Whats your diet?

I've heard refined sugary food is really bad for your hair and I've heard milk is also bad. For my breakfast I have a big bowl of sugary cereal so it sounds like im not doing my hair any favors.

What do you guys like to eat thats hair friendly? What would your typical days diet be?

Also, I know some of you like to fast 1 day a week or so on. What day do you usually do this? Can you work out on that day? Do you just drink water?

Thanks.

In my opinion, worry more about your iron stores instead of worrying about eliminating sugars and starches. Keeping iron stores low will improve insulin sensitivity more than changing your diet. If you like cereal that much, make sure you don't get any of the brands that have extra iron added.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17391316

OBJECTIVES: Hyperferritinemia is frequently observed in nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD), the hepatic manifestation of the metabolic syndrome characterized by hepatic insulin resistance and considered high cardiovascular risk. Iron depletion by phlebotomy has been reported to decrease insulin resistance in NAFLD in small, uncontrolled studies. Aims of this study were to define the relationship between ferritin and iron stores in patients with NAFLD, the effect of iron depletion on insulin resistance, and whether basal ferritin levels influence treatment outcome. METHODS: Subjects were included if ferritin and/or ALT were persistently elevated after 4 months of standard therapy. Sixty-four phlebotomized subjects were matched 1:1 for age, sex, ferritin, obesity, and ALT levels with patients who underwent lifestyle modifications only. Insulin resistance was evaluated by insulin levels, determined by RIA and the HOMA-R index, at baseline and after 8 months. RESULTS: Baseline ferritin levels were associated with body iron stores (P<0.0001). Iron depletion produced a significantly larger decrease in insulin resistance (P=0.0016 for insulin, P=0.0042 for HOMA-R) compared with nutritional counseling alone, independent of changes in BMI, baseline HOMA-R, and the presence of the metabolic syndrome. Iron depletion was more effective in reducing HOMA-R in patients in the top two tertiles of ferritin concentrations (P<0.05 vs controls), and in carriers of the mutations in the HFE gene of hereditary hemochromatosis (P<0.05 vs noncarriers). CONCLUSIONS: Given that phlebotomy reduces insulin resistance, which is associated with liver tissue damage, future studies should evaluate the effect of iron depletion on liver histology and cardiovascular end points.

You are going to get opinions across the board. For myself it's live foods and optimal health for others it is meat with a good mixture of veggie's. I think the key thing no matter what is to exclude dairy, refined food products and sugar. If it has more than 5 or 6 ingredients on the label I would put it back. If I cannot even pronounce one of the ingredients I put it back. Stay as natural as possible.

Espio - Iron depletion may be a co-factor but do you really think that it would have significant effect for a 17 year old? IMO iron depletion or not, if you are still eating shit your hair will suffer, not to mention your body. I've been recently taking a shit load of black strap molasses which has a heap of iron and its only benefited my hair and my teeth too!(much whiter and stronger).

tooyoung - As far as fasting goes I go cold turkey on a Sunday with just water and nothing else, though i don't exercise on that day and wouldn't really recommend it if you're fasting. Also you may want to read up on the 'warrior diet' as that has seemed to help quite a few people, prague being the most notible example. If your really gung ho then you can also check out food combining.

Foods to totally avoid at all costs
All milk(unless organic grass fed Goat's milk)
All refined bread(white or not) with bakers yeast. (I eat soughdour spelt bread)
All refined sugars and starches.
All margarine or butter(unless the butter isn't pasturized)
All refined dairy
Alcohol to a bare minimum
And start cooking your food with coconut oil as this is the best cooking oil for hair.

Get stuck into more veges, fruits, nuts, whole grains and only cook your meat to medium rare. One example is Ramen/soba noodles or brown rice are a good healthy meal as an alternative to refined spargetta or white rice. You just have to get creative and research other traditional cultures and see what you may like, atleast that's what I did.

Now no one is perfect and you have to live a little, but if you cut the shit out of your diet 90/95% of the time then you're well and truly ahead, the supps will take care of the rest.

Its easier said than done though. I'd have no problem cutting out half the crap mentioned. Just Organic is extremely expensive. I've seen organic tomato sauce for 6 dollars and up. Crazy. On top of buying supplements unless you have a high income this is basically impossible.


However, the best way to go around this is to go on a warrior diet I assume? So you only have to eat once a day?

If not I would just advise those on a budget to compromise and opt for the healthiest alternatives out of the already bad stuff.

Silverlin wrote:Espio - Iron depletion may be a co-factor but do you really think that it would have significant effect for a 17 year old? IMO iron depletion or not, if you are still eating shit your hair will suffer, not to mention your body. I've been recently taking a shit load of black strap molasses which has a heap of iron and its only benefited my hair and my teeth too!(much whiter and stronger).

tooyoung - As far as fasting goes I go cold turkey on a Sunday with just water and nothing else, though i don't exercise on that day and wouldn't really recommend it if you're fasting. Also you may want to read up on the 'warrior diet' as that has seemed to help quite a few people, prague being the most notible example. If your really gung ho then you can also check out food combining.

Foods to totally avoid at all costs
All milk(unless organic grass fed Goat's milk)
All refined bread(white or not) with bakers yeast. (I eat soughdour spelt bread)
All refined sugars and starches.
All margarine or butter(unless the butter isn't pasturized)
All refined dairy
Alcohol to a bare minimum
And start cooking your food with coconut oil as this is the best cooking oil for hair.

Get stuck into more veges, fruits, nuts, whole grains and only cook your meat to medium rare. One example is Ramen/soba noodles or brown rice are a good healthy meal as an alternative to refined spargetta or white rice. You just have to get creative and research other traditional cultures and see what you may like, atleast that's what I did.

Now no one is perfect and you have to live a little, but if you cut the shit out of your diet 90/95% of the time then you're well and truly ahead, the supps will take care of the rest.

Thanks a lot Silverlin, yet again. I'm going to check out this warrior diet and getting some supps and see how everything goes.

One final thing, is there anything that reduces body hair but keeps or grows head hair? Pretty much reversing puberty, the hair aspect of puberty anyway.

tooyoung - Pueraria Mirifica will reduce body hair.

I have to agree completely with Silverlin. My hardest to avoid is products with bakers yeast... its just going to take some time to weed it out.

Silverlin wrote:tooyoung - Pueraria Mirifica will reduce body hair.

Ahh right, nice one. Thanks a lot I may take a pic of my hairline and crown and post again on here in 3-6 with progress.

Had the worst diet in the world growing up (sugar, past/hom milk, flour, bad fats, aargh!), but now its probably one of the best! A change in diet (follow mostly WA Price style diet) has honestly changed my hair (looks alive) and slowed down the loss a LOT. Now hopefully I can stop/reverse it a bit with the addition of some other regimen stuff.

High fat, high protein, and complex carbs for me. I find I don't feel satisfied unless I get plenty of fat. Roughly about 2000-3000 calories a day depending if I'm active that day. I tend to shy away from more extreme diet versions (vegan, low fat, etc)

- free range organic meats, game, and liver (check out farmers market for way cheaper)
- free range eggs
- kefir made from whole goat milk almost every day. This with blueberries, cinnamon and stevia is my evening snack- feel satisfied going to sleep and it's ultra easy to digest
- plenty o' veggies
- fresh veggie juice from juicer.... i like carrot expecially
- lots of feremented veggies like beets, bell peppers, pickles, sauerkraut, kimchi
- not a ton of fruit, mostly low sugar fruits like berries, green apples, grapefruit
- coconut oil, cultured cream (creme fraiche), cultured butter, ghee, sesame oil, olive oil, cod liver oil
- a big pot of bone broth every week (this is fantastic nutrition and extremely satisfying and costs pennies to make... just use the leftover carcass from a roast chicken, or you can buy beef bones)
- lentils/beans
- nutritional yeast
- not so heavy on grains, but I do enjoy brown basmati rice, brown rice pasta/vermicelli, brown rice tortillas, buckwheat noodles, wild rice, quinoa/millet
- occasional sweet potatoes/yams
- natto, tofu once in a while
- plenty of spices, I like to add tons of hot sauce, cayenne to my meals. Usually 2 out of three meals a day are very spicy
- I use stevia for all my sweetening needs. Works fantastic. NOW stevia glycerite and powder is my favorite. A little goes a long way so it lasts forever.
- I add granulated lecithin to my high fat meals, such as a couple tbs to my bowls of kefir. Good for liver, skin, and hair.

I have found that while it takes time, cooking from scratch is way healthier and cheaper (especially if you eat organic... like 4 bucks just for ONE can of organic soup??? who the hell can afford that?!?). I used to eat the typical processed crap junk, now after being on a good diet for about a year, my sense of taste changed and I don't really desire that stuff anymore (cept ice cream, lol)

As for actual meal ideas here's some stuff I eat (versatile so can be different every time):

-soup, made with broth, all kinds and tons of it
-protein shake made from blended almond milk, raw eggs, plus stevia, cinnamon, and whatever else.
-wraps with a rice tortilla - versatile, can put on meat, veggies/pickled veggies, yoghurt/tzatziki if in the vegetarian mood, maybe a bit of apple/goji berries, curry, etc
-stir fries. A few noodles plus tons of veggies, meat, eggs, whatever. For the sauce I like to use any combo of any of the following: tamari soy sauce, sesame oil, coconut oil, garlic, ginger, thai basil, rice vinegar, pinch of stevia powder
-omelettes: with eggs and veggies. I don't like the taste of cheese so I don't use it.
-meat with home made cranberry sauce (cranberries plus some stevia)
-tortilla/sourdough bread plus hummus
-curries! sauce (tomato sauce plus curry, cumin, garlic, coconut milk, or whatever recipe you want), plus veggies, meat, and grains if you want. I make it super spicy and add sliced avocado on top to balance the spicyness.
-pancakes made from chickpea flour & eggs, with savoury topping (veggies, curry)
- for dessert: kefir, fruit, bit of dark chocolate (can also melt with coconut oil and have fondu with berries), lemon curd (lemon juice, gelatin, eggs, lemon oil, stevia to sweeten), small toast with stevia, coconut oil and cinnamon, or occasionally, haagan dazz (wanna make my own ice cream from creme fraiche someday but gotta buy the machine first)

To save time, I'll often make one big pot of broth on the weekend, and then just add whatever and cook in the week. You can even just chuck the boiling broth in a thermos, add some veggies/meat, and then by lunch at work it will be cooked. Stir fries/curries only take about 1/2 hr to make. Protein shake is easy in the morning. Or sometimes I'll just make twice the amount for whatever the meal and then have it again for lunch at work the next day.