Paleo Or No?

A look at “The Caveman Diet”

Jan. 8, 2016

Chiropractor Dr. Carrie Mayes realized something was wrong after pondering how people’s health deteriorates as they get older.

"High blood pressure, arthritis, high cholesterol, digestive issues," she listed. "I, myself, was approaching middle age, so I wanted to find out, how do I avoid those things? Is there something we’re doing our whole lives that finally catches up with us years down the line?" For Mayes, it was a book that served as her personal catalyst for change: "The Primal Blueprint" by Mark Sisson.

Sisson, a former triathlete and Ironman competitor, shifted his career focus to fitness writing later in life and included elements of the Paleolithic (or "Paleo") diet

in his book, which explained the foundation of this dietary approach. Sisson does look at least a decade younger than his 63 years and operates a lifestyle, fitness and health blog that speaks to his methods.

Mayes, who divides her time between Traverse City and Port Austin, Mich., was in the midst of grappling with the above questions when she discovered his teachings.

"His directives go back to how we used to eat as hunter-gatherers, before agriculture and before monocrops (fields of all one thing, such as corn or wheat), before junk food and synthesized glucose. While we may eventually evolve to be able to properly digest and utilize processed foods and grains in a way that benefits us, we’re not there yet," Mayes said.

She now attends the Paleo F(x) conference every year to research the Paleo diet and collect new information, and she consults others on the Paleo diet.

EVOLUTIONARY CLUES

The Paleo diet, in a nutshell, limits you to foods and beverages that cavemen, ostensibly, would have been able to acquire: fruits, vegetables, eggs, nuts and seeds that could be gathered; meat that could be hunted; fish that could be caught; and water that could be enhanced with herbs or spices (such as wild mint) to make a tisane.

Proponents of the Paleo diet dislike the "diet" label; they just call it a "different way of looking at food" that takes its clues from evolutionary biology.

Whether it works or not is still a point of contention. Scientific American said the Paleo diet does get one thing right: Most of us would see benefits from cutting down, or eliminating, processed and highly modified foods, such as white bread, artificial cheese, packaged meats and sugar-loaded cereals, primarily because those foods offer less nutrition while piling on more preservatives, chemicals and sodium.

Mayes suggested one way to judge whether a food is Paleo or not is how easy it is to get.

"People used to all grow a wide range of food for themselves that you could use right away, like kale or corn," she said, "but you can’t pick something like wheat and just eat it. You have to process it off of the stalk and grind it; then you’re of course not going to eat a spoonful of flour, so you have to put it together with something else, then cook it, then eat it."

That part may be true, but what many opponents of the Paleo diet point out is that, not only are we no longer cavemen, but our foods have drastically changed.

Christina Warinner of the University of Zurich (Germany) is an expert on ancient diets and recently gave a TED Talk in which she discussed the Paleo diet. She said that, even if we wanted to eat foods that were only available to cavemen, it would be impossible, as every food we eat today is vastly different from its Paleolithic predecessor.

DIFFERENT DIETS

For example, we have bred cows and chickens to provide as much meat, milk and eggs as possible, and we’ve selectively grown plants and vegetables, as well. Corn used to be a grassy, branched plant called teosinte, tomatoes used to be very, very small, and bananas used to be stuffed with seeds.

Mayes agreed that we can’t replicate the caveman days, nor would it make sense to try, but she still supports the basics of the Paleo diet.

"Well, it makes no sense to try and go backwards," she said, "but cavemen couldn’t get certain foods during certain times of the year, so at least eating foods closest to the way nature provides them makes more sense."

Which brings us to the locavore, or local foods, movement, which advocates eating foods only in season and only from the geographic region where you live. So is that Paleo, then? It seems to all depend on how you look at it and who’s explaining it. To get really clear answers about what kind of food our ancestors ate, you’d have to ask a caveman, which obviously isn’t going to happen.

Scientific American pointed out that humans have evolved not to subsist on one particular diet, but to be flexible.

Mayes is confident that Paleo has changed her life, but it’s difficult to tell if it’s a placebo effect or simply the fact that the diet’s requirements include eliminating junky, processed foods, which most experts agree aren’t good for anyone. One conclusion is that the Paleo approach may be great for some people to help structure their dietary guidelines; for others, another plan may be better.

"When I’m on the Paleo diet, I don’t feel sick, I don’t ache as much," she said. "It’s not like everything’s perfect, but everything is less intense. For me, it just works, but for every person, it’s different."

THE BASICS OF THE PALEO DIET

EAT

- grass-fed meat and fowl
- fish and seafood
- nuts and seeds
- eggs
- fresh fruits
- garden vegetables
- wild herbs and spices
- water
- olive and coconut oils

DON’T EAT

- hot dogs/lunch meats
- grains
- prepackaged snack foods
- dairy
- candy/refined sugar
- potatoes
- legumes (all beans, peanuts)
- alcohol/pop/soft drinks
- canola oil, refined vegetable oil