The 2.5 Million Year Diet

February 25th, 2011

The Paleo Diet isn’t a diet as in weight loss, it’s a diet as in a permanent eating choice, like being a vegan or a vegetarian. Although it IS incredibly effective for weight loss too.

Basically it resembles the Atkins Diet but its foundations are based on the diets of ancient Paleolithic Man. Lean meats, seafood, fruit, vegetables and nuts.
The Paleolithic period lasted around 2.5 million years and ended around 10,000 years ago, with the development of agriculture.

The diet is based on the premise that modern humans are genetically adapted to the diet of our Paleolithic ancestors. As our genetics have barely changed since the dawn of agriculture, the perfect diet for human health and well-being is this ancestral diet.

Proponents of this diet argue that modern human populations who live on diets similar to those of Paleolithic hunter-gatherers, are mainly free of diseases of affluence. Also, two small prospective studies of the Paleolithic diet in humans have shown some positive health outcomes.

The diet actually avoids grains, dairy products, legumes, salt, refined sugar, and processed oils. Notice the main two things missing from this diet . . . grains such as wheat, and dairy products. Think about that for a moment. What are two of the biggest and most debilitating food allergies?

That’s right. Lactose intolerance (Dairy) and Celiac Disease/ Gluten Intolerance (Wheat).

Many turn to the Paleo Diet, just as they do to the Atkins diet, because of their problems with wheat or dairy and report that their symptoms disappear, obviously as they are no longer consuming the offending foods.

But the diet is much more than that.

Check out some of the Paleo Diet or Caveman Diet websites and read the testimonials. You’ll see accounts of all kinds of healing and disease reversal, energy levels soaring, muscle and bone ache ending, the list goes on.

It seems that more and more info is pointing to carbs and not protein as the bad guys. It really makes you wonder about carbohydrates doesn’t it?

Tags: atkins, diet, meat, weight loss
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