Gretchen sustained a fall earlier in her life, resulting in a broken rib and a lot of stress. Combined with the fact that she says, “I work with heavy metals and chemicals,” this resulted in her developing a hyperthyroid condition. That problem spiraled further until she became a type 2 diabetic.
Weight Gain
Gretchen describes herself as “not a ‘big’ person, but extremely athletic, and very strong.” Despite her inner strength, she found that she was gaining weight, and had accumulated twenty pounds of extra weight. She says this was “not noticeable to most” as it was visceral fat all around her organs.
A “Clean Diet”
Like many people, she didn’t understand why the problems were persisting because she felt that her diet should have promoted health. Gretchen says, “I was eating a clean diet.”
Vegan Diet Fails
Feeling that she was failing, Gretchen went into action and started researching online. She went from the frying pan into the fire as she discovered vegan diets. Following this type of diet furthered her problems, making her blood sugar even more unstable. Looking back, she says, “Vegan/raw vegan/juicing, what! I did this… listening to the rhetoric, and my daughter was trying to revive me with Honey…”
Her Doctor Recommended Keto
After enough time had passed, Gretchen’s doctor intervened in a way that would help her find her way back to health. She says, “So, my doctor mentioned Keto. It worked. 6 months of trial and error.”
From Keto to Carnivore
After working to refine her ketogenic diet, her diet had evolved to almost a carnivore diet, and she says, “Then, I just threw in the towel, my ancestral eating had zero vegetables, and a little berries. I did it.” Gretchen committed to following a completely carnivore diet, as she was almost there anyway, and she kept seeing more progress.
Carnivore Success
Making this last dietary shift, despite her ketogenic diet being almost completely carnivore, made a big difference. Gretchen stuck to the diet, chasing the improvements she was seeing. She says that now “I’m just over a year of straight carnivore. I’m feeling great.”
Corn Starch, Dextrose, and Zero Tolerance
Gretchen has found that if she eats something not on her diet, particularly including corn starch or dextrose, the effects are terrible: “I’ve had massive reactions to ‘quick meals’ at friend’s houses that contain cornstarch or dextrose, people do not know how sensitive a person who is DE-sensitized to corn sugars are (cheap ‘drunk’ tho.)”
Advice For Others
Gretchen is grateful to Dr. Baker and the carnivore community for the information and support and recommends that everyone eat a diet that makes them healthy. She says, “Anyway, keep it simple; eat food that makes you thrive. My diabetes is not healed, only handled. But I feel great listening to my body vs popular nutritional advice! Thank you Shawn for this forum!”
