Peter D'Adamo: Exemplars

Like everyone else, I’m trying to keep up with events as they unfold. Seems everyone wants to point a finger at someone else; in reality, unless you’ve lived on a deserted island for the past twenty years, everyone is to blame.

We’ve hatched an entire generation on a diet of no-pain-only-gain.

The Dow Jones only goes up, housing prices only appreciate. People at the lower rungs of the economic spectrum are given credit (of a largely predatory type -credit cards) but no guidance about how to manage their finances. Credit can be a fine servant but makes for a terrible master.

All in the name of ‘living the life.’

I’m old enough to remember being mildly uncomfortable in the presence of greedy people. They used to be called ‘materialistic’ if I remember. Back at John Bastyr Naturopathic College in the 1970’s one of my fellow students was planning on going into the wilds of Idaho and doing an entire barter based practice. During breaks he would wax enthusiastic: “I’ll grow herbs in my own garden and when someone can’t pay, they’ll just give me a basket of vegetables or a chicken.”

Last I heard he was practicing in a white lab coat, in downtown Seattle, in a conventional medical office.

When product consumerism stops producing happiness, then it’s time to switch to its psychic counterpart. Feel depressed, worthless and ugly? No problem! We can teach you to think your way to happiness. But first we have to get you to buy into the idea that zits, belly fat and baldness actually do determine your true value in life.

Every once in a while we would get a patient in the clinic who seemed to think that we had the power to make them permanently content and happy. Carolyn, my curmudgeonly RN of twenty years, would look up me from the chart and say, “Now I don’t feel wonderful all the time, do you?”

And in truth I don’t.

Eventually I got to the point where I would explain to the patients that cures often represented the fact that a person could be returned to a level of wretchedness merely similar to that of others. From there on you were on your own.

Most great things are developed or uncovered by people who are mildly uncomfortable in their own bodies. Perhaps that discomfort is even mandatory. Expression is that great intangible that says to the Universe "I’m here." However unlike a pizza, expression can't be delivered to your doorstep. It often arrives during moments of great pain and suffering, and not for nothing, most creative people have had great times of pain and suffering. Sometimes it is the pain that moves us from the comfortable to the unknown; from the secure to the insecure. When we insulate ourselves from the painful consequence of our actions, when we plaster over our failures with 'feel good technologies' like drugs or mindless 'prosperity thinking' we strip away the spiritual basis of that pain and failure, the part of the cycle that gives us the benefits of 'lessons-learned."

We think 'age' is chronological and to a certain functional degree this is true. However age is also a mindset. What is the final mechanism that tells the tree in autumn that it is time to release the leaf? I’m sure that there are all sorts of hormones and cell factors involved, but the simple truth is that the leaf is no longer relevant. Winter is coming, it's time to close down and leaves on a tree trap ice and may bring the whole thing down. So it is time to go.

When are we released from the tree of life? I think it occurs when the Universe inside our self finally just gets bored to death. "You can't teach an old dog new tricks." As the saying goes.

Many pursuits, such as sailing or golf, are characterized by an 'awkward stage' which we could also describe and a sort of 'student mindset'. Kids spend days, months and years in this mode before they enter adulthood, but once they are done with schooling most of us actually become rather adverse to reentering awkward learning situations, perhaps out of insecurity. Nobody wants to look silly or incapable.

Yet this is precisely most creativity and expression occurs. It’s been said that the most common utterance upon the discovery of an important new fact or concept is not "Eureka!" [Greek heurēka I have found (it)] but rather "Now… that’s interesting…"

Sadly, I see more and more 'Old-Young People' these days."There is no fool like and old fool" goes the saying. That is true, but I think young fools are more menacing.

Finally, there is faith. I am also old enough to remember feeling mildly uncomfortable when people would bring up their religious beliefs in conversation. Not that I have anything against faith per se --I just think that it is a matter of personal choice and best kept out of most forms of public dialogue. I think one of the truly brilliant acts of the Founding Fathers was to acknowledge religious behavior and separate it from matters of state. That said I would like to be somewhat certain that my elected officials are not using their personal faith and morals to guide government policy.

Faith can do many great things. My Spanish grandmother was a loyal daughter of the Catholic Church and in her great simplicity there was a warmth and acceptance of life and all its foibles that belied years of hardship and suffering. Think this credit crisis is bad? She brought up a family during the 1936-39 Spanish Civil War, when the fighting literally rolled over her village not once, but three times. Concerned about food prices? She once walked seven miles with a piece of furniture on her head to trade it for a dozen potatoes.

Just before she passed away (well in her nineties) she visited the United States. One afternoon I grabbed my forehead after a stressful day.

"What’s wrong?" she asked.

"Oh, just a headache."

"What does that feel like?"

It was at that point I realized that she had never had a headache in her entire life.

Faith can do that.

One way to truly screw up the truth is to subject it to public debate; since our minds want some sort of resolution, but out of inbred nicety we often want consensus as well. Problem is, as Winston Churchill so accurately pinned it, consensus is often “the sum total of everyone’s fears.”

People seem to have a love-hate relationship with genetics, or perhaps more accurately, an “awe-hate” relationship. Ask the average person what genetics means to them, and they will typically respond with a litany of dread, largely courtesy of the news media. Cloning. Stem cells. Genetically modified “Frankenfoods.” Yet ask that same person where they envision science will find the cure for cancer, or aging, or diabetes, and they will probably answer genetic research as well.

There are indeed aspects of genetics that are potentially disturbing. Consider the genetic modification of our foods. To a certain degree we are becoming one big uncontrolled experiment, as biotechnology inserts genes from one species into another, often for supercilious reasons. Do we need pesticide-resistant plants, courtesy of genetic engineering, or do we need more pesticide-free organic gardening?

It is precisely when biotechnology becomes the enabler of our existing bad habits that we lead ourselves into uncharted territory. It is also the time when the counter argument in favor of genetic modification of foods, that “nature does it all the time” rings hollow. “Nature” is a vast, living breathing mega-structure. To me Nature might more likely try to destroy pesticide manufacturers rather than re-engineer everything to be able to withstand their wares. It would certainly be easier.

In addition, we have the problem of the politically correct scientific conclusion. Scientists are human beings just like anyone else (stupider actually, if DNA pioneer James Watson were to be believed) and the pressure to conform or arrive at conclusions that are not socially distasteful (and hence not publicly fundable) is great.

But here’s what should be the goal: Take the gobs of generalized information out there, filter and analyze it, then let it guide our actions through the process of making the sort of useful decisions and actions that can produce positive change in public health. Our goal is not Eugenics (getting rid of genetic undesirables, like what the Nazis tried to do), but rather Yougenics --the science of studying yourself. As long as our fact-finding is based on the results that pertain only to you, the individual reading this blog, we will always remain on a strong, fair and firm ethical base.

I would go so far as to say that the absence of Yougenics is the main problem with nutrition as it is practiced today. All too often we read studies done on large groups of individuals and can only be left wondering if these results apply to us. Since nutrition began its meteoric rise in the public consciousness thirty years ago, we’ve been barraged with studies that have lead to sweeping conclusions and have then seen these same conclusions laid to rest, one after the other.

A lot of this is the result of nutrition being largely disease-based, a legacy of its years of discovery centered on finding the cause of deficiencies. Conventional nutritional wisdom came to define health as the absence of nutritional deficiency. Some of this is probably a ripple effect from the major developments that have taken place in the field of pharmaceutical drugs. But foods work differently than drugs. For example, we don’t make energy out of drugs; they don’t fuel or cellular processes. Foods are functional entities in our bodies, not drugs that prevent deficiencies, and our reactions to food are much more individualized than those we have to drugs.

Since nutritional science has such a rudimentary approach to food, it is not surprising that most nutrition research yields results that typically conflict with other results. And although it will eventually be yanked, no doubt kicking and screaming, into the genomic age, nutritionists still clamor for the next “one size fits all approach”, substituting one fad for another, each with its own army of disciples and detractors, the cycle to be repeated again and again.

An interesting observation on the Autism website points to the possibility that The Blood Type Diets can be helpful in managing kids with autism. We've seen some indication of this in the Clinic, and I've speculated in at least one book (Live Right For Your Type) that lectin avoidance may be the mechanism by which this occurs. Would be nice to see a good independent study on this. We can at least hope!

Because I attended a Catholic grammar school which was private and did not receive any state or government funding, we were often dispatched on extenuated and cheerless forays out into the public in a quest for its nickels and dimes. This usually included the sale of various candies or 'chance books,” a cluster of five or ten tickets which entered the owner into a drawing of some sort, for a variety of possible prizes.

Never mind that this same public (due to the limitations of spatial geography and the ambulatory capacities of a ten-year old) was already paying through a myriad of other schemes to keep their kids in this very same school. Typically after suitable introductions had been made and accompanied by sufficient eye-rolling and entreaties heavenward, the wallet would be procured and another book of chances sold. Usually, I’d take the opportunity to remind them of what a wise investment they had made, only to be greeted by the sobriquet “Sonny,” and the dismissal of a future possibilities with an off-hand “I’ve never won anything, and I’m not very lucky.”

From that point to this, I’ve always marveled when people tell me that they aren’t very lucky, since of course it is not true. Just wondering about your unluckiness, marks you as being among the luckiest of all. As a matter of fact, you have won one of the greatest raffle prizes of all time; at odds so astronomical so as to be incalculable. You’ve won the raffle of life.

Just think. Your parents first needed to have come from genealogical lines that survived through all the plagues, wars and accidents of time. Second, they needed to be in physical proximity, so as to come into contact with each other. Third, they had to be attracted in such a manner as to stimulate (hopefully) the urge for procreation in each other. Fourth, they had to be in that particular mood at just the time when the team “up at bat” sperm and egg-wise was you. Fifth, the sperm that carried the genetic information from your father had to compete with millions of other sperm in a race that would make the New York City Marathon look like a trip to the store for a newspaper. Sixth, even upon winning, that sperm had to find an egg at just the exact time when it was ripe for fertilization. Finally, after fertilization, the embryo had to travel through the Fallopian tubes and implant in the uterus where it developed form the cluster of cells into something that would eventually grow to the point where it could take care of itself.

So who among us is unlucky?

Just the other day, Martha reconnected via email with an old friend of ours, John Weeks. I first met John back in the mid-1980's when he was the first Development Officer for Bastyr College. I got to know him much better while was serving with him on the American Association of Naturopathic Physicians (AANP) Board of Directors.

John has gone on to carve out a career as the Editor/ Publisher of The Integrator Blog, a website devoted to "a health care system that is multidisciplinary and enhances competence, mutual respect and collaboration across all health care disciplines."

In emailing back and forth with Martha he directed us to a little blurb he had just published on the recent AANP Convention which had mentioned a long forgotten (although not by John) suggestion of mine about creating 'model states' as part of our drive to secure license in all 50 states.

That was interesting enough, but more jostled me out of my typical late morning indolence was a discussion elsewhere about the chronology and authorship of the phrase 'Integrative Medicine'.

In another move undoubtedly destined to make me even more popular with Andrew Weil (who is widely credited with it authorship) I wrote John a quick note that mentioned off-the-cuff that I had used the phrase long ago when I was part of a small committee responsible for formulating the first clinical curriculum at Bastyr College.

Well, after we conducted a see-saw email interview, John wrote a rather nice little blog about it.

The more I read of Andrew Weil's efforts to debunk the work of my father and myself, the more I'm convinced I can't simply turn the other cheek and let these so-called skeptics just get away with disingenuous portrayals of the science behind this diet. His recent slag-job in AARP Magazine is just more proof that I will need to react in a timely and concise manner going forward.

"D'Adamo theorizes that the basis for such differences is our reactions to certain food proteins called lectins. Lectins are common in plant foods, especially grains and beans, and may be involved in food allergies and some immune disorders. But there is no convincing evidence for any interactions between lectins and the molecules that determine blood type."

"Yet some people swear the blood type diet has worked for them. There's a reason for that. Making changes in how we eat is not easy. To follow any prescribed dietary program with rules and restrictions represents a significant commitment of mental energy toward self-improvement. That alone can lead to a greater sense of well-being and better health. But if you want to eat a better diet, I recommend you rely on information grounded in nutritional science."

I think I got on Dr. Weil's bad side a few years ago when I replied to a question posed to me about my recommendation that blood type As eat peanuts, while Dr. Weil was saying that peanuts were dangerous because of the aflatoxin. My response was that this was a silly piece of advice since the only place you can get aflatoxin is in health food stores when you grind your own peanut butter; all the commercial forms must be assayed for it before they can be sold.

Over the next few years Dr. Weil kept up a consistent attack on me and the theory, usually basing his case on the rather odd observation that animals have blood types and yet don't follow the Blood Type Diet.

However with the AARP column Dr. Weil instead shifted to what he considers the lack of proven association between dietary lectins and blood groups.

It's a bad place to pick an argument, since at that point the argument moves up the academic ladder to areas he would be wise to not tread. There are numerous and well-documented links between lectins and blood groups. Searching MEDLINE for the terms ABO Blood Groups and Lectins yields 687 published studies[0] In fact the term ‘lectin’ was derived in 1954 from the Latin for legere, to pick or choose, it having been coined thus to call attention to their blood type specificity.

Dr. Weil's claim appears to have not been researched to any great degree since it appears to me to have been taken from an incorrect assertion that often finds its way onto the Wikipedia entry on the Blood Type Diet.

In fact, blood group specificity is listed as one of the nine major factors influencing glycosylation in the gut (glycosylation is the process of manufacturing the sugar molecules that lectins bind with). Other factors include diet, age, animal species, disease and bacterial population.

Independent of the lectin hypothesis, in my opinion the secretory differences (digestive enzymes, etc.) between the blood groups are an even more significant reason behind the need for the tailoring nutritional needs to these genetic markers.[1] But Dr. Weil doesn't know about these links or chooses to ignore them altogether. Then again, every critic seems to have their own favorite aspect of the theory.

Given his harsh take on my work, it was surprising to read some of his statements about the need for keeping an open mind about alternative medicine. Kinda wish he would practice what he preaches. In a reply to one of his own critics (Arnold S. Relman, editor-in-chief emeritus of the New England Journal of Medicine)[2], he writes:

"As a researcher, you have the luxury of insisting on rigorous scientific testing, and you have the leisure to wait for results to come in. As a practitioner, you are in the trenches, working with patients who have medical needs. And you often have to guess, and you have to make use of your best medical judgment in the absence of definitive evidence."

No argument there.

"In my experience-- I consider experience to be one valuable source of data--many patients use alternative methods because they find that they work. And if a patient has tried a method and found that it works, that patient needs no further proof, does not need to read the reports of a randomized, double-blind, controlled trial in a medical journal to be convinced of the efficacy of treatment."

Even better.

"I don't think you can have it both ways; you can't demand evidence, and then when evidence comes in that contradicts your preconceptions, say you aren't going to look at it."

Words to live by.

Now if Dr. Weil were to keep an open mind, I'd recommend that he read up on the work of William Boyd, who first wrote of the blood type specificity of lectins more than a half centry ago [3] or review the research of Martin Nachbar[4] from the 1980's. Lots of interesting stuff there. A trip to MEDLINE would also be helpful.[5],[6],[7]

In an article critical of Dr. Weil written for the New Republic Relman touched on many of Weil's factual inconsistencies and concluded that:

Weil considers himself an authority on almost every field of medicine. [8]

Finally, it could be argued that the possible reason Dr. Weil supplies for why some people swear that the blood type diet has worked for them ("a significant commitment of mental energy toward self-improvement") may well be the exact same reason some people derive benefits from his own books, tapes and recommendations!

But let's at least end on a somewhat positive note, with a quote from someone who does have experience with lectins. Gerhard Uhlenbruck is one of about three or four top lectinologists of the last century and renowned for discovering the structure of the Thomsen-Friedenreich antigens and the structure and specificity of (aflatoxin-free, I'm sure) peanut lectin. This is what he recently said:

When I first heard of Peter D'Adamo's blood group diet, of course I was very skeptical: Should we have missed in our book (Prokop/ Uhlenbruck: Human Blood and Serum Groups) such an important aspect? But years later, my interest switched to the nutritional field while working on the so-called Metabolic Syndrome, my interest increased in studying the role of genes in metabolic processes. I found out, that Peter D'Adamo's blood group orientated diet could probably be a first step in the right direction..

Back soon with a more positive, happy and helpful blog.