Are Whole-Healthy-Grains Defenseless?


In a world full of animals that bite, claw, sting, envenomate and gore, it’s nice to know that there are perfectly defenseless plants for the weak at heart to hunt.  But are plants really as defenseless as they appear?  We all know that there are plenty of highly toxic plants in the world, but certainly the ones we eat aren’t poisonous.  Think again.  There have been weapons of mass destruction created from plant toxins, like ricin (used by the Soviets during the cold war), but I know of no WMD ever derived from animals.

Every single living thing on this planet has one goal in mind – to proliferate its genetics.  Nothing wants to be eaten – life has a mechanism to protect itself and its offspring.  The nice thing about animals as a food source is that their defenses typically die with them.  Whether it’s sharp teeth, powerful jaws, stingers, horns or hooves they are no longer a threat after the animal is dispatched.  Even a rattlesnake is quite edible once it is dead.  Plants have evolved a much different way to protect themselves – and especially their offspring.  Any species that does not develop a mechanism to protect its children would have certainly went extinct by now.

There is a major misconception that human beings existed mostly on plant foods with only a small amount of meat for supplement.  I guess the conventional wisdom there is based on the idea that our human ancestors were poor at hunting.  Yet, there is plenty of historical evidence of primitive hunter/gatherers hunting certain species into extinction, like the very large ruminant, Aurochs.   So our ancestors were not poor hunters – it is only because we have been shopping for our meat for so long, that we have lost many hunting and trapping skills of our ancestors.  Given the fact that better than 99.9% of all plants on this planet are poisonous to human beings, I’m not sure how this myth has stood the test of time.  I guess if something is repeated enough, people will come to believe it.

Unless the entire planet were a rainforest, it would have been impossible for humans to cover the earth as a vegetarian species.  Even many of the plants we consume today are toxic to us in their raw state, especially their offspring.  Beans, legumes and seeds of all kind are the future of the plant – they are the zygote from which more generations will spring forth.  So why would the plant leave them undefended?   They don’t.   Most seeds contain lectins, which are highly toxic to most animals.   The lectins of the castor bean are so lethal that they were used in the formation of the warfare chemical called ricin.  A dose as small as a few grains of salt is more than enough to kill an adult human.  Many weapons of mass destruction have been created using plant toxins – I know of no WMD that was ever derived from an animal.

Prior to the advent of fire and the ability to make containers to cook them in, it would have been impossible for humans to consume any quantity of beans, legumes or grains.  Heat can destroy the lectins in many plants, so humans were able to use them as a food source once cooking was available.   But heat does little to reduce the amount of phytic acid contained within the offspring of the plant.  Phytic acid binds to many minerals, such as iron, calcium, zinc and magnesium, which renders them unavailable for absorption.   These precious mineral are then carried away and excreted from the body.

Only by soaking and fermenting seeds can phytic acid be reduced.  Any predator that would gorge itself on the seeds of these plants, would soon find themselves depleted and deficient in many of these minerals, which can be quite problematic.  And few seeds are higher in phytic acid than soybeans, which is why the Asian people only consumed soy that was heavily fermented.  The massive amounts of soy inundated in all of today’s processed foods is not fermented and therefore quite counter productive to good nutrition.  Is it any wonder why osteoporosis is so prevalent in our time?   With all of the phytates within those grains, beans and legumes, the american people are crapping out their dietary calcium by the bucket, because it is bound to the phytates.  Then, their high carbohydrate diet further deplete calcium from their bones and teeth.  Because calcium is the only way the body can neutralize the high blood acidity cause by high blood sugar, if dietary calcium is not high enough, it will rob it from the bones.  Eating lots of sugar and phytic acid is a recipe for osteoporosis.  This is the standard american diet (SAD).

 Most antacid tablets for gastritis, such as Tums, contain mostly calcium because of its neutralizing properties.  Our body also uses calcium to neutralize acidic blood, which is deadly if not neutralized.  That’s why I believe that it is not the cholesterol (which is flexible) that causes hardening of the arteries, but all the calcium caught in the plaque that leads to a cardiac event.  Just like the Egyptians, the high carbohydrate blood level invites calcium into the bloodstream which gets caught in the plaque and lead to loss of arterial flexibility.  When Mann studied the Masai, who eat tons of meat and milk, he found cholesterol plaque, but they rarely suffered heart attacks, because the cholesterol was flexible (being a fat) and allowed the arteries to expand.  Mann did not find calcium deposits in their plaque, probably because of their low carbohydrate consumption, thus lower blood acidity.

The most diabolical design of these plant defenses, is that they will not kill the predator right away, especially in the absence of the lectin.  If we humans were to eat raw seed, we would become very ill or die within a short time of consuming them.  That was how our ancestor would have made the association that it was the seeds that were making them ill and avoided them as a food source.   Once we learned that heat would prevent us from getting sick right away, then the first agriculturist civilizations determined that they would be safe to eat.

But unfortunately, there are many back-up defenses evolved into the plants, which do not cause illness right away, thereby making it difficult for people to determine that it is the plant that is causing their failing health.   Now, we have such a large part of the U.S. economy structured on the proliferation of grains, making it even more difficult for anyone to make the correlation, because they are bombarded daily with advertising telling them how super-healthy these grains, beans and legumes are.   Aside from containing a butt-load of carbohydrates, grains and other seeds are a poor source of nutrition.  Human cultures that had to predominantly live on grains found ways to make them easier to digest, but the process of doing so is quite laborious and time-consuming – and in today’s times – not very profitable.

Because poor people had to exist mostly on grains, many of them, and especially their children, suffered from malnutrition.  Because of this, the U.S. government began to mandate that flour made from grains be fortified with vitamins and minerals by their manufacturers.  If grains, bean and legumes were naturally high in nutrition, then why were the poorer people, who could only afford grains, becoming sick?  And why does the government require the enrichment of cereals and flour, if they were so uber-healthy?  Grains are naturally high in only one nutrient – sugar.  Grains are not only very high in carbohydrates, but contain carbohydrates, such as amylopectin-a, which spike the blood glucose levels higher than cane or beet sugar.  Is it any wonder that diabetes has reached epidemic proportions?  The U.S. government recommends 8 to 11 servings of these blood sugar spikers per day.

During his studies, Doctor Weston A. Price found civilizations whose nutrition depended on plants and grains, because of their location and lack of good hunting.  Price found no civilization or tribe who thrived on a fully plant-based diet, absent of any animal foods, but he did find cultures that ate little animal foods and were able to thrive on a grain based diet.   But, these people went to great length to make these seeds digestible.   They were soaked, sprouted. roasted, ground and then fermented (creating sourdough) before baking them into bread or cakes.  Very few people today ferment grains or beans, because it is a time-consuming process and not very profitable to the process food manufacturers.  Even sourdough bread commercially sold are rarely fermented and have sour additives for sour flavor.  If you have ever eaten fermented sourdough bread, you would find them far more sour than any commercial bread advertised as sourdough.

It is far more likely that most of our ancestors prized meat and animal products far above plant foods for its higher nutrition and better safety from toxins, which is why we still call vegetables a side-dish to this day.  Plants were much easier to acquire, so they would have sought after meat as a first priority and simply settle for plants if meat was not readily available and if a hunt was successful, they would supplement or cook the vegetation with the meat.  But, grains were simply not a part of the paleolithic man’s diet until the technology was discovered to make them safe to eat, which only occurred about 10,000 years ago – just a fraction of the time that humans have been around.  Early grain eating societies, like the Egyptians, have recently been diagnosed with massive calcium deposits in their arteries at ages of 40 to 50 years old.  CT scans of ancient mummies has revealed dangerous levels of atherosclerosis. (source) (source) (source).  Remember, these were active people, who ate very little animal fat (usually geese) and got plenty of sunshine.  But the Egyptians loved wheat.  They made cakes, smothered in honey and were the inventors of beer from barley and consumed it as the hydration drink of choice.  Was it their love of wheat that was killing them?  I believe so.

The soybean had a much more diabolical defense to unleash on its predators.  The seed of the soy plant contains very high levels of phytoestrogens.  The purpose of these plant-based estrogen is to cause the insects that dine on them to ultimately become sterile, so the parents may feast on the seeds, but there will be a lot fewer offspring of the predator in the future.  The soybean has evolved its own birth control for those that would eat its young – after all, birth control pills are just estrogen.  These high doses of estrogen can be very problematic for humans, causing breast cancer and young women to enter puberty at a very young age and the boys will not enter puberty until a much older ages.

Peek into your pantry and read some of the processed food labels and you will be amazed how many products contain unfermented soy products.  Even most tuna fish cans will list soy as an ingredient.  If you are eating tuna to obtain more omega 3 fatty acids, they have tricked you by adding omega 6 soybean as filler. (you can get tuna without soy, but it’s a bit more expensive.).  You are probably consuming mass quantities of unfermented soy – why?  Because soy was a necessary plant used in crop rotation to replenish nitrogen into the soil, so they had to find a way to market it.  The government subsidizes farmers that grow it, so its cheap filler for all processed foods – and is making us sick.  It makes cattle and chickens sick, why does anyone believe that it is a health food?  A lot of heavy advertising and marketing brainwashing.

Fruits evolved a completely different mechanism.  The fruit is not a zygote, but actually the ovary of the plant.  The ovary is purposely designed to be high in nutrition and sweet and juicy, because the plant actually wants a predator to eat the fruit.  The seeds of the fruit are completely indigestible, so the plant willfully surrenders its delicious ovary so it will be replanted somewhere else when the predator takes a dump.  But only a fool would decide to grind up the seed of the fruit and make a bread or cake from the flour.  We know that the seeds of most fruits are highly toxic and many can kill a human in short order if made digestible and eaten in quantity.  If we all know this, then why are we convinced that the seeds of other plants are so defenseless, just waiting to be plucked, cooked and eaten?  They are not.

 If seeds are left so defenseless, I defy anyone to grind up some apricot and apple seeds, make a flour and bake it into a cookie and eat it.  It will be the last thing you will ever eat.  Apricots seeds and apple seeds  both contain hydrogen cyanide.  If swallowed, they are harmless, because we cannot digest then and they will safely pass though us.  One seed crushed may not kill you, but could make you feel ill.  Several seed ground up into a flour is certain death to those that dare to eat it.  Plants do and will defend their babies as ferociously as any mother bear would defend her cubs.

Many birds and insects have evolved mechanisms to deal with the toxins in grains.  Rodents seem to be one of the only mammals that can thrive on grains.  One thing that all of these animals have in common is a very fast metabolism – humans do not.  Any wonder why the problems with obesity in the modern world?  We are eating foods intended for animals with heart beats and metabolisms 8 to 10 times that of a human.  We cannot possibly burn the calories per hours that these animals have to.  A humming-bird must dine on pure sugar, but unless you can flap your arms at 80 times per second all day and maintain a heartbeat of 1,200 beats per minute (the human heart would explode) then you can share in their diet.  Problem is, humans are consuming the calories from sugar at the rate of a humming-bird, with our 74 beat per minute heart rate.  Hmmm.  wonder why so many are obese.

As far as plant toxins, many species of birds are known to first consume types of clay prior to eating some of these poisonous grains and berries.  Minerals in the clay can chelate to the toxins and safely remove them.  Humans have no such system yet continue to eat unfermented grains by the pound.  Doughnuts, begals, pasta, snack cakes, chips – all loaded with these anti-nutrients which rob minerals from your body.  The plants will win the battle in the long run, as all of humanity, eating 8 to 11 servings of these heavily defended offspring, playing a game of diabolical chemical warfare on your system, continue to make the human race fatter and sicker (think diabetes).

These little monsters are also reeking havoc on our digestive system, as the gluten protein wear away at your intestinal villi, shrinking them back and opening huge holes in the intestinal mucosa.  Once this happens, large proteins can be absorbed into the bloodstream and cause many autoimmune disease.   Celiacs, Crohn’s, Ulcerative Colitis have been on the steady rising and there is no cure known for these diseases, other than cessation from grains, but few doctors will go against the zeitgeist of the huge advertising of the giant agribusiness (who own the USDA) and will continue to recommend that these IBD patients increase their grain consumption.  Every new study has proven what IBD sufferers already knew, grain fibers make their condition worse.  Though most doctors (who tend to be behind the times) still recommend insoluble fiber from grains, new studies have shown this to be counterproductive, causing gas, bloating, obstructions and bleeding in patients.  Read the testimonies here from some IBD patients talking about the horrible results they suffered when following a doctor’s advice to include indigestible psyllium from grains) into their diet.  I had similar experience with insoluble fiber as they had.

Don’t fool yourself into believing that these people are some how different or from another planet. (basically saying, “it sucks to be them”).  I consider them and me to simply be a more sensitive meter.  Similar damages are being perpetrated on your gut at a slower degradation, but it’s there.  If you do not believe me, take a scan of the gastric medicine isle at your local pharmacy or even Walmart or Target.  Look at all the different OTC medications for GERD, constipation, diarrhea, gas, enzymes for digestion (such as beano) and indigestion.  Someone must be buying this crap, or these stores would not stock so much of it.  How many times a week do you take one of these products?

 Our ancestors did not have access to such OTCs, so they had to learn to avoid or better prepare foods that caused these problems. Now people feel free to indulge in any crap they want and then pop some protonic or other digestive aid.  Is this really healthy?  The damage is still being done and you may well develop an IBD or colorectal cancer at some point.  Grain fiber WILL NOT prevent colorectal cancer as the heavy advertising from the agribusiness has brainwashed everyone – in fact, I believe it has instigated the higher numbers of cases now than we had 100 years ago.  We would have less reason to risk people’s lives with dangerous procedures, like colonoscopies, if grain eating (especially whole gain with the indigestible husks) were not the predominant food of choice.  I believe that colorectal cancer rates would dive bomb and the fear would not be so great as to scare people into risking their lives for colorectal screening (please read my post “The Dangers Of Colonoscopies”) that kills and disables so many at much younger ages than anyone would ever develop cancer.

Ruminant animals, such as cattle, get very sick and will die on a grain based diet if not given antibiotics.  It must have been brilliant marketing to convince what is supposed to be intelligent people that the same grain used to fatten cattle, which makes them sick and in need of daily antibiotic injections, would somehow make humans slim and healthy.  As should have been predicted, these grains also made humans fat and sick – any wonder why.

Dogs and cats have begun to develop many of the same diseases afflicting humans when fed a grain based diet, and most modern pet foods, made for these carnivores, is made mostly from grains.  Now it is quite common to see obesity, diabetes and even cancer in our pets.  Someone felt it was a great idea to base most of our dietary studies using rodents, which is why I pay little attention to any study which based their study on rats.  They are possibly one of the only mammals that have evolved to eat grains and are therefore a very poor analog for humans, who have not developed such a mechanism to deal with the problems offered by grains.

Historically, grains were mostly reserved for the poor as a dietary base and the poor have historically always been sick – therefore why the government mandated the addition of man-made nutrients into the cereal and flour (think agribusiness, like Monsanto, and cereal companies who give huge grants to the USDA and actually have ex-employees appointed to positions in the FDA and USDA).  If a diet rich in grains were the healthiest diet, then the impoverish people would have enjoyed the better health over the rich people who ate so much more animal fat.  This was never the case.  How have people of means, in one of the richest nations in the world, been convinced that the diet historically eaten by the poor and sickly was the diet best for the human being escapes me?  A masterful brainwashing indeed.

These grasses have not been around for millions of years by waving around naked and undefended from predators, with all that sugar available for easy food.  They evolved to reduce their predators population and unfortunately we are now the predator.  Their highly bioavailable sugars promote visceral fat, which in turn drive hormones, such as leptin (messes up the brain’s ability to determine satiation) and insulin (which drives fat to be stored), rendering the predator into a perpetual hunger needing more and more and satisfaction is never achieved.  As a result, this predator suffers obesity, diabetes; which leads to heart disease and cancer and a whole host of gastric and digestive malfunctions.

This is all driven by the billions of dollars of advertising and influence of the large agribusiness, bread and cereal companies to market their highly profitable, government subsidized, genetically engineered and patented franken-plants.  They have successfully convinced people, politicians and medical personnel that these foods, that are at the heart of most of the american health problems, are the healthiest foods that humans have evolved to eat.  How could a species evolved to thrive on such a strange food they never consumed for 99% of their existence in less than 10,000 years?

The plant’s diabolical defenses, that still remain lethal far after harvest, are winning the battle for survival.  They were here before humans and will be here long after humans are gone.  Their purpose is to reduce the population of their predator and it seems that they are on their way to achieving that goal.

If you read my post entitled,Are Humans Living Longer Than Ever Before, it explains how poor nutrition killed the impoverish en mass.  The poverty-stricken people over 100 years ago had no choice but to attempt to live on flour and sugar for calories, which were very low in available nutrients, thus succumb to malnutrition and other diseases of deficiencies, such as beriberi, rickets and even scurvy.  This was why the U.S. government mandated that all grain flour and cereal would have to be fortified or enriched with man-made vitamins.  The health of the poor did improve as a result, so it was a success, but still did not enjoy the health that those of means, who were able to eat animal foods, did.  The enriched flour is typically inundated with mostly B vitamins, because they can stand the heat of cooking, but still lack vitamin C (which is heat sensitive) and vitamin D3, the most important for human health.  These are also man-made vitamins and there are many questions as to their bioavailability, especially after being baked in excess of  350ºF and even higher temperatures when extruded to make cereal flakes and other shapes, where proteins are denatured and vitamins are destroyed.

My next rant will concern the large agribusiness and bioengineering companies, like Monsanto and where I believe that their future goals are and how they will affect us.  I hope you will return to read it.  It should be finished in a few days.  I would like to thank all my readers and especially those who have provided links to some of my articles and help spread the word on the very important information concerning colonoscopy dangers and the fact that intestinal transplants are possible and can give back life to those stuck on TPN.  Together we can make a difference, even if small, we can certainly save some lives.

21 Responses to Are Whole-Healthy-Grains Defenseless?
  1. Bob Johnston
    November 13, 2012 | 11:39 am

    Terrific post. Hopefully I can use it to convince some friends and family that their diet is killing them.

    • Wolverine
      November 13, 2012 | 1:09 pm

      Thanks, Bob. I can always count on you to spread the word. I hope that your friends and family will see the light and adjust their diet to prevent future health problems. No one should have to learn the hard way, as I did. I have some other post coming up real soon that will elaborate on many of these points. Thanks again for your constant support. Best wishes.

  2. Mary
    November 13, 2012 | 9:37 pm

    Just wondering if the sprouted grain breads such as ezekiel bread which contains no flour only sprouted organic wheat, millet, spelt, barley, lentils and soybeans is less toxic than processed grain products.

    • Wolverine
      November 15, 2012 | 5:23 am

      Hi Mary. Anytime the seeds are sprouted, there is certainly a loss in many of the toxins. As I said in the post, the heaviest plant defense is in the seed (protecting its offspring). Once the seed begins to sprout, it also begins to transform from a seed to a plant, so much of the lectins and other defenses decrease. There still remains a high amount of anti-nutrients, such as phytates, which is why many cultures then fermented the dough. The bacteria that ferment the dough consume most of the antinutrients, making the bread more digestible and the nutrients more available.

      The organic wheat should be an heirloom breed, such as emmer or einkorn. I’m not sure how available those ancient breeds are on the market. Since the 1980’s, most of the world’s wheat was replaced with a new hybrid that researchers began producing in the 50s and 60s. This hybrid is a high yield, semi-dwarf wheat which has extremely complex proteins, like gluten and gliadin. These proteins have been found to break down to a narcotic-like molecule and affect the brain, causing a type of addiction to the wheat. Dr. William Davis, author of the book “Wheat Belly“, has likely authored the most in-depth history of wheat and the serious problems with today’s grain. I would really recommend reading “Wheat Belly” for more information on the problems associated with seeds that produce gluten (Wheat, Barley, Spelt, etc.). His website is found here.

      Many of his patients have not only lost substantial weight on his diet, but inadvertently healed other problems that no one had associated with wheat, like rashes, arthritis, migraines and many other problems. I used to suffer arthritis in my shoulders, hips and fingers, which have all went away since wheat cessation.

      Weston Price had encountered cultures who had developed methods of soaking, sprouting and fermenting grains to help make them more digestible and were able to thrive on mostly plant foods. These people had little choice, because animal foods were scarce in their region. Otherwise, it seems like a lot of work to go through for a food so low in nutrition and very problematic to many people (like those with Celiac’s Disease and other gluten intolerance), when we have access to foods much richer in nutrition.

      I know that some people just really can’t imagine a meal without bread, because it’s become a comfort food. In that case, then sprouting and fermenting (sour dough) is the better way to go. So to answer your question, sprouted and fermented breads are far superior and less problematic than commercial breads, which are loaded with HFCS. In the last few years, I have witnessed so many people improve their health by completely dropping most grains and especially wheat and other gluten producing grains, that I always recommend leaving grains for the birds.

      My younger sister has been able to drop a couple of medications she has been taking for years by simply avoiding wheat. She was very reluctant when I first recommended the idea, because she has always been into baking cakes and cookies her entire adult life, but when her conditions worsened she finally had her doctor do a blood test and found that she was indeed intolerant to gluten and decided to take the plunge. She has been like a new person ever since. My father refuses to give up bread, even though he has had a couple of heart attacks and has 11 stents in his arteries. He says he can’t give up bread, so I guess Dr. Davis is correct when he says that the gliadin is a morphine-like compound to the brain and very addictive. My sister agrees and admitted that she had bad cravings and withdrawal symptoms after stopping wheat.

      As far as soybeans are concerned, I won’t eat them at all. If you must eat them, they should definitely be soaked and fermented as the Asians did (Miso, Tempeh, Natto). Otherwise they are loaded with anti-nutrients. Yet, even fermentation does not rid the beans of all the phytoestrogens and goitrogens. My bigger concern with soybeans is related to the extreme damage I have seen inflicted on TPN patients when soy based lipid were infused.

      I lived on TPN for 6 months and was very lucky not to take the damage that I saw other patients sustain to their livers. Many of them suffered complete cirrhosis of the liver and required liver transplants. Many of the children on TPN died as a result of the liver damage from the soy lipid infusion. Please read my post “The Truth About Soy” for more details and links to articles about the damage done to children infused with “Intralipid”, which is made from soy.

      I personally believe that seeds (grains, beans and legumes) are simply a poor source of nutrition and contain too many toxins, anti-nutrients, estrogen, trypsin inhibitors (soy), goitrogens and so many other defenses for me to play around with. Of course, in my case, all the indigestible carbohydrates and the resulting gas, bloating and flatulence cause far too many problems to my transplanted bowels. All of the other intestinal transplant recipients that I befriended while in the hospital do consume these food, but every single one of them have been back in the hospital because of bowel obstructions, some of them a couple of times. I have not had any of those issues.

      Humans thrived for nearly two million years before introducing these foods to their diet, so we can live just fine without them. None of these seeds can be eaten in their raw state or death will come quickly. Though I do cook my meat, eggs, fish and vegetables; they can be eaten raw and not kill a human. So, I have decided to avoid any foods that are deadly to a human without being processed. Processing maybe only slows down the poisoning and doesn’t eliminate it. Too much work for so little nutrition.

  3. Greg
    November 14, 2012 | 12:58 pm


    Bob, as with anything considered to be contrarian, showing evidence does not change people’s minds.

    Humans by nature don’t like to be told what they are doing is wrong, or what they have believed to be true for so long is false. People tend to hold on to long held beliefs regardless of contradicting information given that proves beyond a doubt that they are wrong.

    People are also followers, and refuse to think for themselves because it’s difficult. It’s easier to take someone’s word for something than to critically think. And when the government, most doctors, and commercials perpetually inculcate us with information that grains are healthy, and being they’ve heard this their whole lives, is it any wonder that when someone without an MD or PhD after their name tells them something contradictory to their belief system, that they hesitate to believe it?

    I’ve lost 40 pounds or so in the last 5 months going grain free. People tell me how good I look. When pressed on how I managed it (assuming it’s by eating less and exercising more), I get mostly eye-rolls when saying I eat plenty of animal fat, little fruit (mostly berries), and no grains. Some people seem genuinely interested in my diet, but most don’t.

    Another reason people will not accept giving up grains is because it’s too hard. Most eat a form of grain with every single meal. It’s the staple. Giving up grains means they don’t have as much to eat (they think), so their mind tells them the diet is too hard because they can’t eat anything, and being fresh, non-processed foods is what I eat, one cannot just grab a quick meal in a box or a granola bar or powdered donuts. It takes more time to prepare meals, so that’s another mark against the way I eat, in these people’s minds.

    Human nature tells, also, that people will seek the greatest reward with the least amount of work. One can fill up quickly on grains and junk food for cheap (easy way out), so that’s what they’ll do, and cognitive dissonance will prevent them from changing.

    Seeking the greatest reward for the least amount of work is why socialism/communism can never work, and why the standard American diet continues to cause health problems, and always will.

    • Bob Johnston
      November 15, 2012 | 12:13 am


      I completely agree with you. It takes a special sort of person to allow themselves to be convinced of something contradictory to what they already believe. I think it was Max Planck who said “Science advances one funeral at a time”. My experience is there’s never been a truer statement.

      But I am heartened by the number of people I know who have changed their minds to what is a healthy diet, I think at some point with just the sheer numbers of people who vocally agree with me will go a long way in convincing my friends and family.

      • Wolverine
        November 15, 2012 | 6:52 am

        If I can butt in here, I agree with you Bob. Result will eventually speak louder than all that false advertising. I understand that we are up against a billion dollar machine; when you consider all the bread and cereal companies, plus the huge agribusiness entities, like Monsanto. Then we have the fact that they pretty much own every branch of the government concerning food. Problem is, so far their great advice of 8 to 11 servings of pure sugar they call “heart healthy grains”, their evangelical-like stance against saturated fat and their fucked up pyramid has had nothing but poor results.

        Obesity out of control, type 2 diabetes starting to onset at the age of birth, heart disease killing half the humans in the U.S. and it all continues to get worse each year. I believe as you have stated. As people see the improved health of those who abstain from those “heart-healthy-whole-grains” and processed seed oils (canola/rapeseed), the truth will become clearer. At some point, the cognitive dissonance has to break down when the results of the opposite are so miraculous.

        Thankfully, we have the internet. The big businesses already own all the traditional media. Just keep spreading the word, but more importantly, showing the results. So far, I have had the most complete recovery of any other intestinal or multivisceral recipient from that hospital in 2010. Every other patient has been back in the hospital several times in the last three years. I also take far less medication than the other patients. The doctors don’t want to admit it, because my diet is not the one they recommend to the patients, but it is getting harder and harder for them to argue with the results.

        Thanks again for you participation.

    • Wolverine
      November 15, 2012 | 5:37 am

      Well spoken, Greg. So many snacks and other cheap junk foods are made from grains, so it’s seemingly impossible to convince people to give them up. I truly believe that most people would rather eat their snacks and then just shoot insulin, take a pill or have a few more stents installed in their arteries than give up the junk food.

      You hit the nail square on the head with the cognitive dissonance. When shown the evidence, most people turn away, stick their fingers in their ear and yell;,la – I can’t hear you. They would rather believe the false advertising; that sugar coated Honey Nut Cheerios will protect their heart from that evil cholesterol (which their entire brain and nervous system is made of). I guess most people believe that the doctors influence the information in the advertising, when in reality it’s the exact opposite; the doctors are influenced by the advertising. There goes that damned cognitive dissonance again.

      Thanks for you input. I understand it was directed at Bob, but I couldn’t resist leaping in.

      • Greg
        November 15, 2012 | 7:56 am

        To both…
        I’ve gotten a few people to change their diet. Most think it’s bull and my arteries are clogging, and a couple have been VERY interested because they have seen my results, but when I tell them to lay off sugar and bread, that’s the end of it.

        People don’t understand that sugar and bread is like crack. You get addicted to it, and it makes you crave more when you eat it.

  4. Greg
    November 15, 2012 | 8:08 am

    I wrote my crack analogy before I saw your reply to Mary about the properties of gliadin. Whoops.

    Everyone I work with, ever actually, is usually starving by lunch time, and then starving when they get home for dinner. Most everyone eats some form of grain for breakfast especially, since it’s quick and you don’t have to cook Special K bars. And people wonder why they are so hungry all the time.

  5. Joanna
    April 2, 2013 | 11:44 am

    Just discovered your blog – very interesting post with a lot of good info. I would just like to point out what I believe is one small error which is that grain fed cattle do not get daily injections of antibiotics. the profit margins on beef for the producers are often slim and the cost of any drugs used must be factored in carefully. Most animals fed for human consumption are given some antibiotics but I think it is more due to the stress of being kept in crowded pens which makes them more susceptible to infection – they can develop pneumonia from infections just as we can. Also the damage caused by a grain fed diet doesn’t really have much time to develop since they are slaughtered and consumed at a young age – the bad effect is mostly felt by humans who consume them in the unhealthy Omega 3-6 ratios. Cattle kept for breeding (who live longer) don’t get much grain because again it would cost too much – they are more likely to live on
    pasture and hay.

    • Wolverine
      April 5, 2013 | 5:24 pm

      Thanks for your comment, Joanna. I don’t recall writing anything about daily injections of antibiotics (perhaps I need to read the article again)? I was pointing out the fact that grain fed cattle do become sick on heavy grain feeding and typically require antibiotics at some point. I was raised on a farm, my wife and I still raise a small herd of cattle for our food and her father owns about 80 head of cattle, so I am not completely unfamiliar with ruminant livestock.

      Yes, a small supplement of grain does not cause major sickness in ruminants, as long as they have access to fresh grasses, which should make up the larger portion of their diet. Ruminant animals are grass-eaters by design, not grain eating animals. I was specifically referring to “feedlot” cattle, which are confined in very small and overcrowded spaces and given no access to grass and are force-fed grain as their main staple of their diet in order to fatten them up faster.

      The high carbohydrate content of grains will fatten a ruminant quicker, but the grains will also elevate the acidity within the rumen stomach,which in turn, elevates the acid in their blood. Unfortunately, I have seen the horrible death from the resulting acidosis when ruminants eat too much grain – it is a slow agonizing death for the animal. It is impossible for a ruminant to eat themselves to death on grass, but I have seen many die as a result of grain overload, from both bloat and acidosis.

      You are correct that many of the diseases are transferred because of the close quarters and heavy exposure to their own waste, which many feedlot animals stand in up to their knees, but it is the heavy grain feeding which lowers their immune system, thereby allowing the illness and requiring the antibiotics. I have had to inject many ruminant animals with LA 200 in my time and it was always ruminants who had been stalled and fed strictly grain. The first sign of a problem was severe diarrhea and weight loss.

      Your thoughts are correct concerning the health difference in human consumption of factory raised meat, as opposed to grass fed, but this was not the point of this particular essay. The point of the article was to illustrate that grains are not the health food they are claimed to be and that most mammals become ill when feeding on a predominantly grain based diet – including ruminant animals. My animals feed on grass and have very strong immune systems, but many people do not realize that most of the commercial meats come from feedlot/confinement cattle. Here is just one link to an article about “grain overload” in ruminants. If you Google “acidosis” and “cattle” you will find more information on how deadly grains can be to ruminants.

      Hope this helps clear things up. My information was correct, but perhaps I should have made it clearer that it is a diet made up of predominantly grains that is not healthy for cattle. Cattle can have supplemental grain, but the bulk of their diet must be grasses in order to maintain the strongest immune system. I prefer to feed no grain to my cattle, because I don’t believe that mammals evolved to thrive on grains.

      Plants have evolved far too many defenses to protect their young for me to believe that we can negate all of those defenses and make their zygotes a main staple of our diet. Even though fangs, claws and stingers can be quite frightening, at least they are rendered useless once the animal is deceased – plants use chemical warfare to protect their young, which stay very effective even after their death.

      By the way, it takes about half as much time to get a calf up to slaughter weight by grain feeding them, so the profit margins are worth the effort and problems of grain feeding cattle. It is strictly based on profit margins that farmers often choose to confine cattle, otherwise all cattle would be grass fed.

      • Joanna
        April 5, 2013 | 6:51 pm

        Thanks for your reply. I am well aware of how and why cattle are fed grain instead of grass. I grew up on a livestock raising farm and still have family members who continue to do so. I commented because I am frequently surprised at how little most people know about how their food is produced. My comment about grass being cheaper than grain was only for breeding cattle – grain (and often confinement to pens) is used to fatten quickly as you pointed out but since there is no reason to fatten breeding cattle for sale yes they are usually left on pasture – it’s the younger fattened calves that we mostly find in our grocery stores.

        • Wolverine
          April 6, 2013 | 3:53 am

          Thanks again for the information, Joanna. I believe we both understand cattle very well. You’re right that the breeders are going to be kept on grass, so that alone tells us that the grain feeding is not good for longevity and healthy breeding. I think you just misunderstood my position on just how much medication the cattle receive. I may have to review the article again and see if I can word it differently, so no one else misunderstands the point I was trying to make.

          I’m just not personally a fan of the present day “HeartHealthyWholeGrains” dogma, that I believe was created more for corporate profits than human health. I was trying to stress that pretty much all mammals (except possibly rodents) suffer health problems when grains become the base of the diet – including humans (birds and insects seem to have evolved for grain eating).

          Recent CT scans of Egyptian mummies would seem to support this, as large amounts of plaque from calcium deposits were discovered throughout their arteries and at fairly young ages, such as in their fifties. Egyptians were huge grain eaters, with little meat in their diet and a good amount of walking and outdoor activity (and didn’t smoke), yet were suffering from the same diseases we see today (heart disease, arthritis, diabetes, etc.), which is always blamed on animal products and lack of exercise. According to the USDA recommendations, the Egyptians should have been the picture of heart health, but this was not so.

          I agree with you that most people are unaware of how their meat was raised and I think that many people believe that cattle do well on grains and I just wanted to point out that they actually do not, and can actually die if they eat too much grain (unlike grass). Most people are convinced, through corporate advertising and USDA backing (who are pretty much owned by the agribusiness giants, like Monsanto), that grains are super healthy and full of nutrients. Few people stop to think that if grains are so chock full of nutrients, then why do food manufacturers have to enrich and fortify them with crappy man-made vitamins and minerals (many of which are not bioavailable, like micro-iron shavings rather than heme-iron in cereals)?

          I appreciate your comments and will see if I can reword the part about cattle and grains. Thanks again. I was not suggesting that you didn’t know about cattle or grain overload, I added that information for the benefit of others reading these comments. As you mentioned, I don’t believe that many people who have never worked a farm know about these things, so I took advantage of your comment to provide that information. I didn’t mean to offend you and apologize if I did.

  6. Alexis
    August 11, 2013 | 11:06 pm

    Curious about your thoughts on Vitamin B17, or amygdalin. I think I read a recent post about you fighting Multiple Myeoloma, which I am devastated to hear. Your site is just incredible! A lot of people in the holistic health community use apricot kernels to fight cancer. Any thoughts on this? They are supposed to be the source of the laetrile controversy.

    • Wolverine
      August 12, 2013 | 4:38 pm

      I have done some research into that area, but it seems very hard to determine its effectiveness. Multiple Myeloma is such a rare and misunderstood disease, in many ways different from other cancers, that is hard to know what may control or cure it. Doctors claim it is incurable, but I never believe that anything is incurable, just because they don’t know how to cure it.

      The theory behind the B17 seems plausible and really depends on whether the cyanide is only released at the point of the tumor – that has not actually been proven, to my knowledge. Otherwise, there is a risk of damaging healthy cells, very similar to chemotherapy. The problem with Multiple Myeloma is that no one understands the cause, so it makes it hard to know how to prevent or cure it.

      Thanks for the information. I will continue to do more study on B17 and other vitamins (like vitamin D3) in my fight with MM. I’m sure it was caused by radiation and immunosuppression. My MM is still in a low “smoldering” state and I have been able to keep it there for more than 3 years. The blood levels are still so low that we wouldn’t even know I had it except for a plasmacytoma that appeared on the top of my head.

      Every doctor was kind of stunned that one plasmacytoma could be so advanced when the rest of the disease is still nearly undetectable. In a way it was a blessing, because the tumor made us catch it very early, earlier than anyone would typically diagnose it – my CBC and other blood numbers are perfectly normal and the blood proteins that would signify MM are at less than 5%.

      It is quite possible that maintaining my present diet and lifestyle could keep the disease asymptomatic for another decade or better (and hopefully improve on what I am doing). I have obviously had this for quite some time (3.5 years since my transplant). With such a compromised immune system, the disease should have taken over by now – so I must be doing something right. Thanks again for your concerns, information and kind words about my writing.

  7. Dimitriye
    January 22, 2015 | 5:47 pm

    A bit late to the party, but I’ll comment anyway. I’m 16 and despite a horrendous lack of exercise (something I keep wanting to fix, but never get around to) I’m far slimmer and healthier than most of my peers. I used to think my metabolism was just faster, but now that I think about it, the culture both my parents come from has meat in pretty much every meal. Unless it’s a religious fast, there is not a single Serbian meal I know of that doesn’t contain meat. Well, there are a couple, but those were meals exclusively eaten by the poor who couldn’t afford to eat better. And sure, there are dishes that don’t contain meat, but that’s exclusively restricted to side dishes, where the main course is meat. Bread isn’t even eaten before the meal, it’s exclusively eaten as a side, maybe one or two pieces while you eat. Hell, my grandmother always soaked beans over night before using them in anything. Thus, I can give personal testament to how much healthier meat is than grains and the like.

    • Wolverine
      January 24, 2015 | 5:28 pm

      Dimitriye, thanks for your comments. It’s always nice to have personal testimonies from people who have their own n=1 experiment going on successfully. I hope you can continue with optimal health.

      I do believe that metabolism plays in, so I guess the real question is what causes people to have different metabolisms. Often times the diet and lifestyle alone can dictate the metabolism, because I have seen people change their body metabolism by changing their lifestyle and diet. Then there are people like myself, who do have a faster metabolism than the rest of my family. I have always been rail-thin and everyone else in my family, parents and siblings, struggle with obesity.

      Everyone kept telling me it was because I was young and it would catch up to me, so I kept waiting, hoping one day I could gain a few pounds. I am 54 years old and it hasn’t happened yet — still thin as a rail. It may not be congenital though. I always figured that I was born that way, but recently read a very interesting study that was done on people who are naturally thin and the findings were extremely interesting. It’s rather detailed and long, so I won’t get into it here, but I hope to write a detailed post about it.

      I found it most interesting because they said that out of the thousands of studies that have been done looking at obese people, there have been only 2 studies done looking at the naturally thin people. You would have thought there was more studies done looking at what it is that makes some people thin, rather than always looking at what makes others fat. It led to some new answers for sure. Hope to write that article soon. Thanks for stopping by and for commenting.

  8. Rosa
    April 10, 2015 | 9:16 pm

    Hi mr.Wolverine

    Greeting from Indonesia. Your blog is awesome and intriguing. I have some question regarding the using of the seed for human.

    As you mention in this post that we shouldn’t consume seed, what about topical application?

    I mean, afaik, I guess facial oil is kinda booming right now. Using oil like grapeseed, castor, argan oil, etc to substitute mosturising cream.

    My question maybe a bit out of track but I really want to know if seed will do harm to skin like if it’s consumed.

    Thank you very much!


    • Wolverine
      April 13, 2015 | 3:46 pm

      Hi Rosa. I thank you very much for commenting and it is great to know I am reaching places as far away as Indonesia. Your question is really not far off topic, as the skin is also an organ and absorbs more than most people believe.

      Grains are certainly problematic for consumption with all of the built in defenses given to them as the plants only hope for a passing along its genes (Phytates, lectins, gluton, isoflavons, etc..). There seem to be other problem with seeds as food for all mammals. Being raised on a farm, I spent many nights up with ruminant animals (sheep, goats and cattle) and even horses (who are not ruminant, but hind gut digesters all the same) who got into the feed bags and ate too much grain and try as we might, we could not save them once the acidosis set in.

      I do not know of any mammal that can safely eat grains (corporate farmers pump cattle with antibiotics to feed them grains). If they can kill all other mammals, why not humans? Aren’t we also mammals? The only farm animals that did fine on grains were birds (turkeys and chickens), but birds have an evolved protection for the problematic things in grains. It’s like they teach in survival courses; never eat a berry just because a bird ate it. Birds can eat berryies which can kill a human right away, so birds do have special mechanisms for toxins.

      With that said, I have even a bigger problem with the massive amount of processing, which involves a lot of pressing, heating and even the use of petroleum solvents (typically hexane) to extract the oils from the seeds. My wife and I have a general rule now that we will not put anything on our skin we would not eat.

      I learned the hard way recently just how well skin absorbs (which frightens me about all the years I used acetone to clean my hands, when olive oil would have worked as well to remove most anything). Because of my small bowel transplant, I tend to lose a lot of electrolytes. One day I found myself feeling extremely ill; I was highly anxious, my blood presure leaped up 50 points and my heart was racing. My wife suggested that I get in a bath with epsom salts before going to the hospital, because I had done this before and it was due to low magnesium and the doctors infused magnesium into me.

      Magnesium needs to be present at the nerve synapse for it to transfer information and since the brain is made of nerve synapse, I was in real danger of dying (low magnesium can cause sudden death syndrome). Within 15 minutes, my BP came back to normal and the anxiety and heart racing stopped. This will give you and idea of how fast the skin can absorb. The magnesium leveled out to the magnesium level bath water by osmosis within minutes (epsom salts are made from magnesium oxide).

      My wife and I usually use coconut oil for most topical applications, though I guess olive oil can be good to, since it is used in many soap formulas as a moisturizer. We prefer coconut oils, espcially on cuts and burns because it has many antibacterial and anti-fungal properties and does heal them faster. My wife swears by virgin coconut oil as a moisturizer.

      I cannot say these seed oils are bad for the skin. It really depends on how they were processed and removed from the seed If petroleum solvents were used, I doubt it is good for topical apllication, because the skin does absorb thing quckly and you do not need hexane in your blood stream. If the oils in Indonesia are more naturally made, then it may not hurt.

      Here in the U.S., all the oils are made through factory method to manufacture them as quickly as possible and are exposed to a lot of heat and aer rancid, so much so, that they have to deoderize and bleach them as the last stage of processing. That’s a bit frigtening when you think that so many americans eat that shit every day. No wonder we are so sick.

      Since my intestinal transplant, I can no longer digest those oils at all. They make me immediatelly sick, so they are certainly not digestable (since i am the mine canary of the diet world as one of my readers called me).

      Anyway, just remember that your sking is not rubber or silicone. It is porous and will absorb things via osmosis and these compounds will enter the blood stream. I thank you again for writing and I hope I have heped with your question. If not, please feel free to write again or email me.

  9. Rosa
    April 25, 2015 | 10:42 pm

    Hello Sir. Wow thank you so much for the reply. Recently I’m very interested in topical things like cosmetics and skin care.

    I google a lot about natural cosmetics/skin care and there are a lot saying about don’t want to put something on the skin that we don’t want to eat it.

    First I think, really? I think that most moisturizer will only can be absorbed a little and the rest evaporate. Hahaha. But maybe I should learn more about how skin absorb.

    And according to your story about epsom salt, then I guess we really should care about bath stuff like soap, toothpaste, shampoo. Never thought about this before. Gosh..

    Unfortunately most Indonesians aren’t aware enough about this. They still brand minded. Didn’t care about the ingredients.

    In Indonesia, afaik, long ago many people use coconut oil for cooking. But now we’re using palm oil which I think it’s from kopra (dried palm kernel or something) and go in a rbd process (refining, bleaching, deodorizing). I think it’s using hexane too.

    And for other seed oil like grapeseed, castor, etc it’s not too easy to get, especially if you live in small town. We don’t really know how it’s processed.

    But I’ve read it somewhere since seed didn’t naturally producig oil, then heavy stuff must be done in order to get the oil out.

    If this true… Then shea butter, cocoa butter, chocolate isn’t that healthy whether we eat it or use it toppically like the media and many people said.

    What a life. Ahaha. Once again thank you for the reply Sir. Hope there’re many other Indonesian read your blog. Have a good life sir 😉

Leave a Reply to Greg

Wanting to leave an <em>phasis on your comment?

%d bloggers like this: