Jeff was 56 years old when he signed up for Quantify, after months of waking up at night, struggling to breathe, and not getting anywhere with conventional medicine.
His primary care doctor had diagnosed him with sleep apnea soon after his symptoms started, but he didn’t have anything to offer, other than a continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) machine—a mask to pump air into his lungs—and a quick comment about trying to lose some weight.
While Jeff knew that being overweight was likely a contributing factor to his sleep apnea, when he asked his doctor for dietary recommendations, he was handed a pamphlet that advocated for a high-carbohydrate, low-fat diet, which was basically the diet that Jeff was already on.
Speculating that his doctor probably didn’t have any training in nutrition, Jeff realized he would need to go elsewhere for help.
In his first appointment at Quantify, Jeff’s health coach recommended a metabolic panel, cardiovascular panel, and food sensitivity test, to evaluate his metabolic health, blood sugar regulation, insulin resistance, cardiovascular health, inflammation, and immune reactivity to commonly consumed foods.
Test results
Excited to get his results, Jeff’s metabolic panel showed elevated glucose, hemoglobin A1c, and insulin, indicating blood sugar dysregulation, or the condition of having abnormally fluctuating blood sugar, which was likely caused by the high-carbohydrate diet that he had followed for years, and which often contributes to the development of sleep apnea.
Jeff’s cardiovascular panel showed elevated high-sensitivity C-reactive protein (hs-CRP), indicating systemic inflammation, which was also likely caused by his diet.
Providing an additional clue as to what was going on, his food sensitivity test showed a significant IgG immune reaction to both gluten (a protein in wheat, barley, and rye) and whey (a protein in milk), which together had been the foundation of his diet for his entire life.
Recovery
It was a lot to take in, having never put much thought into how food affected his health, but Jeff was committed to doing whatever he had to do to reverse the condition that was increasingly compromising his quality of life.
Working closely with his health coach, Jeff eliminated processed foods, sugar, grains, and dairy from his diet, increased consumption of fruits, vegetables, nuts, seeds, beef, chicken, fish, and eggs, took certain supplements, such as magnesium malate, vitamin D3, and vitamin K2, and started exercising every day.
Within a few months, he not only started to lose weight, but also started to breathe better at night.
To the bewilderment of his doctor, within a year, Jeff had lost 80 pounds, had no symptoms of sleep apnea, and reported feeling the healthiest he’d ever felt.