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I couldn’t repair your brakes, so I made your horn louder. Stephen Wright

In the confrontation between grains and the human body, the gastrointestinal tract is directly in the line of fire – but the war certainly doesn’t end there. Let’s penetrate deeper and examine the wounds and scars left by grains as they disrupt, agitate and discombobulate the finely balanced machinations of the human body – joints, skin, glands, respiratory system and brain – leaving no organ untouched. It’s a long chapter with lots of detail meant to show you the astounding scope and frightening severity of the unhealthy human experience that exists because, as a species, we made this terrible decision to consume the seeds of grasses.

Grains and Autoimmunity: Dastardly Duo

Mutt and Jeff. Abbott and Costello. Cheech and Chong. Garlic and bad breath. Where you find one, you find the other, and so it is with grains and autoimmune conditions in humans.

When the human immune system is unable to distinguish proteins in your colon, thyroid gland, pancreas or brain from foreign organisms invading your body, it recruits B and T lymphocytes into an army to wage war on your own organs. We call this autoimmunity. It’s a process that, in an astounding proportion of cases, begins with the muffins you have for breakfast or the slice of pizza you ate for dinner. The complex pathways worked out by Dr Alessio Fasano of the University of Maryland and his colleagues (see here) open up an entirely new perspective on diseases that involve autoimmunity. Recall that the gliadin protein of wheat and the nearly identical proteins of rye and barley can remain undigested. Intact gliadin proteins provoke increased permeability of the intestinal tract, which allows foreign substances access to the bloodstream. The misrecognition process of autoimmunity can begin with a bacterial protein that gets into the bloodstream, but it can also start with a grain protein. The gliadin protein and the transglutaminase enzyme of the liver or pancreas bear a strong resemblance to one another, so the presence of gliadin in the bloodstream can trick the immune system into causing autoimmune hepatitis or autoimmune pancreatitis.

This is big. This is as big as identifying and capturing the Mafia don responsible for dozens of gangland-style murders and millions of dollars of contraband, convicting him and putting him away for life. It means that we now have a direct path linking gliadin and related grain prolamin proteins with autoimmune conditions. This sequence of events is not limited to people with coeliac disease or gluten sensitivity; this applies to everyone. Susceptibility will vary based on genetic factors, but it is separate and distinct from the gastrointestinal disruption caused by coeliac disease. It means that a person with no abdominal symptoms from wheat consumption – no heartburn, bowel urgency, colitis, etc. – and who tests negative for coeliac disease or gluten sensitivity can still develop the joint deformity of rheumatoid arthritis years later or the neurological impairment of multiple sclerosis at the age of 45.

Prolamins and Transglutaminase: Dead Ringers

Remember the 1964 Bette Davis film Dead Ringer, in which one sister, Edith, estranged and angered with her twin, Margaret, shoots her in the head and then covers up her crime by assuming the killed twin’s identity? I don’t think any better allegorical description for autoimmunity could be crafted, right down to Ms Davis’s talent for portraying unpopular characters.

The human body relies on a class of enzymes called transglutaminases, which are found in the intestinal lining, pancreas, joints, brain, skin and other organs. Transglutaminase enzymes are responsible for the simple task of removing a nitrogen-containing (amine) group from the amino acid glutamine in the proteins that you consume. In an odd twist of fate, human transglutaminase enzymes resemble the gliadin protein of wheat, as well as the related prolamin proteins of rye, barley, corn and oats. In other words, if their structures are laid out side-by-side, there is an eerie overlap in sequence among all of them, such that the body’s immune response can’t tell the difference: they are immune dead ringers.¹ This has been called ‘molecular mimicry’: two unrelated and different proteins with different purposes, but with sections of shared structure that fool the immune system.

Antibodies expressed against grain prolamins – and thereby against transglutaminase – are associated with inflammatory bowel diseases, ­pancreatitis, joint and muscle inflammation, skin rashes and other autoimmune and inflammatory conditions.² This explains how and why grain consumption causes so many autoimmune and inflammatory diseases other than coeliac disease. For example, children with type 1 diabetes (an autoimmune condition of the pancreas) are more likely to express antibodies against the transglutaminase enzyme, also associated with increased potential for autoimmune conditions outside of the pancreas.³

It is as unsettling as one twin shooting the other, this relationship between something plant and something human that’s close enough to fool even the finely tuned discriminating powers of the human immune system. But such is the unnatural relationship between humans and the seeds of grasses.

Even before the details of increased intestinal permeability were sorted out by Dr Fasano’s team, it had been known for many years that the list of autoimmune conditions attributable to wheat, rye and barley is formidable. These dangerous and sometimes fatal conditions are enough to make you spit out your last bite of raisin bread.

Addison’s disease

Alopecia areata

Ankylosing spondylitis

Antiphospholipid antibody syndrome

Autoimmune haemolytic anaemia

Autoimmune hepatitis

Autoimmune inner ear disease

Autoimmune lymphoproliferative syndrome

Autoimmune thrombocytopaenic purpura

Behçet’s disease

Bullous pemphigoid

Cardiomyopathy (dilated, or congestive)

Chronic fatigue syndrome

Chronic inflammatory demyelinating polyneuropathy

Coeliac disease

Cold agglutinin disease

CREST syndrome

Crohn’s disease

Dermatomyositis

Discoid lupus

Essential mixed cryoglobulinaemia

Food protein-induced enterocolitis syndrome

Graves’ disease

Guillain–Barré syndrome

Hashimoto’s thyroiditis

Idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis

Idiopathic thrombocytopaenic purpura

IgA nephropathy

Insulin-dependent diabetes (type I)

Juvenile arthritis

Ménière’s disease

Mixed connective tissue disease

Multiple sclerosis

Myasthaenia gravis

Myocarditis

Pemphigus vulgaris

Pernicious anaemia

Polyarteritis nodosa

Polychondritis

Polyglandular syndromes

Polymyalgia rheumatica

Polymyositis dermatomyositis

Primary agammaglobulinaemia

Primary biliary cirrhosis

Psoriasis

Raynaud’s syndrome

Reiter’s syndrome

Rheumatoid arthritis

Sarcoidosis

Scleroderma

Sjögren’s syndrome

Systemic lupus erythematosus

Takayasu’s arteritis

Temporal arteritis

Ulcerative colitis

Uveitis

Vasculitis

Vitiligo

Wegener’s granulomatosis

This list shows that the misrecognition process that leads to autoimmunity can involve the joints (rheumatoid arthritis, lupus arthritis), pancreas (autoimmune pancreatitis), small intestine (Crohn’s disease), cerebellum (cerebellar ataxia), nerves of the legs and pelvis (peripheral neuropathy), thyroid (Graves’ disease and Hashimoto’s thyroiditis), skin (psoriasis, alopecia areata), liver (autoimmune hepatitis) and arteries (polyarteritis nodosa) – and it doesn’t end there. There’s no organ that has not been associated with autoimmune attack triggered by grains. This is not to say that every case of, say, autoimmune pancreatitis can be blamed on grains, as other factors may trigger a similar immune response gone awry in susceptible people. But these are all conditions triggered or unmasked by a component of diet, specifically a component of diet that we are urged to eat in greater quantities.

Corn and oats have been associated with a more limited panel of autoimmune conditions. Corn, for instance, has been associated with increased potential for type 1 diabetes.⁴ Rice causes a dangerous condition in infants called food protein-induced enterocolitis syndrome, a disordered immune condition that results in lethargy, diarrhoea, malnutrition and dehydration that disappears completely with rice avoidance.⁵

No other food or food group has such a list of diseases, autoimmune or otherwise, associated with its consumption – not sugar, high-fructose corn syrup, soft drinks or poisonous toadstools. Only grains, the largely indigestible seeds of grasses, are associated with such a frightening list of ways to misguide your immune system.

Type 1 Diabetes: A Disease of Grains?

It’s pretty easy to argue that plentiful consumption of the amylopectin A from grains is associated with increased blood sugars and thereby increased potential for type 2 diabetes. But how about type 1 diabetes, in which delicate insulin-producing beta cells of the pancreas are destroyed for a lifetime? There are several lines of evidence that strongly link grain consumption and the changes that lead to type 1 diabetes in genetically susceptible children and adults. Some of the evidence originates with experimental animal models, some comes from observations in humans.

• In experimental mouse and rat models, 64 per cent of mice fed wheat-containing chow develop type 1 diabetes, compared with 15 per cent of mice fed wheat-free chow.⁶ Likewise, feeding corn to diabetes-prone mice increases the percentage that develops type 1 diabetes from 37 to 57 per cent.⁷

• Children with coeliac disease triggered by the gliadin proteins of wheat, rye and barley are 10 times more likely to develop type 1 diabetes than children without coeliac disease.⁸

• Children with type 1 diabetes are 10 to 20 times more likely to develop coeliac disease and/or antibodies to wheat components than children without diabetes.⁹

• Children with type 1 diabetes launch an abnormal (T-lymphocyte) immune response when exposed to gliadin.¹⁰

I’ve discussed how gliadin increases intestinal damage and permeability that can lead to increased autoimmunity, but don’t forget that grain lectins also damage intestinal tissue, as do partially digested gliadin-derived peptides. And don’t forget to throw in a little pancreatic beta cell glucotoxicity (irreversible damage to beta cells caused by the high blood sugars resulting from amylopectin A in grains). In other words, when grains are consumed, the stage is set for an onslaught of autoimmunity and pancreatic damage, which appear to be closely related to intestinal diseases of gliadin proteins, such as coeliac disease.

And the situation appears to be getting worse. The US National Institutes of Health (NIH) and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)-sponsored SEARCH for Diabetes in Youth study has documented that the incidence of type 1 diabetes in children has been increasing 2.7 per cent per year since 1978.¹¹ This observation has been demonstrated by registries in other countries, as well. What we lack is a clinical trial in infants, half of whom start eating grains early in life, half of whom avoid grains from birth; this would, once and for all, clinch the direct connection between grains and type 1 diabetes. You can imagine the difficulties in conducting such a trial, though, so don’t hold your breath waiting for such data.

In the meantime, we’ve got a smoking gun, fingerprints, motive and opportunity – enough to bring grain up on charges. Do we have enough to convict? I say hang the bastard.

Hypothyroidism: Autoimmunity at Work

You may have noticed that two thyroid conditions were on the list of autoimmune conditions associated with grain consumption. Of all the various forms of misdirected immunity ignited by grains, thyroid dysfunction is by far the most common.

Let’s start with describing what thyroid dysfunction looks like. The thyroid gland, positioned like a bow tie on the front of your neck, is the gland that regulates metabolic rate. When it’s overactive, or hyperthyroid, your metabolism is excessively high and you have high levels of the thyroid hormones T4 and T3, rapid heart rate, anxiety and weight loss. When it’s underactive, or hypothyroid, your metabolism is slowed, you have reduced levels of T4 and T3, and higher levels of the pituitary hormone thyroid stimulating hormone (TSH), a response intended to prod the thyroid to work harder and release more T4 and T3. By far the most common situation is hypothyroidism. Hypothyroidism is therefore a state of slowed metabolism that causes symptoms such as low energy; feeling inappropriately cold, especially in the hands and feet (due to low body temperature); constipation; hair loss; and dry skin. Failure to lose weight after grain elimination is a common signal of hypothyroidism. While grain elimination is indeed a powerful strategy for weight loss, it alone cannot overcome the effects of hypothyroidism, which must be specifically addressed.

Autoimmune destruction of the thyroid gland is called Graves’ disease or Hashimoto’s thyroiditis. Gliadin antibodies can occur in 50 per cent or more of people with thyroid disease, making it the most common expression of grain-induced autoimmunity.¹² Some people, especially those with Graves’ disease, initially experience a period of hyperthyroidism due to inflammation and destruction of thyroid tissue, which causes excessive quantities of thyroid hormone to be released. With or without this period of hyperthyroidism, though, hypothyroidism develops over time, reflecting injury to thyroid tissue and causing the symptoms of hypothyroidism as production of T4 and T3 hormones wanes. Hypothyroidism is underdiagnosed. In common practice, you often have to be miserable before your doctor makes the diagnosis of an underactive thyroid. Some doctors, for instance, will not consider testing or treatment even if you have depression, weight gain, high cholesterol values and increased cardiovascular risk attributable to this situation. I believe this is wrong and should not be tolerated. Because thyroid issues are so common, so neglected and so important to overall health and weight, they will be discussed at greater length in Chapter 11.

Cortisol: A Difference of Night and Day

Cortisol is the primary hormone produced by your adrenal glands, the two little glands that sit atop your kidneys. Cortisol plays a crucial physiologic role in many bodily processes, and it does so in a predictable pattern called a ‘circadian rhythm’, an adaptation to life on earth and its 24-hour cycle of day and night. Once again, grains enter the picture and disrupt this normal cycle of life.

Antibodies triggered by gliadin proteins can damage the adrenal glands, resulting in reduced production of adrenal hormones.¹³ Disruption of vasoactive intestinal peptide (or VIP; see here) by the lectins of wheat, rye, barley and rice is another means by which adrenal gland function can be impaired. Most commonly, cortisol disruption results in feelings of low energy in the morning, depression, inappropriate surges in nighttime energy, insomnia, cravings for salt, inability to lose weight, low blood pressure and light-headedness. One of the difficulties with identifying adrenal dysfunction is that the adrenal glands produce more than cortisol; they also produce hormones such as aldosterone (responsible for sodium and potassium status and blood pressure control); adrenaline (responsible for arousal, energy and metabolism); and adrenal androgens that overlap with the effects of testosterone. One or all adrenal hormones can be disrupted, though the dominant effect is usually determined by disruptions of cortisol.

Disruptions at the hypothalamic and pituitary levels that result in cortisol disruption can be caused by obesity (via the inflammatory phenomena of visceral fat), diabetes, depression, stress, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and other conditions.¹⁴ New neuroendocrine research is also uncovering potential glucocorticoid resistance, or impaired responsiveness to cortisol, in people showing normal or high cortisol blood levels.¹⁵ This may be related to issues with rheumatoid arthritis, Crohn’s disease, ulcerative colitis, multiple sclerosis, asthma, chronic fatigue, fibromyalgia, chronic pain, depression, PTSD and chronic stress. Note that most of the conditions listed get their start with grain consumption.

While other endocrine glands are also capable of all degrees of dysfunction, from subtle to severe, conventionally minded endocrinologists deny this, arguing that the adrenal gland is the only endocrine gland that is either entirely normal or severely dysfunctional enough to threaten life, causing Addison’s disease when underactive and Cushing’s disease when overactive. They believe it’s all or nothing, with no grey area in between. I reject conventional ‘wisdom’ and follow common sense: adrenal dysfunction can occur to any degree and may involve one or more adrenal gland hormones, or it can occur at the hypothalamic or pituitary level. Besides, the emerging neuroendocrine scientific and clinical literature strongly argues that such disruptions short of life threatening are not only possible, but are common.

You can appreciate that the issues are complex and tangled, involving several hormones and organs. Thankfully, the majority of issues surrounding cortisol and adrenal dysfunction can be reduced to disrupted cortisol circadian patterns due to (1) damage to the adrenal gland from grain consumption, and (2) disruption of pituitary signalling to the adrenal gland due to inflammation and chronic stress, exaggerated by the presence of visceral fat. Later in the book we consider ways to identify, then correct, cortisol disruptions, which can help you feel more energetic, provide relief from depression, restore the normal day-night cycle of energy and sleep, and help break a weight-loss plateau.

Matter Over Mind

The effects of grains on the human brain and nervous system, like those in the gastrointestinal tract, are varied and destructive. Neurologist Dr David Perlmutter has written a book called Grain Brain, which is devoted to the effects of grains on brain health (particularly dementia). It’s recommended reading for anyone interested in an extensive discussion of brain health impairment developing due to grain consumption.

In the film The Matrix, Morpheus explains to Neo that, ‘The Matrix is the world that has been pulled over your eyes to blind you from the truth,’ when describing the computer-simulated world injected into the minds of people to keep them from knowing that machines control everything. While the world of grains is hardly as visually arresting or imaginative as the one in this film, both worlds are all about mind control. In the film, human minds are controlled by computers; in the world we live in, our minds have been under the influence of the mind-active components of grains.

The effects of the gliadin and related prolamin proteins on the human brain fall into two categories: (1) reversible effects exerted on the mind via gliadin-derived opiates and (2) autoimmune inflammatory effects, sometimes reversible, sometimes irreversible, on brain and nervous system tissue. The mind and brain effects of grains are largely due to wheat, rye and barley, which share the same gliadin protein. Other non-wheat grains also have brain health implications, but they only work through high blood sugars that lead to dementia.

It’s Not Your Imagination: Reversible Mind and Brain Effects of Grains

Reversible mind effects begin with the gliadin proteins of wheat, rye and barley that undergo digestion to smaller 4- or 5-amino-acid-long peptides, which are small enough to penetrate the brain and bind to opiate receptors.¹⁶ The effects of these peptides, dubbed exorphins, or exogenously derived morphine-like compounds, vary depending on individual susceptibility. In some conditions, a reversible autoimmune process has also been documented (positive gliadin antibody). Because structural damage has not been associated with these phenomena, these conditions, despite their potential severity and destructiveness, are reversible with grain elimination. There are several conditions that fall into this category.

APPETITE STIMULATION. Grain-derived exorphins trigger the grain consumer to take in 400 more calories per day, every day. This is an average value; some people consume more, others less. At worst, it can cause calorie intake to be 1,000 or more calories per day and higher, and trigger food obsessions or other addictive food behaviours. With grain consumption, your appetite is specifically stimulated for carbohydrates, such as pretzels, corn chips and biscuits, and it’s stimulated to a lesser degree for fat. The effect tends to be addictive, with cyclic and recurring desire for such foods driving dietary habits and even dominating thoughts and fantasies. Rid yourself of gliadin-derived opiates and calorie intake drops by 400 calories per day. Food obsessions and addictive food relationships are also typically reduced or completely eliminated.¹⁷

BINGE EATING DISORDER AND BULIMIA. People with binge eating disorder tend to eat in large binges well beyond their need. They are unresponsive to signals that turn off appetite and feel ashamed at their lack of restraint. Bulimia is a similar condition, with binges typically followed by ‘purging’ the excessive quantity of food by vomiting. People with these eating disorders describe intrusive, 24-hour-a-day food obsessions that occur even after finishing a large meal or during the night, triggering nighttime binges. Both conditions are socially incapacitating, ruin relationships and are associated with low self-esteem. Additionally, the bulimic sufferer who puts a finger in the back of her throat to bring up food exposes her tooth enamel to corrosive stomach acid, rotting her teeth over time. Both conditions represent exaggerated appetite-stimulating responses to gliadin-derived opiates.

MIND FOG. Disrupted concentration, inability to focus, impaired learning, impaired decision-making ability and sleepiness are exceptionally common after consuming wheat, rye and barley. Gliadin-derived opiates are the most likely culprits behind these effects, given their known ability to affect the mind. It’s also likely that the blood sugar fluctuations caused by all grains contribute, especially the low blood sugar of hypoglycaemia.

ATTENTION DEFICIT HYPERACTIVITY DISORDER and autistic spectrum disorder. While these disorders are unrelated, they share a similar response to gliadin-derived opiates. Children and adults with these conditions experience behavioural outbursts, such as temper tantrums or emotional ‘storms’ without reason, and they have an impaired capacity to sustain attention. Kids with these conditions already have an impaired ability to learn and pay attention for more than a few seconds or minutes; grain-derived opiates just make it worse.¹⁸ A recent analysis demonstrated that kids with autism lack the markers for coeliac disease (such as transglutaminase antibody), but they do have increased levels of antibodies to gliadin, especially if gastrointestinal symptoms like diarrhoea are present.¹⁹

PARANOID SCHIZOPHRENIA. The worsening of paranoia, auditory hallucinations (hearing voices and receiving warnings or commands) and social disengagement were among the first observations made when researchers started studying the effects of wheat consumption on brain health, attributable to the gliadin protein-derived opiates.²⁰ This effect may be confined to schizophrenics who express an autoimmune response to the gliadin protein, the group most likely to improve with wheat, rye and barley avoidance.²¹

BIPOLAR ILLNESS. We know that people with bipolar illness express higher levels of antibodies in response to the gliadin protein, similar to the phenomenon observed in schizophrenics.²² Gliadin-derived opiate peptides likely also play a role in generating the distortions in judgement and reality experienced with this condition.

DEPRESSION. If there is predisposition for depression, grains – especially wheat, rye, barley and corn – can magnify or unmask that tendency.²³ Depression due to the gliadin- and prolamin protein-derived opiates can be mild, resulting in a pervasive feeling of unhappiness and lack of interest, or it can be incapacitating and life threatening, complete with obsessive thoughts of suicide or self-harm. Both wheat and corn are also responsible for reductions in brain serotonin, which regulates mood.²⁴

OBSESSIVE-COMPULSIVE DISORDER. A person who has obsessive-compulsive disorder helplessly gives in to the impulse to obsessively and compulsively perform some action or engage in some thought – behaviours that have been associated with wheat consumption.²⁵ It might be compulsive hand washing, or housecleaning, or checking and rechecking (and rechecking and rechecking) figures in a ledger. Being locked into such behavioural loops can be debilitating for the sufferer, as these rituals can dominate her thoughts and behaviours, as well as sabotage success at school and work and disrupt the health of relationships.

A world of research still needs to be performed to explore these mind-altering phenomena that develop in people who follow the standard advice to consume more grains. MRI, PET and other brain-imaging modalities may reveal why and how schizophrenics tend to suffer more auditory hallucinations with grain consumption or why kids with autistic spectrum disorder experience impaired attention span. Notably, while some of these effects are associated with an immune response against one or more grain proteins, many are not. But remember: if you know that grains can worsen or cause deterioration in mental conditions, it also means that you know how to undo or lessen the severity of all these effects or, as one of Keanu Reeves’s fellow rebels in the Matrix remarks, ‘Buckle your seatbelt, Dorothy, ’cause Kansas is going bye-bye.’

Brain Drain: Not-So-Reversible Brain Effects of Grains

I discussed how gliadin proteins contribute to the mania of bipolar illness, the paranoia and auditory hallucinations of schizophrenia, and the impaired learning and behavioural outbursts of children with attention deficit disorder and autistic spectrum disorder, phenomena that are reversible or lessened simply by removing grains from the diet. Let’s now discuss how grains can also lead to neurological processes that are more difficult, if not impossible, to reverse, though the reasons for their irreversibility are not yet clear.

Intact gliadin initiates a sequence of events that leads to an immune response against brain tissue (for more information, see here). Some researchers propose that this represents a form of molecular mimicry in which the immune system confuses a foreign protein (gliadin) with a similarly constructed protein of the body, in this case the synapsin 1 protein of brain tissue.²⁶ The part of the brain or nervous system involved determines the way in which the damage manifests. For instance, if the cerebellum is affected, the part of the brain responsible for coordination of movement and control over bladder and bowels, a condition called cerebellar ataxia develops. Sufferers stumble while walking and lose control over urine and stool, and an MRI or CT scan of the brain reveals a shrunken, atrophied cerebellum. People become incapacitated with this condition, typically ending up with Zimmer frames or in wheelchairs. Eliminating all gliadin-containing proteins from grains will slowly or incompletely reverse cerebellar ataxia, given the slow and often incomplete capacity of neurological tissue to heal.

A condition called peripheral neuropathy, which affects the nerves to the legs, can also develop. Sufferers lose feeling or develop constant leg pain, which ascends higher up the body and worsens over time, eventually resulting in a total loss of feeling and progressive debilitation. It can also involve the internal nervous system of the circulatory and digestive systems. If the vagus nerve to the stomach is affected, for instance, it results in a condition called gastroparesis, in which the stomach loses its capacity to propel food forward. While this might seem like an advantage, in that a single meal yields satiety for many hours, it is actually quite destructive because food that sits in the stomach is subject to putrefaction (rotting), causing distress, excessive belching, foul breath and distortions of bowel flora. (A parallel situation called diabetic gastroparesis can develop in people with advanced diabetes.) If the nerves to the heart are affected, there is a loss of control over heart rate. This leads to a higher resting heart rate and potential for abnormal heart rhythms, such as premature atrial contractions, supraventricular arrhythmias and atrial fibrillation.

Grains, especially wheat, rye and barley, can cause seizures. The most common form are temporal lobe seizures (originating in the temporal lobe of the brain) that involve feelings of déjà vu (familiarity), jamais vu (unfamiliarity), amnesia, inappropriate emotions or pointless repetitive behaviours or tics.²⁷ Less commonly, generalized or grand mal seizures can also occur due to grain-induced changes in the brain.

Lastly, dementia can result from the consumption of all grains. Wheat, rye and barley, as usual, are the worst, as recent research has identified antibodies to gluten proteins in the cerebral cortex of the brains of deceased dementia victims.²⁸ For this reason, Mayo Clinic researchers named this condition gluten encephalopathy: dementia from gluten-containing grains. Dementia is much more common, however, as a result of chronic and repeatedly high blood sugars. These are characteristic of all grains, and are also irreversible. The deterioration of grey matter characteristic of dementia is visible on brain imaging as shrinkage of brain volume and loss of the characteristic furrows (called sulci) of healthy human brains, signalling atrophy. We know that diabetics with chronically high blood sugar have a greater risk for dementia. More recent studies demonstrate that blood sugars at the upper end of ‘normal’ are also associated with greater risk for dementia, which is seen on brain imaging as atrophy of the frontal cortex, hippocampus and amygdala.²⁹ Accordingly, foods that raise blood sugar the most are associated with the brain atrophy of dementia.

Wholemeal and white flour products raise blood sugar to high levels – even higher than table sugar. Intact corn kernels raise blood sugar to moderately high levels, while cornflour raises blood sugar to sky-high levels. Grains such as oats, rice, millet, teff, sorghum, rye and barley raise blood sugar to intermediate to high levels. While they are often described as having a low glycaemic index, they would more properly be described as having a less high glycaemic index, since blood sugars typically rise to the 130 to 200 mg/dl range in nondiabetics (ranges incredibly regarded as ‘normal’ by most health-care practitioners). According to the latest research findings, blood sugars above 100 mg/dl are sufficient to increase the potential for dementia. Because the world is experiencing a massive rise in blood sugars, evidenced by the staggering numbers of people with prediabetes and diabetes, we should anticipate an increase in the number of people with dementia, and we should expect to see it develop earlier in life. This is yet another awful aspect of the widely embraced notion of ‘healthy whole grains’.

Grains, for Crying Out Loud

Irrational fear, anxiousness over the littlest things, anger that bubbles over – all are provoked by the mind-active components of grains. While we know that big, heavy brain issues, such as major depression, bipolar illness and schizophrenia, are influenced by grains, we see many lesser, though still quite troublesome, emotions and moods caused or amplified by them. These include:

• Aggression

• Anger

• Anxiety

• Inattention

• Indecisiveness

• Insomnia

• Phobias

• Poor impulse control

• Sleep disruption

• Sleepiness

• Suicidal thoughts

• Unhappiness

This means that many people have been plagued by such emotions and thoughts for years, all the while blaming themselves for being weak or flawed. Many resort to prescription antidepressants, anti-anxiety drugs, sleeping pills, drugs for attention deficit disorder, etc., most of which are only partially effective and have substantial side effects. Many have undergone counselling, psychoanalysis or cognitive behavioural therapy and have endured, cried, felt defeated, lashed out at others or turned to alcohol and drugs to dull the suffering. Some of the most illustrative stories of the power of grains come from people who have struggled with suicidal thoughts for years, fighting off the impulse to drive a car into oncoming traffic or swallow a bottle of sleeping pills – thoughts that miraculously disappeared within five days of having no grains and then abruptly and powerfully returned with any reexposure. On again, off again; on again, off again – incontrovertible proof of individual cause and effect.

There are several ways grains cause mood and emotional effects. While prolamin protein-derived opiates are the culprits in most of these situations, disruption of neuroendocrine hormones, such as vasoactive intestinal peptide, probably plays a role as well. In addition, the gluten proteins of wheat, rye and barley and the zein protein of corn have been shown to reduce brain levels of tryptophan,³⁰ the amino acid that leads to serotonin. Low brain levels of serotonin are associated with depression.

The next time you find yourself yelling at your spouse or kids, feeling unaccountably anxious over a minor problem, struggling to sleep normally or experiencing some emotional response out of proportion to the situation, question whether the emotionally disruptive effects of grains are at work.

A Big Bellyful of Grains: Why Grains Make us Fat

Feed your dog or cat grains in their pet food, and they get fat. Feed your cows and chickens wheat and corn, and they get fat. Feed humans wheat, corn, rice and other grains, and they get fat.

This ain’t rocket science. Nonetheless, conventionally minded nutritionists insist that whole grains cause weight loss. Not true. What the data really show is that white flour products cause people to gain weight, and whole grain products cause people to gain a little less weight than white flour does.³¹ Whole grains don’t make you lose weight any more than drinking a little less vodka makes an alcoholic a little less alcoholic.

The pathways by which grain consumption leads to weight gain, particularly visceral fat of the abdomen, are manifold.

GLIADIN-DERIVED OPIATES STIMULATE APPETITE. Specifically, they stimulate appetite for more grains and sugars: crisps, biscuits, cupcakes, breads, bagels, pizza. They drive hunger that is physiologically inappropriate, causing you to eat more than your body needs, more frequently and in larger quantities than is necessary for sustenance. In rats administered gliadin-derived fragments, weight increased by 20 per cent over three months.³² Block gliadin-derived opiates with opiate-blocking drugs, and calorie intake drops by 400 calories per day, whether or not you have an eating disorder.³³ Although obesity in China is not as advanced as in the Western world, wheat-consuming Chinese are fatter than Chinese who don’t consume wheat.³⁴ The way this works in rats is the way it works in humans, regardless of ethnic origin, colour or political persuasion.

Susceptibility to this effect can vary from individual to individual. It can range from no effect at all to wild, 24-hour-a-day food obsessions, as experienced by some people with bulimia. The effect is most prominent in response to the opiates that derive from wheat, rye and barley, though corn seems to achieve a similar, though less intense, effect in many people.

AMYLOPECTIN CARBOHYDRATES OF GRAINS RAISE BLOOD SUGAR TO HIGH LEVELS. Anything made of wheat, of course, raises blood sugar to high levels. While wholemeal bread has a GI of 72 (and sucrose has a GI of 59 to 65), there is nothing higher than the GI of cornflour and rice flour: 90 to 100. High blood sugars are also followed by low blood sugars, a response to the release of insulin. Low blood sugars 90 to 120 minutes after consuming grains are experienced as anxiousness, mental cloudiness, irritability and hunger. The blood sugar highs of grains therefore set you up for an inevitable blood sugar low, a two-hour cycle of satiety and hunger that sends you back out on a quest to find more food.

High blood sugars also result in high insulin responses, which provoke resistance to insulin, higher blood sugars, higher insulin – around and around in a vicious cycle. This leads to a build-up of visceral fat, the sort of fat that is inflammatory and exudes inflammatory proteins into the bloodstream, adding further to poor insulin response. Grains are among the most potent dietary triggers for growth of visceral fat. That’s why I’ve called it a ‘wheat belly’, but we can also call it a ‘grain belly’. Visceral fat cells also express higher levels of cortisol within each fat cell, a situation that mimics that of people with Cushing’s disease or who are taking the drug prednisone, both of which are associated with extravagant weight gain.³⁵

GRAIN LECTINS BLOCK LEPTIN. Leptin, the hormone of satiety, which is meant to signal us to stop eating after a meal, is blocked by the lectin of wheat, rye, barley and rice.³⁶ Humans, or any other animal, for that matter, should experience satiety once physiological needs have been met. But if grain lectins are in the vicinity, they block the signal to stop.

Can you think of any other food that contains opiates that drive appetite, turns off satiety signals, and causes extravagant hyperglycaemia and hypoglycaemia? If you’re wondering why, after cutting fat and eating more ‘healthy whole grains’, you feel like you can’t eat enough, have to knock over the other customers in the queue at the canteen or gain weight by doing everything ‘right’, well, you now understand: whole, white, sprouted, organic, fresh or stale, grains make you fat.

Diabetes and Prediabetes: Anatomy of a Blunder

Grains cause diabetes. All the flours and products created from the seeds of grasses play major roles in creating the blood sugar disasters that define diabetes and prediabetes.

I’m sure you have heard all the painful statistics about how Americans and the rest of the world are experiencing an epidemic of diabetes: 26 million in the United States have diabetes, and 35 per cent of adults over 20 years old have prediabetes. At this rate, one in three Americans are predicted to be diabetic by 2050.³⁷ It is an epidemic that dwarfs all other epidemics. The International Diabetes Federation reports that 382 million people had diabetes worldwide in 2013, and that number is expected to increase to 592 million by 2035,³⁸ numbers that make the 1918 flu pandemic and the bubonic plague seem like minor public health nuisances. But unlike the flu and plague, which involved contagious, infectious organisms, the diabetes epidemic is man-made: it was not created by rapidly evolving viruses or nasty vermin, but by human blundering.

Public health officials lay blame on the public, of course, claiming that we simply eat too much and move too little. They say that the nearly 500 per cent increase in the number of diabetics in the United States, from 5.6 million in 1980 to 26 million in 2011, happened because modern Americans, and now much of the rest of the world, are the most gluttonous and lazy populations that ever walked the earth. We’re more gluttonous and lazy than we were in 1980, 1990 or 2000, and we’ve become worse every year since.

I don’t think so. Take a look at the graph from National Health Survey data reported by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), showing the number of diagnosed diabetics in the United States.

Note that the number of diabetics (represented by vertical bars) began to increase, almost imperceptibly, between 1983 and 1985. This coincides quite nicely with a number of developments.

1. The release of the first Dietary Guidelines for Americans in 1977. Although released in 1977, it took several years of public education before Americans began to adopt advice to cut fat and eat more ‘healthy whole grains’.

2. High-yield, semi-dwarf strains of wheat, genetically altered by geneticists and agribusiness, were embraced enthusiastically by farmers between 1980 and 1985. By 1985, all wheat products originated with these genetically altered wheats, complete with new gliadin proteins that stimulate appetite. These drove the desire for more food. By the late 1980s, average calorie intake increased by 400 calories per person per day, mostly from snacks and sugary drinks.³⁹

3. High-fructose corn syrup, another product of grains, began appearing in processed foods, including many low-fat products.

4. Supermarkets, rather than small neighbourhood shops, became the prime retailers of food, particularly products with national brand recognition. Supermarkets stocked shelves with processed foods made with low-cost, commoditized ingredients: wheat flour, cornflour, high-fructose corn syrup and sugar. The number of products carried on supermarket shelves in the US ballooned from less than 10,000 before 1980 to 60,000 today.

The Dietary Guidelines for Americans, delivered to us as the USDA MyPyramid and now as MyPlate, tell us that whole grains should comprise a substantial part of our diet, replacing at least half of the processed grains we eat.⁴⁰ Based on the flawed notion that replacing something bad (processed white flour products) with something less bad (whole grains) must be good, the essence of their advice is to replace at least some white flour products with whole grains. Of course, not factored into this equation are the high glycaemic indexes of both white and whole grain products, the changes introduced by agribusiness, and the many people who suffer brain, psychological and health effects from grain consumption.

When I was in 2nd grade, I started gaining weight.

It wasn’t very long before I was the fattest girl in my class. As I got older, I gained more weight. I soon began to hide my eating. I would gulp down big spoonfuls of food out of the pan after I had already eaten the food on my plate. It was a vicious cycle of shame and guilt.

As I reached adulthood, I tried to lose weight. Low-fat, Nutrisystem, a weight-loss clinic: nothing worked for me because I was starving all the time. I was addicted to wheat- and sugar-based products. Nothing gave me joy like biting into banana nut bread or a doughnut. But then the guilt of not being able to stick with the diet set in. That only made me want to eat more.

Fast-forward to December of 2010. I was 38 years old and I weighed 23 stones. I had been diabetic since at least 2006. I had the early symptoms of neuropathy. I had hypothyroidism (later diagnosed as Hashimoto’s thyroiditis). I had high blood pressure. My face was beet red. People would actually ask me if I was sunburnt. I knew that if I didn’t do something to fix me I would be dead before I turned 40. Every time I felt a shooting pain in my head or neck, I thought to myself, ‘Am I getting ready to stroke out? Is this it?’ I knew it was coming.