How many teeth do you have?

So Well wrote:

Every day, eat high quality, whole foods to provide an abundance of nutrients, chosen from each of the following four groups:
1. Animal foods: meat and organ meats, poultry, and eggs from pastured animals; fish and shellfish; whole raw cheese, milk and other dairy products from pastured animals; and broth made from animal bones.
2. Grains, legumes and nuts: whole-grain baked goods, breakfast porridges, whole grain rice; beans and lentils; peanuts, cashews and nuts, properly prepared to improve digestibility.
3. Fruits and Vegetables: preferably fresh or frozen, preferably locally grown, either raw, cooked or in soups and stews, and also as lacto-fermented condiments.
4. Fats and Oils: unrefined saturated and monounsaturated fats including butter, lard, tallow and other animal fats; palm oil and coconut oil; olive oil; cod liver oil for vitamins A and D.

Avoid: foods containing refined sweeteners such as candies, sodas, cookies, cakes etc.; white flour products such as pasta and white bread; processed foods; modern soy foods; polyunsaturated and partially hydrogenated vegetable oils and fried foods.

http://realfoodmommy.blogspot.com/2010/ ... etary.html

I started eating this way not because of the recommendations of the Weston Price foundation, but because I realized that sugar, juice, and even whole grains made me produce too much insulin. Restructuring my diet to avoid the extreme insulin surges and the insulin resistance they eventually produce, and eating what my body asked for, I wound up with a diet that, with occasional excursions, fits the above recommendation.

I do eat whole grain and potatoes now, but in moderation. And the wicked sweet tooth I used to have (hallmark of insulin resistance), is gone. Now, I don't want to eat large amounts of sweets. I didn't like them at all as a child, but after having adults (not my parents) freak out a few times when I said I didn't like cake etc., I decided I'd better learn to like that sort of thing. OTOH, I never felt that kind of pressure to eat healthy foods. I wonder how many other people learn to like junk food because their elders expect them to. My body knew what was good for it. If I'd been able to just follow those cravings from the beginning, I'd be a lot more healthy today.

So Well wrote:napstress, it would be interesting to know if you (or anyone else on the forum) are consuming considerable quantities of the following recommended foods and what your sources of the foods are?

organ meats; raw (unpasteurized) milk and cheese; broth made from animal bones; butter, lard, tallow and other animal fats; palm oil and coconut oil; cod liver oil for vitamins A and D.

I eat a fair amount of cheese. It is pasteurized, but I take a lipase supplement which should at least partly make up for that. I always use butter instead of margarine or "spread", but I don't use it every day. When I cook steak or pork chops (unbreaded), I eat a little of the fat. I usually take cod liver oil in the winter. Carlson is a brand that doesn't have mercury or a bad taste.

Once I'm more rested and can figure out what happened to my stock pot the last time I moved, I'd like to try making bone broth.

Otter wrote:

Thank you. What about organ meats?

So Well wrote:

Otter wrote:

What about organ meats?

I don't eat them very often. The most commonly available is beef liver. I don't like the taste, and given the liver's function, and that cattle are often fed unnecessary drugs, I'm not sure how wholesome it is.

I haven't explored other organ meats, but I'd like to. Do you have any recommendations? What do you eat from this category?

Otter wrote: What do you eat from this category?

Damn, I was afraid you would ask.

Do you really have to know?

So Well wrote:

Otter wrote: What do you eat from this category?

Damn, I was afraid you would ask.

Do you really have to know?

I suppose not, but I am curious.

Beef liver is too strong-tasting for me. Calves liver is much milder at the same price around here.
A big mess of caramelized onions alongside the liver, and that's comfort food.

So Well wrote:napstress, it would be interesting to know if you (or anyone else on the forum) are consuming considerable quantities of the following recommended foods and what your sources of the foods are?

Before I read her book, I was minimizing meat (which included fish and chicken). Years earlier, I had been a strict vegetarian and for one of those years a vegan. I became very ill. Then I saw an acupuncturist, who told me I should be eating a steak every morning for breakfast! Over the years, every acupuncturist and naturopathic physician I saw agreed with the first one. But still I had been restricting animal protein, and eating it only with a measure of worry that it was bad for me. Nevertheless, I was experiencing feeling much better eating it. Sally Fallon's book explained why. So I eliminated the tofu cutlets and tempeh, which never did much for me, for, as it turns out, good reasons, and started eating small amounts of meat at all three meals and it has done wonders for stabilizing my blood sugar, which, I discovered, is key #1 for making me emotionally balanced and stable. I never get shaky, irritable, cold, and overwhelmingly and randomly hungry anymore.

I must emphasize that all of these foods I mention in this post must be from organic, natural, grass-fed, and/or free-range sources. These foods and ways of preparing them have a powerful impact on the body. The impact is only positive if the animals were free of hormones, eating food free of pesticides, and able to move around in a natural way. I am lucky to live in a town with a store that sells grass-fed meats. (In Kingston, NY, about an hour south of Albany).

I also started using butter, which has brought great joy into my life, if nothing else! It just makes sense to me to eat from sources simply provided by nature.

I make the bone broths and always have some on hand in the freezer. The bone broth is very important because I still restrict dairy because it increases congestion in my right ear, but every woman in my family has osteoporosis. According to Fallon, the bones are a good way to get calcium. At first I was hesitant to try making the bone broths, thinking it would be a major project, but I have found a way to incorporate it into my kitchen workflow. Here's the routine: I buy two whole chickens, cut up, and bake them. Then I store two servings each in quart-sized containers: one breast per container; one leg, one thigh, one wing per container. As I eat the chicken (and the skin!!), I collect the bones in a bag that I keep in the freezer. Once I have enough bones, I make the bone broth and freeze it in quart-sized containers. Then I just defrost a container when I want to make a soup or boost a dish to which I would normally just add water. I used to ask the butcher for beef bones, but they got too expensive (from the grass-fed meat store).

I ate chicken liver once a week for a few years. I can get it at two local grocery stores, in addition to the place where I get grass-fed meat. I would have tried beef liver, but could not find an organic source of it. Whenever I made the chicken liver, my cat would harass me until I gave her some. In fact, my cat was never really interested in what I ate until I started eating according to Nourishing Traditions. I took her interest as a sign that I was on the right track! Here's how I made the liver that drove my cat wild: Bake a potato. Cook up some bacon, pat dry, and set aside. Pour some of the grease out of the pan. Sautee 2-3 oz. chicken liver in remaining bacon grease, along with onions sliced long. Along with this dish, I lightly boiled some broccoli, put it on the potato, grated some sharp cheddar cheese onto it and popped it into the oven for a few minutes until the cheese melted. Crumble the bacon over the liver dish. However, I found that this meal would make me feel very, very tired, and actually not very good. Probably too much fat for my system. So I've stopped eating it. (And as much as I love being "allowed" to eat chicken skin, I have to go easy on that too). I haven't tried any other organ meats. My grandmother used to give the heart from the chicken roast to my mother, so I'm curious about that. But since I've never had a chicken heart come my way, I haven't tried it.

After a few years implementing the suggestions outlined in Sally Fallon's diet, I cut way back on carbohydrates, which she doesn't emphasize as much as she does the adding in of animal proteins. (Between this last step and regular, pleasurable exercise (dance), I lost about 15 pounds. Now, at age 46, I weigh what I did in my early 20s, and have maintained that ideal weight for the past 5 years). I don't eat many carbs of any kind, but when I do, I soak my grains for 8 hours with a couple of tablespoons of plain yogurt. This has been very important, because I do not digest grains very well.

For many years, I experimented with lacto-fermentation, and regularly made the beet kvass, sauerkraut, and salsa dishes. They were soooo delicious! Again, that process was not as daunting as I had expected once I developed a workflow for it. I stopped making the sauerkraut and salsa because I stopped eating hot dogs (they gave me the same weird feeling as the liver did) and our favorite Mexican dish. I stopped making the kvass because the workflow balance was disrupted because I was no longer making enough lacto-fermented dishes to make it worthwhile to make the whey. (I'd end up throwing a lot of whey out, which made me feel really bad).

I haven't tried raw meats, except for sushi (in the form of raw tuna), which I eat about once a month, with great joy. The idea of raw beef makes my mouth water, but I don't have the courage to try it. When I think of eating raw liver, I feel a little queasy: it just doesn't smell right to me.

I've tried raw dairy products. There's a farm about an hour from where I live (an hour south of Albany, NY). But raw dairy clogs my ears as much as pasteurized, so I don't bother making the trek.

So, none of this has had any affect on my Insomnia (though maybe the OSAH would be worse if I weren't doing it). But I do know I am functioning much better on it than I had been.

napstress

Now you are doing it right!

Steak for breakfast. Ahhhh!

(Are you going to get the software for your machine and start checking the data?)

Taking wet finger out of mouth from counting teeth . . . interesting.

A high palate from childhood thumb sucking, incorrect bottle feeding and the like also contributes to a malformed palate. In my case I have a very high and narrow palate caused by thumb sucking as a child. I should have listened to my father who prodded and bribed me to quit - sorry dad.

Here are some very graphic pictures (warning for those who don't like to look at anatomy) regarding this syndrome. http://www.brianpalmerdds.com/pdf/Otitis_media.pdf

It would be interesting to get a sampling of data as to how many teeth people without OSA have. It seems to me that most people have their wisdom teeth removed, but that's hardly based on any real data.

Sireneh wrote:It would be interesting to get a sampling of data as to how many teeth people without OSA have. It seems to me that most people have their wisdom teeth removed, but that's hardly based on any real data.

WHY would that be interesting

I have never bothered to count what I have, only what is missing.
My two upper k-nines never grew and my 2 lower front teeth never grew.
I never had any wisdom teeth (maybe that's why I am not so smart).
I had one upper front tooth removed about 10 years ago.

I have 26 teeth. I had all 4 wisdom teeth removed. That would have left me with 28 teeth... But I was referred for orthodontic therapy at the age of 19 because I was getting migraines and they said my jaw wasn't aligned properly or something. My teeth were perfectly healthy, if somewhat crowded on the top (not TOO badly), although the crowding was before they pulled my wisdom teeth. The orthodontist assured me that having my wisdom teeth pulled would have no effect on how much space I had, so he ordered two perfectly good teeth to be pulled from the top of my mouth before all of this. Of course he was wrong. After they pulled my wisdom teeth, the orthodontist spent about 4 years trying to close the gaps that he'd made. He didn't succeed. I'm pretty sure my bite is still misaligned. My teeth are straighter, but there are two unsightly (to me) spaces, one on each side of my mouth. Now apparently I have a pathetically small amount of teeth. But at least I'm in good company, because it seems like the majority of us have fewer than 28 teeth. How interesting to think that there might be a link between that and OSA. Woot! One more thing to blame on my crappy orthodontist.

Smack-dab what I was looinkg for-ty!

Isme wrote: How interesting to think that there might be a link between that and OSA. Woot! One more thing to blame on my crappy orthodontist.

Throw in the university and all its program staff and professors who never mentioned OSA/jaw connection in all his years of study.