During lyme, I followed the advice of many and tried to lower the amount of fruits I usually ate.
I'm born in the tropics, and always ate many fruits a day. Never missed a day without fruits.
Then lyme came after 30, and I thought I had skin candida, and followed (for a short time) the advice of lowering sugar fruits and increasing protein.
The result was that I felt like dying, literally. I felt if I got on with that advice, I wouldn't survive, LITERALLY.
So I dropped all that advice and continued on fruits, daily, never missing a day without, and healed from lyme, never with a fruit break.
Any type of fruit, be it sweet or less sweet.
Then years later, I stumbled on Anthony William that talked about Fruit Fear.
It felt like a breeze of fresh air. Finally someone talking about what I always felt.
I kept thanking fruits, herbs, and spices for healing from lyme. And homeopathics.
How could I drop fruits and herbs if they were the only thing that allowed me to survive? No.
Fruit avoidance was for me like going towards death.
Even dr Klingh said that fruits carry more good than bad (because I think he also bought that story of fruits causing caries, disease, candida).
Since reading Anthony, I moved to even a SUPER INTENSIFIED fruit consumption:
I eat cups with blueberries, had 3 apples and 1 banana for breakfast, I consume half a melon in one go as a little snack easily,...
... take as many bananas I feel like, dates in great numbers, and still force myself to go on fruit JUICES that I never enjoyed (if they are bottled).
I'd rather take fruit juices than spend hours without drinking (which was my case). So it's like a treat, to entice me to drink more.
And symptoms do not budge. Nothing.
I do salads with honey, maple syrup, orange juice and still force myself to cut always a fruit in the salad bowl.
The problem on my skin, that I thought was candida, that comes on cold months of winter (chilblains / pernio) never really react to fruit consumption.
But it reacts to milk products and gluten. I flare for sure if I take these products. Or added sugar.
More recently, I realized that the heavier the meal, the more symptoms will increase. It's not necessarily immediately, but a bit delayed. I'll get delayed flares with heavy meals (meaning, animal protein or high fat meals).
So I'm eating more veggies, low fat, low protein, and REALLY HIGH FRUIT.
I think I definitively went past fruit fear. I enjoy immensely the sweetness of fruits.
This is not to say that you can go consume white or brown sugar because they aren't healthy. Only fruit sugar COMBINED with nutrients are fine.
What causes my symptoms are some NO LIST FOODS such as gluten, high oily, fat foods, artificial sugar, lots of grains, preservatives, chemicals in food, MSG, stuff like that.
Fruit is among the most antioxidant, life prolonging strategies you can make to get off chronic disease.
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Keebler
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- You say: "Only fruit sugar COMBINED with nutrients are fine." (end quote)
That is not - not - not true.
Also not true about honey & maple syrup.
They are still highly condensed carbohydrates / sugars and can cause a spike in blood glucose / contribute fatty liver in individuals with glucose / fructose metabolism issues (many times these go undiagnosed).
Sugar is sugar (whatever type of sugar it is or from which source) once in our bodies no matter the source. Anything we put in our mouth is either protein, fat or carbohydrate.
Even whole fruit gets broken down fairly fast to a simple sugar / fructose. Fruit juice is much worse but whole fruit does not get a full pass.
For those who know, it's not fear that the author you cite who goes on his "feelings" suggests to bully us into buying his books because we don't want to be sissies, after all, and we would love to eat all the fruit.
The science does not back up claims that fruit is a "safe" food in large, or even moderate amounts (because our idea of "moderate" has flown the coup). And it depends on how a person's body is working to process the carbohydrates consumed.
But, I hope, we are wiser now and see the reality and the knowledge of the deception and the lies we often tell ourselves about the seemingly "natural" state of fruit.
The sugar content of most modern fruits trick our brains to not see the reason we need to be very cautious. And, hey, don't we deserve to be happy? Want some candy? It grows right on trees & bushes now that the food industry has us figured out. We've been manipulated.
Fruits may work for you but the high sugar / fructose content of fruits is also harming many others. In excess, and that can be over one serving a day, can damage the liver, contribute to insulin and blood glucose issues, etc.
Fruit is not at all as "natural" as we might once have thought. It's created to be much - much - sweeter than the fruits our ancestors knew. It's really become a processed food in how the scientists have engineered the sweetness for a modern taste.
It's available around the clock, around all seasons - much different than the small amounts our ancestors might have come across.
There are a few fruits (such as dark berries / tart cherries) that are lower in sugars yet still just a half cup is considered a serving that is safe in size and sugar / fructose content. And, for some with insulin resistance or liver damage, even these are best kept to a minimum.
Insulin resistance and diabetes number are sky high. Blindness, kidney failure and amputations are also sky high as a result. That's a fear that is healthy & reasonable enough to avoid the high sugar / fructose contents & amount that you are talking about.
In addition to this farce about eating so much fruit - the glycemic index is also a farce if one considers just that and not the actual carbohydrates number in the fruits one might consume.
More important is the rise in blood glucose for many people and the liver stress, too, since half the sugar in fruits is fructose, that goes straight to the liver and can cause fatty liver disease.
Honey and maple syrup, too, need to be considered for the carbohydrate content. It's all sugar. And that poses a clear and present danger for most of the human population.
The sugars in fruit turn on the addictive / pleasure seeking part of our brain, just like powdered sugar does, just like drugs, too.
We should have fear - and knowledge - of the damage all the sugars (no matter the name) can do to our bodies when they go over a certain carb count of more than about ten grams of carbohydrate a day to a serving. That's approximately a half cup of berries. And best following a meal with protein and fat so the hit is not too hard.
But some with glucose metabolism issues might not be able to do even a half cup and do best with nutrients from other foods.
Sugar is sugar - whether from whole food or not. It's still sugar very quickly in our bodies. We need to know the numbers: of the carbs that go into our mouths and then the numbers of our blood glucose in the next hour & two hours to see how we do with our meals.
It's a good idea for everyone to have a home blood glucose meter so they can check this. Tests at the doctors office miss a lot.
Even the HBa1c / a1c tests can miss a problem as that's an average of 30 days. If one has high spikes and low crashes, that can still even out and look okay but not see the danger sign.
If there is one thing that we can all do for our health and our future, it's to get our own blood glucose meter and test strips to test out various foods we eat in the hour and two afterward.
I was able to borrow a friend's meter a couple months ago and she gave me 50 strips as they cost her just a few bucks.
It was eye opening. I never would have believed some of the foods I thought were so okay on the glycemic index were so harmful to me.
My body did okay and BG barely rose
(for me, maybe not for all, though? Dr. Bernstein says that just one single blackberry can send his blood sugar up 7 points and as a T1D, a serving would be very risky for him).
with a carefully measured 1/3 cup of blueberries and also with raspberries on a different day. Both eaten with 1/3 cup of full fat whole yogurt. As my servings used to be twice that, it looks at first a measly amount.
But since I'm on a ketogenic diet (for seizure management) even full fat yogurt has some carbs and that combination costs me a lot of my "carb budget" with not so much room for lower carb foods.
Though, as I limit my total carbs to 20 grams (total, not net) per day, and no more than 10 per the two meals I eat a day . . . so, it's best that I get those from certain green vegetables.
The body has about 5 grams of glucose circulating at any point in time. More than that is stored as fat for (hopefully - later use but many never use that up when the food supply is over the top &/or too frequent).
Individuals will respond differently, of course. I'm not suggesting anyone follow one path or another.
It is important to know, though, that high carbohydrates can contribute to trouble with the lining / flow of blood vessels and also contribute to heart disease and even possibly to Alzheimer's which is now called Type 3 Diabetes.
[see the lectures of "Ivor Cummins" on YouTube for clarity.]
What I am urging is that before consuming certain foods, to consider your "carb budget" for the meal / day . . . and know how foods consumed will affect your blood glucose stability.
Do not rely on the "glycemic index" as that has major flaws.
Sadly, these meters can cost a bit, well, not so much the meters but the strips. For some, if you have any sign of insulin resistance / metabolic syndrome, your doctor might write a prescription and the cost might be mostly covered.
Still, a prescription is not required and though can get costly 25 or 50 strips should be enough to get a good idea how certain foods act regarding glucose in your body.
It's likely more important than buying vitamins for a couple months to have a glucose test kit.
Dr. Gary Fettke - YouTube "Is Fruit Good or Bad ?" 22:42
(my words) orthopedist who got tired of doing amputations on his diabetic patients and turned to low carb / high fat plans and has seen diabetes reverse for many.
If we are not diabetic, there are ways to avoid the damage of that . . . mostly by limiting our sugars (carbohydrates) . Type 2 Diabetes is very often preventable.
And if we have insulin resistance, pre-diabetes or diabetes, there are ways to reverse this. Exploring the Virta Health website is a good start to one's personal research on how food affects our blood glucose levels:
3-minute video with Nina Teicholz, nutrition researcher -
[ 02-19-2019, 02:05 PM: Message edited by: Keebler ]
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Brussels
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Hey Keebler, that's exactly what he's talking about.
Fruit fear, all sugars are sugars.
Until I haven't given way to fully add fruits to my diet like in GREAT AMOUNTS (I mean, dozens of fruits a day), my weight could not really stabilize.
I went ups and downs, more downs than ups. Now, I'm gaining bits of weight and I hope to get off the dangerous underweight I've been for the last 7 years.
Well, since lyme was gone, I lost weight, slowly but surely.
And my fruit allergies only increased, until I got the fructose intolerance label.
When I started increasing fruits in these great amounts, I was still allergic, and so was my daughter. Very much allergic to many fruits.
The more fruits we eat, the less allergic we get. I think I have barely any allergies now.
My daughter did not gain a new fruit allergy this time either.
We were fearing MCAD at a certain point.
So just continue on your low fruit sugar diet. Maybe it's good for you.
For us, we finally feel we're out of danger of developing MCAD, chemical sensitivities etc.
Even our electrosmog sensitivity seems to be almost fully gone.
I totally attribute that to adding even MORE fruits to my diet. I had been gluten free, milk product free for some time.
Then I became egg free and diminished grains even more (even though I still eat grains).
Our ancestors lived on veggies and fruits, not on 'paleo' or 'keto' diet full of nuts and full of meats.
The brain runs on glucose.
When 'researchers' speak of sugar, they put STARCHES / CARBS / processed sugar / fruits all in the same pot, and then they tell: sugar is good, sugar is bad (but they do not separate sources of sugar from fruits).
The brain runs on glucose. Show me a study where they SEPARATE sugar from fruits in ONE STUDY, and SUGAR from carbs in another and ARTIFICIAL sugars in another.
Nope. They'll put all in the same bag and take their conclusions!
Posts: 6199 | From Brussels | Registered: Oct 2007
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Keebler
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- The brain can run on glucose or ketones (from fat).
Even for those who are on very low carb / ketogenic (or even who eat only meat), our bodies can make its own glucose in the small amounts needed. It's amazing, really.
All carbs do turn to sugar in the body - some we can use right away. But not everyone has the same capacity. Fruit - more than a half cup or a cup a day - can contribute to glucose and insulin issues for those who have these metabolic problems -- and many do, undiagnosed..
The links have lots of detail regarding some of your comments. I wish you had been able to read / watch those as so much is explained.
"the more fruits we eat" . .. . is bad advice. The high amounts you suggest are flat out dangerous for many.
Rather, a half-cup a day, different fruits on different days, seem more reasonable.
Still, when people have their own glucose meters, it's a wonderful tool to see how certain foods worth for their individual bodies one, two, perhaps three hours post meal & how long it might take to have a high come down.
Highs are dangerous for many reason. Bernstein's book explains why, even if one is not diabetic, a high sugar diet (even if the high sugar is from fruit) can set one up to develop diabetes). -
[ 02-19-2019, 09:35 PM: Message edited by: Keebler ]
Posts: 48021 | From Tree House | Registered: Jul 2007
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Brussels
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And you, Keebler is unfortunately still fighting lyme for more than a decade, if my memory is good.
I'll be ONE DECADE lyme free now, in the month of May.
So will my daughter be.
Sorry to say that, I know I'm being mean, but it is a truth, right?
Each one with its own truth, but mine is not paleo nor keto!
I'm still fighting pre-lyme skin problems, but even these are getting better every year.
It's now reduced to a month, maybe 2 of suffering, while before during lyme, it could even go much worse - to a whole 12 months of skin suffering hell.
We never stopped eating fruits. Never. During lyme (only short time during my keto or paleo trials), before lyme, after lyme: fruits were always with us.
Just recently, we increased the gear to amazing amounts (never ever in my life I ate so many fruits as I'm eating now). Also with big bowls of salads.
We're eating dates in great numbers, raisins, apples, apple juice, grapes, melons, papaya, pineapple, pitaya, oranges and tangerines, pears, 4 bananas a day even, blueberries...
My gut feels well.
My head feels like it finally woke up from eternal 'thin' but everlasting fog. I even did not know I had fog for so long...
Not like during lyme, but only after it is going away, I can feel I had brain fog the whole time.
It's like a curtain opened and I can finally reach the deep parts of my brain.
I now start to have hopes one day chronic disease will leave us, for good.
Specially the food allergies, electrosensitivity, and tendency to get infections (not lyme, but other stuff like colds, tummy problems, skin problems)...
Maybe not everyone reacts like me, you're right.
This is the first time I feel the food allergy problem can be doomed for my daughter, who was born full of gut problems.
All the last years, we could barely stay on the same fruit as allergies simply developed (like burning the mouth after pomegranates, apples, oranges, grapes, etc etc). An inferno cycle.
It's almost all gone. The same apples that would simply burn my mouth and cause me terrible stomach pains until last year (from my garden) do nothing to me now.
Paleo and keto type of diet never budged a single step forward for me: I just felt like dying, literally.
Posts: 6199 | From Brussels | Registered: Oct 2007
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Keebler
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- You say: "And you, Keebler is unfortunately still fighting lyme for more than a decade, if my memory is good.
I'll be ONE DECADE lyme free now, in the month of May.
So will my daughter be.
Sorry to say that, I know I'm being mean, but it is a truth, right?" (end quote)
--- How dare you demean me for still struggling with lyme while you brag on being free from it.
You know you are being mean, and you still grab onto that?
I have many complicating matters - and I have never - ever - had the finances for any kind of reasonable plan. So knock that off.
You should never demean someone for the state of their health while bragging about yours.
My comments about sugar / carbs / fruits and the risks for some people are valid and acquired from much research.
I'm not saying every one should be LCHF / keto / paleo at all. And each of those have major differences.
What I am saying: people who can get a blood glucose meter and test themselves after certain foods will benefit from that knowledge so they know that those foods either
work for them -- or against them. And adjustments can then be made.
And, yes, all carbs turn to sugars in the body. The amounts consumed at any one time / each day really matter. -
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Brussels
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Sorry, Keebler! I'm not demeaning you.
I almost 'know' you, so long we've been 'talking' to each other though lymenet.
You did a wonderful job here, much more than almost anyone else.
I learned tons with your links in the past, to which I'm thankful.
I'm just telling you that keto and paleo never meant anything for healing lyme for us.
How long have you been on keto?
Keto is high on fats.
When fats enter the blood, it will create a traffic jam. The glucose cannot go anywhere, so any fruit or cookie you eat, will be stuck in your blood, and cannot reach your cells.
You'll immediately see glucose levels rising.
Take off the fats, clean your liver, and glucose can go where it is supposed to go: to your cells.
People do get diabetic eating high fat diets because the sugar does not have a way to get off the traffic jam.
While people swear by keto-paleo, we ran away from them, despite 'studies'.
Also against candida: I kept hearing 'stop fruits' and get better.
Candida ALSO thrives on meats.
How do proteins and meats disappear in nature? Degraded by bacteria and fungi!!
Meats make your body acid.
Pathogens (not only candida) thrive on acidity.
They can't thrive on a basic milieu. They die.
Fruits make your body basic, as well as vegetables.
All meats make your body acid. No exception.
I'm added sugar free for decades. Added sugar makes your body acid.
We healed from lyme eating quite a few servings of fruits a day.
And we get bitten by ticks and we do not develop lyme anymore, for the last 10 years, at least.
We never did keto.
Many studies link DIABETES to FAT consumption now. Leptin resistance to fat consumption.
Just google, you'll find them.
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Brussels
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Hey this is an article about fruits and how beneficial they are.
Fruits help to prevent diabetes type 2 and helps in many other types of diseases.
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Keebler
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- You say ". . . I'm not demeaning you." (end quote)
Yes, you did / are. You even said you knew what you stated was mean and decided to post it anyway. That's even more demean to know you are being mean and not care.
Fruits cannot be helpful for diabetics or prevention of such in the amounts you suggest.
Again, though, with a personal blood glucose meter, people can see for themselves.
The links I posted in a set above answer the myths you raise about fats.
The book: The Big Fat Surprise by Nina Teicholz is an excellent place to see the data in her ten years of researching this. She has many presentations as well.
She discusses the difference in fats that matter. Industrialized vegetables oils (from some such as corn, canola) can be very dangerous. However, fat from animals can help in so many ways.
Other researchers suggest: Even better from grass pastured ruminant animals not fed corn. but if all one can afford is the typical meat, when sugars are low in the diet, many medical markers improve.
The myth about animal / saturated fats was just that: a myth to see margarine, etc.
And, even the liver does well with animal fats, avocados, etc.
And, for those who prefer vegetarian diet, tips are offered by many of those from the links set -- what to avoid, what helps.
The work of Gary Taubes regarding how carbs work (or which ones don't) also goes hand in hand.
It's important to consider what both Taubes and Teicholz bring to the table. My posts cannot do their work justice.
Again: I do hope people will consider the links set above and get a glucose testing kit so they can see for themselves, in their own bodies, how they do with certain foods regarding glucose levels.
For a good foundation to health , nothing really matters more than glucose stability for it affects everything else. Everything. Again, I suggest the lectures of "Ivor Cummins" at YouTube. He explains why I say this far better than I can.
Even better to add: the works of Prof. Timothy Noakes. He was a high carb runner who developed diabetes. He saw the terrible drawn out death his father had with diabetes and he studied and started low carb high fat approach.
I found the study of 7 years that proves that fruit is good for treating diabetes!
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hiker53
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If I could jump in. Keebler, you and Brussels both contribute so much to Lymenet. Please don't argue.
I still have complications from Lyme and am gluten free, dairy free, and eat only one egg per week.
I do eat fruit and I think it is good for you. The brain does run on glucose.
If it does not get enough glucose the brain will run on "ketone bodies."
While I can't claim to be totally well, I still believe in a diet that is moderate in most items. Obviously processed foods are not good for us and since I have the celiac genes I avoid gluten.
I guess my belief for myself is to eat most foods in moderation with a few exceptions. So, I eat my protein, fat and carbs with every meal.
But each person is different, so maybe Brussels can eat a lot of sugary fruit and Keebler can't.
Some day we will all be well.
Blessings!
-------------------- Hiker53
"God is light. In Him there is no darkness." 1John 1:5 Posts: 8887 | From Illinois | Registered: Aug 2004
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hiker53
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If I could jump in. Keebler, you and Brussels both contribute so much to Lymenet. Please don't argue.
I still have complications from Lyme and am gluten free, dairy free, and eat only one egg per week.
I do eat fruit and I think it is good for you. The brain does run on glucose.
If it does not get enough glucose the brain will run on "ketone bodies."
While I can't claim to be totally well, I still believe in a diet that is moderate in most items. Obviously processed foods are not good for us and since I have the celiac genes I avoid gluten.
I guess my belief for myself is to eat most foods in moderation with a few exceptions. So, I eat my protein, fat and carbs with every meal.
But each person is different, so maybe Brussels can eat a lot of sugary fruit and Keebler can't.
Some day we will all be well.
Blessings!
-------------------- Hiker53
"God is light. In Him there is no darkness." 1John 1:5 Posts: 8887 | From Illinois | Registered: Aug 2004
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Keebler
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- It's good to see that "one serving a day" was the measure.
However, " association" does not prove "causation"; and "self-reported" remembering how often a food is eaten has shown to be unreliable. Epidemiological studies also can have pitfalls.
Normally, those in some kind of health study may do other things that contribute to or improve good health outcomes. It's really hard to adjust for this tendency in measurement scales.
Still, it's certainly worth a look as many do love fruit and it's nice to see ways to make that work for people.
As for how to figure out what some studies mean, In her lectures, articles and book, Nina Teicholz explains how to assess various kinds of studies.
" one portion of fruit per day" is a very reasonable amount and likely their portion size is about 4 oz. but my eyes cannot find that stated.
With attention to overall lifestyle, if they walk / bike as daily living, etc. . . . that also will help most people manage one serving a day of fruit.
One portion a day is no where near the amounts you have been suggesting in your posts. The "one serving a day" is likely very manageable when all other food actions are good, too.
One serving is most often considered 100-grams or about 4 ounces / half-cup, but my eyes could not find an amount.
My eyes also could not find how / how often they measured blood glucose.
Most people know how to fool any blood test that is at a certain time of the day but most valuable are measures one, two, and maybe three hours after consumption.
No note if timing of the very reasonable amount was
the fruit alone, or
at the end of a meal containing protein and fat. That would help a great deal in glucose stability.
Again, a good idea for every household to have a glucose meter and test strips to see for themselves, how any food affects their numbers an hour and two hours after a meal.
When such personal testing is done on various food over about a month or two, that's good detail to know then what foods are best, in what amounts, etc. -
Posts: 48021 | From Tree House | Registered: Jul 2007
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Brussels, I've never cut out fruit either. Could the increase in vitamin C from the fruit be part of what's helping you with your skin? My husband always had skin issues and finds vitamin C has eliminated most of them.
I do TERRIBLE on keto or paleo. I get so fatigued I can barely function. I tried it as part of my treatment and did nothing but get worse. I tried it several years post-Lyme when I was working on my gut after having had c diff, and same thing, made me feel bad.
I include as many different foods as possible and don't limit fruit, honey, maple syrup, or anything else that is unprocessed, other than gluten or things I'm allergic to.
I always eat fruit alone because it digests so easily and can ferment in the gut if eaten with anything else. I will put it in a smoothie with leafy greens and nut milk (that I make when I'm making the smoothie).
Like you, I eat unprocessed foods. I eat healthy fat. Fresh fish (I live in Florida). Lots of vegetables. Fruit and dates. Some non-grain "grains", and some grains. Some meat, not a lot.
I'm wondering if your fruit cravings now are making up for not eating as much for so long. I find I'll crave a food I haven't had in a while. I'll eat it every day. Then suddenly I won't want it anymore. Like olives. I ate olives every day for a few months. Same thing with dates.
-------------------- sixgoofykids.blogspot.com Posts: 13449 | From Ohio | Registered: Feb 2007
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