Kevin Marti introduced today’s speaker – Adrian-born and raised, Dr. Mike McAuliffe. Mike is a retired internist after having been in private practice for 33 years. Mike, however, is now still conducting endoscopies in addition to serving as the Medical Director of Gleaners as well as the Director of Diet & Nutrition for the Gray Institute where he has spent considerable time developing his “Controlled Carb Diet” program. It was this program, Kevin said, that his staff of 65 Gleaner employees have experienced a combined weight loss of over 500 pounds – 20 of those Kevin lost himself! It was this program specifically that Mike was on hand today to speak to us about.

 

Mike began his presentation by speaking about three men. The first was an engineer named Richard Bernstein who was 40 at the time. He had been a diabetic since he was 10 years old and knew he’d be dead by age 47 if something didn’t change in his life. He then acquired a glucose monitor and started testing his own sugar levels against many of the foods he was eating. What he discovered was that the only foods he ate that caused his blood sugars to rise were “carbohydrates”. He tested it for a number of years. He also found that when he limited his carb intake to 80 grams a day, his blood sugar levels actually went down. He was so impressed with these findings that he went off to medical school so he would be more believable when he went out to share this information. He is now in his 80’s and he even wrote a book titled The Diabetic Diet.

 

The next person Mike spoke about was David Smith a physician from Grand Ledge, Michigan who only treats diabetic patients. Mike attended a luncheon that Dr. Smith spoke at and during the talk mentioned Dr. Bernstein and the results his diet (controlled carbs) was having on his own patients. Dr. Smith, Mike said, looked around the room to those in attendance and said: “This diet is not optional for diabetics; it’s a matter of life or death.” Having heard Dr. Smith’s talk, Mike decided to try it out for himself.

 

This lead to the 3^rd person Mike wanted to talk about – himself. Mike said he weighed about 207 pounds five years ago and had just heard Dr. Smith speak. He said he remembered telling his wife the afternoon of the same day he started the diet that he just “felt different”. He wasn’t crashing throughout the day and was not even hungry! After one month went by he noticed he’d lost 10 pounds! After 2 months – another 10 pounds! After a third – 10 more until he lost a total of 50 pounds in 5 months!! Since he wasn’t sure it was the diet that caused him to lose weight but possibly a medical condition, Mike had tests done but they all came back negative. He even started to eat junk food and that’s when he started to put weight on again. Consequently Mike had to buy a whole new wardrobe!

 

Following the weight loss due to eating no more than 80 grams of carbs a day throughout the diet, he said he needed to eventually increase his carb intake to 100-150/day to maintain the weight. Mike directed us to his two 30-minute videos on You Tube. On those videos, Gary Gray from the Gray Institute interviews Mike relative to this amazing diet. He suggested we go to the site and type in: Gary Gray Interviews Dr. McAuliffe and watch them. They are 30 minutes each.

 

A question from an audience member about how this diet differed from the Atkins' Diet was answered by Mike who explained that in Atkin’s it is recommended that a person eat no more than 30 grams of carbs a day which Mike said was way too low since it results in what is called Ketosis. Mike also said that you don’t have to run out and purchase Dr. Bernstein’s book – simply reduce your carb intake to lose weight (something, Mike said, exercise really won’t do in itself).

 

Share this with family and friends who are looking to lose weight without feeling tired and having to starve yourself like many of the other diets out there. Thanks, Mike, for some great information!!

 

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