Latest / Health with Hashimoto’s - Thyroid or Immune Education for Autoimmune Thyroid Disease / 196 // Freshly Milled Flour & Hashimoto's: Loophole or False Hope?

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196 // Freshly Milled Flour & Hashimoto's: Loophole or False Hope? · Health with Hashimoto’s - Thyroid or Immune Education for Autoimmune Thyroid Disease

• 0:00
  When someone is diagnosed with Hashimoto's, one of the first pieces of advice
• 0:03
  that they often hear is to try to go gluten-free.
• 0:06
  And most of us don't like that advice. I have done several different episodes
• 0:10
  about gluten-free because some people say, some research says,
• 0:15
  that about 80% of people feel better on a gluten-free diet. But then we start looking for loopholes.
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  Like, what about freshly milled flour?
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  Can you tolerate freshly milled flour and gluten in that if you have Hashimoto's.
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  That's what we're talking about today.
• 0:29
  And spoiler, for some people, yes, some people, no.
• 0:32
  Welcome to the Health with Hashimoto's podcast. This is where you will find
• 0:36
  clarity and simple, sustainable strategies to feel better.
• 0:40
  I want to help you figure out your root causes.
• 0:43
  My name is Esther Yunkin. I am a registered nurse. I know how exhausting it
• 0:47
  is to live with fatigue, brain fog, and the ups and downs of Hashimoto's.
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  And that is why I'm here. I'm here to cut through the confusion and to give
• 0:56
  you practical steps that support your body, calm your immune system,
• 1:00
  so that you can regain your energy and feel like yourself again.
• 1:04
  Freshly milled flour is exactly what it sounds like.
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  It is flour that has been freshly milled from the wheat berry or from the grain.
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  It might not necessarily be wheat flour, it might be a different kind of flour.
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  The biggest benefits come because it's the whole part of the grain.
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  So this includes the bran, the germ, and the endosperm.
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  It's rich in minerals, rich in vitamins, rich in fiber.
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  A lot of this stuff has been processed out of what in my house we now call dead flour.
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  You know, flour that is shelf stable that you would just get at the grocery
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  store, all-purpose flour, bread flour, whatever kind of flour it is. It's been processed.
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  If it is called whole wheat flour, it's still missing.
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  I believe it's the germ that it's missing. It has the bran added back in,
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  but it is still missing part of the goodness that comes from the whole grain.
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  So when people mill that flour and then use it within like a couple days,
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  you get so much more nutrients, more nutrient value from that.
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  Another benefit of using freshly milled flour is because you have more control
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  over the source of your grain.
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  So you can choose the distributor, obviously, where you're buying it from.
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  And you can choose, are you going to get heritage wheat?
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  Heritage wheat is typically, all of this is typical.
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  I don't think there's any like hard and fast definitions for each of these.
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  But heritage wheat is typically pre like 1950s before wheat started being more modernized.
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  Obviously, it's been like going through generations of change since.
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  I don't know, Egyptian times.
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  But heritage wheat is usually referred to, at least I've seen it as like pre 1950s wheat.
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  Obviously, it's not GMO. And then you can also get other different types of
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  wheat grains on my buckets of wheat berries.
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  I have a family tree that lists how old things are. The most ancient of,
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  grain of wheat that we have is einkorn.
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  Einkorn is pretty weird to bake with. When I first saw that in the Facebook
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  groups, I'm like, it's still wheat. How can it be weird to bake with?
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  If you've ever baked bread with regular flour, you know that you put the flour
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  in, you put your yeast in, you let it proof, you let it rise,
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  and then you punch it down, you need it, and you let it rise again.
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  There's always two rises.
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  If you're making einkorn, then it doesn't like to have a second rise. It's very finicky.
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  It doesn't have the same gluten as modern wheat does.
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  And when I made my sourdough einkorn yesterday, it was almost like a thick cake
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  batter when I poured it into the loaf pan.
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  There was absolutely no eating, just mixing.
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  And then I let it rise once and
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  put it right into the oven. It was perfect sandwich loaf sourdough bread.
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  So, so good. And einkorn has been really hard to figure out a good sandwich
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  loaf, so I was so proud of that one.
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  But that's the most ancient wheat, and then there's a lot of different varieties
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  in between einkorn and today's modern wheat, or even the heritage wheat.
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  There's red wheat, there's white wheat, there's spelt. And.
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  Emmer. And there's a whole bunch of non-wheat grains that you could also mill.
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  So some of the benefits, like I said, you get the whole grain in your flour
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  and you also get to choose where your grain or what kind of grain you're going to use.
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  And if you want it organic, if you want it heritage, if you want it from out
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  of the country, you know, all of these different things, you have more control over that.
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  So there are benefits for freshly milled flour.
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  There are also some downsides because you're getting
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  the entire grain you have more
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  bran and bran is sharp and
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  so if you're used to baking a lot especially bread some
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  people find that the more they need their freshly milled
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  flour the more that bran acts as
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  little tiny knives and will cut apart the gluten so even if you have like a
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  red wheat or a white wheat which are more like the modern all-purpose flours
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  you're gonna some people find that they have less gluten developed just because
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  the brand is cutting up the gluten.
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  And you can find a lot of YouTube videos and different things on that if you're wondering.
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  I am part of several different freshly milled flour Facebook groups.
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  And for today, I did some research on, you know, molecular mimicry for gluten.
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  Is that a thing or isn't that a thing. And then I also looked in the groups
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  so that I could give you a lot of first-hand or I.
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  If you have Hashimoto's, can you tolerate freshly milled flour products?
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  Now, this was first brought to my attention when I watched an interview with Sue Becker.
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  Her website and everything is, I think, Becker's Bread.
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  And she talks about how she has Hashimoto's and she can do freshly milled flour.
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  And she's seen a lot of people turn around their health. She has a lot of firsthand
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  experience watching people's lives change.
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  She also said that she, I think she said she has a science background and she
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  doesn't believe in the gluten molecular mimicry theory.
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  So that was one of the first things I looked at in preparation for this podcast
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  episode. Is that a thing?
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  And there's not a ton of evidence. Like we can't say definitively yes,
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  but there's more evidence yes than there is no.
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  So I can see how she gets that wiggle room in order to say it.
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  But overall, yes, a lot of the research and a lot of the experts do point to
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  that there is molecular mimicry for gluten and thyroid.
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  One research paper said that is molecular mimicry between gut and thyroid tissue transglutaminase.
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  But honestly, I don't think most of us care about the molecular aspect of gluten.
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  We just want to know, can we eat regular food?
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  Can we eat wheat if it's freshly milled?
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  Can we find a loophole so we can eat regular things again?
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  At least that's what I'm looking for. That's what I've heard from different
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  clients. So let me tell you from the Facebook groups, like I said,
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  I'm in several different freshly milled flour ones.
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  I'm in some gluten-free freshly milled, them in some regular.
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  And overall, it's yes and no. And that's how it goes for so many things.
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  You are a bio-individual. You are a unique person.
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  Your gut is different than anybody else's gut.
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  Your history and all of the things that go into your current health, it's unique to you.
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  So it is your job, your privilege, and your job as somebody with Hashimoto's
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  to figure out what works for you. What are your unique root causes?
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  What is your mix? And if you have not yet been through my root causes revealed
• 8:08
  mini course, it's going to take you less than an hour to figure out most of
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  your root causes, at least based on common sense.
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  Of course, you can always do testing, but in less than an hour,
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  I'm going to help you figure that out because you are a unique individual.
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  So let's find out what some unique individuals have had to say.
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  The first post that I'm going to talk about is basically, have you seen your
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  health change since switching to freshly milled flour?
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  This is for everybody. This is not just for people with thyroid problems,
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  autoimmune problems, or Hashimoto's.
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  This is, have you seen your health change or your family's health change?
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  The poster says, don't get me wrong. I know it's better for me and my family,
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  and I've actually grown to love the taste and love making bread.
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  I just haven't noticed any real differences.
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  I still feel like I'm bloated. I might feel fuller longer, but nothing like
• 9:01
  the testimonials talk about from the Beckers. And.
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  You will notice in the freshly milled community, there's a lot of references
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  to Sue Becker and things that she says because she is one of the leading voices on it.
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  And a lot of people do agree with her and a lot of people don't agree with her.
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  So one response to this post says, I am pre-diabetic.
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  The last three weeks I have eaten all of my freshly or all of my flour fresh
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  milled and my blood sugar has been in the normal range.
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  And she also said that she has worn a continuous glucose monitor for a year.
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  So she does have a really good baseline of what works for her and not.
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  Another person said that changes were more subtle, but after seven years of
• 9:46
  being pregnant and or breastfeeding, she was exhausted all the time and she
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  did start feeling better after eating some freshly milled wheat.
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  Now I want to go back to the research and one said that a lot of people who
• 10:01
  are on a gluten-free diet consume an inadequate amount of vitamins B and C,
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  folates, iron, zinc, and magnesium.
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  And freshly milled wheat or freshly milled grain is higher in the B vitamins
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  and it's higher in a lot of the other vitamins and minerals.
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  So one reason that people hypothesize that people feel better when they're eating
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  freshly milled grains is because they're getting more nutrients.
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  If you are already taking a really good multivitamin because you know you have
• 10:34
  gaps in your diet, you might have already filled these gaps and so you might
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  not feel a difference when you switch to freshly milled grain.
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  I have noticed that commonality when I am talking to people personally.
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  I have not seen that on the Facebook groups. I'm not going into every comment
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  and saying, oh, if you felt a huge change when you started eating freshly milled
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  grain, can I ask, were you taking a really good multivitamin to fill in the
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  gaps in your diet? I'm not going there.
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  I'm not going to take over somebody's post to do some multivitamin research on that.
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  But this person, Brenda, said, I think a lot depends on your eating or health
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  habits before starting freshly milled flour.
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  I've been doing it for quite a while, but I was eating very healthy and exercising before I started.
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  I've been pretty healthy my whole life. I'll never go back though,
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  because I know the health benefits and I believe, even though I didn't notice
• 11:30
  any big improvements and I didn't have much health wise that needed improving
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  and I wanted to stay that way.
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  Another person said, I've been milling my flour for about a year,
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  I have not seen any great changes, but I do find that I have better bowel movements.
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  Another person said, my gut is so much more regular. One week I couldn't make
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  bread and my gut churned the whole week.
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  That is a common thread through a lot of people in the freshly milled flour community.
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  They say that their bowel movements and their gut is much different.
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  A couple other comments on this specific thread.
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  Basically, no, you're not the only one as much as I love it.
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  I have not seen any tangible results either.
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  Somebody said that their skin is better.
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  Somebody else said that acne is better. Overall, I think the general theme,
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  although again, every single person is individual.
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  But the general theme is, I haven't noticed a lot of changes,
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  but I do enjoy knowing that it's better for me.
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  And that is freshly milled flour in general.
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  But what about if you have Hashimoto's? To recap my story, when I had my youngest
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  son, who is now 12, I had to go on a huge elimination diet because of some problems that he was having.
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  When I added foods back in, I found out that I was no longer tolerant to gluten.
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  It really amped up my migraines. It really lowered my migraine threshold.
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  And I had other problems with it too. So it's been, like I said, about 12 years.
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  I've gone off and on it, tried it different times. Every time I felt worse and worse on it.
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  And then when COVID happened, I tried long fermented sourdough.
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  And was very hopeful. I had some bread and within like an hour,
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  I was just super, super depressed, which was so unusual for me.
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  And finally, I was like, oh, this is the gluten.
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  After listening to the episode with Sue Becker, I tried Heritage wheat,
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  freshly milled sourdough, and I was very hopeful and again, could not tolerate
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  it. I could tolerate it better.
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  I wasn't really depressed, but I had brain fog.
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  I just didn't feel like myself. I put some of my podcast episodes on YouTube.
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  I don't really talk about YouTube.
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  I don't really work YouTube very much.
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  But that specific video is on YouTube. And I have had so many people saying,
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  oh, that was just a detox reaction.
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  So I guess you have to know what is a detox reaction and what is an autoimmune flare.
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  For me, it was not a detox reaction. People might want to say that.
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  I don't want to let my body get used to being sick again.
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  I don't want to get used to those symptoms and just say, oh,
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  this is how it is. I know what my body feels like off of gluten.
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  And I know what happens when I have an autoimmune flare.
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  And for me, having heritage wheat that was red wheat or white wheat,
• 14:24
  it sent my autoimmune condition up a little bit with the brain fog and not feeling
• 14:29
  like myself, the decreased energy.
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  That's not a detox reaction. That's my body saying, hey, you know,
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  whispering what's going on.
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  I want to catch those whispers before my body has to start yelling.
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  So to all of those people who are like, yeah, no, that's just a detox reaction.
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  I'm going to fight back and say that was not a detox reaction.
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  That was my body telling me, communicating with me what was going on.
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  So since then, I found out that there are even more ancient grains,
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  and I now can use the most ancient, which is eid corn.
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  I have gone up that family tree, or I guess down that family tree, a couple rungs.
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  On that ladder and I can't do that. My body tells me no.
• 15:13
  So for me, I can do einkorn, especially if it's sourdough fermented.
• 15:18
  I can do it fresh as well, but I have noticed that it's better for me.
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  My body appreciates it more if it is sourdough. So that's my story,
• 15:28
  but what about other people?
• 15:29
  Again, these are stories, testimonials from the Facebook groups that I'm on.
• 15:34
  One person said that she has Hashimoto's. And when she went gluten and dairy-free,
• 15:38
  her inflammation dropped. She no longer had joint pain.
• 15:41
  Her antibodies decreased by about 50% for the first time ever.
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  And when she uses freshly milled gluten-free grains, then she can still do all
• 15:52
  of the freshly milled stuff, but continues to get the benefits from gluten-free.
• 15:56
  Somebody else echoes something that we've talked about a lot on the podcast.
• 15:59
  She said, my experience is that some gut healing has to take place first.
• 16:04
  Once that happens, slowly introducing freshly milled flour can bring a benefit.
• 16:09
  But every person is different.
• 16:11
  Hashimoto's is an autoimmune disease and the immune system is attacking the
• 16:15
  body. We have to heal the gut.
• 16:17
  She goes on to say, if you just start having freshly milled flour,
• 16:21
  but you have a broken immune system and gut problems, it might not help.
• 16:25
  Another person said, I think this is just people trying to sell their opinion
• 16:29
  wrapped as truth. They may even believe what they're saying,
• 16:32
  but there's no hard and fast rule for thyroid or Hashimoto's issues.
• 16:36
  Absolutely. You are an individual. Unfortunately, there is no 100% yes, 100% no on this issue.
• 16:44
  You really have to figure out what works for you. And like the other person
• 16:47
  said about the gut, you really do have to...
• 16:51
  Tend to your gut health first. We do know that gluten and zonulin talk directly.
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  Gluten tends to think of zonulin as like the remote control that opens the gate of a castle.
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  Like, you know, back medieval times when they had the gates,
• 17:10
  they would lower them and close them, lower them and open them.
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  Zonulin is like the remote control that tells it to open and gluten pushes that
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  button. So if you want leaky gut, if you want all of the gates to open and everything
• 17:23
  to go through, gluten is going to do that.
• 17:26
  And so we have to figure out how to have really good gut health.
• 17:30
  And that's one thing that I worked on really hard over the last year before
• 17:34
  I tried gluten this last time in the form of the most ancient wheats.
• 17:39
  Another person about this Hashimoto's, she said she is on thyroid medications.
• 17:45
  She has been using freshly milled flour, and everything is fine,
• 17:51
  having no problems for two years.
• 17:53
  All of her numbers have actually dropped drastically.
• 17:56
  Another person said that her daughter has Hashimoto's, and she can eat some
• 18:02
  freshly milled items in moderation, and it does not affect her.
• 18:05
  But she did have to go gluten-free for a while. Somebody else said that her
• 18:10
  husband still gets headaches from freshly milled einkorn sourdough.
• 18:14
  So like I said, einkorn is the most ancient wheat that is available,
• 18:18
  and this person uses sourdough and still cannot tolerate it.
• 18:23
  You really have to figure out what is going to work for you. Somebody else said...
• 18:29
  The only way to know is to try it. We are different.
• 18:32
  And that is where I'm going to leave this episode because that is really the only answer.
• 18:37
  Yes, absolutely work on your gut health. Gut health is crucial.
• 18:41
  It is one of the main root causes of all autoimmune conditions.
• 18:45
  I have a bunch of episodes about gut because of this, because it is such a root cause.
• 18:52
  I will put probably five or six of the episodes down in the show notes,
• 18:56
  but if you only have time for a couple.
• 18:59
  Look to episode 178, which is the gut-thyroid connection.
• 19:04
  And there I'm talking about specifically things I learned from the book Super Gut.
• 19:08
  And then also 184, which is how to improve gut health without overwhelm.
• 19:15
  So 178 and 184 would be where I would start if you want two episodes about gut health.
• 19:23
  But essentially, work on your gut, heal the gut, and then experiment.
• 19:27
  See what works for you. Keep a good food log, a good diary of, I tried this food.
• 19:33
  Make sure that you're logging your brain fog symptoms, your energy symptoms,
• 19:37
  your gut symptoms, and then keep that log for probably at least three days so
• 19:43
  that you get a good picture of what different foods do when you eat them and experiment.
• 19:49
  The only way you're going to know what works for you is by trying and experimenting
• 19:53
  what works for you. There's no hard and fast rule.
• 19:57
  As much as everybody wants me to say, there's a loophole to the gluten thing.
• 20:01
  And if you use freshly milled flour, there's your loophole.
• 20:04
  Well, I can't say that because it's not accurate.
• 20:07
  It might work for some people, but it doesn't work for everybody.
• 20:10
  And the only way you're going to know if it works for you is to try it.
• 20:14
  This podcast is for informational and educational purposes only.
• 20:18
  Please discuss any changes with your trusted health care provider.
• 20:21
  To take your next step, join our school community and explore the courses available there. You do not,
• 20:27
  out alone. So that is school, S-K-O-O-L.com, and it is the Health with Hashimoto's community.
• 20:34
  I'll see you next time on the Health with Hashimoto's podcast.