5 years on Lion Diet - Can it be Peat friendly?

[Philomath]

I just listened to Mikhaila Peterson's youtube Q&A regarding her five years on the modified carnivore diet she calls the Lion Diet.
Many of you already know from previous posts that Mikhaila and her dad, Dr. Jordan Peterson, have been eating a carnivore diet for years.
Mikhaila has had many health issues that she attributes mainly to a leaky gut from poor food, depression medication, environmental toxins and allergies. She admits to it being an "elimination diet", which is how it started, and even got her dad to do it after he was hospitalized for pain medication addiction.

So my point here is that she's been doing this for over five years and looks good, sounds better and says she is "healthy". After a few years, she has learned what works and what doesn't. To me, what she's doing doesn't seem to be that different from what Dr. Peat suggest.

The lion diet - her idea of a starter elimination diet consists of:
Beef Steaks
Bison
Lamb
Salt
Electrolytes (sodium, magnesium, potassium)

After a few weeks of eating the above, you could begin adding the following:
Wild fish/Salmon, herbal tea, and herbs are great first options to begin reintroductions, just don’t add them all at once so you can get an understanding if any of them are causing you trouble. It’s not recommended to reintroduce grains, dairy, sugar, or legumes. These foods continuously cause a wide range of problems for people. -Mikhaila

She does say in the interview that she has eaten honey without much issue. I believe the no sugar policy is because it can feed bad bacteria like candida. She also said she has a huge soy intolerance so that would explain why she won't eat eggs and certain olive oil that's likely cut with soy oil. She advocates for avoiding aged beef while choosing fattier cuts.

So for any of us on the forum that continue to have health issues (like sinusitis for me), could this "lion" type diet be a good "elimination" diet that works within the Peat framework?
Eat only non aged, grass fed beef, bison or lamb - with as much gelatin as possible, range fed (no soy/grain) egg yolks, maybe occasional liver, and just enough carbs in the form of honey or fresh squeezed organic fruit. If you go without dairy, then a supplement of calcium would be necessary.

To me, the Lion Diet just seems like a distilled and rigid "peat diet" (I know, there's no such thing as a Peat diet) that servers as a functional elimination diet. One could start with the above and add dairy, sugar, tubers, shellfish, rice etc. and see what agrees with them or not.

Your thoughts?

 

[Dean]

As someone who's done carnivore and Peat and spent time over the years vacillating between the two, I don't see a whole lot of overlap between the two approaches. If you want to try the Lion diet, why not just go ahead? No need to waste the mental energy trying to rationalize it.

If you're in the US though, non-aged beef and "grain-free" eggs are going to be hard to come by, unless their from your own cows and chickens.

 

[DrJ]

I think Mikhaila is a nutcase and sadly her dad seems to be turning into one from abusing all the benzos. I don't think a "lion diet" is very Peat-y with all the phosphate.

But sure, if you are having massive autoimmune issues then a no-residue diet which is basically what that is may help but I don't think it's a sign of good health to have to stay on that long term. Good health is a digestive system that can take a wide range of foods and be fine because it shows the body is well-adjusted to a varied environment and able to deal with small digestive stressors with ease.

Personally I wonder if an all-fruit diet wouldn't be much better than a carnivore diet for autoimmune issues because it should much better support energy production to exit the autoimmune state rather than retreating into a no-residue diet to sort of "safely hide" in the autoimmune state.

 

[Ania]

For the last 5 years I have been doing fruit and meat diet due to health reasons. Tons of fruits and some meat, eggs, seafood, liver, fish( but not more than 100 grams of protein daily). I tried both carnivore and frutarian. Non of them was sustainable for me long term. They just left me feeling deprived and miserable. With fruit and animal protein I feel balanced. I resolved many health issues. Feeling great. For me there is no coming back to ”regular diet”, since I am intolerant to most foods. However, like Michael I resolved debilitating arthritis, which occurred to be crazy reaction of my immune system to regular foods. Unfortunately, milk proved to be the worst offender. So I have to supplement eggshells daily for my calcium. But that is ok as long as I do not suffer any more.
I am glad I do not have to be that strict, I hated my carnivore experiment. My heart was pounding all the time, I could not sleep and I had epic constipation. But that’s just me…

 

[ursidae]

How can someone be so sensitive to all foods that they turn into a wreck from ingesting a flake of black pepper, yet not be sensitive to plastic surgery, fillers, tons of makeup, hair bleaching chemicals, fake tans and fake nail glue?

 

[GreekDemiGod]

For the last 5 years I have been doing fruit and meat diet due to health reasons. Tons of fruits and some meat, eggs, seafood, liver, fish( but not more than 100 grams of protein daily). I tried both carnivore and frutarian. Non of them was sustainable for me long term. They just left me feeling deprived and miserable. With fruit and animal protein I feel balanced. I resolved many health issues. Feeling great. For me there is no coming back to ”regular diet”, since I am intolerant to most foods. However, like Michael I resolved debilitating arthritis, which occurred to be crazy reaction of my immune system to regular foods. Unfortunately, milk proved to be the worst offender. So I have to supplement eggshells daily for my calcium. But that is ok as long as I do not suffer any more.
I am glad I do not have to be that strict, I hated my carnivore experiment. My heart was pounding all the time, I could not sleep and I had epic constipation. But that’s just me…

What is your average Calcium intake? Is eggshell your only Ca source?

 

[Ania]

Yes, eggshell is my only source. I take around 5 grams daily. Calcium content is 36,6%, so it is more or less 1,8 g. And maybe some tiny amount from coconut water.

 

[Korven]

How can someone be so sensitive to all foods that they turn into a wreck from ingesting a flake of black pepper, yet not be sensitive to plastic surgery, fillers, tons of makeup, hair bleaching chemicals, fake tans and fake nail glue?

Lmao

maybe she only uses ancestral bleaching chemicals, fillers, makeup etc

 

[Limon9]

I just listened to Mikhaila Peterson's youtube Q&A regarding her five years on the modified carnivore diet she calls the Lion Diet.
Many of you already know from previous posts that Mikhaila and her dad, Dr. Jordan Peterson, have been eating a carnivore diet for years.
Mikhaila has had many health issues that she attributes mainly to a leaky gut from poor food, depression medication, environmental toxins and allergies. She admits to it being an "elimination diet", which is how it started, and even got her dad to do it after he was hospitalized for pain medication addiction.

So my point here is that she's been doing this for over five years and looks good, sounds better and says she is "healthy". After a few years, she has learned what works and what doesn't. To me, what she's doing doesn't seem to be that different from what Dr. Peat suggest.

The lion diet - her idea of a starter elimination diet consists of:
Beef Steaks
Bison
Lamb
Salt
Electrolytes (sodium, magnesium, potassium)

After a few weeks of eating the above, you could begin adding the following:
Wild fish/Salmon, herbal tea, and herbs are great first options to begin reintroductions, just don’t add them all at once so you can get an understanding if any of them are causing you trouble. It’s not recommended to reintroduce grains, dairy, sugar, or legumes. These foods continuously cause a wide range of problems for people. -Mikhaila

She does say in the interview that she has eaten honey without much issue. I believe the no sugar policy is because it can feed bad bacteria like candida. She also said she has a huge soy intolerance so that would explain why she won't eat eggs and certain olive oil that's likely cut with soy oil. She advocates for avoiding aged beef while choosing fattier cuts.

So for any of us on the forum that continue to have health issues (like sinusitis for me), could this "lion" type diet be a good "elimination" diet that works within the Peat framework?
Eat only non aged, grass fed beef, bison or lamb - with as much gelatin as possible, range fed (no soy/grain) egg yolks, maybe occasional liver, and just enough carbs in the form of honey or fresh squeezed organic fruit. If you go without dairy, then a supplement of calcium would be necessary.

To me, the Lion Diet just seems like a distilled and rigid "peat diet" (I know, there's no such thing as a Peat diet) that servers as a functional elimination diet. One could start with the above and add dairy, sugar, tubers, shellfish, rice etc. and see what agrees with them or not.

Your thoughts?

At the very least such food choices remove starch and most polyunsaturated fatty acids. 1¾lbs of fatty steak seems to be around 2,000 calories so that would be a decent benchmark. Most strikingly this has:

~0.6 micrograms of thiamine (50% of RDA)
~65 micrograms of folate (15% of RDA)
~9.7:1 ratio of phosphorus to calcium
~13 milligrams of iron, mostly heme (160% of RDA)

Not to mention the astronomically large amounts of methionine and tryptophan.

Maybe she's using a multivitamin on the down-low... I noticed in the video that her hair has been dyed and she's wearing makeup: it's impossible to judge her health by appearances then, but her voice is shrill and she isn't articulate, perhaps owing to the severe lack of folate and thiamine, two "brainy" substances. Since calcium wasn't mentioned among the minerals, her parathyroid hormone is likely high, perhaps in the upper quartile, and her doctor has accepted this as adequate based on the defined range.

She's probably hypothyroid and just can't tolerate other foods.

 

[Immanency]

@Philomath Hello,an elimination diet can potentially be the quickest way to identify with foods can be negative in some aspects,and wich foods do not in a given quantity,the only potential problem i see if that some people have a low digestion to begin with,and although they can notice some positive effects from the removals of certains foods,they can quickly feel worst in others aspects if they consume only meat fat and organs,like feeling tired,cold extremities,sleep not to deep etc.

the addition/increase quantity of meat,organs,fat can be great for improving some people health,the removal of most foods can be a great improvement in many aspects,and detrimental in others,ideally identify as quickly as possible which foods are problematic,and wich one are not

many of these influencers lie,some potentially lie about many aspects of their health,many of them potentially take hormones,0 libido,cold extremities,reflux,no emotions,no motivation are common negatives effects that can be experience on an all meat diet

i would advice anyone that want to experience an elimination diet to try each food on their own,not necessary space out,it is very easy to notice the effects,and if the food cause problems,to remove the food on its own,and to try to combine it with others foods to see how it evolved,per exemple a lot of fat or sugar can make worst in many aspects,you add/increase other foods and the negative effects from sugar/fat will disappear

 

[animalcule]

Some thoughts:

1) No. There is almost no overlap between a carnivore diet and Ray Peat's dietary principles/philosophy. It seems like you're trying to force a merge between two camps that you like and want to be true. But it just doesn't fit. For starters: Peat is pro sugar. Carnivore is anti.

2) Let's stop calling it the Lion Diet. The "Lion Diet" is just the carnivore diet, but Mikhaila Peterson needed to rebrand it so that she could link it to herself, and then monetize it. It is a marketing term. Full stop. Few people seem to remember, but when she first started the carnivore diet, she launched a $600/year membership program for the "Lion Diet." It was an egregious amount of money to charge for information that is basic/free and "support" that could also be found on other forums for free (but of course, you wouldn't be able to interact with Mikhaila on those forums). She needed to brand what she was doing, and so the "Lion Diet" was born. It's just the carnivore diet, people, and when you use the marketing term that she coined, you're telling me (and everyone else) that you're buying into post-2017 marketing terms for a diet that has been around for centuries.

(I hate to be all "back in my day," especially because I definitely would never encourage anyone to do a carnivore type diet, not after my disastrous experience, but ... back in my day, not even that long ago, we didn't have hardly any 'influencers' in this space, trying to make a buck off of their carnivore 'expertise').

3) "She looks good." Yes, she does! But she also: has lip injections, botox, a lip lift, probably other fillers, wears makeup, does facial procedures, and possibly has additional plastic surgery (and she'll definitely get some in the future, from what I can tell, she's open about this). She's got $$$$ and she puts a lot of effort into her appearance. It's true that the carnivore diet can give a sort of glow to the skin -- I experienced this glow, and received compliments about it, until I crashed and burned. However, Mikhaila Peterson has also enhanced her looks through cosmetics and cosmetic procedures.

 

[joaquin]

When the body can't switch easily into ketosis and there is a need for fuel for the heart, this is not good.

 

[John mcclain]

I watched the q&a too it was very enlightening...if it's all true...personally I feel alot better without much carbs or caffeine but that's just me...I'm very much on the fence between high carb n carnivore my own personal experience is carnivore at the moment with thyroid has me in good place...but like ray says it's all an experiment...

 

[vrd2107]

She looks good because she has had a considerable amount of fillers (her chin, cheeks, bridge of her nose, lips) and botox. I’m pretty sure she got breast implants too. Her boobs are much larger now and she used to be completely flat chested. Maybe this is a result if her pregnancy. Not sure.

I’m sure eating meat and salt helped her and her dad lose weight. You should try it if you think it will help you. For a while this past year my body was not tolerating any food that was not meat or butter well. Especially vegetables and fruits. I eliminated them from my diet and my digestive symptoms were immediately arrested. But, in the long term, it didn’t fix my problem because my problem was I had developed food intolerance for entire types of foods and I didn’t want to only eat meat for broth for the rest of my life. Idk, at a certain point trading symptoms for unsustainable ‘management’ of symptoms is just the same problem in different form. I eventually reintroduced a diverse diet with reduced vegetables (I still cannot tolerate raw vegetables but eat them anyways sometimes when I want to) because to me, eating such a restrictive diet is not a life worth living.

 

[animalcule]

She looks good because she has had a considerable amount of fillers (her chin, cheeks, bridge of her nose, lips) and botox. I’m pretty sure she got breast implants too. Her boobs are much larger now and she used to be completely flat chested. Maybe this is a result if her pregnancy. Not sure.

I’m sure eating meat and salt helped her and her dad lose weight. You should try it if you think it will help you. For a while this past year my body was not tolerating any food that was not meat or butter well. Especially vegetables and fruits. I eliminated them from my diet and my digestive symptoms were immediately arrested. But, in the long term, it didn’t fix my problem because my problem was I had developed food intolerance for entire types of foods and I didn’t want to only eat meat for broth for the rest of my life. Idk, at a certain point trading symptoms for unsustainable ‘management’ of symptoms is just the same problem in different form. I eventually reintroduced a diverse diet with reduced vegetables (I still cannot tolerate raw vegetables but eat them anyways sometimes when I want to) because to me, eating such a restrictive diet is not a life worth living.

Exactly, on both fronts. MP enhances her looks w/cosmetic procedures AND the carnivore diet brings many people immediate relief to digestive issues, but it doesn't tend to heal anything long term -- you're just avoiding triggering foods.

I also had MORE food intolerances AFTER doing carnivore than before, suggesting that it weakened my digestion rather than improved it. Other carnivores all but admit this, but they'll just say, "Oh, my body is just more sensitive to plant poisons because it knows how harmful they are now. I'm running optimally now." Mhm, sure ... Chaffee recounted how a little bit of herbs on his lambs caused him to have suicidal thoughts. I also experienced mood disturbances when I went "off diet," so I believe the herbs had this effect on him. But unlike Chaffee, I don't think this proves how terrible plants are -- it just proves that the carnivore diet has made him so hypersensitive, a bit of mint and thyme could send his system so out of whack that he wanted to die.

 

[username]

Exactly, on both fronts. MP enhances her looks w/cosmetic procedures AND the carnivore diet brings many people immediate relief to digestive issues, but it doesn't tend to heal anything long term -- you're just avoiding triggering foods.

I also had MORE food intolerances AFTER doing carnivore than before, suggesting that it weakened my digestion rather than improved it. Other carnivores all but admit this, but they'll just say, "Oh, my body is just more sensitive to plant poisons because it knows how harmful they are now. I'm running optimally now." Mhm, sure ... Chaffee recounted how a little bit of herbs on his lambs caused him to have suicidal thoughts. I also experienced mood disturbances when I went "off diet," so I believe the herbs had this effect on him. But unlike Chaffee, I don't think this proves how terrible plants are -- it just proves that the carnivore diet has made him so hypersensitive, a bit of mint and thyme could send his system so out of whack that he wanted to die.

I am an ex carnivore dieter. It actually did improve my digestion, and if things get rocky nowadays I return to just meat and add sugar now that I want to stay away from keto. It is how I reset digestion. So yea, I found carnivore great for digestion during and after the diet.

 

[joaquin]

In this day and age, when most are indoors the majority of the time, not getting sunlight, and not sweating, it behoves us to be especially careful with the diet. Because in times past, man could get away with eating lots of this and that due to the enormous benefits of sunshine on the skin.

 

[stoic]

Congratulations to those who saw the entire video - I couldn't watch more than a minute of that vapid, conceited, serotonergic mess.

 

[FrenchKiwi]

I am an ex carnivore dieter. It actually did improve my digestion, and if things get rocky nowadays I return to just meat and add sugar now that I want to stay away from keto. It is how I reset digestion. So yea, I found carnivore great for digestion during and after the diet.

Do you think it is a superior approach to fat loss as well?

 

[lady1light]

Lmao

maybe she only uses ancestral bleaching chemicals, fillers, makeup etc

How can someone be so sensitive to all foods that they turn into a wreck from ingesting a flake of black pepper, yet not be sensitive to plastic surgery, fillers, tons of makeup, hair bleaching chemicals, fake tans and fake nail glue?

I am so curious about this too she mentions being so allergic to most shampoo and soap, but then is always wearing so much makeup, and I just don’t get it!