Empower Your Total Health The Way Evolution Intended (…And Didn’t) by Nora T. Gedgaudas, CNS, CNT
A wealth of nutrition and health information
Primal Body-Primal Mind takes the many issues being discussed in the paleolithic (primal) community and summarizes them into short and informative chapters. Paleolithic nutrition encompasses the diet that our ancestors ate prior to the neolithic (agricultural) revolution. This diet includes meat raised on natural diets, vegetables, small amounts of fruit in season, fats, nuts, and seeds. The diet avoids grains, legumes, starchy vegetables, and processed foods and oils. Gedgaudas also covers the dietary recommendations of the Weston A. Price Foundation, a nonprofit that promotes small farmers, sustainable agriculture, raw dairy (for those who can digest it), and fermented foods for intestinal health.
Gedgaudas brings together many issues affecting our health both positively and negatively. Some of the topics she covers include:
- The diet of our ancestors
- Nutritional problems with grains
- Why we should avoid vegetable oils
- The dangers of soy
- Gut health and the immune system
- Which fats and oils promote health and which harm it
- The importance of saturated fat and cholesterol and the bad science surrounding them
- How much fat and protein we should consume based on current research on longevity
- The importance of proper hydration
- Metabolism, weight loss, and the roles of insulin and leptin
- Pros and cons of juicing foods
- The problems inherent in a low-fat, high-carb diet
- Shifting from sugar burning to fat burning and how to temper sugar cravings
- Recommendations on supplements for various conditions and for shifting away from a predominantly carbohydrate-based diet
- How diet affects mental health
Unfortunately, Gedgaudas did not footnote her claims but provided a partial bibliography of some studies, articles, and books. Many times I wanted more information on scientific claims but couldn’t find the references. And other reviewers are correct that the book contains many errors in grammar and punctuation. Despite these shortcomings, the book is an excellent summary of health and dietary issues that can act as a springboard to further research. For example, Gedgaudas claims that we should keep our protein intake low to down-regulate the newly discovered mTOR metabolic pathway. I’ve never heard of that, but now that I know about it, I can do my own research. I will also be looking further into leptin’s role in metabolism.
Nobody gets everything right. The field of nutrition is rife with disagreement. What’s important is knowing the issues so we can research and decide for ourselves how to proceed. The breadth of information covered in Primal Body-Primal Mind is where this book is most valuable. If you’ve been around the paleolithic community for some time, you probably already know a lot of this information. If you’re new to nutrition and diet, then I highly recommend this book. You can save years of wading through pop literature that capitalizes on bad science funded by food manufacturers and pharmaceutical interests.
I’ve been a heavy sugar consumer my whole life, and when I reached middle age I started falling apart. By incorporating many of the recommendations in this book, I have reversed arthritis, irregular heartbeat, chronic, longstanding back pain, ataxia, stiff joints, low energy, and slowly worsening mental function. I’ve also lost and continue to lose weight without ever being hungry, and my hair is growing back.
Listen to my interview with Nora Gedgaudas: Why the Food Pyramid Can’t Be Trusted but Evolution Can.
Buy Primal Body-Primal Mind from Amazon.
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