Living a healthy lifestyle has gone beyond a necessity in the modern world. For many people, it is fashionable trend and they are trying to do everything to meet its requirements.
There is nothing wrong with a wish to stay fit. The problem is that there are so many experts in this branch with absolutely diverse views and opinions some of which are obviously self-exclusive that anyone can easily become confused about the exact healthy habits one should develop. It is especially true when it comes to diets. Here comes one of the most popular belief into our predecessors being a way more healthier than modern people. For that reason, if we want to stay fit for as long as possible, we should adapt the behaviour and eating patterns of the prehistoric people.
If you also feel like you could have been much healthier if you lived thousands of years ago, read this article.
Why do we think ancient people were healthier than we are?
Undeniably, something about the life during the prehistoric time was healthier than we what we have today. For example, it is certain that ancient people were a way more active than we are. They definitely did not junk food or sterilise themselves with countless harsh cosmetic products. These people did not stuff themselves with antibiotics and had never encountered dangerous substances used in modern goods made of polymers. They did not expose themselves to radiation and nitrates. The list can be countless.
Unfortunately, the majority of these things cannot be changed. The modern world is just the way it is and we are surrounded by all of the things for good. Even if you are trying to escape from civilisation to a genuinely rural area, it is still rather difficult and even if you manage to do it, in all likelihood your rural life will be interrupted soon by industrialisation.
For that reason one of the things which seem to people to be achievable when they want to mimic the lifestyle of cavemen is changing a diet. Yet, here comes a great confusion since there are many nutritionists absolutely sure that their favourite diet was exactly the one used by prehistoric people. For some of them is a fat-fueled ketogenic diet whereas other believe it is a special paleo diet. Moreover, there are also many experts claiming our predecessors were thus healthy due to the fact of being vegans. Needless to say it is rather difficult to understand which diet you should really choose if you want to be like cavemen.
What did the first people really eat?
Unfortunately, no matter how hard you try, in all likelihood, you will fail in your attempt to copy the diet of cavemen. One of the greatest problem is that many species they used for food are even no longer available since people have been selecting the best vegetables, fruits and corns for hundreds of years. As a result, the food we have today is a way more nutritional and, needless to say, tastier than what our predecessors had to eat.
It turns out that ancient people were not able to be leading either the paleo diet or the ketogenic diet. They simply did not have access to such amounts of fats and meat as modern people do. Meat was not available all the time although prehistoric people were hunting and were not vegans all of the time. At the same time, the plants which are used today for extracting fat which is a foundation of the ketogenic diet were not available to the first people. They even did not know about the need of extracting them in the first place and without a possibility of keeping the ratio of fats in their diet thus high as it is required by the ketogenic diet, they were not able of staying in the ketogenic state all of the time.
In addition to it, the vegetables and fruits consumed by the first people will just seem uneatable even to the most advanced vegans or adapts of row eating.
There was an entire range of rather extravagant plants consumed by the first people including roots and flowers. Still, even the plants we enjoy eating today were absolutely different. For example, you have certainly heard about a watermelon being a berry. Six thousand years ago, you would not have any doubts it is a berry since this plant never exceeded the length of five centimetres. Additionally, it was extremely bitter. It is quite possible that you will not be able to swallow if and if you really push yourself, you might experience an intense heartburn afterwards.
Were the first people really thus healthy?
The first people were very active physically, however, they were suffering from a range of illness which are not thus popular nowadays. Apart from various infections, vitamin deficiencies were extremely widespread. The deformed people’s bodies making them rather weak.
Interestingly, the overall health condition of men used to be better than in women. That is so because they got better nutrition for being hunters and they were not risking to die during labour. The average lifespan of prehistoric people was around 30-40 years.