Why an Anti-Inflammatory Diet

My journey toward adopting the Anti-Inflammatory Diet called Paleo AIP has been long and winding. It started a few years ago when I read the book "The Calorie Myth." I had some success following that book's diet and exercise program. I lost 3 inches on my waist while eating far more food with each meal than I had previously.

Unfortunately, in order to avoid inconveniencing others, I stopped following that diet during a vacation and never really got completely back on it.

Then, 2 years ago, I went to see a sleep doctor who diagnosed my difficulty resting: sleep apnea. In the process of completing a sleep study and follow-up consultations, each time I visited the doctor, I saw that I had gained another 10 lbs. This consistent increase was incredibly frustrating because I was trying to follow what I remembered of "The Calorie Myth," although, in retrospect, probably not strictly enough. I was drinking a lot of soda to keep myself going during the day, and I was only exercising once a week instead of every other day.

My sleep doctor recommended something she called "the TQI (To Quiet Inflammation) diet," created by a woman who lives on Vashon Island, near Seattle. After some digging on the internet, I finally found her website and her book, "The Abascal Way: To Quiet Inflammation for Health and Weight Loss." I ordered the material and started reading.

As I explored her writing, I had a tough time understanding her book and found it difficult to internalize the principles behind her proscriptions. I also read several other diet books that seemed uninspired or not quite right for me. My mind kept gravitating toward an Anti-Inflammatory approach. I figured I should give it another chance, since the idea of reducing inflammatory stress resonated with the theoretical framework presented in "The Calorie Myth"--that weight loss or gain is about hormones, not about "calories in/calories out."

So, I delved into more anti-inflammatory diet books. I searched for a program that would provide me with a predefined meal plan and exercise regimen, so that I wouldn't need to reinvent the wheel with every ingredient.

I found a couple books on Amazon that had high ratings and looked promising: "The Immune System Recovery Plan: A Doctor's 4-step Program to Treat Autoimmune Disease" and "The Paleo Approach: Reverse Autoimmune Disease and Heal Your Body"

I started reading the first book and adopted its recommendations one at a time. First, I removed gluten. Then I dropped corn from any source, including high fructose corn syrup. Eliminating corn is tough for anyone in modern society. Try going to a Mexican Restaurant: ordering fajitas without tortillas will earn you bizarre looks from any waiter. The difficulty eliminating corn is compounded for me. Work tempts me with giant glass-door fridges packed with soft drinks.

At this point, despite foregoing significant chunks of my normal diet, I wasn't making any visible progress, and I was only feeling marginally better. In addition, I was falling asleep trying to read Recovery Plan. So, I switched to perusing The Paleo Approach.

And . . . instantly hooked! The beginning of The Paleo Approach is a dense explanation of how the immune system works, how the gut functions, and how autoimmune disease starts. To my great surprise, I learned that psoriasis is an autoimmune disease--so is inverse psoriasis, which is my specific malady (normal psoriasis is on the extremities [e.g. arms or legs] while inverse is closer to the core of the body).

I thought, "Why wasn't I told this?!?" (I might have been told, but I definitely don't remember.) "I can bring my psoriasis under control without steroids!" From that moment, I began to follow the precepts of the book in earnest.

Each inflammatory food the book presented, I eliminated from my diet. I also paid more attention to my body's response to food, such as whether or not I got flu symptoms (e.g. phlegm or body aches) or intestinal grumblings within 30 minutes of eating. I used to ignore those feelings, because I could always work through them, and I needed to quickly resume whatever I was working on. But, now I use those feelings as cues that my body is responding negatively to something in the food and that I should figure out what the offending ingredient is and avoid it.

A couple of weeks reading The Paleo Approach helped me understand what was happening and alter my diet positively. The transition was a little tough (Alas, potato chips!) but I worked through it with the help of awesome steaks (simple, salt-dusted, and seriously delish!); lots of mixed greens with quality, flavorful olive oil and vinegar; and crunchy baby carrots.

After 4 weeks, my weight loss was visible, and I started getting comments. I continued losing weight for about another 8 weeks. My weight has since plateaued, but I am much more energetic, I can exercise more easily (I run without feeling asthmatic which has never happened to me), and food tastes better. My cravings for chips have faded, replaced by nutritious alternatives: plantain chips.

Changing my diet alone didn't completely reverse my inverse psoriasis. The inflammation died down. At the 12-week mark, I stopped applying my medications, but I still had some redness. So, I changed the soap I use. Now, I can barely see my symptoms. I am going to continue to keep an eye out for agents of inflammation and eradicate them from my daily life.

Psoriasis has no cure: I will have this autoimmune disease for the remainder of my life. But, as I continue this anti-inflammation diet, I am hopeful that my symptoms will almost completely disappear, and only rarely, if ever, showing up again. Once my symptoms improve long enough, I should be able to reintroduce some of the foods I have eliminated, knowing that my body will give me cues about what it will and won't tolerate.

Weight Loss Through Diet

Pickles: I've lost 55 lbs in the last 4 months. I dropped from 250 to 195 and it's entirely due to my diet. And I don't mean "diet" as how much I consume--I'm eating a lot of food each day. I mean "diet" as what I consume--where I choose to get my nutrients from.

When starting this diet my goal wasn't losing weight; it's just an amazing side-effect. I started down this path because I wanted to bring my psoriasis under control. As I researched this class of diets the books I read frequently mentioned weight loss, so I knew that I might see some weight reduction but I didn't expect to lose this much and definitely not this quickly.

So what is this miracle diet? The short answer is an "anti-inflammatory diet". The long answer is much more involved; I followed 3 diets simultaneously.

At the core, I am choosing to follow the Paleo Auto-Immune Protocol (a.k.a. Paleo AIP) because food outside of that diet appears to contribute to my psoriasis. The second diet was low FODMAP because high FODMAP foods cause me digestive distress. Finally, I also avoid high-fructose foods because I have fructose malabsorption meaning lots of fructose also causes digestive distress.

In the last 4 months my gut has healed a little so I have relaxed my FODMAP restrictions; I'll eat high FODMAP food, just not in large quantities. I expect to start eating more fructose, but I am waiting a while longer before testing that. However, I believe I will need to follow Paleo AIP--or some other anti-inflammatory diet--the rest of my life. My psoriasis symptoms have improved and almost disappeared, but it's taking a lot of time and deliberate choices throughout my life.

This post is the start of a series of posts which will explain what I've learned over the last few years about diet and exercise. Along the way I will detail my adventures in cooking while Pineapple critiques my efforts. From the best steak ever and my smoothie recipes, to newly-discovered allergies.

I'll occasionally cover non-food topics such as my exercise regiment or how I improved my symptoms by changing my soap. But I promise that the vast majority of my posts will be focused on food.