What is all the Carnivore Hype About? January is World Carnivore Month #worldcarnivoremonth2024

The Carnivore community has grown exponentially, and people are reporting that they have cured their auto immune conditions, gut issues, eczema, skin conditions such as acne, reflux, diabetes etc.  The list is long!

The most interesting interview I have ever watched is with Mikhaila Peterson – Dr Jordan Peterson’s daughter.   She was on The Joe Rogan Experience on YouTube and it is worth a watch.  You can watch it here.  When she is on the ‘Lion Diet’ her rheumatoid arthritis symptoms disappear.  She currently eats beef, water and salt.  Anything else sets off her immune system.

On January 2^nd, 2023 my husband and I started the Carnivore diet.  We decided to stick to it religiously for 30 days and then see if it is something we wanted to continue.  Well, 9 months later we were still on the diet and had our blood tests done before we started and 4 months after we started.  The results were very interesting.  Even though our Cholesterol went up, with LDL over the suggested limit, both our trigylerides decreased.  Our blood glucose levels and insulin levels are better than they have ever been and our inflammatory markers had decreased.  Not only did the benefits show up in our blood test results, but we felt (and looked) amazing.  Here’s some of the improvements we found:

• Glowing skin
• No more bloating
• No more gas/farting (my husband was a gasbag before)
• No more snoring or sleep apnea in my husband
• Clear sinuses and no allergies (me)
• No more mouth breathing
• Regular bowel movements (once per day)
• Mind clarity
• Increased Energy
• More powerful workouts
• My husband lost 20 kg’s pretty quickly
• I lost 8 kgs (from not being able to drop a single kg eating a macro calorie controlled diet, weighing and measuring food and exercising daily)
• No more water retention
• Started building muscle

What I have discovered while doing the Carnivore diet too is that it is an excellent elimination diet.  You remove everything from your diet except meat, fat, eggs, salt, water and electrolytes.  (We were having dairy too – milk in our coffee, cheese with meat sticks, kefir and occasionally plain, homemade yogurt).  This is what happens:

• The nutrients in the meat and fat nourish the cells in your body and help to heal the gut.
• Your gallbladder is stimulated to produce bile by the amount and type of fat you’re consuming
• You give your digestive system a break from having to work so hard to digest food, especially fibre.
• Your gut microbiome resets and the overgrowth of yeast (candida) and bacteria in the gut disappears as it doesn’t have anything to feed on (sugar and carbs).

It is worth mentioning that it is the easiest and most simple diet I have ever embarked on (and I have tried many).  If you’re hungry there is no guessing what to eat.  Meat and fat with salt or eggs and meat for every meal.  It also saved us a lot of money – even with the price of good quality meat.

You may be wondering, but what about the environment and the government, agencies and Institutions telling you that eating red meat is bad for your health and bad for the environment?  Take a look at The Savory Institute here and many other Regenerative Farming advocates, as well as Sustainable Dish (Diana Rodger’s) and her book Sacred Cow or her website here.  These are people reporting on the misinformation around eating meat and the impact it is having on our environment.  I watched an interesting interview with Dr Jordan Peterson and Elon Musk and they stated that there will never be as many people on the earth as there are right now.  We are in a declining population!  That to me is so fascinating.  More on this another time.

Another observation is that we didn’t need Vitamin C – if you don’t eat carbs, you don’t need extra vit c.  Isn’t that interesting?  People worry about scurvy and it is one of the most asked questions from people – what about Vit C and fibre?  Well, we thrived without either.  We did not get sick while we were on Carnivore either.  People around us were constantly sick and we just didn’t pick up anything.

So, what are the pitfalls of Carnivore I hear you ask?  Well, this is what you can except in the first week or two:

• Diarrhoea while your body gets used to the amount of fat you’re consuming.  The gallbladder hasn’t had to work for a long time (especially if you’ve been on a low fat diet).  The fat will stimulate the production of bile and might push out gallstones from the gallbladder.
• Nausea due to above.
• Excessive thirst.  That is why it is important to drink water and electrolytes, which really help.
• Headaches as you transition into Ketosis and your body starts burning fat for energy instead of glucose/carbs.
• Flu like symptoms as your liver starts to detox and you may have oxalate dumping if you’ve been consuming high oxalate food in the past.

My experience was chronic diarrhoea and nausea for about 10 days after starting, but I do have a sluggish gallbladder and suspected inherited gallbladder issue called Gilbert’s Syndrome.  I found that drinking a lot of liquids and continuing with high fat helped a lot.

So, the plan in 2024 is to do the Carnivore Diet for a month as an elimination diet and then start introducing GAPS food into our diet in February.

I am happy to answer any questions you may have if you’re considering doing the Carnivore diet.  DM me or email me with any questions.

My next newsletter will be all about GAPS and how to introduce GAPS food into the diet and the benefits, so stay tuned!

Happy 2024 everyone and thank you for all your support and encouragement in 2023!

In love, health and light