There is good and bad in everything! This is the case with Paleo too. It is great in many ways, but is it really the be all and end all?
Let’s start with the good.
Paleo is great as it cuts out many toxic foods from your diet such as sugar, junk food, fast food, dairy, wheat, refined, processed and packaged foods. It has you replace these foods with mostly plants, some meat and other healthy proteins like nuts and seeds. However, it also has you cut out all grains and legumes. I do not believe all grains and legumes are evil. Yes they are acidic and inflammatory, but so is meat.
Over to the not so good.
I do not believe it is completely necessary or a wise decision to cut out all grains and replace them with meat. One of my major problems with Paleo is BACON. This is certainly not a healthy food, it actually is a toxic meat and although it tastes amazing, should rarely, if ever pass your lips. Piggy’s are the garbage collectors of the planet, just ask any butcher what they find when they cut open a pig. They are riddled with parasites and unlike other meats these parasites are nearly impossible to kill by cooking. Parasites of this kind can take up residence in your body and can cause disease. Paleo flags itself with the ‘clean eating’ logo, eating pork though, is definitely not clean eating.
Red meat may be a healthy source of iron, zinc, and B vitamins, but it is acidic, inflammatory, contains hormones, both natural and if not organic added hormones, toxins and pesticides. It’s also high in the bad saturated fat. Ask any arthritis patient if there doctor wants them eating meat? They will tell you their doctor has asked them to give up meat as it is so acidic - it literally pulls calcium from your bones to digest and alkalize the body, so certainly not great for arthritis.
Now the good thing about Paleo is that it promotes eating only clean, healthy, organic meat, which is great for the animal, the planet and you, if you’re going to stay healthy!
In my opinion any diet that gets you off the toxic bad foods and replaces them with a huge amount of live, raw, natural foods is going to improve your health. Just remember to eat organic meat, skip the bacon and continue to have a few healthy whole grains and legumes in your diet like organic brown rice, rich in protein, B vitamins, vitamin E, unsaturated fat, minerals (particularly iron) and carbohydrates. A few legumes is fine as well, the trick here is to food combine correctly. For example, when having grains and legumes, keep the meal vegetarian with no animal protein and keep grains and legumes at the 20% acid part of the meal, in the same way you would with meat or any acidic food. Remember 80% alkaline 20% acidic. I feel a small amount of a grain like this has a lot more to offer the body than a piece of meat.
Many people today are on high protein diets, this is not ideal or necessary to be healthy. This is a subject that causes much confusion for people today. One bonus of Paleo is that meat does provide complete protein. Just note your plants, whole grains, legumes, nuts and seeds are a great choice as well and that yes, we do need protein every day but generally in small amounts. Individual requirements are certainly different person to person, however a little protein with each meal is generally all the body needs. Choose from foods like fish, organic eggs, lamb and chicken, and equally as wonderful when it comes to protein is our vegetarian choices, such as whole grains, nuts and seeds, brown rice, spinach, kale, avacados and chia seeds to name just a few.
I think Paleo is a good, safe option to start your health journey, you will definitely see health benefits like increased energy and weight loss, just remember it’s the plants in Paleo that do the real healing!!! Not the meat.
And finally…
The real reason paleo works is it is an “Alkalizing diet” it has the alkaline ratio right of 80 / 20…
80% - Alkaline foods - plants
20% - Acidic foods - meat, most nuts, grains, eggs, dairy
For example, the acidic foods allowed in paleo are meat, nuts and seeds.
If you get the acid / alkaline balance wrong that’s when disease will creep up on you.
Considering most people’s diets are completely the opposite (90% acidic and 10% alkaline), this is not a good state to be in. So once they start the paleo diet, which is highly alkazing, due to the high amount of plants, fruits and veggies, this alkalizing diet allows the body to heal. If you’re doing paleo right and only having a small amount of acidic animal proteins then the body can deal with this.
True healthy eating is about taking veggies from a side dish to the true main event!!!
Yours in Health,
Maria X
