My cogs in my brain won't stop turning, so on the ride home I jotted some thoughts down. This should probably be a few blogs, but hey, ya take what you can get I'll post more details about the conference and a few pics over the next few days...

Thoughts on Non-secretors

I like to think that in the world of X-Men, it's the non-secretors who are the mutants*(see new note below), or conversely, the superheroes. Dr. D'Adamo says we're just plain weird, and that is true. We're a bit harder to pin down. What are the advantages to being a non-secretor, beyond resistance to one or two rare illnesses? I know there are some, but they remain to be illuminated by experience.

For one, we do have this internal enforcer, this force inside us that does its best to make us perfect in our compliance. However, secretors can be highly lectin sensitive under certain circumstances, as well.

I don't know, but I suspect I would not have found and tried the diet yet, if I had not been faced with the challenges of being a non-secretor. We are by most definitions, less perfect than secretors biologically, yet in a perfect state one can no longer learn. Without pain, we do not learn. I suppose as a population, if there were not these often problematic adaptations, the species would not learn either. Both genetically, and as a culture, non-secretors have something to share with the population at large; we have a lot to teach, because we learn it more quickly due to the power of dietary influence in our lives. I feel that I did some of that teaching over this weekend, as I got to help Steve Shapiro with the client panel, and just meeting and talking with everybody, but I did a whole lot more learning. It's so cool to sit down next to somebody you've never met during a break, introduce yourselves, and within seconds, start learning amazing things from them.

A sampling of what I learned

There were many "ah-ha" moments when I realized, "Oh, that's why I've been doing this…I was just doing it to follow the instructions" I re-read the books now and things jump out at me that I never noticed before.

List of things I'm grateful I've done, and will continue, especially now that I've learned why they're so important:

-Following the diet for many months before conceiving a child.

-Taking Folic Acid and B12, and good quality vitamins for many months before conceiving.

-Avoiding farmed salmon at all times

-Eating, and feeding my family organic whole foods

-Avoiding Lectins – the mechanisms of the damage they can do have been illustrated to me, and I'd rather keep all my organs in good working order for a long time to come.

-Avoiding Gluten (the super-lectin in my book)

-Using Organic Butter

-Setting goals, and living a long productive life

I'll go into more detail in coming blogs.

Setting Goals

However, regarding setting goals…I'd forgotten how much I love to learn. I was sick of school, but now I'm thinking of going back on a very part time basis. One thing at a time of course, and my top priority is raising my children, but I'm going to take some continuing education to keep sharp for the day when eventually I will go back to school.

Before I finished university, went to work, and had children, I thought of becoming a genetic counselor (this was before discovering Bland and D'Adamo). University of Utah medical school has a good program, and the combination of one-on-one counseling sessions, combined with the fascinating subject of genetics really appeals to me. I could aim for Naturopathic school, but I think by the time I get there, this science of nutrigenomics will be advanced enough that I won't step on too many toes in conventional medicine (and if I do, oh well!) Maybe preventative genetic tests will have become affordable by then as well, making genetic counseling something within reach for everyone as a powerful preventative tool.

It should be a fun ride. Slow, but steady. I think I could have a long lifespan ahead of me. I am an O after-all, and the BTD is giving me an edge.

I still can't believe that I was able to grasp most of what was taught this weekend, even by Dr. Bland, who can say more in one paragraph than most people learn in a lifetime. It must be my genetics background…it's so nice when things start coming together.

Oh, I met a woman at the conference, named Debbie, who has a Blood Type Friendly health food store with a large selection of gluten-free foods: www.glutenfree4life.com She said foods are labeled on the shelf for what blood types can eat them. Very nice person with an interesting story of her own. It looks like the products aren't organized by Blood type on the website, but I'm sure she could provide you with information. Great resource for other celiacs on BTD.

I have some other very cool links in my notes, that I'll find for you. One with recipes, and some interesting scientific ones that the presenters shared with us.

More to come!

*Note: I'm actually just referring to the mutants in the x-men movie, not to non-secretorism as an actual mutation. There is a tendency to think of any disadvantage as a mutation, yet the term mutation is not used in genetic circles very often, as they have more descriptive terms for these differences, like Single Nucleotide Polymorphisms, which nonsecretorism is not.