The Gluten “Issue”

Diet and Nutrition
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I’ve never given much thought to gluten. I’m more than sure I consume it multiple times a day.

However, I’ve seen a lot of articles about it, some saying it’s the absolute worst, causes inflammation, people who stopped consuming gluten felt ten times better, better “health”, this that and the other. I’ve come across other articles that say everyone else is tripping over gluten and it actually isn’t anything to be afraid of.

So if I may ask, what’s the big deal with it?

Linked articles would be awesome to read to if you have them.

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Hi there planetcybertron. I hope your doing well with your training.

I think there are very, very few people who actually have celiac disease, or are gluten intolerant or allergic to wheat.

That said, most of us could benefit from eating like a diabetic. Less refined grains that have very little nutritional value. I suspect it’s this effect that makes so many people like being gluten free. If they eliminate the crackers and cookies and breads, they are healthier, loose weight and have better control of their blood sugar. All good things. Most of us are eating too much refined sugar, refined flour. You can see how eating gluten free, IF you eat healthier plant-based foods, would be a healthier way to live than the average American diet.

Bread seems to aggravate some conditions like Psoriasis so, there are good reasons to try going gluten free.

I just have no real motivation to do it myself. I have a Bosch mixer that will kneed 6 loaves at a time, and I like to make my own bread and own a wheat grinder so I can use whole wheat flour.

A few years ago I read Wheat Belly. Personally, I wasn’t impressed with some of the science in the book. A lot of things based on his personal experience. And some strange comparisons to “ancient” grains and then how he felt on the newer wheat strains. It was a lot of anecdotal evidence, IMO. And he seemed to reach a lot of conclusions based on his own experiments on himself.

It became a fad. I know of a family to who took their kid off gluten for several years (no pizza or birthday cake at parties) and it turned out that he was NOT gluten intolerant.

I’ve seen articles debunking the idea that we have a big percentage of people with gluten problems. Like this one.

Diabetes is another story.

Take care,
Puff

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That was also my first assumption.

I don’t think it was really a bunch of people having inflammatory responses to gluten. They just needed to switch what they ate and how much of it.

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Gluten insensitivity is a legit diagnosable thing but, bottomline, most people fall into ^ this category.

Making an effort to avoid gluten automatically makes you read labels and pay extra-close attention to what goes in your mouth, specifically carb sources, which leads to physique and health improvement on its own.

Like Puff was saying, cutting back on bread, pasta, and snacks/desserts “because of the gluten” can be a good thing. Avoiding things like barley and rye “because of the gluten” is almost certainly not necessary for the majority of people.

Dr. Mike Roussell talked all about gluten here and TC has an article about it here.

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Thanks man. More insight really helps, because I’ve been confused about gluten for the longest.

That South Park episode didn’t help either. The papa johns thing lol

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In my little circle of people I know of one person with an actual gluten allergy, my aunt. I’m pretty sure she’s really allergic because she’s a doctor, and doctors are good at knowing these things.

The other handful of self-diagnosed celiac’s I’ve interacted with seem very willing to latch on to other fad ideas like being anti-vaccine and believing that smoking weed will prevent cancer (which glutens cause, of course). Okay, fine. I once saw you eat six hot dogs and wash it down with PBR, but sure I’ll make sure there’s extra lettuce for lettuce buns at this year’s cookout.

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https://vlipsy.com/vlip/deadpool-2-sorry-im-late-i-was-rounding-up-the-gluten-nDFkmzoL

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I’ve definitely seen some bona fide cases of non-ceoliac gluten insensitivity. One of my closest friends was basically sick for his entire life until he cut out gluten. It was a running joke among our social circle about how sickly he was. Always congested, could never breathe out of his nose, no sense of smell, tired, weak, trouble sleeping, all kinds of horrible shit.

Cut out gluten and he’s a different person now; the difference is staggering. His sister was the exact same and it cured her too.

It does seem to be the case though that people’ll eat a 16" pizza and feel like shit, then say “oh I feel sick after that pizza. It must be the gluten!” No - it’s because your fat ass just put down 4000 calories of cheesy, greasy, processed garbage in about 15 minutes and now you’re paying the price.

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@mertdawg will no doubt provide some interesting insight here.

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I’ll try to come back later, but there is experimental evidence that gluten raises inflammation in many people who don’t have celiac, which results in a rise in cortisol levels. and also correspondingly causes hormonal insulin resistance. I believe that I have an allergic or inflammatory response to wheat, especially high gluten wheat, beans, corn, and “nut” skins (skins of almonds, hazel, walnut etc). Also probably milk though not aged cheese or butter to a large degree. In my case, it manifests itself as sinusitis, watery eyes, difficulty concentrating, and sleep disturbance though I have no noticeable gut related issues.

Wheat intake correlates highly with diabetes when compared to other starches like potato and rice. There is evidence that wheat consumption can make people prone to leaky gut.

I believe that my sensitivity developed over many years, but snuck up on me, and that it varies greatly from one individual to another.

Also, high sugar, corn oil, soybean and canola oil all affect my sleep. I have what would usually be called exercise induced asthma and it is prevalent in my family. If I eat those trigger foods, I will have a wheezing sound with my breathing especially at the start of exercise. People thought I was totally out of shape, but it was a mild asthmatic response and it absolutely stops when I eliminate the trigger foods.

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Thanks for the info.

I’m more than certain I’m not intolerant to gluten. I am severely lactose intolerant though. I noticed that wheat and the lists of gluten containing products don’t make me feel bad, they just make me fat lol.

So the insulin resistance mentioned above makes sense.

Appreciate all the articles too.

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4000 cal pizza? What the fuck

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I once had this incredible nacho pizza:

Base, salsa, cheese, corn chips, onions, jalapenos, guacamole, sour cream, cream cheese.

It was about 2 inches thick at its thickest. I reckon that pushed 4000kcal haha

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Extra cheese, pepperoni, crumbled sausage, bacon, and pineapple.

And a cup of sauce on the side for dipping the crust.

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It does not even need a lot of extra toppings, a 16" pepperoni pizza has over 3000 calories, a deep dish probably gets you there.

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I have a neighbor named Jed, great guy, really cool, really short in stature. He always had health issues especially chronic stomach aches. Five or six years ago he was diagnosed with coeliac disease. He told me eliminating gluten from his diet made all the difference in the world, he was a new man.

Three years ago my 8 year old son started limping from knee pain. We assumed he hurt it falling off his skateboard (in the kitchen). For a couple weeks it didn’t get better so we took him to the doctor and they found nothing wrong except for inflammation. It still didn’t get better so I started doing some home therapy with him. It still didn’t get better so we took him back to the doctor and they prescribed real physical therapy. That didn’t work and in the mean time his wrists started hurting as well he developed pleuricy. By this time he was also lagging other children his age in growth.

We started taking him to specialists and they diagnosed Juvenile Arthritis and oh, by the way, he has Coeliac Disease. I told the doctor about by concerns over his growth. She didn’t know if there was a relationship but she referred us to a growth specialist who told us the first thing he looks for with a low growth child is gluten intolerance.

My son has been off gluten for close to two years now. He no longer has any joint pain. I think it’s safe to say his “Juvenile Arthritis” was entirely due to gluten in his diet. His height has also sky rocketed in this time. He’s probably gone from 5-10 percentile to 75 percentile in this time.

Prior to his symptoms he was a little stud. At four years old, he could run the entire course at the local BMX park. While other kids his age are tooling around in their culdesac on training wheels, my four year old boy was going down the 30 foot ramp, jumping off the first jump and tearing up the whole course. I would hear teenaged boys praising him up on the ramp. “Hey, check this kid out” kind of stuff. At 6 years old he could run a nine minute mile. At 8 years old, just prior to his symptoms, he was equally as fast as his 13 year old brother in a sprint. Since his recovery, he’s gotten back a fair amount of athleticism but he’s not back to being the stud he was. I think at least part of that is due to him becoming kind of tentative but I wonder if there is a certain amount of opportunity loss. I’ve heard stories of kids coming back from so much worse so i don’t know what to think. I’m thrilled he’s on no medication, he’s pain free and he’s growing like gangbusters.

Getting back to my neighbor, Jed, who is about five foot five. Maybe shorter. I look at his 16 year old son who is at least six feet tall and I wonder if the gluten could have made that much of a difference. For a child like my son, whose growth gets retarded by gluten, it’s hard to know if the growth is just delayed and made up for later or if it is completely lost. Based on the very small sample size I’ve seen of my son and Jed, I think it impacts final adult size.

I have no idea if I am gluten intolerant but when my son went off gluten I went off it too. The winter before last was my first winter off of gluten and my training that winter was the best I’ve had in a decade and a half. I got my deadlift above 405 by December and it usually takes me to March or April. I got my squat over 315 which hasn’t happened since I was 36 years old. I’m 53 now. I hadn’t managed 100 pound dumbbells on chest press since I was about 20 years old but I managed it that winter.

Unfortunately, that doesn’t close the case for me and gluten. I didn’t have the same training results this winter. My DL didn’t hit 405 until about a month ago. I could probably manage a 315 Squat but I prefer to be able to get at least 3 or 4 reps and I’m at about 290 for that rep range. I only got up to 90 pound DBs on Chest Press.

In my opinion, if you have any type of autoimmune disease or if you have chronic stomach aches, you should get tested for gluten intolerance. If you don’t have anything like that but want to see if going off effects your training, go for it. Please report your findings back to me. I agree that the reduction in carbs is probably the best benefit for most people.

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Damn! Here in France, pizzas at the supermarket are all around 1200 cal, I guess in a restaurant you could push to 2000 but 4000 you must be reaaaally hungry!

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My two cents are that the issue is with processed white flour but gluten gets the blame.

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Actually, there is evidence that grain fiber causes leaky gut condition in susceptible individuals. Psyllium scrapes off endothelial cells of the small intestines and may promote fungal overgrowth and reduce helpful culture growth, while cellulose and pectin fiber are very good for intestinal bacteria.

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I would guess there are a lot of other things not factored into the findings. I believe a totality of our diets and lifestyles leave us vulnerable to a laundry list of diseases. Mainstream medicine is grasping at straws and looking everywhere except diet/lifestyle.

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