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Protein and Detoxification When embarking on a detoxification program, an essential criterion is protein restriction – but not to the extent that it inhibits healing. Protein restriction encourages the release of toxins and excess sodium from within the cells; once this occurs, the cell's oxidative potential is restored. Loss of oxygen utilisation by the cell underlies so many of our chronic diseases, where the cell gradually slips into fermentation which heralds the onset of all our chronic diseases – including immune incompetence, inflammatory disease and cancer. Excess dietary protein will oppose this flushing of toxic debris at the cellular level, which is why so many detoxification programs rely heavily on fruits and vegetables for their cellular purging effects. However, we need to watch that we don't become protein deficient, as a protein-deficient diet sustained over a long period of time will inhibit healing and may lead to the very symptoms that you may be trying to resolve – such as worsening of chronic complaints, digestive problems, immune deficiency, hair loss, incontinence, heart palpitations, weakness, dizziness and fatigue. Protein-restricted vs protein-deficient diets It can be easy for unseasoned detoxifiers to fall into the trap of purging themselves to death instead of to health! Replenishment needs to occur simultaneously with cleansing, and this means meeting all the nutritional requirements for healing and regeneration without inhibiting the detoxification process. So you need to be clear on how much protein is enough protein on a detoxification program. First, there is a big difference between a protein-restricted diet and a protein-deficient diet. Let's start with how much protein we need. According to current nutritional guidelines, the recommended daily intake (RDI) is one gram of protein per kilogram of body weight, which means a person weighing 55 kilograms would require 55 grams of protein. This is very easy to obtain from a varied diet. Animal foods contain 20–25% protein (meat delivers 20 g per 100 g of protein, and cheese 25 g per 100 g), while cereal grains average 12% (dry weight) and legumes 25% (dry weight). If we take a varied diet which contains some animal protein,
grains and legumes, we can see that most foods offer enough protein to
satisfy nutritional requirements: However, as most nutritionists are eager to point out, animal protein is “first class” and of a high quality, while vegetarian protein is "second class". With second-class proteins, up to half the protein consumed may be discarded by the body as being unusable. This fact often forms the basis of negative assertions about vegetarian diets, but, as we shall see, such opinions taken out of context are unfounded. Supplementing protein shortfalls If we take the analogy of writing a book, we can easily explain protein requirements. A book requires a quantity of letters which are assembled into words. However, the book is generally going to require more of some letters, like the vowels, than the x's, y's and z's. So we have a “letter profile” for the book. The body is similar. Like our 26-letter alphabet, proteins have a 22-amino-acid alphabet. The amino acids are assembled in particular sequences which make the specific proteins. And like the "letter profile" of a book, we have an "amino-acid profile" where we require more of some amino acids than others. Animal protein happens to fit the human protein profile; in other words, it delivers the amino acids (building blocks of protein) in the ratio we require. Generally we refine this profile down to eight essential amino acids, as the remaining 14 can be synthesised from these. On the other hand, vegetable protein does not fit the human protein profile and is often missing one or more essential amino acids (the limiting amino acids). What does this mean? Imagine you are going to bake a cake and you require 200 g flour, 100 g sugar, 100 g butter and two eggs. However, you find that although you have all the ingredients, you only have 100 g of flour. This means that you can only bake half a cake. This is exactly what happens in the body: unless all the ingredients are present in their correct ratio when required, the body will use what it has and discard the surplus. It will not wait until the next meal to make good any shortfall. Over a period of years, this type of diet can have an erosive effect on the body, which may not manifest until the rate of tissue degeneration starts to exceed regeneration – generally at the age of 40+. However, if we mix our second-class vegetable proteins at the same meal, we can often supplement the shortfall. For example, both nuts and cereal grains are deficient in the amino acid lysine, while legumes are deficient in tryptophan. However, by taking legumes at the same meal as, say, rice or nuts/seeds, they will supplement each other's deficiencies and convert the protein value from 55% to 70% – or that of a first-class protein. Additionally, dairy (as in yoghurt) has a special role to play. Although it provides only 3% protein, it is very rich in many of the limiting amino acids and, if taken in small amounts with other vegetable protein, will supplement the profile and further increase the protein value of the meal. So where does this leave detoxification regimes which rely heavily on vegetable juicing? Well, the good news is that vegetables (unlike grains, legumes and seeds) have a first-class amino acid profile. The bad news is that they deliver only 1.5–2% protein, which means that you would need to eat 1 kilogram of vegetables to ensure taking in 15–20 grams of protein, so 1 litre of juice each day (provided by 1 kg vegetables and 1 kg apples) would provide you with the same amount of usable protein as 100 grams of meat. Increasing the juicing increases the protein content. If we add yoghurt at every meal where we are having grains
(oats, rice, etc.) and legumes, then we ensure first-class quality protein
at each meal. Let's add it up: Technically, this would satisfy the requirements of a person weighing 81.85 kilograms! It's important to remember that, on any detoxification program, you are obtaining your protein from low-protein sources. But by strictly adopting a regime which ensures both the quantity and quality of protein, it is impossible to become protein deficient. One of the secrets of the success of this therapy is the type of protein that you consume. Protein Content in Vegetables: grams/100 g (%) [Kathryn Alexander is a Maleny-based nutritional healing
and detoxification expert who does personal consultations and workshops.
She is the author of Get A Life: The Detoxification Diet Made Easy!,
which is available from Maple Street Co-op. Contact Kathryn on (07) 5435
8138 or 0414 702520 (mobile), |
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Address: 37 Maple Street, Maleny Qld 4552, Australia Telephone: (07) 5494 2088 (int'l +61 7 5494 2088) Fax: (07) 5499 9246 (int'l +61 7 5499 9246) Email: info@maplestreetco-op.com.au, or maplest.coop@serv.net.au Website: www.maplestreetco-op.com.au |