promote a chain of fitness centers. The small, thin, male representative is escorting a huge, bulked-up bodybuilder through the facility. At each “station,” when the fitness center representative tries to describe the workout machine, the weight lifter just keeps saying in his thick Nordic accent, “I lift things up and put them down.” He is summarily escorted out the back into the alley. The fittest people are not welcome, I guess.

But if you want to improve your heart fitness you need to lift. If you want to improve your stamina, you need to lift. If you want to improve your bone quality, you need to lift. We are meant to be muscled. Cardiac fitness is not an end to itself. When you lift weights, your heart gets stronger and your vessels better support your basic human function, which is to move and to lift and carry. When you use your muscles to near their capacity, they get stronger, and they improve the cardiac system to support the activity. I know you have been told you have to run a lot to do “aerobic conditioning,” but it is not true. You can lower your resting heart rate, you can get lean, and you can improve your body’s oxygen carrying capacity by lifting. And along the way, you keep your weight in a good range because muscle is the driver of metabolic rate. The runner burns a lot of calories during running, but the rest of the time does not burn the calories a guy with lots of muscle burns. The weight lifter burns more calories all the time. If you really want to decide for yourself the best form of exercise, just do what I have done and make a study of people in the gym. You should not use college gyms as a measure, because young people have not yet hit the problem of midlife fitness. But look at a public gym – I use Anytime Fitness because they are really “anytime” and pretty much anywhere. Look
at the people using the “cardio” equipment – the elliptical, the stationary bicycles, the treadmills – these are the “cardio bunnies.” There is usually a row of fattish bodies jiggling like crazy on those machines. Then look over at the weight lifting area. It is rare to see anyone with excess fat. These people, the ones who pick up heavy things and put heavy things down, range from slender and defined to very muscular, but rarely fat.

Now, it is okay to do some running or cycling or tennis or whatever you like. But if you want functional good health, focus on weights and hit the running trail for twenty to thirty minutes three times a week. Short-duration, high-intensity aerobic exercise complements weight training.