Welcome Guest, Give the Gift of Health to Your Loved Ones
Originally posted by Dr. Davis on 2016-01-05 on the Wheat Belly Blog, sourced from and currently found at: Infinite Health Blog. PCM forum Index of WB Blog articles.
Jenny shared her photos and experience living the Wheat Belly lifestyle. Although she did not start specifically on the Wheat Belly pathway, the extravagant improvement in health made her wonder what exactly allowed all of her health conditions, not just weight, to disappear.
“Just wanted to share a picture of me as a ‘before’ and ‘during,’ because I’m still not done! I began my journey on January 12, 2015. I began as an Atkins dieter purely to lose weight. I did that, but 2 weeks into it I noticed such major changes in my body and mind that I knew there was something bigger.
“Prior to losing weight, I had extremely high liver enzymes. I had the classic lupus butterfly rash on my cheeks. My face and neck were constantly itching. I had constant gas and other bowel symptoms which, honestly, I didn’t realize I had until they were gone 2 weeks into cutting carbs and wheat/grains. I had keratosis pilaris my whole life on the back of my arms. They disappeared.
“One month into being wheat- and grain-free, I had my liver levels checked—back to normal. 3 months later, my cholesterol began to drop and is now well within a normal level. My doctor wanted to categorize my achy wrists and elbows with all of my other random symptoms going on as an autoimmune disease. My hands, wrists and elbows have no pain now. I had no idea how horrible I felt until I felt good.
“I’ve lost 65 lbs in 11 months!”
You can see the typical changes in Jenny’s face: the dramatic reduction of facial edema/inflammation, bigger eyes. The facial changes, of course, are simply the outwardly visible changes that accompany disappearing inflammation that had previously accounted for her lupus, skin rashes, joint pains, and gastrointestinal distress. And, impressively, she reversed her fatty liver (non-alcoholic fatty liver disease) with this lifestyle. And you can appreciate that she accomplished these rather astounding health improvements DESPITE her doctor, bumbling and stumbling around but never understanding any of it, likely trying to resign Jenny to a life of prednisone, anti-inflammatory drugs, and eventually costly and toxic intravenous drugs to subdue autoimmune inflammation.
The Atkins diet and the Wheat Belly lifestyle do indeed overlap in a number of important ways. Both restrict carbs, though Dr. Atkins did not specifically finger wheat and grains as the biggest culprit, as he worked in the 1970s and 1980s before much of the science behind the Wheat Belly lifestyle became available. After the initial Atkins “induction phase,” whole grains are added back towards the more advanced phases of this diet—a huge mistake, often reflected in the rapid weight re-gain when people did this, not to mention the return of numerous health problems. There are a number of other issues that Dr. Atkins had no way of knowing about, writing over 40 years ago, such as the importance of bowel flora, vitamin D, iodine, the immunogenic potential of the casein beta A1 protein (which is why we limit most dairy), exposure to herbicides and other industrial compounds, the explosion of thyroid disease including issues specific to the T3 thyroid hormone, and others.
The Atkins diet was revolutionary for its age, but its time has past. It is time to shed the light of newer findings on food and eating, and that is what Wheat Belly works to do.
Another of Jenny’s before and afters: