It wasn’t until I understood the dangers of gluten for myself that I realized it wasn’t just a fad. As I studied it more closely and proved it in my own life, I realized that I needed to chose to follow a gluten free lifestyle for myself and my family.
In my vast experience of trying to lose weight, be healthy and feel good, I think that I’ve tried all of the diets that are out there! The Rotation Diet, The Blood Type Diet, The Atkins Diet, and now what some people call the ‘fad’ of Paleo, Grain Free, and Gluten Free. I actually am a fan and a believer in the benefits of much of the science behind most of these diets. However, none of them have ever before convinced me of the necessity of adopting it as a lifestyle, not just a short-term fix. To understand the dangers of gluten, you need to be aware of wheat as it is today, and to recognize that our health may not stand a chance if we don’t wake up and realize that not everything is as it seems!
It’s funny. In all of the years that I spent being completely in love with fettuccini alfredo, garlic bread, pizza, bagels and crackers, I never really made the connection to the fact that how my body felt and the struggles I was having may have been linked directly to those dangerous gluten related dietary choices! I knew that I felt really good after eating sushi, for example. I also knew that I was extremely full to uncomfortable after having an Italian pasta dinner. I just chalked it up to heavier foods verses light foods, and tried to eat smaller portions of the heavier foods, or less often.
As I began studying and learning about the dangers of gluten, it was like the light bulb finally went on upstairs! It may be that the only people who are desperate enough to get rid of something so basic and beloved (like bread) in their diet are those who are really suffering in their health or feel so miserable that they’re willing to try anything! If you’re reading this, that’s probably you, right?!
The proteins in wheat have been found to create an opiate type of response to our system. Gluten affects the pleasure center of the brain which makes us feel satisfied and happy after our grain-filled treat. However, gluten also negatively affects our brains by contributing to things ranging from brain fog to seizures, alzheimers to psychiatric disorders, obesity to diabetes. Anthropologists have even found that the jaws and teeth of civilizations who were not grain-eaters or had no access to the Western world’s diet were much healthier than what we see in the teeth of modern diets who concentrate on the food pyramid with grains as the staple food.
So Why Change Your Gluten Consumption?
The scientific evidence of the dangers of gluten is backed up for me by the changes that I’ve experienced in my own life and the dramatic changes in my daughter’s life upon removing gluten and grains. I can safely say that grains and gluten had negatively effected our lives in countless ways. I suffered regularly from brain fog, very slow thyroid, stomach pain, neck and back pain, acne, syndrome x and a host of other things. My daughter had migraines three times per week, bi-weekly grand mal seizures, daily petite mal seizures, thyroid issues, mineral deficiencies, liver struggles, exhaustion and more. Of course we mourned what we thought was the loss of our favorite foods when we made the decision to check out all of the hype behind the grain free movement. But within the first week of removing wheat from our diets we saw incredible changes! My daily brain fog was near non-existent, my neck didn’t feel like I couldn’t hold it up on my own anymore, and my response to the question ‘how are you today’ wasn’t automatically ‘exhausted’! My daughter’s migraines subsided to one per month (coinciding with her menstrual cycle), the daily petite mal (absence) seizures dropped to only several per month, and the grand mal seizures became more typically 1 day per month and a half after (also coinciding with her menstrual cycle – known as Catamenial Seizures) only a short time of removing gluten and grain completely from the diet.
After our own experience of what we regained after removing dangerous gluten and grains from our diet, I don’t ever want to go back to feeling the way that I did or watch my daughter’s health regress at all. That is motivation enough for us to make this a lifestyle change, not just a fad diet.
Dr. William Davis, author of Wheat Belly, shares the history and background of wheat as well as the dangers of gluten and it’s affect on our health in the video below. I encourage you to research wheat and test the claims of redeemed health for yourself by removing it from your diet for at least a month to see how you respond and feel. You can do it, I promise!!!
**For more bread replacement recipes like this one, sign up below to receive my free Ebook:
Breadless Life Survival – Grain Free Bread Recipe Guide.