Scary Dairy

I guess the most upsetting thing about this article “Scary Dairy” is that currently, at the time of writing, we’re still told to consume 2 serves (600ml) of milk each day… Now before you read on, this article is a summary of a podcast I was listening to the other day which gave me the inspiration I needed to dissect what they were talking about and write this article. You can find the podcast here: Episode 148 Scary Dairy I thought the information they shared was important so I summarized the main points. Enjoy. To get the best understanding of why dairy is so scary we need to start way back at the beginning so you can get the full picture.

BIRTH

When we’re born we come out sterile. Through the birthing process we collect enough enzymes in our gut to handle the lactose (sugars in milk) from mum. It stimulates growth and a bunch of other functions like immune system etc. We have these enzymes for a period of time or until the milk runs out. We then grow teeth and are supposed to start eating food but we don't, why….?Because we’re told to consume dairy, we’re told it is a good source of protein and calcium. So we start our days with cereals covered in milk while we finish it off with a latte. Basically we never let our gut have the chance to purge the enzymes because we kept feeding them. The “milk” supply never really stopped like it would have back in caveman days.

MILK, CALCIUM AND STRONG BONES

We need to let go of this whole “Milk is good for calcium and strong bones” bullshit. Studies have now proven that milk can actually have an adverse effect on bone health as well as heart disease. This is a legitimate study too, you can find the full study here. The study included 100,000 people in Sweden over 20 to 30 years. The milk drinkers were more likely to die from heart disease and cancer, and among the women, the milk drinkers suffered more overall fractures and hip fractures.Bone health and heart disease aside, there are also links to milk contributing to eczema and asthma as well! So where do you get calcium from if we shouldn’t consume milk?? The same place we got it from before we had fridges to store milk, (which was only a little over a hundred years ago too so not that long) FOOD! Yes that's right, we can get all the calcium we need directly from the foods we eat. Foods like Chia seeds, Almonds, Broccoli, Leafy Greens and Sweet Potato just to name a few.

DAIRY vs FOOD for Calcium

So we need to establish WHY you would consume dairy over food for calcium. More importantly why would you consume dairy at all, by looking at the side effects caused by both. Food, Vegetables, Nuts & Seeds = No Side Effects (allergies exempt of course)Dairy = Side Effect - Cancer! There is a recent study that was published December 2017 that stated when you drink cows milk it increase the risk of cancer. This can be attributed to cows milk having these growth factors which initiate cancer cells. Not only that it also suppresses a self destruct mechanism in our body that would normally purge the “bad cell”. Interestingly … Smoking does the same thing! Aside from the growth factors in milk, the lactose (sugar in milk) when broken down in the body form other sugars that directly stimulate cancer growths.

CASEIN….?

We’ve all heard somewhere that consuming casein at night, “because it’s slow release”, is a good way to stop you going catabolic while you sleep and it’ll give you a deeper sleep which will aid in recovery. Let’s debunk this myth real quick!! Casein produces casomorphins which drive inflammation. If you’re inflammation is high then this is going to reduce your recovery. Checkout my inflammation cycle

INFLAMMATION FROM MILK

So, lets just say that you’ve been consuming milk since birth, you won’t actually know what it’s like to have no inflammation because you’ve been inflamed this whole time. This is because it takes about two weeks for your guts to purge the gut bugs that feed off lactose (milk sugar) it takes a few months more to purge the bugs that feed off casein. In short, you would need to eliminate milk from your diet, after 2 weeks you would feel the results of reduced inflammation as the lactose bugs die off and then a few months later the casein bugs would follow. I could almost guarantee that if you were to introduce milk back into your diet after this time you feel, all be it mildly, some form of discomfort, irritability or inflammatory response. Now that we’ve established that cows milk can have an inflammatory response what happens if we combine this with gluten?? A standard typical breakfast would be: Cereal or grains, or worse sugar coated cereal or grains covered in milk… You’ve now consumed gluten which will cause inflammation, milk which will cause inflammation and to top it off you’ll probable have a latte when you get to work! You’re body doesn’t stand a chance. Just to add fuel to the fire, if this is a breakfast that you’re giving to your young boys the estrogen that's in milk has shown to suppress testosterone too.

WHEN IS IT OK TO CONSUME DAIRY?

So we’ve covered a lot of the BAD things about dairy, what are the good things and when is it ok? Whey protein is an ok source of protein if you’re deficient in protein and can’t get it from food. Specifically whey isolate has been broken down and in this process most of the “bad stuff” covered above has been taken out. As a good rule of thumb, the harder dairy gets the safer it becomes. Milk being a liquid would be the worst and things like hard cheese or butter being the best. The process of dairy turning into cheese removes a lot of the “bad stuff”. If you are going to consume cheeses etc be mindful of what you’re having it with. Try consume it with fruit that has the peals still on so get all the polyphenols (natural poisons) that will help kill off some of the bad bugs. Or just go to town and have a few scoops of gut right the next day.

CLOSING THOUGHT

I want to leave you with this closing thought… Whether take on board the info in this article and with all the other conflicting information about dairy just ask yourself this: Why would you consume dairy when there are safer alternatives. Remember back in the 60s even doctors said that smoking was ok… we know now that it’s obviously not. In comparison if we’re told that milk is ok, even with evidence that it’s clearly not, will we find the real truth in 40 years? As i mentioned above: Food = No RiskDairy = Potential risk of cancerI’ll leave it with you to decide.Photo by Nastya Maxymova on Unsplash