Books you should read if you give a fuck about your health

A few months ago, I wrote an article (in French, sorry) about my new way to eat that is (for me) the good way to eat.

I didn’t invent what I said. Of course, it comes from my personal experience of losing more than 30 pounds (and feeling so much better) by dramatically reducing my consumption of carbohydrates (something that was suggested by my doctor, specialist in nutrition).

I also read a lot of books and articles about nutrition because it truly has become a passion for me. I’m now ready to recommend you some great books you should really read if you care about your health. It could change your life like it has changed mine. I’m not kidding!

These books are written by prominent specialists (mainly MDs) who have a tremendous experience and have seen a lot in their respective careers. The authors don’t agree with each other on everything, but they are all pretty much going in the same direction.

You’ll notice that these are all very recent publications. The truth of 2005 is not the truth of 2015. I strongly suggest you to forget everything you think you know about eating healthy and read these books.

Here’s the list...

“Wheat Belly: Lose the Wheat, Lose the Weight, and Find Your Path Back to Health” by William Davis (2011)

This book is about the numerous damages wheat will cause to your health if you eat too much of it. Seen as healthy by many, it’s probably the worst piece of food of the modern diet. We consume more and more of it but more importantly, modern wheat is very bad for your health because it has been altered over the years via selective breeding to become some kind of “frankenwheat”. The wheat we eat today is very different from the wheat we ate 50 years ago and it has clearly been associated with conditions and diseases such as obesity, diabetes, painful joints, heart diseases, cancers and many more.

“Fat Chance: Beating the Odds Against Sugar, Processed Food, Obesity, and Disease” by Robert Lustig (2012)

Robert Lustig is an American pediatric endocrinologist at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF). In “Fat Chance”, he documents the science and politics that led to our current pandemic of obesity and chronic disease. In the 1970s, governments decided that we needed to get fat out of our diets. Fat has been gradually replaced by sugar, which has totally disordered our bodies and ultimately made us fatter than we were before. For Lustig, sugar (and especially fructose) is the real enemy, not fat. If you don’t have time to read the book, you can watch the video “Sugar: The Bitter Truth” that has been seen more than 5 million times on YouTube!

“Good Calories, Bad Calories: Fats, Carbs, and the Controversial Science of Diet and Health” and “Why We Get Fat: And What to Do About It” by Gary Taubes (2007 & 2010)

Gary Taubes is a science writer who originally focused on physics issues but recently turned to medicine and nutrition. He wrote two books about the subject: “Good Calories, Bad Calories” (2007) and “Why We Get Fat” (2010). His main hypothesis is based on: carbohydrates (flour, sugar, and starches) generate insulin, which causes the body to store fat. The two books are pretty similar so if you had to choose only one, I would go for the second one, which is more elaborate and explains how people can change their diets to get their health back.

“Grain Brain: The Surprising Truth about Wheat, Carbs, and Sugar–Your Brain’s Silent Killers” by David Perlmutter (2013)

In this book, renowned neurologist David Perlmutter presents the following hypothesis: gluten and carbs are destroying your brain. Specifically, it can cause dementia, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), anxiety, chronic headaches, depression, and much more. This book elaborates one of the numerous assumptions found in “Wheat Belly”, focusing only on what grain can do to your brain. Unfortunately, we all know now that grain (and especially wheat) is not only bad for the brain…

That’s it for now but I’m planning on reading more books soon:

• “Living Low Carb: Controlled-Carbohydrate Eating for Long-Term Weight Loss” by Jonny Bowden (2010)
• “The Big Fat Surprise: Why Butter, Meat and Cheese Belong in a Healthy Diet” by Nina Teicholz (2014)
• “The End of Dieting: How to Live for Life” by Joel Fuhrman (2014)
• “Foodist: Using Real Food and Real Science to Lose Weight Without Dieting” by Darya Pino Rose (2013)

Do you have anything else to recommend? Thank you!