How I’m Cleaning Up My Diet (And Some Interesting Science on Longevity)

I’m trying to fix up my diet. I’m doing this because I was suffering from some GI issues, which I think were caused by a protein shake I’ve been drinking like water. I’ve only just started this process, but there are a variety of ideas that I keep coming across that I believe are worth looking into. I put the recommendations first since that’s probably what you came for.

Recommendations

Here are the actionable things:

• Elimination diets seem to be a good way of figuring out what foods are causing you problems. This involves starting from an incredibly bland and barebones diet and then slowly adding in foods of different types and seeing how your body responds. This is a pretty good tutorial on how to execute one: https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/elimination-diet#section2 

• Foods I’m confident everybody should get rid of:

  • Sugary foods (soda, candy, etc.). If you want a treat, I think no more than once a week is a good idea. Fruits and dark chocolate are a good way to wean yourself off of these foods. Your taste buds adapt to dietary changes, so pretty soon those fruits will be sweet enough for you and soda/candy will be too sweet for you to enjoy, making this process much easier. 

  • Artificial sweeteners. These tend to be used as a way to reduce sugar intake but everything I’ve read about them indicates that they may be just as damaging if not worse than sugar. 

  • Processed foods (most stuff that’s in a package, food that has a lot of ingredients, food with ingredients that you can’t pronounce). A lot of the preservatives and multisyllabic ingredients that are in these foods are pretty bad for you and can be the cause of inflammation. There’s also the issue of bio-availability of micronutrients (if they exist in the first place). Many of these foods are processed in such a way that it’s hard to get the micronutrients out of the food. 

• Don’t spend a lot of time trying to parse through the literature and information on which diet is best. You’ll (probably) get lost in a lot of tangential nonsense that misses the point of trying to improve your health. Try different diets out and pick what works for you. 

• These are the supplements that I take based on what I’ve read:

  • Omega-3 fish oil: anti-inflammatory, nootropic. One of the key things I’ve read is to have a high ratio of omega-3 to omega-6 fatty acids

  • Turmeric (curcumin): anti-inflammatory, nootropic

  • Ashwagandha: anti-inflammatory, nootropic. Useful in decreasing anxiety

  • Deglycyrrhizinated licorice: this is supposed to coat the lining of the stomach, so it’s quite useful if you suffer from GI issues

• Foods that are supposed to be good for the microbiome:

  • Kefir

  • Kimchi

  • Sauerkraut

  • Basically, anything that’s fermented

• Things like probiotics are mostly useless. Also, don’t take antibiotics for viruses.

• Some non-food related things you can do to also decrease inflammation and manage the stress response that may play into managing autoimmune conditions:

  • Exercise. Cardio and strength training, try to get both in. You don’t need to be running marathons or pumping iron like Arnold, but making these a habit have too many benefits to lift.

  • Some form of mindfulness. Examples include meditation, Qi Gong, yoga. Keep trying different options until one sticks.

  • Fix your sleep - no sleeping pills. I’d highly recommend looking into CBT-i, which is cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia. It has a high effectiveness and can help wean you off of sleep pills. This is a very good overview of CBT-i: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YjJGfDHCaBU . There are also books that’ll guide you through it. 

  • Make friends who you can be emotionally open with. I’ll write something about how I got over social anxiety in the future. In the meantime, the best resource I’ve got for this task is https://markmanson.net/, though this point is the most non-obvious one on this list. 

  • Therapy. If you have some form of PTSD, I’d look into doing EMDR to process that. PTSD is a chronic stress disorder and will lead to all kinds of inflammation and chronic illness as well as a higher predisposition to addictions and substance abuse. If you’re dealing with depression or anxiety, cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) is highly effective. If getting a therapist is out of question at the moment, Feeling Good by Michael Burns is a very good guide through CBT. 

  • Supplements I take for anxiety not listed previously:

    • L-theanine

    • Creatine

• The fewer medications that you can take, the better. Obviously consult your doctors on this point and don’t let me determine what you should do, but in general, using medications to manage chronic illnesses will introduce other side effects. If you can make the appropriate lifestyle changes that will help you manage the underlying issues, I think it’s worth it. Examples of medications I think one should try to wean off of are antidepressants, PPI’s (proton pump inhibitors), etc.

Vegan vs Carnivore

While everybody agrees that the standard American diet is not healthy, there’s almost zero agreement as to what’s a better alternative. People’s opinions on nutrition seem to be just as polarized as their opinions on politics. Unfortunately that means I’m not completely confident about what I should do with my diet. I really enjoyed this video that explains why nutrition science is so confusing. 

So where does this leave me? Frankly, I’m not sure. I’m trying to go to a more plant based diet at the moment. But I do want to talk about the other dietary regimens I’ve looked at.

The carnivore diet is the most extreme one I’ve seen. Having been a lifelong vegetarian, it’s the antithesis of what I’d want to do. But I can’t ignore the fact that many people see a reduction in their chronic illnesses and conditions. Most of the doctors who promote this diet cite issues such as leaky gut and the destructive effects of fiber, among other things that would impel one to stop eating plants. You’re also not supposed to eat just any meat product; you’re supposed to avoid processed meats that you’d find in fast foods (though I don’t see much discipline from followers of this diet in making sure their meat comes strictly from animals that aren’t tampered with). This diet is a subset of the keto diet, which puts one in ketosis where they use endogenous ketones as opposed to carbs to fuel the body. People used to the standard American diet would probably find keto easier to pull off than the vegan diet since eating meat is tied into American culture. 

On the other end of the spectrum, we have the vegan diet, which is more well known. It involves only eating plant based foods, and generally suggests eating these foods as close to their natural state as possible. The basis of this diet is that animal products are the main drivers of diseases such as heart disease, diabetes, etc. There’s a strong push to avoid processed foods in general, and I tend to see more discipline from vegans in avoiding them. 

There are two primary things I think both extremes on the spectrum have in common. The first is that both recognize the destructive nature of processed foods and sugar on our body. There’s a pervasive skepticism to the standard American diet as well as an alarm at how many seemingly innocent foods are actually processed or packed full of sugar.

The more interesting commonality between these two camps however is the cult-like behavior both sides engage in. This article here provides an overview on the signs of cult behavior. If you give r/vegan and r/zerocarb a look, then you’ll be able to spot the signs of both camps being cult-like (at varying levels of intensity). What I find particularly interesting is that either side consistently takes jabs at their opponent and the highest voted content on either subreddit is memes that aggressively push the subreddit’s underlying ideology or attack the opposing camp. This is what I mean when I say talking about diet is like talking about politics. I believe veganism as a camp has been around longer than the carnivore camp, but the vegan camp almost necessarily induced the creation of a carnivore camp due to both the often extreme language vegans can use towards non-vegans as well as the fact that veganism is attacking something that is seen as a pillar to American culture. 

In any case, if either side is operating as a cult, it follows that anybody trying to get information without falling into the event horizon of either side will end up confused. For this reason, I think the minimal principle we can hold is removing sugar and processed foods from our diets. More importantly, if both extremes have examples of people who thrive with their corresponding diet, it’s probably the case that you need to figure out what is best for your body. 

Microbiome

The microbiome is something I’ve been seeing pop up repeatedly that I think is worth following given the major claims made about its importance in health and the fact that it’s only been seeing acceptance in the medical establishment recently. There are all kinds of claims being made about the microbiome, such as the idea that it holds 95% of the body’s serotonin supply and that the microbiome is the body’s “second brain.” All of these claims deserve to be held up to scrutiny and shouldn’t be taken at face value, but it does seem like there’s a lot of interesting research coming out on the microbiome. 

The main reason I’m interested in the microbiome is because it seems to be tied into all kinds of chronic illnesses, the ones that stick around for a long period of time and are particularly difficult to treat. Articles like this that talk about how scientists influenced the microbiome to fight off chronic GI diseases give some credence to the idea that many inflammatory diseases, particularly linked to the GI, may secretly find a solution in a healthier microbiome. This link means that eating a diet that supports the microbiome would be a key method in preventing some chronic illnesses. There also seems to be some research discussing how personality is influenced by the gut microbiome, which plays into the idea that the gut produces 95% of the body’s serotonin. I read this book a while back that talks about how important the gut is for brain health and clearing up brain fog, so the microbiome may be of interest to those trying to get more mileage out of their mind.

Reading about the microbiome also involves reading about the different substances that supposedly destroy it. One of my cardinal sins has been using artificial sweeteners in my protein shakes, which apparently turn the microbiome toxic. This doesn’t surprise me given all of the other negative things I’ve read about artificial sweeteners, so I’ll be staying away from those. Usage of antibiotics also devastates the microbiome, which makes sense since antibiotics are used to treat bacterial infections. While I still plan on taking antibiotics if I ever get a case of flesh eating bacteria or an h pylori infection, I’m probably going to be more hesitant to use them for much more manageable infections or things that may not even be a bacterial infection. In any case, it seems that the microbiome is a fragile system, but most of the substances that damage it are things that I’d probably avoid anyways. 

Inflammation, Chronic Disease, and the Stress Response

An idea that’s been popping up is that certain foods can cause inflammation, the chronic type of inflammation that leads to disease. I lack the scientific background to rigorously scrutinize these claims, but the logic is convincing. It centers on the idea that inflammation was an advantageous response for early humans that suffered some sort of trauma. The inflammation would kill off any bacteria that could infect the human, which would give the human a fighting chance in surviving the trauma. Inflammation in this acute time period is useful, but it is not meant to last over a longer time span. The logic goes that early humans would not need to worry about eating an inflammatory diet since they had evolved to live eating the foods around them. It’s a different story for modern humans that are eating all kinds of processed foods that are “foreign” to the body. The idea is that many of these foods lead to the same inflammation response, but chronically having this inflammation would tell the body that it needs an immune response going all the time, which is the root of many of these chronic illnesses that are fundamentally autoimmune illnesses.

Now is this true? I don’t know. But I’m inclined to believe this line of logic for a variety of reasons. One is this paper that discusses how inflammation may be key to Alzheimers. This paper here talks about the role of inflammation in diabetes, which is a disease that is very much modulated by food. Diseases like irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) seem to have inflammation playing a destructive role according to this paper. These are all diseases that are chronic and have complex mechanisms of action. The general complexity of the mechanisms of action make me think that the faults are system wide, which aligns with the idea that chronic inflammation through the entire body would play a key role in these diseases.

Even more intriguing is the idea that depression is accompanied by massive system-wide inflammation. This video builds on the link between depression and inflammation by discussing how depression may be an inbuilt evolutionary mechanism that prevents us from spreading disease to other humans when we are infected, which aligns with depression accompanying inflammation. Another piece of evidence that falls in line with this idea is that exercise is a better treatment for the clinically depressed than many antidepressants, which makes sense given that exercise acts as an anti-inflammatory.

All of this makes for a very interesting story, but things become even more interesting when we factor in the inflammatory role of stress on the body and how stress management is often key to controlling many chronic illnesses. This paper here discusses how stress and inflammation are relevant to depression. Many people’s bouts of depression begin due to chronic stresses and lead to thought patterns that lead to depressive behavior, but very often the depressive behavior is the same kind of behavior that would prevent an infected human from passing on their infection in the early human frame of reference. 

If one takes a bird’s eye view of all of these different interlinking threads, they may predict that a lot of aging research focuses on the role of inflammation and the stress response in causing chronic disease. From my discussion with a friend who does aging research, it seems that many scientific articles in the field of preventative medicine do focus on inflammation. This fact makes me optimistic about the goal of reducing inflammation and stress through diet and lifestyle for the long run. 

Atavism and Medical Establishment Skepticism

Atavism - a tendency to revert to something ancient or ancestral

The largest recurring theme through this investigation has been atavism, or reverting back to a diet that is more in line with what ancient humans probably ate. It’s clear that processed foods are terrible for us and that it’s safer to eat foods that are closer to their natural form. Vegetables not only are packed full of micronutrients that we know are key to our proper functioning, but they probably also have a lot of micronutrients that we don’t know about yet which we need to function. Given the option between taking a pill for your daily requirement of magnesium and eating enough spinach to get your daily dose of magnesium, it’s a better idea to do the latter since there may be a bunch of other nutrients we don’t yet know about that help us function. Similarly, it’d be a better idea to eat free range meat that was fed a diet free of antibiotics and growth hormones than something from McDonalds. 

An unfortunate reality is that eating foods that are closer to their natural form tends to cost more. While you may prefer eating the free range meat, if you’re living paycheck to paycheck you may be forced to buy the meat that was treated with a variety of antibiotics and chemicals. I’d like to see more initiatives that help make healthier foods more affordable. 

The principle of atavism applies outside of foods as well. It seems that the world of clinical psychology is undergoing a similar revolution through its rediscovering many of the ideas put forth by eastern philosophies, with the advent of mindfulness. There seem to be several bodies of knowledge that are advancing by integrating many of the “holistic” ideas that more ancient bodies of knowledge put forth. In fact, many of the herbs and spices that I’ve read help reduce inflammation are foods advocated in the Ayurveda, an alternative medicine system from India. That doesn’t mean we should completely throw away knowledge from the “west”, which has tended towards classification and atomism, but that we should use both bodies of knowledge. I believe many of these ancient bodies of knowledge, which tend not to have hard established science backing them yet, will point the way for where science should investigate.

How far do we take this principle of atavism? If one follows it to its logical conclusions, then they’d probably be an anti-vaxxer and protest the usage of GMO’s. While I now understand why people have these positions, I still don’t hold them. I still haven’t found papers linking the usage of vaccines to increased risk of any chronic illness, and I’m not convinced that organic foods are really healthier than GMO’s, mostly since GMO’s forego the usage of heavy industrial pesticides. That being said, blind trust in genetically modified foods is also something to be avoided. 

On a similar note, I understand why some people are skeptical of the current medical establishment. The current paradigm of prescribing pills for every illness is ineffective for chronic illnesses. Pills come with all sorts of side effects and usually treat the symptoms. Most doctors seem to be well trained in matching pills to symptoms but aren’t well versed in topics such as nutrition or lifestyle changes outside of what most would consider common sense. When you hear about the influence pharmaceutical companies have over doctors as well, it becomes easy to believe that doctors are conspiring to keep the American population sick so that big pharma can continue making money. I think Hanlon’s razor applies well to this situation though, that we should never attribute to malice what can be explained by stupidity. I don’t think doctors are conspiring against the average person. It’s more that medical schools traditionally have had very few courses on nutrition and our civilization’s paradigm of thinking embraces atomism and ignores holism. This becomes evident when we talk about diseases like fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue syndrome, which are system wide issues that can’t be boiled down to a single gene or a single organ malfunctioning in some very specific reaction. From what I’ve read about fibromyalgia, it seems like a diagnosis slapped onto people who have unexplained system-wide pain. And it doesn’t seem like patients who take conventional treatments necessarily are able to return to their old, pain free life in the same way somebody who’s infected with H. Pylori takes antibiotics and feels back to normal in two weeks. 

That being said, there are doctors who do a good job of learning the nutrition side of things and are not so keen to push pills. There are also professionals who are not doctors that can aid in these sorts of issues, such as nutritionists and psychotherapists. The moral of the story I can see from all of this is that we shouldn’t have blanket skepticism of the medical establishment but should integrate non-traditional bodies of knowledge in understanding our health that also allow us to improve upon the existing medical body of knowledge.