what things can the paleo diet NOT cure that are caused by diet? just wondering over here...

Paleo Phil <[log in to unmask]> wrote: > Philip:
> >Unfortunately, Paleo diets aren't cure-alls.
> 

Susan:
> >The Paleodiet cured all my maladies 

Well, it cured all your maladies except bunions and RLS, of course. I hope
it eventually cures those in the future for you, but I can't guarantee that.
Given that your bunion symptoms first became noticeable after 9 years on a
Paleo diet, it sounds like you may be stuck with those bunions,
unfortunately (unless you undergo surgery--but I wouldn't do that myself
unless they became real bad).

> so I'd like to think they are
> >cure-alls if everything is done right. (Isn't that why we are on the 
> >diet?) 

I'm on the diet because it resulted in many health improvements and because
it makes sense, not because I expect a cure-all (though some people may
experience this). If we expect a cure-all then we are setting ourselves up
for possible disappointment, which might make sticking to the diet more
difficult. I think that Ray Audette unfortunately went a little overboard in
NeanderThin and gave the impression that the diet is a cure-all for most
people. I think it does amazing things that doctors thought were impossible
(such as total remission of Grave's disease), but no diet or supplement or
drug is a cure-all.

> >Did you have flat feet or a very high arch before 1998?
> 
> flat feet

Your flat feet may have contributed to your bunion formation (along with
other factors), so the underlying process was there before you went Paleo.
From what I've researched, I suspect that flat feet have a dietary component
and that it is rare among H-G's. Since you already had flat feet and other
modern food disorders before you went Paleo, and since flat feet can be an
early part of the process of bunion formation, I don't think your Paleo diet
is to blame for your bunions. I also don't think that wearing boots created
your bunions. The boots likely just impinged on the bunions, causing pain,
which then apparently caused you to notice the bunions. 

If you did not notice the bunions until after wearing boots, it sounds like
they are not that severe. If you do a Google image search on bunions you'll
see what severe cases look like, including cases with the overlapping toes I
was talking about (some of my toes overlapped, though not as severely as in
the Google images, and then gradually straightened on a Paleo diet). Perhaps
you will be lucky and not have the bunions progress much further--and
appropriate diet and nutrition might help here. 

> The only answer, I suppose, is to cut down on the meat for a while to 
> see if the uric acid Ron Hoggan mentioned is the culprit. 

You could try that. If you were not actually diagnosed with bunions, then
you should ask your doctor or podiatrist whether they are bunions or some
other inflammatory disorder like gout or arthritis. In the meantime you can
check out the symptoms of gout to see if they match yours:
http://www.merck.com/mmhe/sec05/ch070/ch070b.html.

> I am 
> addicted to pemmican. 

Hmm, food addiction is one indicator of food sensitivity, but I wouldn't
jump to conclusions too quickly. Many people try an elimination/rotation
diet to try to pin down whether any foods are affecting them. Sometimes the
relation of a food to symptoms can be coincidental. It's difficult to
pinpoint because people tend to eat a lot of different foods and ingredients
in the course of a few days. 

Caveat: none of us here are medical doctors and any suggestions we make
should be taken with a grain of salt. The best suggestion I can make is
probably to try to get a firm diagnosis and then educate yourself about your
health issues.

> I guess I will have to have a pemmican 
> intervention... How much is too much meat to eat?  

That probably depends on the individual.

> Is getting a 
> bunion the only way to know?

No

> How much meat did Native Americans eat?

Plains Indians ate quite a bit. The bison hunting tribes reportedly ate
little else beyond bison meat and organs and some roots, greens and berries.
The less nomadic Indian tribes ate more plant foods. In contrast to the
Plains Indians or Greenland Inuit, some groups of !Kung San of the Kalahari
desert in Africa were observed to eat around 2/3 plant foods by calories. So
there is quite a range among hunter-gatherer peoples. You can read about all
this stuff in various articles on the Net and in Cordain and Audette's
books. Anthropology books are also a useful resource. Richard Leakey wrote
some very readable ones, though he quoted inaccurate data on plant food
consumption ratios.


 
---------------------------------
Expecting? Get great news right away with email Auto-Check.
Try the Yahoo! Mail Beta.