The other day I found this most excellent website. It describes a very common diet nowadays – very low carb, and very high protein. A true carnivore diet of mostly meat: beef, chicken, pork, and tuna. Why so much meat? Because eating too many carbs will encourage illness in the form of UTIs, Kidney Disease, Diabetes, and ultimately – if not treated – death.
I knew it! Bring on the bacon!
Hold on, although it sounds exactly like I’m talking about the Atkins Diet, or Paleo, or even the South Beach Diet – because all of these are low carb, high protein diets – I’m not. You knew it was too good to be true – didn’t you?
No. The name of the website is www.catinfo.org and I’m talking about the perfect diet for your CAT! Because that’s what cats are – they’re CARNIVORES. Dr. Lisa Pierson, DVM explains the danger of feeding your cat dry kibble, because they are obligate carnivores. That’s the way mother nature made them, they are designed to eat meat.
Feed them anything else and they get sick. Sound familiar?
The SAD Diet
The typical Standard American Diet (SAD) is about 50% carbohydrate, 15% protein, and 35% fat.
Most of our carbs come in the shape of simple carbs like breads, pastries, white flour, and highly processed convenience foods, like fast food. We get our protein from meat – 99% of it from factory farms where the animals are fed high concentrations of growth hormones and antibiotics. And generally our fat comes in the form of processed oils and dairy products.
And the result? We are one of the sickest countries on the planet and our healthcare costs are soaring. We are overweight, if not obese and are plagued by high rates of heart disease, diabetes, and cancer.
Obviously this diet is not working for us. Just like our feline friends, if we eat the wrong diet we too get very sick. So as Dr Pierson pointed out on her website, just like our cats need the right diet to not only survive but also thrive, so do we.
But which diet?
Should we be eating more like our feline friends, the cats? Paleo? Atkins? More protein and less carbs?
The Dangers of Low Carb/High Protein Diets
The typical ‘Paleo Diet’ varies – but is usually very low carb / high fat and high protein. So about 10% carbohydrate, 30-50% protein, and 40-60% fat. Much like a feline diet.
The theory is that without the carbs that your body usually uses for fuel, it is forced to switch into burning fats – hence the weight loss. This state is called Ketosis and was made famous by Dr. Robert Atkins.
Did I mention Dr Atkins died of a heart attack?
Not only that, but according to WebMD there are plenty of other risks involved with a low carb/high protein diet.
- High Cholesterol
- Kidney Stones
- Kidney Failure
- Osteoporosis
- Cancer
- Nutritional Deficiencies
- Constipation
- Diverticulitis
- Heart Disease
- Loss of Muscle
Enough? Clearly this is NOT the direction we want to go.
Humans Are Not Carnivores (or cats)
So back to the diet question. If SAD is not working, and Low Carb/High Protein is worse….then what’s left?
On her website, Dr Pierson states that our cats do not have the proper enzyme in their saliva to digest carbs, which is why she suggest we avoid giving them dry food.
We do. It’s called Amylase. It’s one of the things that differentiate us humans from many of the other mammals. We can digest carbs. Actually throughout all recorded history, humans have thrived on carbs. So clearly our diet must be mostly consisting of carbs. GOOD carbs. Complex carbs in their whole natural state with their fiber intact.
Carbs like beans, lentils, whole grains, tubers, fruits, vegetables, nuts, and seeds.
THIS is the diet nature designed for us.
Although some historians and anthropologists say that man is historically omnivorous, our anatomical equipment (teeth, jaws, and digestive system) favors a fleshless diet. The American Dietetic Association notes that,
“most of mankind for most of human history has lived on vegetarian or near-vegetarian diets.”
Meat eaters hate to hear it, but there it is. We may have the equipment to be omnivores, but nature designed us to be Vegans. So take your meat you were saving for dinner and feed it to your cat. They were designed to eat it – not us.
And just maybe they won’t be so grumpy looking if you do 
