Ditch These 5 Foods
Transform your Body FAST by Eliminating the Five Common Foods that cause Bloating, Weight-Gain, and Hormone Disruption
Transform your Body FAST by Eliminating the Five Common Foods that cause Bloating, Weight-Gain, and Hormone Disruption
Header
greg@theplanetdoctor.com
IG: @theplanetdoctor
Welcome!
With all of the demands put on us in the modern world, making our health a priority isn’t always easy. One way to get great results with minimal effort is to stop eating the five foods listed below – which together lead to slow metabolism, bloating, weight gain, decreased testosterone (& other hormone disruption), and chronic inflammation. They also create significant free-radical damage which stimulates disease and aging in the body. When you take these foods out of your diet, you’ll be amazed how much better you look and feel in a short amount of time.
We are told that in order to get healthy and fit we need to ADD this supplement, INCREASE intake of a certain superfood, or eat at a certain time. That advice can certainly be helpful, but REMOVING the foods that are causing you problems produces quicker and more significant results. It took me years to figure out these key foods that are harming millions of us and making staying fit harder than it has to be.
Header
My journey in the world of health and fitness began when I played three sports in college and then played professional football. I had some success as an athlete, but throughout my athletic career I was perennially a bit overweight and bloated. So my athletic talent and lots of hard work had produced some athletic achievements, but a truly healthy, fit, lean physique had always eluded me. And my diet was the culprit.
Later I got my PhD, read lots of books about alternative cutting-edge diet & nutrition theories, wrote nutrition curricula for the county health department, and managed a raw food café. I added to that endless trial-and-error experimentation on my own body to separate fact from fiction and see what actually worked in the real world. Slowly but surely, I honed-in on a few key dietary changes, and when I applied them, within a few months I had the chiseled, healthy, lean body I’d been seeking for years. I shed almost 40 pounds very quickly, and I even saw my six-pack for the first time in my life! All from a few changes to my diet and without changing or increasing my workouts at all.
Header
Just to prove that these steps can very easily be fit into a busy schedule, I’ll share a personal anecdote. In my mid-40s my wife and I had two young kids. I had a full-time job, two toddlers at home, I wrote two books in four years, AND I was going on very little sleep – you parents know what I’m talking about! Also I couldn’t always workout consistently. Suffice it to say that I was a very busy, sometimes overwhelmed Dad.
BUT, I managed to keep my lean physique through those years mainly by avoiding the five foods that I’ll share with you in a moment.
All this is to say that if you’ve gotten a little (or a lot) out of shape, don’t worry, I’m here to help. You can get back to a leaner, healthier body more quickly and easily than you might think. With my simple diet tips, you’ll save tons of time and energy and get great results surprisingly quickly.
I know, because it took me years to develop these time and energy-saving tricks. Many fitness plans tell you to work hard in the gym and be consistent. That’s good advice but also pretty obvious. And not everyone can totally change their schedule and motivation overnight to do that. When you start small, such as removing these 5 harmful foods from your diet, you’ll start to feel better and look better immediately. That will motivate you to take the next steps and you’ll be on your way to the lean physique you want!
You may think that you need over-the-top workouts seven days a week plus an extreme diet to shed fat and get into good shape again. There is certainly a time and place for intense workouts, but they are absolutely not necessary to significantly transform your body. In fact, when you take into account hormonal and psychological factors, making subtle changes to your metabolism through targeted shifts in diet & fitness are often more effective than extreme regimens. Think about it -- turning the rudder of your boat by just one or two degrees will drastically change your destination after only a few days.
Header
Another myth is that you have to drink green juice and brussels sprouts all day to get healthy. While those foods are definitely good for you (and I LOVE green juice), for most of us, we will see better and quicker results by first removing the harmful foods then adding new healthy ones.
And I'll reiterate that removing these 5 foods from your diet is good for EVERYONE on every diet. Heavy meat eaters, vegetarians, vegans (I've been all three of these) and people of every age and ethnic background will benefit from taking these toxic foods out of their diets.
Lastly, it’s completely false that removing these foods from your diet means you will have to sacrifice and go without the foods you love. It’s the exact opposite. All you’re removing is low-quality, chemical-laden foods and you’re getting back to wholesome, delicious, higher quality food that’s home-cooked, hearty, natural, and delicious.
So without further delay, below are the five foods that should be avoided in order to transform your body.
-- Greg Schwartz
- Tony Robbins
CHAPTER 1
Header
Virtually all non-organic, conventionally grown food has been sprayed with pesticides. If a food is not labeled “organic” you can assume it has pesticides on it and in it. What do pesticides do? Well let’s break down the word – Pest (bug), cide (kill). They are designed to kill bugs and weeds. But they don’t stop there. When you eat them, pesticides also kill the good bacteria in your gut which causes havoc in your body. The beneficial bacteria in your gut perform several critical tasks that keep you healthy, alive, lean, and optimally functional.
First, it boosts your energy production. Gut microbes communicate through bio-photons (light) with your body’s mitochondria (energy producers which evolved from bacteria themselves) to keep your body at a high-energy level. If those bacteria are killed, that communication is severed and mitochondrial production and regulation can be significantly altered. Fatigue, low-energy, and poor sleep are symptoms that may be caused by disrupting mitochondrial productivity. These effects can directly contribute to weight gain, sedentary lifestyle, and reduced athletic performance and reduced general activity levels.
Second, your gut microbes help to regulate your mood. Up to 90% of serotonin (a feel-good hormone) is produced in your gastro-intestinal tract. And there are about 10 trillion bacterial cells in your gut, compared to only 1 trillion total cells in the rest of your body. That means you are mostly bacteria!
Header
Moreover, the enteric nervous system – or your “second brain”, consists of a nine-meter-long vagus nerve stretching from your mouth to your anus. These nerve sheaths have more neurons than your spinal cord! Killing the beneficial microbes that maintain a healthy gut biochemistry can cause significant disruptions in serotonin production. Maybe the steady increase in pesticide consumption in the US in recent decades is one factor contributing to the fact that 20% of Americans take anti-depressants. So often, the inception of weight gain is based on long-term mood suppression which results in behavioral modification and reduced activity levels.
Third, your beneficial gut microbes significantly boost and maintain your immune system. Immunity is the ability to process and respond to substances that come into the body from a variety of external sources. Skin, lungs, and the gastro-intestinal tract are the three main systems that process incoming materials and the GI tract by far has the most surface area and processes the most incoming volume of material on a daily basis.
So most of the body’s immune system mechanisms are focused there. Gut microbes specifically stimulate the production of T-cells which help the body distinguish between native healthy body tissues and unwanted invaders. When you take in foods and toxins (pesticides, food additives) that are harmful to you, the gut responds by rushing blood, T-cells, and white blood cells to the area in order to heal. This is called “inflammation.” It’s critical to our survival in the short term but when it is chronic, it can cultivate bloating, water retention, weight gain, and a huge variety of diseases and degenerative conditions.
In Short: Eat organic as often as you can, both in fresh produce as well as packaged goods. This keeps pesticides out of your system and keeps your healthy gut bacteria thriving, which in turn boosts your immunity, energy production, and mood. HINT: oral antibiotics also kill healthy gut bacteria, so only take them when totally necessary.
CHAPTER 2
Header
Artificial Flavors, Colors, & Preservatives
This sounds like a lot of ingredients to look out for, but often they are all present together in the same category of packaged foods, so they are easy to recognize. These harmful chemicals are in thousands of processed, packaged foods and they cause a variety of problems in your body. The most common problems are that they are often endocrine (hormonal) disruptors and/or carcinogens (causing cancer). There is a giant list of them, but most of the usual suspects are:
Endocrine system disruptors affect glands and organs such as the pituitary, thyroid, testes, ovaries, and adrenals. These systems control growth, development, metabolism, sexual reproduction, and blood-sugar levels. Beyond thyroid disfunction, diabetes, low sperm count, (low female fertility as well) and various cancers, endocrine disruption can also cause a huge variety of other maladies.
Header
Last but certainly not least harmful on this list of damaging food additives are excito-toxins like MSG, or monosodium glutamate. Sometimes now slightly reconfigured and renamed “yeast extract,” “torula yeast,” and “autolyzed yeast extract,” MSG over-stimulates the flavor receptors in the brain to basically trick you into thinking this food has more flavor than it actually does. This is generally bad for the brain and the palate alike.
Some studies show that excito-toxins can impair cognitive functioning for up to 45 minutes, and when experienced long-term this can theoretically become more of a permanent impairment. Also, like artificial sweeteners, excito-toxins such as MSG can dull the palate to natural, unmanipulated whole foods and make them less desirable to us.
There is one more aspect of these food toxins that can dramatically affect your body for the worse. Endocrine disruptors, both in the food additives above and in the environment (from industrial processes -- dioxins, flame retardants, pesticides), are stored in our fatty tissue. A study published in “Obesity” by Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health showed that patients undergoing bariatric weight loss surgery showed a massive spike in endocrine-disrupting toxic chemicals in their bloodstream post-operation. This adds proof that these toxic chemicals are stored in the body’s fatty tissues.
This is significant for two reasons. First, these toxins cause free-radical damage (breaks cell walls, damages DNA, etc) which accelerates aging and disease, particularly cancer. Second, in my personal experience, it makes fat noticeably harder to metabolize (harder to lose) when it is infused with these toxins.
Here is a personal example from my life. I had played three college sports and worked out vigorously for my entire young life, but the first time I ever saw my six-pack was at age 27 after I decided not to eat any processed food – that is, nothing out of a package, can, or box – for a few months.
Header
I believe this allowed my body to finally cleanse itself of these toxins, because I stopped eating them and my body could get rid of the ones that were already there. This made the fat just melt off of me more easily than I’d ever experienced in my life. My six-pack emerged so easily just like magic – with essentially no modification in workout or activity level. That was 20 years ago and I’ve basically had a six-pack since then. I should say that there were three other key steps that I followed to get my 6-pack, but removing these toxins was definitely the most critical step.
In Short: When you buy packaged products, the shorter the ingredients list, the better. Non-flavored chips, for instance, usually have corn or potatoes, oil, and salt. Those are the ones you want. Bar-B-Que chips will have 15 ingredients or more, most of them being toxic. Overall, the less food you eat out of a package, can, or a box, the better. Processed foods inevitably have multiple ingredients, and manufacturers often sneak in the harmful ingredients (listed above) because they add to shelf life, unnaturally boost flavor, or make food a more appealing color. None of these are good for our bodies, and the quicker we get back to whole, healthy, delicious food, the better.
CHAPTER 3
Header
There are many fake sugars to avoid, unfortunately. Artificial sweeteners like aspartame (Nutrasweet), saccharin (Sweet ‘n Low), sucralose (Splenda), and Acesulfame (Sweet One) are generally toxic to the body and are correlated with some strange neurological problems and cancers. But the main bloating & weight gain connection is that over-stimulation of sugar receptors without the corresponding delivery of actual calories has two negative effects.
One, it makes us crave more sweets, which is clinically proven to cause weight gain, for instance in people who drink multiple zero-calorie sodas per day. And two, it can desensitize and modify our palate, making natural foods like fruits and vegetables much less palatable to us. This systematically steers us away from whole, healthy food and toward packaged, processed, and chemically enhanced food products.
HFCS or High-fructose corn syrup is another culprit. It’s a cheap sweetener made from our copious over-abundance of GMO corn. There hasn’t been extended research on the effects of this laboratory-made sweetener on our bodies, but suffice it to say that this concoction does not exist in nature. HFCS flooded our food industry products for a few decades and became an ingredient in thousands of processed foods, so our bodies were suddenly doused with this new substance to deal with. We have yet to see the results, but in the meantime it’s generally good to avoid high-fructose corn syrup because lab-made substances broadly cause inflammation, which can be accompanied by metabolic disruption when it is a sweetener.
Header
Sorry to do this, but I will actually add to this list regular good-old refined white sugar. Even though this is not a laboratory-produced chemical sweetener, refined white sugar does not occur in nature and it is extremely toxic to the human bio-chemical environment. Sugar intake has skyrocketed in the U.S. in the last 50 years. Triggered by the infamous McGovern report of the 1970s which warned of the damage of high-fat diets, the food industry shifted away from fat and toward sugar as it’s palate-luring food enticement for consumers.
Now the average American eats about 150 lbs of sugar per year, or about a cup a day. Since refined sugar has only existed for a few hundred years, our bodies have not evolved to deal with it yet and it is causing massive widespread health problems, especially in the Western world. Refined sugar creates chemical storms in the body and stimulates inflammation which feeds most if not all of the diseases and maladies known to humanity. Heart disease, cancer, diabetes, skin problems, depression, fatigue, and many other health problems are all exacerbated by increased sugar intake.
The effect of fake and processed-sugar-related inflammation to create a “Dad Bod” is just that – inflammation – which includes water retention, free-radical activity (cell damage, DNA damage), and histamine or over-active immune response. This, in turn, results in bloating, redness of the skin, tiredness, weight gain, and other effects. Specific sugars, such as maltose, the sugar found in beer, are shown to add fat specifically in the abdomen region. Hence the term “beer belly.” Sugar feeds the bad bacteria in our gut which stimulates candida, leaky gut, and creates a metabolic pathway that virtually ensures higher sugar intake that same day, and long-term as well.
Header
Craving sugar is a sign that your body is already out of alignment. Rather than fighting sugar cravings every day – whether you give in or don’t give in – the key is to shift your body chemistry back into a place where the cravings stop. The good news is that when you bring your body back into alignment, most effectively with regular exercise, basic cleanses, rest, and whole foods, sugar cravings will dramatically diminish, if not completely vanish.
Of course, natural sugars such as those in fruits are by and large beneficial for the body. They are a healthy mix of glucose, fructose, sucrose, dextrose, and other sugars, all of which are delivered slowly into the body via a slow-release cellulose matrix (a.k.a. fiber) that keeps our insulin response low and keeps the glycemic index of most fruits manageable.
One non-fruit sweetener that seems to be non-toxic and safe within moderation is stevia. This is extracted from the stevia leaf and is included in many packaged natural food products such as healthy protein powders and drinks. I recommend stevia as a transitional replacement for artificial sweeteners.
In Short: Avoid artificial sweeteners – and as much as you can, avoid refined sugar. An excellent replacement is liquid or powdered stevia. Here is a metabolic trick to help you – if you indulge in sugar, never do it two days in a row. This creates an insulin momentum that makes you crave sugar day after day after day. When you only have sugar every other day – a handful of cookies, some ice cream, etc. – there is a sugar/insulin spike for a few hours then it settles down again and you’re fine.
CHAPTER 4
Header
Trans fats/hydrogenated oils, and processed vegetable oils (corn, soy, and canola) should be avoided.
What fats are healthy? Unsaturated fats found in plants (avocados, olives, nuts, seeds, etc.) and cold-pressed vegetable oils like olive oil, flaxseed oil, walnut oil, and avocado oil (for high heat cooking due to its high smoke-point). Even coconut, which is high in saturated fats, contains medium-chain triglycerides which are easy for the liver to break down compared to other forms of saturated fats.
Trans fats and hydrogenated fats are also very harmful to our bodies. Some trans fats occur naturally in animal products but most in our food system are artificially made in efforts to create cheap fats. The conundrum that the food industry faces is that plant-based or unsaturated fats are liquid at room temperature (oils), so not ideal for dry goods such as crackers, cookies, etc.
But animal fats are too expensive. Their solution? Modify plant fats (vegetable oils) in the lab to make them solid at room temperature. The process involves forcing hydrogen atoms onto flexible, liquid unsaturated fats which makes them solidify. Basically, hydrogen atoms attach “across” or “trans” the fat molecule which doesn’t occur in nature, hence “trans fats” which are unnatural and causative of significant free-radical damage, cancer, and inflammation.
Header
Frying food in oil also creates trans fats, or increases the trans-fat content of the oil being used. This is one reason that fried food is unhealthful, especially from restaurants. Because restaurants re-heat and re-use fryer oil many times before replacing it, which significantly increases the trans-fat content.
Other unhealthy fats are processed vegetable oils such as corn, canola (rapeseed), and soy/soybean oil. These oils are almost always genetically modified (unless they are organic) and usually they are also extracted with chemicals and high-heat. This extracts more oil from the plant and gives the oil a longer shelf life. But it also makes them unhealthy for humans because they cause free-radical damage, inflammation, and undergird the cultivation of several chronic health conditions. Almost every single mainstream salad dressing is made with one of these harmful oils. The solution? Make your own dressing with equal parts olive oil and vinegar, and add a squeeze of mustard. Very easy, quick and healthy.
Better choices for fats: Vegetable fats like avocados, olives, seeds (pumpkin, chia, sunflower, hemp), dark chocolate, raw or roasted nuts, coconut, or COLD-PRESSED OILS such as extra-virgin olive oil & cold pressed flaxseed & walnut oil (good raw not for cooking) and avocado oil (high smoking point so better for cooking).
In Short: Avoid fried foods and don’t overdo it on animal products. Also do your best to avoid products with corn, soy, or canola oil. These tend to be mainstream salad dressings, mainstream chips and breads, and cheap cooking oils. As mentioned above, making your own salad dressing with olive oil, vinegar of choice, and mustard is one way to avoid bad fats. Another is to cook with avocado oil. Add some coconut oil to olive oil, walnut oil, or flaxseed oil increase the smoking point and stability of these oils.
CHAPTER 5
Header
Most packaged products containing wheat are highly processed. This includes cookies, crackers, breads, pastas, cakes, muffins, cereals, etc. But what happens to a wheat kernel to make it “processed”? There are three parts of a wheat kernel – the bran, which is a fiber-rich outer layer, the germ, which is the protein, fat, and vitamin-rich “seed” from which a new plant can grow, and the endosperm, which is the biggest part of the kernel and consists mainly of carbohydrates and some protein. Processing removes the bran and the germ, which takes away most of the fiber, a lot of the protein, and many essential vitamins (by the way, its the exact same process and results that turns brown rice into white rice). The endosperm that’s left is ground up and ends up as a depleted, high-carbohydrate, vitamin-deficient flour.
Food manufacturers like this flour because it has a longer shelf life than whole grain flour (the germ spoils more quickly). It’s good for profits but it’s not good for our bodies. Without the fiber to allow a slow release of carbohydrates, as in all whole plant foods, processed wheat creates an insulin spike in our bodies. In other words, it has a high glycemic index.
If we eat a bit of processed wheat a few times a day, this keeps the insulin in our system at a high level. When there is insulin in our system, our body is in fat-storing mode. When there is low insulin, we are in fat-burning mode. So eating lots of processed wheat products throughout the day is actually the perfect recipe for weight gain because your body is kept in fat-storing mode all day long.
When we eat whole wheat berries/kernels or truly whole wheat flour, all of the fiber and protein are included, which significantly changes and improves the effect that that food has on our bodies.
Header
In Short: Look for “whole wheat berries,” “sprouted wheat flour,” (the best two options) or “whole wheat flour” as the first ingredient in wheat products to ensure you’re getting the vital fiber and protein that you need and keeping your insulin response low at the same time. “Sprouted wheat flour” is found in Alvarado Street breads (found in whole foods) or the Trader Joe’s brand sprouted wheat breads. Ezekiel brand breads also are made with sprouted wheat flour.
Most mainstream cereals are made from processed grains, and the ones that are made from whole grains are loaded with sugar (try to find one that’s not!). So if you like cereal like I do, I recommend making your own. I combine oats with nuts, dried fruit, dried coconut and a one-ingredient cereal like puffed wheat or puffed kamut (in plastic bags at Whole Foods and some health food stores). Then I add a plant-based protein powder sweetened with stevia and unsweetened oat or hemp milk. It’s delicious, packed with protein, and keeps you full for hours.
CHAPTER 6
Header
Step-by-Step Guide to Removing these 5 Foods from Your Diet
The five foods above are unnatural, unnecessary, and harmful for every human being, no matter their background or genetic make-up. They are a result of the modern food industry trying to save money by growing food faster and cheaper, then using cheap, processed ingredients and making them over-stimulate your taste buds and have years of shelf life through the use of harmful flavors, sweeteners, and preservatives.
5 EASY STEPS:
OK, so let me lay out a simple step-by-step approach to removing these foods from your life easily and painlessly.
Step 1: Shop the Perimeter. You may have heard this common advice before. When you get your food from the perimeter of the grocery store, you generally only have access to fresh, whole foods like fruits, vegetables, butcher cuts of meat, eggs, and dairy. Why are these foods around the perimeter of the store? Because they need to be refrigerated in coolers that are often plugged into the wall.
The interior of the store has foods that can last for YEARS without refrigeration. Why? Because they are filled with preservatives. Preservatives are great for food-industry profits because foods retain their value for a long time. But preservatives are very bad for our physical health for the reasons that you’ve just read above. Basically shopping the perimeter of the store means that you are simply buying fewer foods in packages, cans, or boxes which avoids all of these harmful ingredients like artificial colors, flavors, sweeteners, and preservatives (NOTE: Dairy is one of these “perimeter” foods, but it should be eaten sparingly).
Header
Step 2: Start reading labels as much as possible. Obviously we are going to eat some packaged foods in our regular routine at some point, so getting some basic label-reading skills is essential. The Golden Rule is – the shorter the ingredients list the better. I buy a cereal that has one ingredient – puffed wheat. Corn chips usually have three ingredients – corn, corn or sunflower oil, and salt. But flavored chips have upwards of 10 or 15 ingredients just because of those complex artificial added flavors. So plain corn chips or potato chips are a world of difference from Bar-B-Que flavored chips.
Step 3: Start buying as many organic foods as possible. The way I started, I believe, is an easy and inexpensive method. Pick a fruit or veggie that you eat a lot of. For me, it was apples. Start by buying only organic apples, even if all of your other produce is conventional (with pesticides). That way, with minimal effort and planning, you’ve cut off the largest source of pesticide-laden food in your diet. Most grocery stores nowadays have at least a small organic section where you can generally get organic versions of carrots, apples, and greens, and sometimes avocados, onions, oranges, some cruciferous vegetables, etc.
Step 4: Don’t try to be perfect. By this time, you’re probably a few weeks in. You’re probably feeling a lot better, lighter, cleaner by now which should be big motivation to maintain these changes. A key at this point is this – DON’T TRY TO BE PERFECT.
Trying to be perfect in your new diet takes so much energy that it can become overwhelming, and slipping back into old, easier habits becomes more likely. So just try to move in the right direction, get it right most of the time, and maintain. Eventually feeling great will become a new normal and going back to those old harmful foods will frankly feel terrible. At that point, you’ve won the game because your cleaner body and palate will guide you to the right foods for your health and for your leaner, more vibrant physique.
Header
Step 5 -- Long-Term Maintenance: This can be a lot of information to take in all at once, and it may seem like it will be hard to keep track of all of these foods to avoid. But there’s an extremely simple way to steer clear of them moving forward, and here it is. Eat less processed food. And to be even more specific – eat less food out of a package, can, or a box. Of course, fast food is highly processed so it should be generally avoided as well. Even though those foods are convenient for our schedules, they are not very convenient for our health maintenance.
What you’ll realize is that you have to begin preparing more food at home, because you know what’s in it! Restaurant food is definitely in general better than processed, packaged food, but almost all restaurants serve conventional (pesticide-laden) foods with GMO (genetically modified) staples like GMO corn and soy, as well as hormone-laden animal products. If that seems discouraging or overwhelming, just steer clear of the usual suspects like fast-food, and inexpensive chains like Applebee’s, Shoney’s, Denny’s, and similar restaurants.
But don’t be fooled that this diet means sacrifice and restriction. It’s exactly the opposite. It may require some adjustments, but as written in the introduction, all you’re doing is switching from low-quality, chemical-laden, processed food back to wholesome, delicious, home-cooked (or quality restaurant-prepped) food. It will taste better and make your body instantly feel and look better. Yes, breaking bad habits can be tough, but always worth it. And for the amount of effort it takes to replace these processed foods with whole ones, you will get fantastic results.
And remember, you haven’t even added any workouts to your schedule and you’ll already look and feel better! That’s a great deal for the small effort involved. Now, it goes without saying that regular exercise – and I recommend resistance exercise such as weights – is in general very good for your health.
Header
Being active is obviously a fantastic way to maintain weight, and to feel and look better. I absolutely recommend a lifestyle with plenty of activity and exercise. This diet plan doesn’t focus on exercise, and instead focuses on removing harmful foods as a key to better health. This is because I myself and many people I’ve advised and coached have had robust exercise regimens and still didn’t get the results that we wanted. I found that eliminating these foods made all the difference. So I offer these five (or six!) foods to avoid here today.
In closing, I wish you delicious meals, great health, and the fit, lean physique you’ve envisioned and dreamt of!
Greg Schwartz
greg@theplanetdoctor.com
IG: @theplanetdoctor