Forget everything you know: the meat and cheese myth
In fact, when meat and cheese are eaten, the metabolic processes occurring in the cells produce an excess amount of acid, and neutralizing this acid requires an excessive amount of calcium and other alkaline minerals. In this way, calcium is excreted from the body along with the acid. In other words, you do obtain calcium from cheese, but far more of it is excreted due to the acidification caused by the cheese. Believing that calcium deficiency will be corrected by eating cheese means accepting, from the very start, the vicious cycle that this will create.
The acid-base balance in our body must constantly be kept in balance. An excessive rise in acidity means the person can enter a coma that could ultimately end in death. One of the mechanisms activated to prevent this is our brain slowing down its oxygen uptake.
A decrease in oxygen means the emergence of problems such as fatigue, weakness, and exhaustion.
In numerous studies conducted especially in Switzerland and Germany, high levels of acid and calcium have been detected in the urine of people who consume animal-based foods. This shows that far more calcium is excreted through urine than is obtained from animal-based foods. The most logical approach to breaking this vicious cycle would be to reduce the consumption of animal-based foods.
Osteoporosis — bone loss — which is very commonly seen today, is caused not so much by a calcium-poor diet as by the calcium the body itself loses. For this reason, loading these patients with calcium from animal-based foods is pointless. While high levels of acid and calcium have been detected in the urine of those who consume animal-based foods, those who eat vegetables and fruit have been found to lose less calcium. In short, it has now become clear that bone loss is caused not by an insufficient intake of animal-derived calcium, but by calcium loss. This puts an end to the myth that eating cheese strengthens your bones. Because an excessive amount of oxygen is spent neutralizing the acid, the oxygenation of organs decreases, and the resulting decline in function leads to symptoms such as fatigue, weakness, exhaustion, lethargy, and drowsiness in these people.
In the United States, Dr. John McDougall has proven through his research that animal protein causes bone loss (The McDougall Program for Women). It has been documented that the United States, the country with the highest consumption of milk and dairy products in the world, also has the highest incidence of osteoporosis. For example, 100 g of cabbage contains twice as much calcium as milk. Fennel and broccoli contain as much calcium as milk. While 50-100% of the calcium in cabbage is absorbed and utilized, only 40-64% of the calcium in milk is utilized. Twice as much of the calcium obtained from milk, cheese, meat, and meat products is excreted through urine, because the resulting acids combine with calcium — as well as magnesium, potassium, and sodium — and are excreted from the body. In China, where very little milk and dairy is consumed, osteoporosis is quite rare. For this reason, it is necessary to stay away from animal proteins.
The second major danger that cheese and meat products create in the body is that they make chronic infections far more likely to occur.
This is because the acidification of blood and tissue caused by meat and cheese weakens the immune system. There are many scientific articles published on this subject. The result of a weakened immune system is that organs and cells fail to receive enough oxygen, and as a consequence, bacteria, viruses, and fungi begin to multiply more rapidly in poorly nourished tissues. In short, these foods weaken the immune system, making it easier for infections to take hold in the body.
In people who eat this way, fatigue does not go away with sleep. Even if they sleep for as long as 10 hours a day, they still feel tired. This is because neutralizing the acid produced by meat and cheese, and restoring the acid-base balance to normal, takes a great deal of time. Because the body uses the oxygen it takes in to neutralize the resulting acid, fatigue, weakness, and exhaustion occur.
Especially if meat and cheese are eaten in the evening, it will take you a long time to recover from fatigue the next day. Of course, a second factor that worsens this situation is our biological rhythm, because food consumed late at night is harder to digest.
Sleep is not merely a period of rest but an active process during which the body renews itself. Consuming foods that are hard to digest and that promote acidification during this period causes chronic fatigue to worsen further.
For this reason, meat and meat products should be consumed no more than two days a week, and cheese should not be eaten in excess, for the reasons listed above.
The third major danger associated with cheese is that it contains a substance called tyramine. This substance is normally broken down by the enzyme monoamine oxidase. Certain medications — for example, antidepressants containing tranylcypromine — inhibit the monoamine oxidase enzyme. As a result, tyramine from cheese accumulates in the body, which causes high blood pressure. For this reason, patients taking antidepressant medication are advised to limit their cheese consumption. Tyramine is found not only in cheese but also in foods such as sausage and salami. It would be beneficial for people who are depressed or prone to this condition to limit — or even avoid entirely — consumption of these types of foods, in order to recover more quickly.
The real cause of high blood pressure linked to meat is "homocysteine," which results from the failure of vitamins B6 and B12 to eliminate the amino acid "methionine" produced in the intestines as a result of excessive consumption of animal-based foods, particularly meat and meat products. Today, the effects of homocysteine on human health and on the formation of cholesterol are only just beginning to be understood. This subject also forms one of the most important pillars of anti-aging treatment. Homocysteine causes oxidized LDL cholesterol to be perceived as a foreign substance by macrophage cells in the blood. Macrophages attempt to destroy LDL cholesterol by absorbing it into the cell. During this process, the toxic substances released accumulate on the inner surface of the blood vessels, causing arteriosclerosis.
Arteriosclerosis causes a variety of diseases, most notably brain hemorrhage, heart attack, and colon cancer. A detoxification program for these individuals is very important for staying healthy. Special care must be taken to ensure that the detoxification program is carried out by a physician qualified in detoxification, because both the vitamins to be supplemented and the nutrition program to be applied must be tailored to the individual.