38 of 39 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Loren Cordain rocks!!, December 18, 2011
This review is from: The Paleo Answer: 7 Days to Lose Weight, Feel Great, Stay Young (Hardcover)
When I was in engineering school there were some professors who were very, very smart but they were lousy teachers. There were also professors who did an excellent job of teaching and they made teaching look easy. Loren Cordain is an excellent teacher. I've read two of his books, now. His books have significantly more technical detail than any other book I've read on nutrition (I've read dozens) and yet it's all VERY easy to understand. It seems that every popular book on nutrition contains some testimonials and I'd like to share my own testimonial.
I read Loren Cordain's first book, "The Paleo Diet" in 2004. I started following the diet right away and lost weight. Then I got lazy and went back to eating the standard American diet (SAD). In 2007 I had blood work done and my doctor alerted me to the fact that my liver enzymes were elevated. They did an ultrasound test and found nothing seriously wrong with my liver. I was relieved but still concerned about the health of my liver. I'm no doctor but surely the liver is a vital organ. Don't ask me why but I still kept eating the SAD diet. My doctor drew my blood every six months for the next two-and-one-half years. Each and every time my liver enzymes were elevated. Last year I decided to follow a strict paleo diet. After 10 weeks I had lost thirty pounds and my liver enzymes were in the normal range. As a side benefit the acne on my back, which I had for decades, had completely disappeared. I hate to use hyperbole but the paleo diet is damn-near miraculous.
If you are new to the paleo diet concept you should keep something in mind. The paleo diet is not an "invention" but actually a discovery of what humans ate for millions of years. The paleo diet mimics the diet "designed" for us by the evolutionary process. Because this "diet" has been a way of life for millions of years it's ironic that some people call paleo a "fad" diet.
I've given Loren Cordain five stars for this book but I have one minor nit-pick. He could have included a paragraph or two about the significant health benefits of pasture-raised (grass-fed) meat. His first book did a very good job of this and that's where I learned about eatwild.com. This website has very good information about the health benefits of pasture-raised meat, poultry and eggs. Feed lot beef, poultry and eggs are crap and I try to avoid it. At the time of my first reading of Cordain's first book it was difficult to find pasture-raised meat and eggs. In the last few years it has become much easier to find. Pasture-raised beef can be found at every Whole Foods Market.
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews
Was this review helpful to you? Yes
No
27 of 29 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Timely Update to The Paleo Diet, January 1, 2012
This review is from: The Paleo Answer: 7 Days to Lose Weight, Feel Great, Stay Young (Hardcover)
For many years prior to 2004, I bought into conventional wisdom regarding diet and nutrition and ate lots of whole grains, as did many of my acquaintances who were striving for good health. The results were disastrous across the board: weight gains, gastrointestinal problems, skin problems, atherosclerosis, insulin resistance, autoimmunity and more, a cascade of unaccountable chronic issues. We could not understand how we could be eating such "healthy whole grain goodness" and yet become so sick and fat. Dr. Cordain's original pioneering Paleo Diet book led many of us, including me, to greatly improved health. The science that has been unfolding since has essentially all been pointing in one direction, supporting Dr. Cordain's theories. The scientific support is so strong that you see little of the back and forth, the contradictory study results, that usually accompany unfolding science in peer reviewed journal articles. Yet as always seems to be the case, few of those practicing medicine or nutrition in the trenches seem to have recognized the truths and effectiveness of the principles.
The Paleo Answer is a much welcome update to The Paleo Diet and The Paleo Diet for Athletes. Several years ago, I'd suggested such an update and was told it was in the works. The original book, The Paleo Diet, good as it was, contained some understandable errors of the time that needed revision, such as the suggestion to use flaxseed oil for cooking, when flaxseed oil is far too fragile for that purpose.
Dr. Cordain tends to be a relative purist when it comes to paleo diet principles, and many readers will be daunted when they read the new book and find that so many of their favorite foods are seriously deleterious. Yet there is sound science backing up Dr. Cordain's assertions, and it all makes great sense when you consider that the foods that science documents as deleterious are those that would have had no place in human diet during the eons over which the human race developed. Other authors and proponents of primal diets tend to compromise more in terms of accommodation for popular conventional foods such as dairy, nightshades, and legumes. I've endeavored to follow the science as reported in journals preceding Dr. Cordain's new book and so far as I can see, he gets the science right, and more important, it works in practice, in real life application.
Following Cordain's relatively strict paleo diet principles, I lost 35 excess pounds in about six months and have not gained any of it back in the 6 years that have since passed. I eat as much in terms of food quantity as I feel like and I never have a problem feeling excessively hungry, so the weight loss and maintenance have been relatively effortless so long as I limit my food selections to those that fit the Paleo profile. GI problems disappeared, skin rashes cleared, obstructive sleep apnea resolved, cardiac arrhythmias normalized, and a recent electron beam coronary artery scan showed a calcium score of zero in my coronary arteries, no measurable arterial plaque. Yet years prior, even conventional CT scans showed mild arterial calcium buildup.
The diet and lifestyle can be especially beneficial for those tending toward autoimmune disorders, lupus, multiple sclerosis, rheumatoid arthritis, Sjogren's, scleroderma, autoimmune hepatitis, autoimmune thyroid disease, and others. The few autoimmune patients that I know of who have been willing to institute Cordain's Paleo principles strictly have had exceptional improvements and sometimes complete resolution of all symptoms and signs. Without question, a considerable amount of diligence, study, effort, and expense are involved in maintaining a strict paleo diet and lifestyle. Most restaurant fare and most quickly prepared processed foods are off limits. For many of us, myself included, great efforts must be made to avoid consuming even the tiniest amount of wheat gluten at the risk of provoking a return of symptoms that can last a couple of weeks.
In the big picture of things, we can look at the history of medical science and see that in the period between 1900 and 1960, many acute and infectious diseases were conquered. But since then, in terms of real results, there have been few breakthroughs that treat patients truly effectively for chronic diseases such as heart disease, autoimmune disorders, diabetes or asthma. Incidence of many of those disorders is actually increasing. Something has been missing in the focus of all the admirable science that has been directed at those disorders, possibly because so much has been focused on developing profitable patentable "pills" to provide relief. Dr. Cordain is leading the way to what are and will be a new series of breakthroughs in avoiding and treating disabling chronic diseases. Relief will not be as simple as popping a pill, and only a relative few will be willing to make the considerable effort and to sustain it indefinitely. But the rewards for them will be well worthwhile.
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews
Was this review helpful to you? Yes
No
16 of 16 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
I loved it!, December 17, 2011
This review is from: The Paleo Answer: 7 Days to Lose Weight, Feel Great, Stay Young (Hardcover)
I'ma huge fan of Paleo and have read all the books that have been circulating mainstream for awhile. Even though a lot of things have already been said before this book provides me with that much needed research element that justifies the nutrtition! Great for people new to paleo, I believe it is comprehensive and enoyable to read. Paleo is not a diet it is a lifestyle and Dr. Cordain helps you to undestand why.
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews
Was this review helpful to you? Yes
No
