Wheatgrass a cure all?

[wmonique2]

Hello friends,

I have a friend who has digestive issues, breathing issues and a host of other issues and she drinks wheatgrass (no gluten in it) everyday.

She swears by it and is pushing me to try it. I did some research and it seems to help ulcerative colitis and other things.

Anyone tried it?

I am afraid to try anything right now for fear that it would exacerbate my current symptoms

Just curious what y'all think about this.


Love to all

Monique

[Polly]

Good Morning, Monique!

I really enjoy your posts - you have such an upbeat attitude and positive outlook - even during this difficult period before you have made much progress towards remission. You are an inspiration!

My advice would be to say no to wheatgrass. Listen to your "gut" (pun intended!). I'm sure Tex knows all of the science behind wheatgrass, so I know he'll weigh in here. Strictly speaking, I think the gluten is in the seed portion of wheat, which is not present in wheatgrass. But since the grass eventually produces seeds, I'm not sure if it can be completely GF????? Anyway, Dr. Fine says that the human digestive tract is not ideally designed to eat grass of any kind. Grass-eating animals (ruminants) have a very different system for digesting grass - like chewing it (cud), swallowing it and then regurgitating it to chew some more. I think they have more digestive organs, too - like 2 stomachs maybe. Anyway, I'll leave this to Tex too - I'm sure he knows.

I think the soundest advice for a newbie is to eat as much pure, non-commercial food (paleo preferably) as possible and to avoid all unnecessary meds, supplements (exception - vitamin D), and herbs until major healing has occurred. Then it's the time to experiment, IMHO.

How are you doing this week? Better, I hope.

Love,

Polly

[wmonique2]

Hi Polly,

Thank you so much for your post. I love reading yours too because they are always so informative and you are always so kind and generous.

My instincts always tell me not to mess with my system when I am in trouble. And like you said, best to stay away from anything that is not essential or elementary. You're right, no time to start re-arranging the chairs on the deck of the Titanic


Two stomachs? I'd love to have another one right now! What a perfect solution! I'd have to choose between a cow or a camel, one hump-er or two hump-er?

Joking aside, I am better today, this morning at least. Let's hope it stays that way and gets better.

And thank you so much Polly for your much appreciated advice. I always welcome it.

Love,

Monique

[JFR]

Monique,

I have been fiddling with my diet for a decade now. What has been most helpful to me was first to have discovered paleo about 10 years ago and then to come to this forum and take the enterolab testing, discovering, among other things, that dairy and eggs had to go. Dairy has never been paleo but the Specific Carbohydrate diet (SCD) recommended it so strongly as essential that I figured it was ok. I know now that it wasn't nor were the eggs I was eating that the paleo people swear by, nor can I consume much fiber without getting into trouble. In this journey of mine through dietary cures I have tried a number of "magic bullets" and none of them worked. Polly's advice is about as magic as it gets.

Jean

[tex]

Actually, I don't know much about wheatgrass (or wheatgrass juice), except that it's probably overpromoted (like a lot of supposed health benefits that people see as opportunities to allow them to cash in on a trend). Since wheatgrass plants are ordinary wheat plants, it's not a paleo food, obviously. Wheatgrass was originally promoted by Ann Wigmore, and the following quote, taken from the site of the American Cancer Society says it better than I can:

The wheatgrass diet was developed by Boston resident Ann Wigmore, who immigrated to the United States from Lithuania. Wigmore believed strongly in the healing power of nature. Wigmore's notion that fresh wheatgrass had value came from her interpretation of the Bible and observations that dogs and cats eat grass when they feel ill. Wigmore claimed that the wheatgrass diet could cure disease.

In 1982, the Massachusetts Attorney General sued Wigmore for claiming that her program could reduce or eliminate the need for insulin in diabetics. She later retracted her claims. In 1988, the Massachusetts Attorney General sued Wigmore again, this time for claiming that an "energy enzyme soup" she invented could cure AIDS. Wigmore was ordered to stop representing herself as a physician or person licensed to treat disease. Although Wigmore died in 1993, her Creative Health Institute is still active. Wheatgrass is readily available, and her diet is still in use.

What is the evidence?

Wheatgrass is a natural source of vitamins and minerals. However, available scientific evidence does not support the idea that wheatgrass or the wheatgrass diet can cure or prevent disease. One small early study found that wheatgrass juice, when used along with standard medical care, seemed to help control symptoms of chronic inflammation of the large intestine, a condition called ulcerative colitis. This 2002 study tested fresh wheatgrass juice against a sham drink in a group of people with ulcerative colitis. All of them received regular medical care, including their usual diet. Those who drank about 3 ounces of the juice every day for a month had less pain, diarrhea, and rectal bleeding than those in the group drinking the placebo.

http://www.cancer.org/Treatment/Treatme ... wheatgrass

Here's the problem with Wigmore's observation about dogs and cats eating grass: They don't eat it because they think it's healthy — they eat it because they know that they can't digest it and it will cause them to vomit. IOW, when they feel the need for an emetic, they eat grass so that they can purge their stomach contents. That has absolutely nothing to do with the benefits that Wigmore claimed for it.

That said, remember that the medical community as a group, has the rather unsavory habit of denying the efficacy of any treatment that has not been proven to be effective by a random, double-blind testing program. It doesn't matter that no researcher has ever done any research on any given topic, (because no one has come up the money to sponsor a study) — if a concept has never been proven (for whatever reason), then it must be a false claim (in their eyes). Here's an example of a study that actually was done (the one mentioned in the quote):

CONCLUSION: Wheat grass juice appeared effective and safe as a single or adjuvant treatment of active distal UC.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11989836

Remember, though, that MC seems to be much more closely related to Crohn's disease than to UC, in many aspects. Personally, I've never tried wheatgrass, or wheatgrass juice, and I have no plans to do so in the future, because I don't consider wheat to be my friend.

Love,
Tex

[wmonique2]

Thank you Jean, Polly, Tex for that expansive reply

Got it! Stay away from snake oils and miracle cures, Monique !





Thank you so much for your generosity.

Love you all,

Monique

[Joefnh]

Monique I thoroughly agree with the other posts and wanted to just remind us of an old saying...

"if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is"

History is replete with examples of a natural ingredient being peddled to be a cure for all things. If indeed that was true why has no one including big pharma patented it and made bucket loads of cash on it.

This is another example of just such an item. I'm sure the inventor really believed in their cause, as many do, it just may not be backed by science.

With MC the main ingredient for success is 'slow and steady wins the race'. Or as PP member Ant says "Slowly Slowy Catchee Monkey"

Thanks for all of your great posts and attitude Monique, we all here can learn by your example

[wmonique2]

Thank you Joe!


I love your posts too-----always informative and fun! (loved those virtual lobsters you posted, made me salivate).


You are all my teachers and I feel that I have been so lucky to meet such a wonderful bunch of fun, brainy, compassionate, generous and caring people.

Too bad we are all so far away from each other. I'd invite all of you to come to my house for French food, wine and dancing (oops, forgot I am a double P person now--can't do any of it). Hey, I can dream, right?



Monique

[Leah]

Keep dreaming Monique! Now that I am somewhat healed, I can actually drink some white wine :).... no red though.

Leah

[Lesley]

Monique,
I don't know what I would have done if I hadn't found this group. I was SO sick and feeling so hopeless. Something was amiss when I first got on the board, and I didn't get the answers to my posts. It was painful. Then Tex emailed me and helped me get on the board.

The help I got here was literally life saving. I had D 24/7. Couldn't do anything at all, couldn't move from the potty and didn't know what to do. There was a point where I was throwing up too, so it was coming out both ends. The doctors were no help at all.

I also was served the funny threads, and I am sure they contributed to my getting better. Laughing is health.

This crowd is wonderful!

[wmonique2]

Leah,

White wine? The last time I had a glass was in November in Rome, Italy and then I repeated the experiment in Marseille, France! I actually had wine everyday. But that was before the S hit the fan

Have one for me, Leah. Pinot Griego with a delightful quiche Lorraine with homemade, flaky crust, a wonderful green salad of buttery leaves and radicchio, followed with an airy mousse...ahhhhh, dreamin'....dreamin'....I'm in heaven...


Lesley----I was like you too last year until I found this poop doctor called, you wouldn't believe it, Dr. Bizarro and after 3 long, drawn out miserable months of making me go through every possible test hospitals offered, found a solution in mesalamine and entocort, and he DID stop the D and V. I didn't know if I was coming or going most of the time. Down to 90 lbs and dying.

I went back to him recently when the nausea and dyspepsia started and Bizarro lived up to his name and told me to eat EVERYTHING and that's when I knew that our romance must end, notwithstanding the affection I had developed for him especially when I looked into his dead eyes :-)

Love to you all!

Monique

[Lesley]

Monique,


That was really funny. Dr. Bizarro! That's hysterical! I love your description.

My docs also dead eyed (what a description!) and lack SOH totally! I wonder if it's GIs in general? I always marvel what makes a person dabble (literally) in s**t all day. It's worse than being a pathologist. I can see a point in the latter, but GI? Do you see a GI being a star of a detective series in books or TV? Descriptions of s**t hitting the fan? My imagination has gone to town on this one. I think I should go to bed.