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Maybe you have a friend or family member who has gone Paleo or Keto, or you’ve come across a piece of media that has piqued your curiosity. They tell you that you’ll feel better and weight loss will feel effortless for the first time in your life. Odds are if you’ve been living in America the last few decades you’ve likely tried more than one diet and you want to know if this will work. Perhaps you’ve done a bit of research and you’re not sure where to start on your primal health journey. Paleo, Whole 30, Keto, Primal, or Autoimmune Paleo…
Is The Paleo Diet Right For You?
Paleo is also known as the Ancestral Diet. It’s the basic primal health template that all other paleo diets fit into. That is, what did our ancestors eat? Imagine yourself out in nature far away from the modern world. If you had to live there what would you eat? You’d eat what you could forage and hunt, a.k.a. the original human diet before we “modernized” it with agriculture. Your real food diet would consist of plants, nuts, seeds, eggs, fish, meat, and seasonal fruit. Dr. Terry Wahls compares her paleo protocol to the US RDA guidelines and it’s 2 to 3 times the recommended daily amount of nutrients depending on the nutrient. Her protocol is for those with MS and it calls for 9 cups of vegetables from 3 different categories among other things. When was the last time you ate 9 cups of vegetables in a day that weren’t potatoes or corn?
When you eat the rainbow as they say you end up eating a variety of nutrients that your body needs to fuel itself. Think about it, every cellular process in your body relies on what you feed it. Feed it real food full of nutrients and get ready for a health change. All of the coaches I know, including myself, decided to become Primal Health Coaches when we learned how powerful food was for our own health. There are still doctors who will tell you that food doesn’t matter but they are dead wrong. They’ll tell you it’s your genetics and that nothing can be done but the science of epigenetics says otherwise. The food we eat, sleep we get, social interactions we have, and sensible exercise all play a role in shaping which genes get turned on or off. That is the power you have! Every day you get to decide what you want your future health to look like.
Some may have more of a struggle than others. Frankly it depends on how long you’ve had issues and how severe they are. Everyone is different and although I start everyone who is new to the paleo diet with the basics. Sometimes we make our way into the other Paleo diet realms. The thing is, if you’re new to this world how do you know which one to choose. What’s the difference between Paleo, Primal, Keto, Whole 30, and AIP?
What’s The Difference Between Paleo and Whole 30?
Paleo and Whole 30 according to their food lists aren’t much different. Whole 30 is Paleo minus any sweeteners, no added sweeteners of any kind, not even stevia, in any food products. The one point alone is a great shopping experience. When you begin reading every ingredient (not the nutrition facts) it’s an eye opening experience how many things have a sugar or sweetener added to them. You may be surprised to learn that most things that come in a jar, can, box, or bag in the supermarket often has a sweetener added and usually more than 1 sweetener. See, they use more than 1 sweetener so that they don’t have to list sugar as the first (and consequently most abundant) ingredient.
The biggest difference between Paleo and Whole 30 is a handful of rules. When you’re following Whole 30 you can’t have any breads, muffins, cakes, or other no-brakes foods even if they are Paleo. The goal is to break you of your habits. I think the biggest hurdle most have to creating permanent change is the old habits they keep around. For example, you can make Paleo tortillas but there’s an entire aisle in the supermarket where you don’t have to make them and they’re less expensive. The point of Whole 30 is to help you figure out that you don’t NEED the tortilla, bun, pasta, cookies, or added sugar. Instead you’ll find new recipes and if you’re like me you’ll discover that you’ll enjoy food more because everything has real flavor. No more bland starchy canvasses.
The biggest shock for me, after going 30 days without any added sweeteners my taste buds changed. I couldn’t believe how over the top sweet everything is for “regular people”. It’s actually kind of disgusting and I did my first Whole 30 in 2014…
What’s The Difference Between Paleo and Keto?
I belong to a Paleo for Beginners group on Facebook and every once in awhile I’ll answer someone’s question or try to help. (I hate that people are sick because of our sketchy food system.) Anyway, something I’ve seen a lot lately is people saying that they tried Keto and it didn’t work so they’re going Paleo. Ugh…these are the things that make health coaches want to get on their soap box. While there are some coaches who would tell you to jump straight into Keto I am not one of those people. You need to build the metabolic machinery with a primal health lifestyle before jumping into Keto. That is, if you’ve been eating SAD (Standard American Diet) for your entire life that is a carbohydrate loaded eating style. Conversely, Keto is purposely low in carbohydrates. The first step is reminding your body how to use stored body fat for fuel instead of relying on a constant stream of carbohydrates.
When you go from SAD to the Paleo diet you’re going to have carb flu (nearly everyone does unless you ease into it), so why intensify the carb flu? It’s kind of like people who want to give up caffeine. Why make yourself miserable? Gradually add more and more decaf to your caffeinated beverage or drink less caffeinated teas. We all have challenges in our daily lives so why make it more difficult than it needs to be?
When coaching clients I take them where they are, ask what their long term goals are, and then I help them navigate to where they want to go. If someone is coming from SAD I’m going to help them go Paleo before I’d suggest Keto. There’s an intuition that you have to tap into which lets you know that your body may be ready for Keto.
What’s The Difference Between Paleo and Primal?
The difference between the Paleo diet and the Primal diet is dairy. Primal allows for dairy whereas Paleo does not. The thinking behind dairy in the Paleo world: If you have ancestors from the higher latitudes (near the poles) there is a very short growing season for plant life. It is thought that in order to survive these ancestors would have relied on milk to help get through the lean times. Consequently, those who could consume this food source had a better chance for survival and passed their genes to the next generation.
On the flip side, those who have ancestors from the equatorial region of the planet had access to plant life year-round. They didn’t have to rely on dairy and today most of the people who are lactose intolerant have genetics that come from this region.
That being said, the casein protein in dairy behaves in much the same way that gluten does in the body. Typically if you’re sensitive to gluten then there’s a good chance you’re also sensitive to dairy. The best way to know where you stand is to eliminate it for 30 days during a Whole 30 or a strict month of Paleo and then try it out. Many discover that they do better with goat milk than cow milk because it’s a different type of casein.
What’s The Difference Between Paleo and Autoimmune Paleo?
Autoimmune Paleo is much stricter than Paleo but for good reason. Most autoimmune diseases are preceded by a leaky gut and autoimmune paleo removes all of the foods that have the potential to cross the intestinal barrier. When a person has leaky gut they essentially have undigested food particles leaking out of their intestines into their body cavity. The immune system senses these foreign particles and over time the immune response turns into an autoimmune response, that is, the body begins attacking itself. Which autoimmune disease you get depends on your genetics. Some have had great success with Autoimmune Paleo but others do not.
There are some people who find that the lectins, plant compounds, and fiber in vegetables are simply too much for them. One such person is a gal named Mikhaila Peterson. Taken from her website:
“I was a really sick person since I was 2. I was prone to getting bacterial infections (strep throat, pneumonia, etc.), yeast infections, colds, etc. I was diagnosed with severe rheumatoid arthritis when I was 7 and ended up with multiple joints replaced at age 17. I started antidepressants for severe depression/anxiety in grade 5. I suffered from “idiopathic hypersomnia” – aka I couldn’t wake up. I spent approximately 17 hours a day sleeping and the rest in a half daze. I had itchy skin starting at age 14 that I just ignored. Then my skin problems started at about age 19. “
Mikhaila is a carnivore, that is, her diet only consists of meat. I’ve been following Dr. Shawn Baker and Dr. Georgia Ede and reading the research and anecdotal evidence they present. I’ve even tried carnivore myself.
What I Know For Sure
We are all unique individuals and what works for one may or may not work for another. I think one of the greatest mistakes humans have made is to suggest that everyone eat the same thing in the same quantity. (Looking at you food pyramid) All diets have a universal principle that generally makes anyone who follows them feel better: Don’t eat fast food or processed food. That by itself will get you a long way but if you’re not thriving, you’re dealing with health issues like: insomnia, mood disorders, autoimmunity, an inability to lose weight, a lack of energy, an overall lack of vibrancy, it may be time to consider a real food approach to healing.
Make sure you have a physician who will work with you on your Primal Health Journey, especially if you’re taking medications, some won’t. Look for a doctor who practices functional medicine, a naturopath, osteopath, or search The Paleo Physicians network.
Originally posted on April 22, 2019 @ 11:51
