Why The Tooth Fairy
Gave Up Grains & Sugars

Alvin H. Danenberg, DDS • Nutritional Periodontist
December 4, 2017

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Why the tooth fairy gave up grains & sugars

(Way back in August 2014, I wrote this tale and published it on my website. Several readers asked me to republish it on my website. With some tweaks and revisions, here is the tale for children to read or for parents to read to their children.)

 

A Whimsical Tale – updated

You may think you know all about tooth fairies. You know that they discreetly appear at night to sneak away your child’s baby tooth, which is hidden under his or her pillow. You also know that tooth fairies exchange the tooth for little trinkets. These little pixies flutter about with their cute big eyes, their huge smiles, and their soft silky wings. But what you probably don’t know is that these precious little busy bees have been around for a long time. As a matter of fact, they have been around for thousands of years.

These tooth fairies knew of a time when little boys and little girls hardly ever got tooth decay. In those days, mommies and daddies worked hard gathering and hunting food. The children ate all the good, nutritious foods that their parents brought to the table. Bodies were strong and lean, and teeth were white and straight. Adult teeth lasted a lifetime, as they were designed to do. But then, something changed. Unfortunately, the fairies didn’t realize it until much later.

Starting about 10,000 years ago, certain foods were grown on farms. As years went by, some people began to change these foods. Good things were removed from these foods, and bad things were added to these foods. These “new foods” eventually became part of almost everyone’s diet. The fairies didn’t think any harm was going to come from them. But, it did. These foods started to damage the teeth of children and adults. All of a sudden, it seemed like many people started to develop toothaches and loose teeth and holes in their teeth. The fairies finally learned that something was wrong with these “new foods”. They discovered that these “new foods” – these grain products and processed sugars – were a cause of dental problems and other health problems that were beginning to harm children and adults.

The fairies made a pledge to give up grain products and processed sugars and to try to tell everybody that these were not healthy foods.

Before these “new foods” came into the picture, children ate very healthy. So, the fairies became focused on a new mission – to tell the world that unhealthy grain products and unhealthy sugars needed to be avoided in order to regain dental health and overall health. You see, our bodies were never designed to eat these modern-day foods. These foods irritated our guts and eventually upset our bodies. It took a long time for the fairies to grasp that so many other diseases were caused by these “new foods”.

So, the fairies gave up grain products and processed sugars and started to teach the world to be a healthier place. Most importantly, the fairies wanted to teach better eating choices to the children, whom they were meant to protect.

 

Message for Moms and Dads

Parents can create healthy meals for their children. To that end, parents need to consider removing unhealthy grain products and processed sugars from meals and replacing them with healthier choices. Choose healthy varieties of meats, fish, eggs, and fats from animals that have been raised humanely in their natural environments. It is important to include leafy green vegetables at every meal. Over 50% of every “plate of food” should consist of non-starchy vegetables of all colors. You could add in some fruit or a starchy root vegetable or a few nuts and seeds. The foods hunter-gatherers ate for thousands and thousands of years are the foods that will allow healthy bodies of all ages to survive and thrive today. These food choices are part of a Primal (or Paleo-type) Lifestyle.

The recipes I have created and published on my website are nutrient-dense foods that are healthy and delicious. I invite you to explore some of them.

 

 

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Six Steps to the New You

evolution rSo, it’s the New Year and you’re thinking about the New You.
 
You think you want to go Paleo or Primal or Ancestral. They basically are all the same with only slight differences. Here are 6 steps to reach your goal of eliminating the bad foods. Although some people may want to jump in all at once, there may be problems going too fast.
 
For example, research has shown that refined sugars may be as addictive as cocaine. You could have intense cravings for refined carbohydrates during the first few weeks. It also would be reasonable to expect some withdrawal symptoms like headaches, sluggishness, or a little “brain fog” after eliminating these from your diet. Going slowly may be the best thing for you.
 
Others might have uncomfortable body reactions because already-stored toxins could be released too quickly and bad bacteria could be overwhelmed too quickly. These reactions might manifest in various ways like acne, diarrhea, nausea, stomachaches, bloating, gas, muscle or joint aches, or headaches. For these reasons, some people may prefer to take it slowly.
 
There are some people who may not have made up their minds that a new program is right for them. They might prefer to test the waters by taking baby steps.
 
Here is a progressive program that eases you into a healthy eating lifestyle over the next 12 weeks – one step at a time. Remember, this isn’t a diet; it’s a lifestyle change. Of course, you don’t have to take it slowly; you could jump in 100% on day ONE.
 
Step 1: Eliminate unhealthy oils and fats
For the next 14 days, remove all vegetable and seed oils, chemically produced trans fats, and partially hydrogenated fats from your diet. The reason: these oils and fats are toxic to your body. The only oils you will put on salads in moderation are macadamia oil or extra virgin olive oil. When it comes to sautéing, the only fats you will use will be saturated fats like coconut oil, butter or ghee from grass-fed cows, or other saturated fats like tallow from grass-fed and grass-finished cattle or lard from pastured pigs. You will completely avoid such liquid polyunsaturated oils as canola oil, sunflower oil, safflower oil, corn oil, cottonseed oil, soybean oil, etc. If you are eating processed foods, you will need to investigate the ingredient lists of these foods to see if they contain any forbidden fats or oils.
 
Step 2: Eliminate all grains
For the next 14 days, remove all grains from your diet. The reason: these carbohydrates will damage the lining of your gut, will change your gut bacteria to produce more harmful microbes, and will interfere with your normal hormonal balance. Grains include all cereals, breads made from wheat or other grain flours, pasta, crackers, cookies, cakes, muffins, bagels, pretzels, popcorn, rice biscuits, and anything on a label that includes any grain product. If you eat foods from grain-fed animals, you ultimately will be eating grain that was incorporated into their meat and fat.
 
Step 3: Eliminate all added sugars and artificial sweeteners
For the next 14 days, remove all added sugars and artificial sweeteners. The reason: refined and artificial sugars eventually stimulate your hormones to function poorly creating cellular damage as well as damage to your gut lining and to your healthy gut bacteria. Look at labels on processed foods. Many are loaded with sugar and sugar aliases like high fructose corn syrup, agave nectar, cane juice, dextrose, etc. Artificial sweeteners consist of aspartame (NutraSweet), sucralose (Splenda), Saccharine, etc. If you need a sweetener, you sparingly may use local, raw honey, which is a whole food.
 
Step 4: Eliminate all legumes
For the next 14 days, remove all legumes from you diet. The reason: legumes contain antinutrients that prevent certain minerals being absorbed through your gut and damage the lining of your gut. They include peanuts, black beans, garbanzo beans, pinto beans, lima beans, soybeans, lentils, etc.
 
Step 5: Eliminate pasteurized and homogenized milk and milk products
For the next 14 days, remove all conventionally processed milk products that include all pasteurized and homogenized products. The reason: these milk products have been physically, chemically, and biologically altered in such a way that it may be damaging to your gut lining and your hormone balance. Also, many people are lactose intolerant and/or sensitive to the casein protein in milk, which can mimic the gluten protein. Raw and non-homogenized milk and cheeses from cows and goats are OK if you can tolerate them.
 
Step 6: Eliminate most processed food products
For the next 14 days, remove processed food products. The reason: these generally contain chemical additives, preservatives, artificial ingredients, genetically modified foods, excess unhealthy salt, unhealthy fats, refined sugars, acellular carbohydrates, and various elements that may be toxic to your body over time. If the processed food only has healthy ingredients you recognize, then don’t be concerned. But if this food product has ingredients you cannot pronounce or obvious offenders as I have described, avoid it.

Healthier Mouth … Healthier Lifestyle … Healthier You
Part 2 of 5

evolution rMy eating style is based on human evolution – sometimes known as Paleo Lifestyle, or Ancestral Lifestyle, or Primal Lifestyle. They are all the same. Below are the foods that our ancestors never ate because these foods did not exist over the 2.5 million years of human evolution. Our bodies were never designed to ingest and digest these foods.
 
Foods to Avoid:
 
• Modern grains can initiate inflammation and a leaky gut, through which undigested foods and bad bacteria can leak into the bloodstream. Not good! This creates a cascade of events that can cause various chronic diseases and obesity. Grains also encourage the development of unhealthy bacteria in the gut, which never evolved to digest grains completely. Unhealthy bacteria in the gut mean unhealthy bacteria in the mouth. Grains need to be eliminated from our diets.
 
• Unnatural sugars contribute to unhealthy bacteria and chronic diseases as grains do. From a dental standpoint, sugars are fermentable carbohydrates that feed oral bacteria, which cause dental decay and gum disease. All added sugars like fructose, agave, and high fructose corn syrup should be avoided.
 
• Polyunsaturated vegetable oils (like canola oil, sunflower oil, soybean oil, corn oil, and safflower oil) are unstable and break down easily as a result of commercial processing and normal cooking. Ingestion of these fats damages metabolic processes causing harm to individual cells. Also, chemically altered trans fats and partially hydrogenated fats are toxic to the body. All of these need to be avoided.
 
• Processed foods contain too many carbohydrates, unhealthy fats, and an excess of unhealthy salt. They also contain various chemicals, which attempt to add back nutrients and to help food maintain a longer shelf life. Many of these additives are toxic. Processed foods should be avoided.
 
• Legumes have anti-nutrients that irritate the intestinal lining and prevent proper absorption of many minerals. Legumes are not essential for health and only offer a low level of nutrients per gram. Legumes include most beans, peas, lentils, soy, and peanuts. Commercially available soy and peanuts should always be avoided because cooking cannot destroy peanuts’ anti-nutrients, and soy contains phytoestrogens and trypsin inhibitors. The phytoestrogens confuse the body into thinking it is real estrogen, and the trypsin inhibitors interfere with normal protein digestion. However, soaking other beans, peas, and lentils for 8-12 hours and cooking them long enough to reduce the harmful level of anti-nutrients are methods that may make these legumes less harmful.
 
Tomorrow I will suggest those foods that are critical for health.
 
NOTE:
I DO NOT RECEIVE ANY COMPENSATION FROM ANY OF THE COMPANIES I HAVE RECOMMENDED.