Eat Right

Eat right for your type

Ever noticed how some people that you know will tell you that they cannot eat certain foods, since they may have trouble digesting them, or simply that it makes them feel tired or even fat?

Well, a colleague of mine who works in the operating room with me recently reminded me of the 'eat right for your type' diet, by Dr. Peter J. D'Adamo, and that perhaps we should give it a try.

If you are not familiar with this diet, let me explain a little bit about it.  Doctor D'Adamo, whose website and diet books are actually based on follow-up work that he did after his dad's initial research into the science, explains how we humans today process the foods that we eat.

The concept is that our blood types, of which there are 4 (type 'O', type 'A', 'B', and 'AB'), reflect our internal chemistry, which actually can determine the way we absorb nutrients.  A lot of the pre-disposition that we have today for processing nutrients is in our individual genetic blood types, which tendencies we have inherited from thousands of years of our ancestor's evolution.

For example, the oldest blood type, 'O', (think hunter-gatherer), can surprisingly eat most all meats, but is intolerant to wheat and other grains.  Blood type 'O' requires a high protein, low carbohydrate diet.

My husband is type 'O', his ancestors are from Western Europe, and he has tried the diet (not really a diet, it's what we would call a modest lifestyle change).  After 3 weeks I can already see that he has lost his 'wheat belly', and tells me he does not have hunger pangs or sugar crashes anymore.  Mainly, he has had to cut out peanuts, peanut butter, all things wheat, and hard cheeses, which he loves.  But he feels great!  (By the way, he can eat other nuts, brown rice, mozzarella and goat and feta cheeses so you can see there are options).

Well, we still have a way to go before we are completely sold on this, but let me just say that 1) It's easy to get the genetic concept of why you can only eat what you or your ancestors are 'used to' and 2) So far it does not feel like a diet or punishment since we have been eating pretty much the things that we like, we just have to be willing to eliminate a few things and replace them with others.

More updates to come...CRNAMom