Customer Reviews

Going Against the Grain: How Reducing and Avoiding Grains Can Revitalize Your Health

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1 star:		(3)

 

 

It does take courage to write a book telling people to stop eating foods that they have eaten, and yes, trusted, all their lives. I have IBS (30 years) and most recently food sensitivities (6 years) which have made my life sheer misery. I have gone many places (outside of traditional medicine of course) to look for answers, and this book is my latest stop. I was very interested to hear about the way wheat affects some people and compare it to my own experience, having given it up 2 years ago. I wanted to know why several good (and unexpected) things happened and here I found answers/hypotheses.

Melissa really needed to have a good editor look at this book before she published it as the writing style is uneven and sometimes amateurish-sounding, never a good thing in a "scientific" publication. I do appreciate her effort, her willingness to share her experience, and, as I said before, her nerve--- it's not easy to come out against something as popular as wheat.

This is an excellent supplement for your personal health library.
The author discusses classic allergy components of wheat, gliadins, glutenins, albumins and globulins. Surprisingly,
oats are deemed to be safe for celiacs. Scientists believe that gluten doesn't distill soy which is considered a hidden derivative. Soy-based veggie burgers and meat substitutes are
said to contain gluten. The wheat free diet consists of
Ancient Harvest Quinoa Flakes, Omega-3 Muesli,
Quinoa Flakes, Trader Joe's Gluten - Free Waffles and Lundberg's
Organic brown rice pasta. The author provides a sample grain-free
breakfast consisting of eggs, fruit, spinach, onion omelet,
strawberries, grilled fish taco etc. In some patients,
autoimmune disease is aggravated by an increase in Lectins which
disturbs gut permeability thereby causing bacterial overgrowth
and the classic leaky gut syndrome. The author provides a
scientific discussion to show how the immune system actually
attacks itself and how patients can deal with this phenomenom.
The book is very valuable if you have a medical history which
is adverse to gluten products.

This book will be valuable if you have a history of Crohns
Disease, Irritable Bowel Syndrome, Ankylosing Spondylitis,
Celiac Disease and a whole host of autoimmune and digestive
system ailments and manifestations.

I decided to stop eating "bread stuff" as a new year resolution (2004) because I had a number of friends that were losing weight on the Atkin's Diet. I did not want to go on a "diet" but I wanted to do something. In making this decision I needed to read more about my eating which led me to Dr Mercola's site and his book. I used the EFT (emofree.com)meridian tapping techniques to help with any of the cravings that I may have had come up while doing this.

Reading the reviews on his book led me to this book "Going Against The Grain". So here I am and writing my first review. I received this book 2 weeks after I stopped eating bread/stuff. This book is precise and informative. It may be a bit dry...no big hype or products being sold, but well worth the read.

I did have to process out, at times, the idea that I have been eating something all my life that wasn't meant for my body. ( My personal viewpoint)

Within 5 days of not eating wheat (bread,pasta,cakes,muffins cookies etc)my craving for sugar lessened by 90%. I was amazed at how easy this was for me. My energy level went up and I just knew that something had changed.

This book explained to me precisely what was happening in my body when I ate these grain foods. That alone gave me much self-empowerment and validation for my action to stop comsuming grains and increasing my vegetable intake. I also saw the pattern in my life from the way I ate that took away from my over-all health. I am not a dieting type person. I like eating pasta...my heritage is Italian.

I have since lost weight easily and quickly as she mentions happened to clients in her book. I even get excited about eating veges !!! And I have lost great interest in these other foods. Never thought I could do this, but I have and I am truly grateful for having read this book. It should be on the shelf with the cookbooks in every home.

On an aside. I am 2 1/2 months in my new lifestlye. I have eaten some sugar in the form of icecream, and chocolate. I am able to bypass the wheat foods easily and without longing. I have eaten one hamburg on a bun, and a small slice of cake. I have no more interest in potatoes and rice. And if someone told me 6 months ago that this would be me within a year I would have said NO WAY. I'd never have the discipline.

Thank you Melissa Smith

Though every diet "simplification by food-type elimination" is necessarily a distortion of nutritional reality, which is complex, Smith's simplification by grain elimination is VERY helpful for many, if not most, typical eaters. Since most grains must be cooked to be chewable/digestible, it's obvious that grain eating is not natural in humans' evolutionary past. (Chew on raw wheat kernels to appreciate this fact.) In addition, most grain consumption, among Americans at least, is unfortunate in that wheat is the most-consumed, the most problematical regarding allergenicity, and the most commonly debased by bleaching and removal of higher-nutrient portions such as the germ and bran, etc. Refined grains, especially the bleached variety such as typical bakers' white flour, are simply an abomination and as much a health scourge as hydrogenated fats which, tragically, are often combined with refined-grain products in packaged crackers and chips of many varieties.

In the nutritional counseling I've done for four decades (I'm 72, very fit w/no gray hair, etc.), I've always recommended NO refined flour products, and greatly prefer the grains quinoa, amaranth and spelt over the more commonly available grains. In my experience, Smith's recommendations are very much on track, including her comments on the advantages of increasing pH toward the alkalinity side (away from the acidic side) by reducing grains and eating more dark-green, leafy vegetables. (Spelt and millet, by the way, are less acidic and therefore more conducive to better human biological terrain in the body than are wheat, rye or oats.)

There is no single key to the ideal diet, but Smith points most readers in a direction that is highly probable to improve their eating pattern, their energy and their emotional well-being.

"Going Against the Grain" is an entertaining & educational read.
By removing gluten from my diet I have lost 20 pounds. I am 49 years old, and now weigh less than when I graduated from college. My energy level has picked up, and my low moods are less frequent. Melissa has an excellent resource section in the back of the book that I have found quite helpful. For better nutrition, you need to read this book!

I finished this book last night. Yes, I admit it. I bought into the Food Pyramid's propaganda. I even taught it to my students at the school where I teach. I told them: You have to eat 6-11 servings of grain/cereal/pasta each day! Now I feel sick about it. After I read the first few chapters of Smith's book, I realized I have been addiced to carbohydrates most of my life, which accounts for my (losing) battle of 15-20 lbs of excess weight all my life. She explains how the addiction and cravings (for sweets and carbs) happen and why (blood sugar spikes), and why this is so dangerous to your long-term health. We've all read the headlines of how the US has more obesity, diabetes, and heart disease than ever before. She explains why...we eat WAY TOO MANY refined grains in this country, which go hand-in-hand with sugar you don't need. I'd always read food labels before, but didn't know what high-fructose corn syrup was (for example) and now I know why it's so bad for you...and it's in nearly EVERYTHING we eat! The night I finished the book, I cleaned out my pantry. I filled several bags with pasta, cake mixes, sugar, convenience foods, packaged foods, cereal, corn meal, canola oil, the list goes on. It's all stuff I love. And it's all stuff that's slowly killing me, and now I understand how my body works and what it needs. The author's solution? Eat less grains (even better, eliminate them altogether) and eat more non-starchy vegetables and small amounts of protein at EVERY meal. That's the basic guideline (there are others too) but that's the biggie. Smith's book gives menu plans and recipes too. By the way, people with gluten or wheat intolerance, this book should be your Bible.

This is a great book. It is well written and very easy for anyone to understand. I gave my copy to my daughter and just ordered another for myself. It is a diet you can live with and feel much better. As a side benefit I have lost weight without even trying. I really feel Melissa Diane Smith is on the right track and knows what she is talking about. For anyone who wants to know more about avoiding grains this is the book to read. Some of the other "Grainless Diet Books" are way too complicated and not realistic in their goals or their eating rules. Buy it, try it, you'll love it.

This is an eye-opening, easy read that will change the way you think about eating from the first page on. It doesn't scare or overload on science, but rather presents the facts on grains and tells a compelling story about why they're not as good for us as we have been led to believe.

As a person with celiac disease, I have been avoiding gluten-containing grains for some time. It was not until I read this book that I understood why monitoring my intake of other grains (and loading up instead on more veggies) could further benefit my health. Having instituted some of the changes suggested in this book, I now feel I have better blood sugar control and digestion.

I shared this book with many friends and family that have varied health issues and interests. They all found it to be very enlightening - and a true pleasure to read. Every person took at least one piece of new information away from the book that has since influenced their dietary choices (whether it be to eat fruit with cheese to balance the acidity; to choose alternate snacks to rice cakes which are high glycemic; or to choose sweet potatos over white ones for better nutrition and less starch) . The suggested meal plans and recipes are also a great source of inspiration for anyone currently on, or embarking on on grain-free or low grain diet.

I have had a history of hidden illnesses over 20 years which doctors could not explain and medication helped little. After being crippled about 10 years ago and diagnosed with chronic bowel syndrom I changed my diet since medication did not help. This was doing fine until two years ago when I developed an acne condition all over my body. Doctors could not help and used the demi-God attitude that it was just acne and live with it. This sent me searching for alternative medicine. I had periods where I cleared and than boom it broke out again. After reading this book and illiminating all Gluten my skin cleared, eyes cleared, have a better memory and am losing weight and eating more. Tests showed I have Celiac and this book led me to a better life.

Melissa Diane Smith's book "Going Against the Grain" has served as a valuable tool in educating my wife and me about the role of grains and carbohydrates in our diet. I am a carboholic and have worn out three bread machines making a 2-lb loaf every 3 days or so for several years. The book has helped me realize that the excessive amount of bread I was eating was putting stress on my system. I have since cut back on grains and carbohydrates, particularly in the form of bread and juices, and experience a more even level of energy as a result.

My wife has long urged me to change my eating patterns but it wasn't until "Going Against the Grain" appeared that we both understood the dynamics involved which helped me to finally take action.

We are both grateful that this book was written and feel it has enhanced the quality of our lives.