In my last article, I discussed a bit of the results I received from the massive amount of physicals I’ve had recently, and the discovery that I have a leaky gut which is causing a bunch of problems.
I also discussed the new diet I’m utilizing to fix this problem.
Several people in the comments immediately recommended I do the carnivore diet.
I realized, reading these comments, that I had never written a full article about the carnivore diet, even though it’s been a big deal on the internet for about five years now, ever since Jordan Peterson’s angry feminist daughter started promoting it.
First, I’m going to address the carnivore diet in general, then I will discuss why I, in particular, am not choosing to use this diet to fix my leaking gut, with real data and science behind my decision (as always).
Carnivore Diet People
The biggest problem with discussing the carnivore diet is that it quickly became an irrational cult on the internet. Much like flat earthers, vegans, feminists, and tradcons, it became a thing people were following because of the emotions they had around the diet rather than the science behind the diet itself.
For example, as soon as people started talking about the carnivore diet on my blogs a few years ago, when I correctly pointed out that it probably woudln’t be great for your gut biome if you only ate animal prodcuts for literally the rest of your life, various people attacked me personally and I had to ban a bunch of folks for violations of the Five Simple Rules.
Other people said that I should “get educated” on the carnivore diet and many of them sent me links to a Joe Rogan episode with one of the biggest carnivore diet gurus at the time (I forget his name).
In the first 20 minutes of the episode, Joe asked the guy how his blood work and biomarkers looked after being on carnivore for an entire year. The guy answered that he had no idea. He never had any blood work done(!).
Joe reacted with shock, and so did I. Why the hell would you try such a radical diet, go around on the internet promoting it as healthy, when you haven’t looked at any of your fucking biomarkers?
Insane.
And this was the guru all of these canrivore people were pointing at as the expert.
I turned off the episode and moved on.
Again, clearly, these carnivore people were in a cult, not following science.
FYI, that same carnivore guru (again, I don’t remember his name because I don’t care), after about three years, started eating fruits, veggies, and carbs because carnivore was fucking up his health, exactly as I had predicted.
Carnivore Can Still Help
Does that mean carnivore is bullshit? No.
Just because a lot of carnivore people are irrational doesn’t mean that the diet itself can’t be beneficial. I personally know people who have indeed benefited from the carnivore diet.
You may be one of those people, and if the carnivore diet has helped you, that’s fantastic and I support you.
The biggest reason carnivore helps people is that it forces people to stop eating shit like bread, pasta, sugar, gluten, high-inflammation dried fruits, artificial flavors and chemicals, and a bunch of other garbage.
Yeah man, if you stop eating that crap, your health will improve and you will feel better. But you can stop eating those things without converting to full-on carnivore. I’ll discuss that more in a minute.
So if you’re one of these carnivore people, make sure you read this statement: I’m not against carnivore and if carnivore helped you, I think that’s great and I support you.
(Now let’s see how many irrational carnivore people in the comments, DMs, and my email ignore that statement.)
The Biggest Issue With Carnivore
The biggest issue with carnivore is what I’ve said all along: it is a fantastic diet to use as a temporary cleanse, as in several months or so. It is an absolutely dreadful and unhealthy diet to use as a long-term lifestyle or for the “rest of your life.”
Again, the proof is in the pudding regarding the sheer amount of famous carnivore gurus who eventually had to reluctantly announce to their audiences that they started eating fruits, vegetables, legumes, and other carbs because of all the very predictable health problems they were incurring by embracing carnivore long-term.
If you are a carnivore person, you might respond with the more rational response of, “But that’s right, Caleb. You should do carnivore just for a few months and then pivot to eating healthy carbs and fats also.”
The problem is that over the last five or six years that carnivore has been promoted on the internet, I have literally never seen any carnivore person recommend this approach.
100% of these guys say or imply that you should just eat carnivore pretty much for the rest of your life and that every other diet is stupid.
Which, of course, is factually incorrect. But internet cults usually are.
So my position on carnivore today is the same as it was many years ago when the fad started hitting the internet hard. I think carnivore is a fantastic way, as a temporary cleanse, to clean up health problems in your body, and then after a few months, you get off carnivore and switch to a healthier, long-term, balanced diet.
If you disagree with that statement and think carnivore is perfectly healthy to do for 50 years straight, as always, show me your data and let’s take a look. As usual, emotions, anger, name-calling, and snark don’t work on me and further indicate that I’m correct.
Why I’m Personally Not Doing Carnivore
With all of that context, now I will explain why I personally will not be pursuing carnivore to address my specific set of problems.
As I explained earlier, I’ve had a huge number of comprehensive tests, including mapping my genetic profile, my gut profile, heart health, full-body MRI, and various other things. I have worked with several doctors on this and I am also working with AI.
Using AI (the best paid version of Claude Sonnet 4.6), I have fed the almost hundred pages of reports of test results into it so I can ask questions based on the results.
When first going through these results, I asked AI, based on my results, if carnivore was a good idea to address my leaky gut and other problems. Here’s exactly what it said:
Great question — and your test results actually give us a pretty clear answer on this. Here’s what the data says:
Your leaky gut situation: Your Zonulin came back at 238.7 ng/g (reference is <175), which confirms increased intestinal permeability. Your Secretory IgA is also elevated (2336, reference 510–2010), and your Anti-gliadin IgA is slightly elevated (183, reference <175), suggesting your gut is reacting to gluten specifically.
Why carnivore might seem appealing: Eliminating gluten and processed foods does reduce gut irritants, and some people feel better short-term. Since gluten is a trigger for you, removing it would help — but you don’t need to go full carnivore to achieve that, and it will likely make your situation worse.
Why carnivore would likely work AGAINST your specific case:
Your prescribed 3-month protocol includes prebiotic fiber. Phase 2 of your gut plan specifically includes Organic Sunfiber prebiotic, and Phase 3 is microbiome re-population with a multi-strain probiotic. A carnivore diet provides zero fermentable fiber — meaning you’d be starving the beneficial bacteria you’re trying to rebuild. This directly undermines the protocol you’ve been given.
Your DNA report recommends a Mediterranean diet, not carnivore. It specifically calls for fruits, vegetables, and plant diversity to support your biological processes — particularly your antioxidant status, inflammation control, and methylation.
Your detoxification genes (Phase II) are compromised. Your DNA report flagged this and specifically recommended daily intake of foods like broccoli, cauliflower, and kale to compensate. These are completely off the table on a carnivore diet.
Lipid metabolism concerns. Your DNA summary flags the need to support lipid metabolism with soluble fiber and plant sterols — carnivore does the opposite.
The bottom line: A short carnivore stint might quiet some symptoms temporarily (especially by dropping gluten), but it would likely set back the microbiome rebuilding that’s central to your actual healing plan. The structured 3-phase protocol you’ve been prescribed is far better matched to what your tests actually show.
So there you go. Going on the carnivore diet would be a bad idea for me and would work against my goals of fixing my gut.
This is why it’s so dangerous and reckless to just adopt a severe diet like carnivore just because some zealots on the internet reported some positive results by doing it for a few months. You don’t know your DNA or gut profile. You don’t know what’s going on inside your body.
I realize that most people can’t afford $7,000 in advanced genetic and gut health testing, but there are lots of simple, inexpensive blood tests and biomarkers you can get a look at before making a major change like this, and you should.
One of the biggest things being on TRT has taught me is that everyone’s body is radically different and reacts well and poorly to different things.
Again, carnivore can help, and maybe it can help you. But don’t just go into this shit blind like so many carnivore gurus did in the past. That’s dumb.
I feel heard! To be fair, I wasn't recommending it to you, just sharing my story. I know you do research before making a decision like this.
For anyone else reading, don't turn this diet (or anything else) into dogma. Be scientific.
My plan was to start at a baseline elimination diet to heal, then slowly reintroduce new foods and measure how my body reacted to them.
I am no longer strictly carnivore and have reintegrated new foods after methodically testing them.
My long-term plan is to eventually identify all the vegetables I can eat and settle on a diet that I know works for my body chemistry. Mostly because I miss vegetables; I was the kid who liked broccoli.
I'll be giving this more attention when I leave the US later this year because I'm curious how the change in food ecosystem will impact things.
I've met people who were intolerant to certain foods, then realized they were fine with them once they left Western countries. Something something Big Food.