Brea

Hi all,

As an experiment, this turophile (cheese fancier) has decided to go dairy free for a month. I cannot tell you how amazing this has been. I have lost a great deal of weight already! The one thing that has saved me was mayonnaise, because it is dairy free. I think I'd miss 'creamy' tastes if it wasn't for that and coconut milk! Has anyone else tried this? If it continues this way I think I may give up dairy forever.

The main reason I decided to try this was that I read: we are the only animal that consumes the milk of another animal, or consumes milk in adulthood. The milk we choose to drink is made for the specific purpose of: making big fat cows! So I felt it was logical to cut out dairy for a while and see what happened. What amazes me the most is how everything- EVERYTHING- seems to have dairy products in it! Still, with a little more concentration on what I am putting into my body, I am already seeing results. I can't believe it. Any thoughts?

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www.breamorgiane.com

sedoniaraqs

Have you checked out the thread on bhuz.com about milk? Lots of opinions. I guess I'm just repeating myself here, but I know some people are not members of bhuz.

Basically, I think there may be some good reasons to avoid or limit dairy. However, the "milk is only intended for calves" and "we are the only animals that drink other animal's milk" are both logically fallacious arguments.

First, the "milk is only intended for calves, not humans" argument. This is fallacious from a biological perspective because it is essentially mixing apples and oranges. Natural selection has lead to mammals producing milk for their young. It does not follow that this mean that taking and consuming another species' milk is not natural. Natural selection does *not* provide certain organisms for other organisms to eat (except in a few special kinds of symbiosis in which "parts" of an organism are offered to symbiotic mutualist parners; this doesn't apply to us).

Anything we eat deprives a plant, animal, or fungus either of its life or some part of its body or some resource (like honey or milk) that costs it energy. This is the nature of the predator/prey relationship, whether the prey is animal or plant the basic nature of the relationship is the same. Natural selection dictates that any food we can exploit that increases our ability to survive and reproduce is going to be an advantage. Natural selection dictates that if a plant or animal has a feature that helps it avoid getting eaten (a poisonous plant or fast-running animal, for example), then that is going to be an advantage. That many Northern Europeans remain lactose tolerant into adulthood suggests that consuming dairy in cold northern environments has been advantageous and selected for.

The "we are the only mammals that drink other mammal's milk, therefore drinking milk is unnatural" is a fallacious argument because its a non sequitur. The second statement does not follow from the first. There is an almost endless list of things that we do that are pretty much unique in the animal kingdom. Here is a partial list:

We are the only vertebrate animals that do agriculture (I say vertebrate because there are ants that cultivate fungus for food).

We are the only animals that bake bread, brew beer or ferment wine. If other animals want to get drunk, they have to find and eat a bunch of rotting fruit.

We are the only animals that cook food.

We are the only animals that build fires.

We are the only animals that make music or art for the sake of art (this distingishes Homo sapiens from all of our extinct hominid ancestors and relatives also, including the Neandertals).

I used to like pointing out that we are the only species with female orgasm, but someone on bhuz pointed out that some other primates are thought to have this, so I guess this one is out.

But you get the point. And please reread the beginning of my post. I'm not saying there aren't valid reasons to avoid dairy, its just not the ones you mentioned.

Sedonia

Brea

Hi Sedonia,

Yes, I saw what you said about dairy consumption. I don't necessarily agree with the arguments I stated, only that I thought I'd give it a shot because those arguments made sense to me (at the time). You do bring up valid points about the many things we do that other animals do not!

Mainly the reason I decided this was that I have what could be called a major obsession with dairy, possibly an addiction, and mostly to cheese. I thought I'd stop it entirely for a while and am quite shocked that perhaps the only thing really getting in the way of me losing weight was my cheese addiction.

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www.breamorgiane.com

sedoniaraqs

Brea, if you had a real cheese obsession, then eliminating cheese probably just reduced the total calories you were eating.

I love bread, pasta, and rice. And sweets. When I eat these foods, they overstimulate my appetite, mess up my blood sugar, and make me more food obsessed. When I limit them to occasional and small servings, my appetite diminishes and I find it easier to eat the number of calories required for weight loss. I think that probably alot of people need to eat fewer carbs and more protein, especially middle-aged women with extra fat around the waist, but I won't go so far as to suggest that everyone needs to eat this way. Everyone's physiology is a bit different.

Sedonia

Moon

Hi Brea,
I never tried it and don't plan on doing so, but I just wanted to congratulate you on your weight loss. And it's great you pointed out coconut milk for people who want to try it but miss the creamy taste.

karena

I might be wrong, but I thought coconut milk was more fatty and with worse fat that cows milk Might be wrong but if weight loss is the concern might just be worth checking...

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"Nothing is black and white, it's all shades of grey" Me

Moon

I meant a good alternative for the creamy feeling of dairy products, not as a weight loss product.
And you can also buy low fat coconut milk. At least at my supermarket you can.
I didn't think milk is really that bad for your weight? Usually it's cheese that's causing the problem.

gisela

I like soy cream for replacing milk or cream in food. It's a lot creamier than coconut milk and doesn't have bad fat in it (i think). I also heard that coconut fat is not good at all and that it clogs your arteries. The kind of fat that get's really hard in the refrigerator is bad, "they" said. Don't know if that's a good rule though.

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You need chaos in your soul to create a dancing star-nietzsche

karena

Sorry I think I meant Brea was talking about the weight thing but your post must have been nearer

It's made me curious now whether I am talking nonsense or not. Isn't it amazing what you can find on the internet - what did we all do before??
This has all the fat contents of various milks. Coconut does rank pretty high
Milk | Irish Health Focus | Vhi
But when I was looking there was all sorts of stuff about the other health benefits, and what kind of fat it was that was bad, and all the other rubbish that is found in cows' milk and so on.
Personally, I think everything in moderation is fine (especially those toblerone brownies i made at the weekend )

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"Nothing is black and white, it's all shades of grey" Me

KuteNurse

Congratulations Brea on your weight loss I quite frankly wish I had five more pounds on me to keep warm! OMG it is freezing out! lol And it only going to get colder! The high on Saturday is -8 F!!!!! That is not including the wind chill! Brrrrrr