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Do you experience any of the following issues?
Bloating, gas, and abdominal cramps
Painful and swollen joints
Fatigue and tiredness
Skin rashes
Hormonal fluctuations
Nausea
Allergy like symptoms
Neurological symptoms
These are symptoms that occur when you have inflammation in your gut. What causes the inflammation? Your body can be disrupted through physical stress, chemical stress and emotional stress. A common overlooked chemical stress to your body are sugar-binding proteins called Lectins and membrane proteins called Aquaporins.
How Do You Know If You Are Sensitive to Lectins?
LECTINS and AQUAPORINS
Lectins are a large class of sugar-binding proteins that can be found in all forms of life. In plants, lectins are part of the natural defense against microorganisms, pests, and insects. Many members of the lectin protein family can agglutinate (clump together) and become problematic for human health.
Lectins have been thought to contribute to the development of diseases such as celiac disease, autoimmune diseases, rheumatoid arthritis, obesity, cardiovascular disease, and type 2 diabetes through mechanisms involving translocation across the intestinal barrier and activation of the adaptive immune system. [1,2] The most common high-lectin foods include: grains, legumes, and nightshades.
Aquaporins, or “water channels”, are membrane proteins that form pores to facilitate water transport between cells. Human aquaporins show similarity to aquaporins from food sources (e.g., spinach, soy, corn, tomato, etc.) which could trigger the production of antibodies, which might increase risk for neuro-autoimmune disorders. [3]
What are Lectin and Aquaporin Sensitivities?
Lectin and aquaporin sensitivities are your body’s delayed immune response that can occur hours to days after these foods are consumed.
Symptoms associated with lectin and aquaporin food sensitivities include:
Bloating, gas, and abdominal cramps
Painful and swollen joints
Fatigue and tiredness
Skin rashes
Hormonal fluctuations
Nausea
Allergy like symptoms
Neurological symptoms
Risk factors that may place you at higher risk for lectin or aquaporin sensitivities include:
Frequent use of antibiotics
Following a vegan/vegetarian diet
Leaky gut syndrome
Family history of autoimmune disorders
Mental health problems
Imbalances in the gut/ immune system
Following a vegan/vegetarian diet high in grains and/or legumes
Those with known intestinal permeability
History of rheumatoid arthritis (painful and swollen joints)
Experiencing fatigue and tiredness
Psychological symptoms or disorders (e.g., depression)
Neurological autoimmunity or degenerative symptoms of undefined origin
Presence of skin rashes
Nausea (especially during or after meals)
This book is easy to read, understand, and follow along to help you decrease or remove lectins from your nutrition thus reducing inflammation in your gut.
From the Back Cover
Most of us have heard of gluten—a protein found in wheat that can cause widespread inflammation in the body. Americans spend billions of dollars on gluten-free diets in an effort to protect their health. But what if we’ve been missing the root of the problem?
In The Plant Paradox, renowned cardiologist and heart surgeon Dr. Steven Gundry reveals that gluten is just one variety of a common, and highly toxic, plant-based protein called lectin. Lectins are found not only in grains like wheat but also in the “gluten-free” foods most of us commonly regard as healthy, including many fruits, vegetables, nuts, beans, and conventional dairy products. These proteins, which are found in the seeds, grains, skins, rinds, and leaves of plants, are designed by nature to protect plants from predators (including humans). Once ingested, they incite a kind of chemical warfare in our bodies, causing inflammatory reactions that can lead to weight gain and serious health conditions.
At his waitlist-only clinics in California, Dr. Gundry has successfully treated tens of thousands of patients suffering from autoimmune disorders, diabetes, leaky gut syndrome, heart disease, and neurodegenerative diseases with a protocol that detoxes the cells, repairs the gut, and nourishes the body. Now, in The Plant Paradox, he shares this clinically proven program with readers around the world.
The simple (and daunting) fact is, lectins are everywhere. Thankfully, Dr. Gundry offers simple hacks we can easily employ to avoid them, including
Peel your veggies. Lectins are concentrated in the leaves, peels, and seeds of plants; simply peeling and deseeding vegetables (like tomatoes and peppers) reduces their lectin content.
Shop for fruit in season. Fruit contain fewer lectins when ripe, so eating apples, berries, and other lectin-containing fruits at the peak of ripeness helps minimize your lectin consumption.
Swap your brown rice for white. Whole grains and seeds with hard outer coatings are designed by nature to cause digestive distress—and are full of lectins.
With a full list of lectin-containing foods and simple substitutes for each, a step-by-step detox and eating plan, and delicious lectin-free recipes, The Plant Paradox illuminates the hidden dangers lurking in your salad bowl—and shows you how to eat whole foods in a whole new way.
About the Author Steven R. Gundry, MD, is the director of the International Heart and Lung Institute in Palm Springs, California, and the founder and director of the Center for Restorative Medicine in Palm Springs and Santa Barbara. After a distinguished surgical career as a professor and chairman of cardiothoracic surgery at Loma Linda University, Dr. Gundry changed his focus to curing modern diseases via dietary changes. He is the bestselling author of The Longevity Paradox, The Plant Paradox, The Plant Paradox Cookbook, The Plant Paradox Quick and Easy, and Dr. Gundry’s Diet Evolution, and has written more than three hundred articles published in peer-reviewed journals on using diet and supplements to eliminate heart disease, diabetes, autoimmune disease, and multiple other diseases. Dr. Gundry lives with his wife, Penny, and their dogs in Palm Springs and Montecito, California.
References
Pan et al (2013). Effects of Soybean Agglutinin on Mechanical Barrier Function and Tight Junction Protein Expression in Intestinal Epithelial Cells from Piglets. Int. J. Mol. Sci. 2013, 14, 21689-21704; doi:10.3390/ijms141121689
Cordain et al (2000). Modulation of immune function by dietary lectins in rheumatoid arthritis. British Journal of Nutrition (2000), 83, 207–217
Fukuda and Badaut (2012). Aquaporin 4: a player in cerebral edema and neuroinflammation. Journal of Neuroinflammation, 9:279. https://jneuroinflammation.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/1742-2094-9-279