Wheat Belly

Ah yes - as the low-carb world gets semi-erect (that's all they can muster) over Dr. William Davis's release of his book - Wheat Belly, it's time to take a step back and calm down over this whole wheat and gluten thing. 

Before we begin, let's please all try to keep this in perspective.  180DegreeHealth offers many things for many people.  And I can't help but take perhaps the greatest satisfaction in helping young guys who remind me a lot of myself, to keep from making the same dumb mistakes I made - or at least help them recover from the world of dietary extremism that they were drifting towards prior to finding 180D. 

I've already done two posts on Martin, aka The Belgian Jackhammer.  The first was about the start of his recovery from a period of vegetarianism and fasting followed by a long stint of full-on ZERO CARB under the guidance of Charles Washington (Skeletor).  The second post came more recently as the Belgian Jackhammer shared some actual lab results showing a 120% increase in testosterone, a drop in uric acid levels, rock-bottom clotting factors, and a 72 point drop in total cholesterol (with a rise in HDL) that he experienced when switching from zero carb to a wheat-based diet.

During this, Martin was able to become a regular kid again.  He could hang out.  Have pizza.  Have some beers with the guys.  And his speed, strength, muscularity, leanness, and sex drive all went through the roof as expected with that large surge in man juice.  In short, the kid ate his Wheaties, and is acting and looking like an Olympian. 

Coincidentally, I had some burgers with Half Navajo a few weeks ago, another guy in more or less the same boat when he found 180, who noticed the same changes when switching from low-carb to a diet based mainly on pizza, burgers, and Rocky Mountain region microbrews (inspired by the great beers of Belgium).  He's lost 25 pounds eating that while just enjoying life, and the arms hanging out of his shirt are covered with veins.  At 5'9" and 145 pounds, there's not an ounce of fat on him.  I'd say the two leanest 180 followers are both eating the same diet - mostly wheat and beer.

Anyway, that's not to say that wheat isn't a problem for some people.  Sure it is!  And while some can eat wheat and actually see their swollen bellies get smaller and smaller from eating wheat, others can see it get larger and larger.  Beer has obviously been responsible for a few bellies too. 

Nevertheless, what drives me up the frickin' wall is seeing wheat portrayed as the root of all evil, and the predominant cause of the obesity and/or diabetes epidemic.  The new black sheep.  If you can write a book called "Wheat Belly," then you should be able to write a book called "fill in the blank" Belly.  There are many paths to a swollen belly.  Cortisone injections, Prozac, antibiotics, on and off the wagon jogging, Mountain Dew, dieting, adding carbs to a prolonged ketogenic diet, etc.  

Note - before Dr. William Davis became a type 2 diabetic with a swollen belly, he was doing a lot of unwanted exercise (jogging) and dieting (low-fat vegetarian I believe) - two activities that have a much closer link to such health problems than wheat consumption.   

But who cares about what causes each person to have a pot belly?  Sure, maybe some people do get it from eating wheat.  It's plausible.  What chaps my ass is that this wheat hunt ignores the many negative symptoms that some people, like Martin and myself, experience from eating a low-carb diet - the proposed blanket solution to eating a wheat-heavy diet according to Dr. Davis. 

In fact, Dr. Davis may just be inspiring me to write a book called "Low-Carb Dick," with dual meanings.  One of them relating to the negative emotional side effects frequently experienced while restricting carbohydrates.  The other relating to something experienced by me and Martin before pizza saved our pepperonis... before spaghetti saved our noodles... before... (I wanted to come up with something about bagels, but could only come up with advice for women seeking to please their men... "Screw Kegels, eat bagels!").                

So anyway, here's Martin attempting to eat an entire 16" pizza with his friends cheering him on (actually, they were trying to psyche him out so that they didn't have to pay for the thing and buy him beer after).  Feel free to fast forward to the end to see if he did it, and to see him flash his wheat belly while personally addressing you.  That's right you - the "180DegreeHealth followers..."  Oh, and pardon Martin's "French," but he took this challenge very seriously!  "It's not an effing joke!" he says at the beginning...

Hypothyroid Face

The before and after pictures shared by Korg Kcuf in the last post on low-carb hypothyroidism reminded me of the stunning before and after hypothyroid treatment pictures I once came across.  Fortunately, I have found these photos online, and they do show some remarkable changes in facial appearance. 

You often hear this swollen facial appearance referred to as "carbo face," which is one of the more retarded things I've ever heard.  If anything, this should be called "Eskimo face," as the native Eskimo had perhaps the puffiest and roundest faces on earth. You can even see telltale signs of facial myxedema in this young Eskimo mother, with quite a bit of fluid gathering below and above the eyes.  And this is someone who is incredibly well-adapted and epigenetically-programmed to a diet high in meat and fat and low in carbohydrate. 

Anyway, Korg's development of increased abdominal fat, a posture more rounded in the shoulder area, facial puffiness, and a drooping chin among other changes are prominent signs of hypothyroidism, as well as hypercortisolism/Cushing's.  These two conditions tend to go together, overlap, and cause one another - so it's hard to separate one from the other.  There is no question though that these facial and physical changes can be used diagnostically to tell what, in general, is taking place in someone's body.  And sorry to pick on low-carb.  There are countless paths to hypothyroidism and/or hypercortisolism, such as calorie restriction, endurance exercise, stress, chronic inflammation, infection, winter, or allergy.    

I remember when I had just finished doing 5 months of intense physical exercise on a low-carb diet for the first time my body and face became very puffy.  My eyes started looking very swollen, especially first thing in the morning (interestingly, laying down for long periods allows gravity to bring the fluid back from the body and into the face - it's very common to have a puffy face in the morning that ends up in the "cankles" if you have spent a lot of time standing during the day).  This is not just from the low-carb diet alone though.  My face (and belly) got very swollen again during re-feeding after my most recent bout of overly-strenuous endurance exercise in 2009, and has since cleared out even though my weight has increased by 15 pounds (mostly lean tissue increase).  But enough about me.  Here are some before and after thyroid treatment photos featured at http://www.jcrows.com/hypothyroidism.html. 

Pay attention to the hypothyroid/hypercortisol affects, including swelling of the neck, swelling below the eyes and in the upper cheeks, swelling between the eyes and eyebrows (the fluid presses the brow upward), disappearance of the outer third of the eyebrow and hair in general, and subtle retraction of the nose.  Very fascinating.  If you're a nerd I guess.  Following a hypothyroid diet many notice steady improvement in these exact facial patterns, even if they gain body fat.