Does anyone on here try to adhere to a diet where it keeps the PH of your body at an Alkaline level or do any spit or urine testing to see what Acidity or alkalinity your body is at? I read that the body functions best when its at an alkaline state.
alkaline diet = no steak, coffee, pasta, Copenhagen, or beer. Good luck with that.
I believe it’s aimed towards cancer patients. I tried to research it back when Randy Coture claimed his new health was because of an alkaline diet. I’m sure he had a professional nutrionast that calculated & prepared his meals. In my research I found it was way to complex, to many restrictions & alot of pro vegan.
Not for me, no thanks!
[quote]titopuente wrote:
Does anyone on here try to adhere to a diet where it keeps the PH of your body at an Alkaline level or do any spit or urine testing to see what Acidity or alkalinity your body is at? I read that the body functions best when its at an alkaline state. [/quote]
Sure, just have plenty of vegetables and a little fruit with each meal.
You don’t need to give up high-acid producing foods, you just need to balance them with alkaline-producing foods.
I don’t see a point to the testing unless you suffer from related health issues.
I’ll start off by making a quick and true point: If your blood pH actually went below 7 (alkaline), that in itself would lead to tremendous health consequences. Blood pH of 7.35-7.45 is considered where the body is “naturally” at and where most bodily processes are meant to occur at.
Certain fruits and most vegetables are alkaline. Almost everything else is slightly acidic. Unless you have a specific health issue, what you should take from this is that you should eat vegetables and fruit (certain types) in your diet to balance out the more acidic foods (meat, etc) in your diet. The reason to consume alkaline foods is not so much to become in an “alkaline” state but moreso to avoid becoming too acidic, if that makes sense.
[quote]DeadRamones wrote:
I believe it’s aimed towards cancer patients. I tried to research it back when Randy Coture claimed his new health was because of an alkaline diet. I’m sure he had a professional nutrionast that calculated & prepared his meals. In my research I found it was way to complex, to many restrictions & alot of pro vegan.
Not for me, no thanks![/quote]
It’s not that complicated at all, just try to balance one serving of something acidic with at least two servings of something that’s non-acidic and your golden. Having a steak? Eat a serving of broccoli and a sweet potato with it and your set.
If your sticking to healthy/whole foods, eating this way isn’t any trouble at all. Just make sure your having fruits and vegetables with every meal, have some lemon with your water, and take your fish oil and you’ll be headed down the right road.
This is one of the things that no matter how many times one drives a stake through its heart, it keeps coming back. I don’t have the energy and have found from experience it is a waste of time.
However, if any want to, google: site:Forums - T Nation - The World's Trusted Community for Elite Fitness alkalinizing
and go for the first thread, first 1 1/2 pages.
[quote]WestCoast7 wrote:
It’s not that complicated at all, just try to balance one serving of something acidic with at least two servings of something that’s non-acidic and your golden. Having a steak? Eat a serving of broccoli and a sweet potato with it and your set.
If your sticking to healthy/whole foods, eating this way isn’t any trouble at all. Just make sure your having fruits and vegetables with every meal, have some lemon with your water, and take your fish oil and you’ll be headed down the right road.[/quote]
Thanks for simplifying.
I actually think this topic is pretty important for members of the weightlifting community. I had been having skin problems for years (yea yea I know it sounds like an infomercial), and to make a long story short, changing my diet and aiming for a more balanced intake of alkaline foods is the change that eventually helped me clear all the inflammation.
It’s simple if you think about it, as weightlifters we are taking in massive amounts of protein everyday (meat, shakes etc.), and protein has a highly acidic effect on the body. I am not saying reduce the amount of protein you are consuming, I am just saying that it is important to match it with an equal amount of vegetables.
Bottom line is, try to match the servings of protein you are consuming with two servings of veggies or other alkaline foods. Even if your not having skin problems or anything similar, it’s a healthy move, and can also help to get you away from processed foods and other junk. Load up on veggies, it does a body good.
I don’t know why I even try, really. When pseudo-science, regardless of absolutely undoubtable proven wrongness – e.g. claiming that calcium has to be “leached from the bones” and so forth – grasps the mind of the public, there is no point in explaining the matter, as the grip is far too strong.
I’ve learned my lesson.
[quote]Bill Roberts wrote:
I don’t know why I even try, really. When pseudo-science, regardless of absolutely undoubtable proven wrongness – e.g. claiming that calcium has to be “leached from the bones” and so forth – grasps the mind of the public, there is no point in explaining the matter, as the grip is far too strong.
I’ve learned my lesson.[/quote]
It’s not pseudo-science bud, its simple science. Protein, and the process required to break it down produces acid, and making sure to balance that acid out with alkaline foods, or alkaline producing foods, helps to keep your body in check. If you don’t like it, don’t read it, nobody called you in.
Yes, you’ve demonstrated precisely what I was saying.
There is zero chance that I or anyone can succeed in informing fans of this such as yourself on what is in fact the case here. I wasted my time providing you the means of easily finding where this has already been discussed and the facts made clear. Accordinly, I’m not going to waste my time further on this hopeless subject. End of story.
I am simply noting that fact, as otherwise people might well expect me to discuss this yet again. If you don’t like my noting it, and you do seem to have an objection to it – why else your response? – that is your problem. As (from above) you would say yourself, you didn’t have to read my post, nor did you have to read this one, so maybe you won’t need to object again to my posting with your stuff about “no one called you in.” But if you do, don’t worry: you’ve already established to me where you are coming from. Goodbye.
I think Bill knows a bit about science… read the other thread he referenced, just do it.
[quote]Bill Roberts wrote:
Yes, you’ve demonstrated precisely what I was saying.
There is zero chance that I or anyone can succeed in informing fans of this such as yourself on what is in fact the case here. I wasted my time providing you the means of easily finding where this has already been discussed and the facts made clear. Accordinly, I’m not going to waste my time further on this hopeless subject. End of story.
I am simply noting that fact, as otherwise people might well expect me to discuss this yet again. If you don’t like my noting it, and you do seem to have an objection to it – why else your response? – that is your problem. As (from above) you would say yourself, you didn’t have to read my post, nor did you have to read this one, so maybe you won’t need to object again to my posting with your stuff about “no one called you in.” But if you do, don’t worry: you’ve already established to me where you are coming from. Goodbye.
[/quote]
I just wanted to support something that has been of great benefit to me and my health. Just because it hasn’t worked for you, or because you have read somewhere that it doesn’t work, doesn’t mean that it cannot.
In it’s simplest form, the concept is to eat a large portion of healthy vegetables and some fruits, how can that not help in any shape or form? It is one of the most basic pillars of nutrition, to eat large portions of healthy fruits and vegetables, and you come in claiming that it is of no value? That is simply not true. I don’t care if you don’t think that Body PH and balance exist, but to discredit healthy eating is simply puerile.
Veggies are good for you, no matter what you want to claim they do or don’t do inside your body. They helped me eliminate inflammation, it might not work for everyone, but I am pretty sure that shifting to a healthier diet will provide benefits in one way or another.
Don’t stress Bill. I’m sure there are many others whom, like me, open a topic like this and only read your posts, providing us with a sort of immunity to those who insist on posting ‘information’ which is mind-bogglingly wrong.
I had a good chuckle when I read what your were referring to, regarding the poster who stated that high acidity diets causes ‘calcium to be leached from the bones’.
I am not challenging Bill’s expertise or level of knowledge, I am simply asking that one does not completely discredit something that has helped me achieve better health. I know there are people that go to far to one side, like the one who discussed calcium leaching, but I am simply stating that adding more alkaline foods to my diet that previously consisted of highly acidic ones, helped overcome my high levels of inflammation.
The thing is, the explanation – pH of the body – cannot be the explanation.
There’s no question that vegetables are good.
But your decisions should not be from being “acid-forming” or “alkalinizing” as these are not the causative factors of the benefit you received.
Trying to optimize one’s diet on pseudo-scientific parameters such as these can readily result in wrong decisions, such as avoiding phosphorus-rich foods because “they are acid-forming.”
Instead one should aim to optimize intake of nutrients, including phytonutrients, phosphorus, calcium, magnesium, potassium, etc.
And, for example, having more protein doesn’t mean needing proportionally more of certain other things. The protein does not require “balancing.”
The other things may well best be increased in any case. But if they’re already right, more protein does not shift the amounts of other nutrients that should be consumed.
And on the phytonutrients: It is very likewise various flavonoid compounds – as well as some others but largely the flavonoids – that gave you your anti-inflammatory effect.
And these have no effect on either the PRAL score (“acid-forming” or “alklaninizing”) nor in fact on the body’s pH.
While factors that do favorably affect such a score, such as decreasing phosphorus intake, decreasing protein intake, or increasing potassium, magnesium, or calcium intake likely did nothing for your inflammation.
Fruits and vegetables tend to be low in protein and phosphorus, and high in those other minerals mentioned above. Thus they are rated as being “alkalinizing.” But in fact, if for example you don’t need more calcium (if a person consumes a lot of protein powder, they don’t) but let’s say would benefit from more phosphorus intake, picking foods based on PRAL score not only makes no sense but is actually counterproductive. And furthermore, picking fruits and vegetables based on these scores is simply throwing darts at a wall in terms of likelihood of making better choices, as the phytonutrients have absolutely no effect on the PRAL score.
And yes, people following this method really, in many cases, do pick their fruits and vegetables based on PRAL score, and pay absolutely no attention to the phytonutrients which are the real reason for their benefits (assuming potassium, calcium, and magnesium were good in the first place, as is often but not always the case.)
It is naturally difficult for people when following a totally wrong theory gives them good results to realize that the theory is wrong, and their benefit was achieved for quite different reasons.
This theory is particularly insidious because it combines sounding scientific, yet understandable and apparently based on things that are right that people do know, with a concept that people just find appealing, and it has sucked in some very intelligent people, so it is possible to find some very credible authors who have, unfortunately, advocated the thing.
The only thing that is scientific about this theory is that it is a scientific method of predicting and controlling urinary pH. It is actual science in that regard. However, the projection that along with urinary pH comes all these other things, is pseudo-science (purely leap of faith, no evidence, and with fingers stuck firmly in ears with regards to those matters in which it is provably not true.)
You see? 
Well written responses, thanks for taking the time to post 'em, and I am not arguing against them.
Bottom line, eating healthier, aka more veggies and certain fruit, helped me a lot, and I don’t really care what the scientific and non-scientific theories may be. I think a healthy diet has taken me just as far, if not further, than a good lifting regiment.