Wally Day wrote:

>A tesimonial:....Clearer sinuses, reduced
>asthma (these two have always been a problem for me),
>easier sleeping, clearer thinking, and surprisingly, a
>much calmer, more relaxed demeanor. The last does actually surprise me
because for years I swallowed the
>vegan-hygiene-macrobiotic line that meat was a
>"stimulating" food that causes aggresive, carnivorous
>behavior. However, as I increased meat consumption and
>reduced grain-milk-bean consumption, I found the exact
>opposite to be true. Anyone else?

Richard Keene wrote:

>This is a perfect way to put it.  Things that used to
>give me panic attacks and realy set me off, don't
>now.

I've had similar results.  I've never had asthma but I have had problems
with sinus and nasal congestion and allergies.  When eating lacto-vegetarian
I often awoke midway through a nights sleep with a nose so stuffy I could
not breath--literally suffocating--not fun!  I tried macrobiotics also and
it gave basically the same result, plus extreme digestive problems and I
looked and felt like death warmed over.  When eating vegetarian my memory
declined and also I more often than not I had an anxiety or panic attack
just before meals--many mornings especially (after the nights fast) I would
have shakes and panic attacks while making my grain based breakfast.  I
think these attacks resulted from low blood sugar.  On all versions of
vegetarianism I tried I was glum and also flew off the handle more easily
and to extremes.  As with Wally, I had been led to believe by various
teachings that eating meat makes one prone to anger, but I found the
opposite to be the case in my experience.  Also, on vegetarian diets wounds
and injuries healed very slowly.

Adding meat, fish and poultry to my grain-based diet reduced the anxiety,
panic, and anger attacks but the digestive and congestion problems did not
improve, in fact I think they got worse.  Since changing to paleo my
demeanor is even more improved, I laugh more easily and more frequently, I
have almost no digestive problems unless I eat too much fat (I have a low
fat tolerance  and am amazed that people can eat so much pemmican), and my
congestion problems also are dramatically reduced.

Re modified paleo: I've tried modified paleo (i.e. some grains) and it does
not suit me well, I get indigestion and congested quickly.  If I eat a
"normal" serving of grains I get bloating and flatulent during the day and
have pains in my intestines by evening and difficulty breathing at night.
No thanks.

Don