What about all those different diets? What do I really need to eat?
Most people are so confused about what to eat!! There are so many diets out there. People are so so bombarded by all the conflicting information in magazines, books, and the internet. We were told fat was bad, then eggs were bad, then to carb up; only to have it reversed a few years later.
I get these questions all the time - Do I need to do Whole 30? Be vegan or vegetarian? Paleo or Keto? It is overwhelming and paralyzes people, so they just throw up their hands and just eat whatever.
Let's look at at some the diets that are popular out there.
Paleo Diet- A paleo diet typically includes lean meats, fish, fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds — foods that in the past could be obtained by hunting and gathering. A paleo diet limits foods that became common when farming emerged about 10,000 years ago. These foods include dairy products, legumes and grains.
Low Carb Diet - A low carb diet restrict carbohydrate consumption relative to the average diet. Foods high in carbohydrates (e.g., sugar, bread, pasta) are limited, and replaced with foods containing a higher percentage of fat and protein (e.g. meat, poultry, fish, shellfish, eggs, cheese, nuts, and seeds), as well as low carbohydrate foods (e.g. spinach, kale, chard, collards, and other fibrous vegetables).
Keto Diet - A true keto diet is a very low carb, high fat diet that shares many similarities with the Atkins and low carb diets. It involves drastically reducing carbohydrate intake and replacing it with fat. This reduction in carbs puts your body into a metabolic state called ketosis.
Elimination Diet - This is an exclusion diet used to identify foods that an individual cannot consume without adverse effects. Adverse effects may be due to food allergy, food intolerance, other physiological mechanisms (such as metabolic or toxins), or a combination of these. Elimination diets typically involve entirely removing a suspected food from the diet for a period of time from two weeks to two months, and waiting to determine whether symptoms resolve during that time period. It involves slowly adding back food groups and seeing if symptoms return. Integrative and Functional medicine practitioners frequently use these in their practices.
Whole 30 Diet - A month-long eating program that has become very popular in the past few years. It completely cuts out certain foods that may harm your health for a period of 30 days. It is similar to an Elimination diet, and you slowly add back in foods to see how it affects your health.
Gluten-free Diet - A gluten-free diet involves excluding foods that contain the protein gluten, including wheat, rye and barley. Most studies on gluten-free diets have been done on people with Celiac disease, but there is another condition called gluten sensitivity that also causes problems with gluten.
Vegetarian - It is a diet abstaining from the consumption of meat (red meat, poultry, seafood, and the flesh of any other animal) and may also include abstention from by-products of animal slaughter. There are different types of vegetarians. Lacto-vegetarian diets exclude meat, fish, poultry and eggs, as well as foods that contain them. Dairy products, such as milk, cheese, yogurt and butter, are included. Ovo-vegetarian diets exclude meat, poultry, seafood and dairy products, but allow eggs. Lacto-ovo vegetarian diets exclude meat, fish and poultry, but allow dairy products and eggs. Pescatarian diets exclude meat and poultry, dairy, and eggs, but allow fish. Vegan -This is type of vegetarian diet that excludes meat, eggs, dairy products, and all other animal-derived ingredients. Many vegans also do not eat foods that are processed using animal products, such as refined white sugar and some wines.
Flexitarian - The Flexitarian diet is one that is centered on plant foods with the occasional inclusion of meat. Flexitarian is a combination of the words flexible and vegetarian, signifying its followers' less strict diet pattern when compared to other vegetarian pattern diets.
Mediterranean Diet- diet inspired by the eating habits of Spain, Italy, and Greece in the 1960s. The principal aspects of this diet include proportionally high consumption of olive oil, legumes, unrefined cereals, fruits, and vegetables, moderate to high consumption of fish, moderate consumption of dairy products (mostly as cheese and yogurt), moderate wine consumption, and low consumption of non-fish meat products. (These last two diets are my personal goal in a perfect world!!)
So what do we eat?? Can we make sense of all this?
If you look at the above mentioned diets, they all actually have more in common with each other than the Standard American Diet, often referred to the SAD diet. One functional medicine doctor likes to call it the HAD diet (Horrible American Diet).
What is the Standard American Diet? It is generally characterized by high intakes of red meat, processed meat, pre-packaged foods, butter, candy and sweets, fried foods, conventionally-raised animal products, high-fat dairy products, eggs, refined grains, potatoes, corn (and high-fructose corn syrup) and high-sugar drinks, and low intakes of fruits, vegetables, whole grains, grass-fed animal products, fish, nuts, and seeds. That is one reason Americans are so unhealthy, and there is an epidemic of diabetes, heart disease and obesity. We can change that!!!
I often start with baby steps with my patients. So many people don't even eat ANY fruit or vegetables during the day; it is amazing. Just starting with this is a huge step!
We need to focus on being the best we can be. The basic principle is that eating a wide variety of high-quality, whole, and mostly plant-based foods is truly powerful medicine that improves health and hinders the development of disease. Whichever of the above diets you decide to try, you need to focus on health and real food. Remember that when you eliminate whole food groups, some nutrients are left out. We will go into more detail in future blogs, but this is a start.
Stay away from processed food, added sugar and factory made/fake food. We need to eat simple, real, fresh, nutrient-packed foods that are easy to cook. Foods that come from a farmer's field, not a factory. Weight loss and optimum health follow along. I think we need to remember that food is energy, medicine, and connection.
All material gathered and researched through my amazing fellowship program, The Arizona Center for Integrative Medicine.
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