This book is a tome!  I’m so not kidding.  I love Sarah’s website, and as I’ve been battling chronic disease – possibly not autoimmune but certainly similar, at the very least – with little to no rational help from my doctors, I knew I needed to know more about what she had to say.  The Paleo Approach may seem a little pricey – until you get it.  It’s huge.  Like, college textbook size.  It’s in full-color with gorgeous design.  And it is jam-packed.  There is so much information here I don’t even quite know where to start, to tell you about it!

Let me back up a little first and talk about the tone of the book.  This is one of the best things about Dr. Ballantyne’s writing, in my opinion.  She’s very knowledgeable, and her information is clearly science-based.  But it’s also very down-to-earth – and understanding.  Having “been there,” in terms of chronic illness, she knows what it’s like to be exhausted.  She knows what it’s like for food to be the enemy.  She knows what it’s like to be scrabbling for answers.  So while her writing is firm, there’s also a gentleness there that is often lacking in other health sources.  (I don’t know about you, but my body beats me up enough; I don’t need food writers doing it, too!  So this is significant, to me.)

I really can’t begin to tell you all that’s in this book.  Seriously – you’ll simply have to take a look at it yourself.  The first two chapters talk about autoimmune disease – how the immune system is meant to work, what goes wrong that causes autoimmune disease and what sorts of things can trigger it – and about food and how it interacts with this whole process.  There is a ton of science here.  Many of you may even find your eyes glazing over and have to skim over it or jump forward.  It’s that in-depth.

But once this foundation is laid, there is a ton of practical information.  What not to eat – but also what to eat.  How to address other lifestyle issues like stress management, exercise, and sleep.  Supporting various body systems.  Supplementation – when it’s called for and what to look for.  And there’s a very long chart of foods with a pretty thorough overview of their nutritional value.

I particularly appreciate that The Paleo Approach emphasizes what can be eaten.  There is a whole list of foods that are okay.  And it’s fairly detailed.  I don’t just mean “meat & poultry.” I mean “antelope, bear, beaver, beef, bison, boar, camel, caribou, deer…” – and as you can probably guess, that’s only the beginning.  There is so much I can’t eat (and I’m not even on the AIP diet yet!) that my brain sort of “checks out” and I can’t remember what I can eat, even though I know there are options, so I found this really helpful.

My only issue with this is really not with the book itself, but just with reality.  It’s really, really expensive to eat this way, and I’m not sure how realistic it is.  Dr. Ballantyne is somewhat understanding of the fact that, for instance, grass-fed meat costs more than conventionally-raised, and offers some basic suggestions to help with that.  But the fact is that any sort of paleo-based diet is far more expensive than a basic whole foods diet, even if you stick with downright cheap meat, because it excludes all of the grains and similar foods that people have relied on for centuries to affordably “fill out” a meal.  The difference in cost between a serving of beans & brown rice, or whole-grain pasta with meat-based sauce, and a meal comprised entirely of animal foods and veggies, is vast.  (And this particular diet doesn’t even allow for slightly less expensive options like pastured eggs.)

On top of that, I guess I come from a particularly health-savvy area or something, because all those cuts we’re always told are super-healthy but should be quite affordable because hardly anyone wants them?  Those sell for premium prices here.  (I’m serious.  If I want bones from the supermarket, I have to actually purchase a package of bones for a not-insignificant price.  I guess people are catching one.  Which is a mixed blessing, I suppose.)  I have a family of 6.  Our food budget has already nearly doubled over the past few years just due to rising prices, and that’s for conventional foods.  The idea of eating a diet comprised entirely of pastured meat and pricey veggies sounds good, but…what’s impossible is still impossible.  (And the idea of less-common or more “quality” cuts, like steaks, lamb, bison, or a variety of fish?  Forget it!)

So I dunno…I struggle with this whole concept.  I know at an intellectual level that we should be eating certain things (although I disagree that grains should automatically be excluded from healthy people’s diets – if they’re causing us problems we need to ask why, because they didn’t for centuries), but the practical level is a whole different matter.  But if it’s doable at all, Sarah’s book provides the tools to do it.