Wheat Belly – A Timely & Important BookWheat Belly, by William Davis, MD, is not so much about a fat belly (more on that later) as it is about a health risk that is with us every day – the wheat most of us eat in many forms. Consider taking the time to read this book and you may find, as I have, that the symptoms, health problems, and solutions related to wheat are worth taking seriously. As I read this book, I found a number of situations and symptoms that I have experienced myself or that I have heard about directly from friends. The book will be #5 in the September, 2011 bestseller list for “Advice and How To” books. |
Dr. Davis is Medical Director of the Track Your Plaque program and advocate of early heart disease prevention and reversal. He practices preventive cardiology in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. His popular website is the Heart Scan Blog. In this video, Dr. Davis comments on why this is so important…
Wheat Belly
So what’s wrong with Wheat? The following is a high level summary of the health risks of eating wheat, as fully explained by Dr. Davis in the book.
Wheat Can…
- Accelerate weight gain* as it is one of the largest sources of carbs.
- Cause Celiac Disease, nervous disorders, and other maladies due to Gluten.
- Accelerate weight gain* due to its high Glycemic Index (comparable to table sugar).
- Cause protracted sugar highs and lows (usually 2 hours apart) contributing to weight gain*.
- Cause inflammation, osteoporosis, arthritis, joint pain, etc. due to its acidity.
- Stimulate appetite, contributing to weight gain*.
- Accelerate glycation leading to accelerated aging, skin deterioration, acne, rashes, and hair loss.
* weight gain is a known risk factor/precursor for cardiovascular disease, Diabetes, etc
Dr. Davis chose to call the book Wheat Belly, because a protruding belly (Wheat Belly) is a dead giveaway of too much wheat in the diet. In times past, a prominent belly was a sign of wealth and privilege, but is now common at all income levels. A Wheat Belly has become a bit too acceptable, which is a shame because it is both unhealthy and a telltale sign of eating too much wheat:
But wheat’s impact on the waistline is its most visible and defining characteristic, an outward expression of the grotesque distortions humans experience with consumption of this grain. A wheat belly represents the accumulation of fat that results from years of consuming foods that trigger insulin, the hormone of fat storage. While some people store fat in their buttocks and thighs, most people collect ungainly fat around the middle.
As an introduction to wheat, Dr. Davis warns that the wheat we eat today is very little like the wheat we consumed just 40 years ago. The changes to wheat since then revolved around continually developing new hybrids and have increased exponentially to make it cheaper, tastier, and easier to use. We’ve seen remarkable progress on the production side (the business of producing and selling wheat). On the consumption side (the poor blokes who eat this stuff) there appears to be little oversight on the impact of those changes.
Modern wheat, despite all the genetic alterations to modify hundreds, if not thousands, of its genetically determined characteristics, made its way to the worldwide human food supply with nary a question surrounding its suitability for human consumption.
Well, that’s disturbing! Especially when a consistent message we hear is to eat more “healthy whole grains”!
The challenge with this discussion on the potential health risks of wheat is that it is part of the fabric of our lives – our entire lives since we were children – from cereal in the morning to hamburger buns. It is both a staple and a valued source of comfort food. So why must we now consider dropping this treasured food from our diet!
Dr. Davis addresses this head-on with a startling warning on the price any of us may have to pay to hold on to our treasured comfort food. He provides detailed information on the broad spectrum of potential health impacts of wheat consumption. For each of the types of health risks he includes either his own personal experience with wheat or direct information on patients who have suffered from and sometimes recovered from these health problems. This is an example of actual results with his patients:
After three months [on a wheat-free diet], my patients returned to have more blood work done. As I had anticipated, with only rare exceptions, blood sugar (glucose) had indeed often dropped from diabetic range (126 mg/dl or greater) to normal. Yes, diabetics became nondiabetics. That’s right: Diabetes in many cases can be cured—not simply managed—by removal of carbohydrates, especially wheat, from the diet. Many of my patients had also lost twenty, thirty, even forty pounds.
But it’s what I didn’t expect that astounded me. They reported that symptoms of acid reflux disappeared and the cyclic cramping and diarrhea of irritable bowel syndrome were gone. Their energy improved, they had greater focus, sleep was deeper. Rashes disappeared, even rashes that had been present for many years. Their rheumatoid arthritis pain improved or disappeared, enabling them to cut back, even eliminate, the nasty medications used to treat it. Asthma symptoms improved or resolved completely, allowing many to throw away their inhalers. Athletes reported more consistent performance. Thinner. More energetic. Clearer thinking. Better bowel, joint, and lung health. Time and time again.
Surely these results were reason enough to forgo wheat.
More on the Book…
Since the thought of removing wheat from our diets is so foreign to most of us, consider what may be at stake: the following abbreviated list of the health risks of consuming wheat: Celiac Disease, nervous disorders, accelerated weight gain, inflammation, osteoporosis, arthritis, joint pain, accelerated aging, skin deterioration, acne, rashes, hair loss, cardiovascular disease, and Diabetes.
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I'm here to help, so let me know if I can help with getting off of sugar or weight loss in any way. Contact me at Joe AT CravingSugar DOT net. If you like what you see here - Share It at the top of the post!!Joe Lindley
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I am thin with a sugar that is fine so what do you eat in place of your whole wheat toast in the morning isn’t this about over doing wheat as we over do everything in this country the french eat fat sugar and wheat and they don;t have heart disease they also eat CHEESE GOD FORBID CHEESE we in this country just eat too much of EVERYTHING ELLIE ABRAMS
Ellie,
There’s a lot of truth in what you say. When you get into the details, however, interesting issues start to show up that help decide what to do. The French, for example: they do eat lots of fats and seemingly a lot of carbs, but when you really look at it, they don’t eat much sugar. So part of the reason behind their success is low sugar, perhaps a lower level of carbs. Interesting!
…Joe…
If I could understand this messy “communication,” I might be able to discern whether this person has valid arguments.
But, since I can’t break it down without a real brain strain, I’ll just say that yes, wheat is damaging to our health–and blast all those “scientists” who felt the need to destroy the real food God created in the first place!
Thanks Jay – the scientists who did this had valid reasons for making the changes – it is sad though, that the food manufacturers who sell it to us didn’t check it out better!
…Joe…
Hi Ellie – I would wager a French diet contains far less processed food than a North American diet, i.e. trans fats, high fructose corn syrup, processed grains and sugar, factory raised meat/eggs, prepackaged “food” that has little food value. A terrific book that might help in the understanding of many other variables is Michael Pollan’s “In Defence of Food.” (opening line: “Eat food. Not too much. Mostly Plants” Conventional nutrition “science” (most often funded by those with a very vested interest, i.e. processed food industry) tries to understand food my separating it into it’s chemical components, an extremely misleading tactic as scientists have as yet a rather limited understanding of how the body uses and absorbs food. If they were correct, we as a continent wouldn’t be facing the epidemics of obesity, diabetes, heart disease, the list goes on.
Two weeks ago I came across a magazine article by Dr.Davis of “Wheat Belly.” I bought the book and read it shortly thereafter. I have followed his recommendations quite closely, and have never in my life had more energy or felt better. I have lost over 15 lbs since then, all while eating as much as I wanted all of the time. It’s truly what you eat, not how you eat – I don’t calorie count, portion control, etc., I just cut out wheat, severely reduced oats, rice, soy, processed sugar – I basically reduced my starches in general. These dietary restrictions have the effect eliminating most processed foods, So I eat fantastic foods, as much as I want of them, mostly from my local farmers markets. And the results have been nothing short of profound.
Even if you are at what you feel to be a healthy weight, I highly recommend reading Wheat Belly. There are many other health benefits associated with leaving wheat behind, and you may find some of they may apply to you.
Good luck!
Graham,
Thanks for your contribution to this! And congratulations on your success! I keep on hearing more and more positive feedback about Wheat Belly.
…Joe…
In the last couple of years, I have been eating gluten free.. as I thought I had a gluten allergy… Since, I have been eating organic–as much as possible–and gluten free… I am hypothyroid, so weight loss has been.. little to none.. which I do not understand.. Suggestions please!
Hi Melody,
I’m not a Doctor so would not be able to give you specific advice, but I can make some suggestions. Hypothyroidism could certainly have a negative impact on weight loss. Cutting out wheat should have helped, it seems to me, to lose weight, though. Dr. Davis, who wrote this book is very helpful to those who ask health questions on his blog. Why don’t you try asking him this question as a comment on one of his blog posts: http://www.wheatbellyblog.com/
I’d add to the comment, however, more detail on your diet. You cut out gluten, but did you also cut out sweets and high glycemic carbohydrates? He may need to know that and any other info you can provide on the diet you used.
Good Luck!
…Joe…
Melody,
I just saw a post on Dr. Davis’s blog that may be of help to you. Here it is:
http://www.wheatbellyblog.com/2011/10/i-eliminated-wheat-and-i-didnt-lose-weight/
Good Luck!
…Joe…
Thanks for the review of Wheat Belly.
Since putting sugars and wheat out of my diet I have lost 145 pounds. I feel great. I’ve put my weight loss story down in a blog. Click on the link provided.
Dan Moffett recently posted..TRIALS
Joe, I am definitely going to buy a copy of this book asap.
I completely agree that eliminating starchy and white carbs is the healthiest thing one can do to maintain a healthy weight.
I experienced this myself a few years back. I eliminated these foods out of my diet and without counting calories or using other strategies I lost my excess weight, no problem.
I also found that when I began to slowly add starchy carbs back into my diet, I would begin to regain the weight.
BTW, I followed your link to the Wheat Belly Blog…there’s some great info there…thanks very much.
I’ll be doing more extensive research on this.
AD’Angelo recently posted..Lose Belly Fat For Women Over 40 | Losing Belly Fat
Great! Good to hear. Yes – the wheat belly idea is catching on very quickly….
…Joe…
A little over a year ago, my dear friend for 40 + years was healthy, not over weight, active, ate no meat,etc. Then she suddenly got Lupus. I just read in in the Feb. 1st issue of BottomLine by William Davis,MD that wheat can cause Lupus! Does anyone know if it can be reversed by cutting out wheat from the diet? She is getting worse and worse. Any sound advice? She is only 67.
Thanks.
Sandy
Sandy,
Sorry to hear about your friend. I don’t have an answer for you and haven’t heard about Lupus and wheat. But that doesn’t mean there’s no connection. Wheat seems to have negative impacts on the immune system so just about anything could possibly be affected by it. Why don’t you try some online searches. Also, maybe there is more info at Dr. Davis’s website: Wheat Belly Blog.
Good luck!
…Joe…