Disease Proof : Disease Proof : Health & Nutrition News & Commentary : Dr. Joel Fuhrman

This year is coming to a close in less than forty-eight hours.  For those of you who have been waiting for the infamous Times Square ball to drop to commit to getting your health back, the most exciting adventure of your life is about to begin! 

If you commit 100% to nutritarian eating as taught by Dr. Fuhrman in his books, newsletters, lectures, teleconferences, and articles, you will eventually live in freedom from toxic food addiction and get your health and life back.  Guaranteed. 

You must become a serious student and give it your all as if your very life depended on getting an ‘A’ in Overcoming Food Addiction; because without a doubt, it does!  (Note: 100% commitment does not mean that you will never stumble along the way.  However, it does mean that when slip-ups happen, you'll get up quickly, dust the dirt off, and keep running towards the goal of optimal health.) 

Excess weight will drop off, and medical stats will improve significantly as a by-product of replacing artificial and toxic substances with excellent nutrition.   

In 2010, don’t settle for anything less.

Go for it!  You can do it!

I wrote the following on July 9, 2008; the day before committing to nutritarian eating:

I feel sluggish most of the time with a cloud of malaise overshadowing my energy, even after a good night’s rest.  The bones and joints in my feet hurt.  My knees ache.  My feet, hands, and face are puffy. I’m bloated and my belly is extended.  I could pass for looking eight or nine months pregnant.  My lower back gets stiff and hurts after I sit for any length of time. I never have a break from this burden of obesity unless I lie down.  I carry it around day in and day out.  It is with me wherever I go.  The slow spiral into this dark abyss has arrived ever so slowly.  I am now bound and gagged in its prison cell.  Stuck.  It’s time to climb out and feel the sunshine on my face, and breathe fresh air again.  It’s time to live again. 

The following was written one year later; July 9, 2009:

Soon after a professional photo shoot (below) to document the one year anniversary of beginning my transformation, I celebrated by going on a bike ride.  Not using the best of caution, I zoomed down a hill on a gravel road.  My front tire lost control in the loose stones, and you can imagine what happened next. I ended up in another photo shoot, in a hospital radiation lab, lying flat on my back under an x-ray machine.  Although I was in excruciating pain and feeling miserable, I leapt with joy on the inside when I overheard the technician instruct his assistant to reposition my body because I was thin!  (Thankfully, I had no broken bones or serious injuries.)

"Thin." That’s spelled, "T-h-i-n." 

That four letter word was music to this woman's ears; the perfect ending to an adventuresome year of transformation!    

                     "What would life be if we had no courage to attempt anything?"    -Vincent  van Gogh

One year of nutritarian eating:

Let's hear from you.  Are you committing to nutritarian eating in 2010?  Dr. Fuhrman recommends making your intentions known to at least four people.  Here's a great place to start!

image credit:  digi-hound.com  

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I live in northeastern Indiana, and as I’m writing this post the ground and evergreen trees are covered with a blanket of beautiful, sparkling snow.  I took the pictures below from my front door.  (Note the cross country ski trails on the right ~ that’s the fancy footwork of my teenage daughter.)  Hopefully, it will continue to be a white Christmas!                    

As you are baking for holiday gatherings, the following recipes from the Member Center of DrFuhrman.com, including Dr. Fuhrman’s Healthy Times Newsletters, may be of interest to you.  After the gifts are unwrapped, the company is gone, and you have a moment to relax, I encourage you to browse through the many wonderful recipes on the Member Center.

A holiday treat does not have to be junk food or damage the health of your loved ones.  -Dr. Fuhrman

 Enjoy making health promoting memories with your family and friends!

Cashew Cookies

1 cup raw cashew butter or 2 cups raw cashews

1 cup oats

1 tsp. cinnamon

1/3 cup date sugar

1/2 cup water

1/4 cup unsweetened applesauce

1 tsp. vanilla

Unsweetened strawberry jam

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Blend oats (and raw cashews if you are using them) in a food processor or VitaMix until it’s the consistency of flour.  Pour blended ingredients into a large bowl and stir in all the remaining ingredients except the jam.  Mix thoroughly.  Drop by teaspoonfuls on a cookie sheet.  With your fingertip, form a small well in the center of each cookie.  Place a small amount of jam in each well.  Bake for 15 minutes.  (makes approximately 2 dozen)

Chocolate Oat Clusters

2 cups unsweetened applesauce

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

1 cup date sugar

2/3 cup raw walnuts, ground

2/3 cup whole wheat flour

1 ¼ teaspoons arrowroot powder

4 Tablespoons Dr. Fuhrman’s Cocoa Powder or other natural cocoa powder

¾ cup oats

8 dates, pitted and coarsely chopped

¾ cup chopped walnuts

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.  Blend applesauce, vanilla and date sugar in blender until creamy.  In a large bowl, combine the flour, arrowroot powder, ground nuts, and cocoa powder.  Add the blended wet ingredients to the dry ingredients and mix well.  Stir in oats, chopped dates and chopped nuts.  Bake for 10 minutes.  (makes approximately 4 dozen)  These cookies freeze well.  For a chocolate-coconut cookie, add 3 tablespoons of unsweetened, shredded coconut.  

Sweet Beet Carrot Bars

2 cups whole grain flour

1 cup beets (raw, peeled and shredded)

1 large carrot (peeled and shredded)

3 teaspoons baking soda

½ cup date sugar

2 cup unsweetened applesauce

1 cup pineapple (blended)

1 banana (mashed)

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 cup chopped walnuts

1 cup currants

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Mix flour and baking soda in bowl.  In a larger bowl, beat date sugar, blended pineapple, mashed banana, and applesauce together.  Stir in the vanilla and then add the flour mixture along with the chopped walnuts, shredded carrots and beets.  Mix well.  Spread in a non-stick baking pan.  Bake for 50 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.  Cool and cut into squares.  

At our house, when the fresh pine boughs are placed around the centerpiece of candles and fresh fruit, that means Christmas is just around the corner.  All of my children will be home by lunchtime tomorrow so I'm making a big pot of their favorite vegetable soup to welcome them all home!  

What health promoting foods and/or memories are you creating with your loved ones this Christmas? 

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Are you stuck in the dieting rut that says, “I have to give up this or that; I can’t have this; I can’t have that?” or  “My New Year’s resolution will be to restrict calories to lose fifty pounds by summer.” 

If you are, you are one of millions held captive in the American dieting prison system.   

Nutritarin eating is about . . . . eating.

I can eat this. I can eat that.

It’s not about deprivation, because when the body gets the nutrients it so desperately needs, over time, the taste and desire for junk and unhealthy food choices naturally diminish.  Food preferences change and the body seeks out excellent nutrition instead.    

As we choose to eat foods that have high amounts of nutrients:  unlimited amounts of fresh vegetables and fruits, unlimited amounts of beans/ legumes, limited amounts of unsalted nuts, seeds and grains, a bit of fish and poultry (if desired); we no longer are controlled by unnatural cravings for junk. 

Just like the body doesn’t naturally crave nicotine unless it repeatedly smokes cigarettes; likewise, it doesn’t naturally desire artificial, processed food unless it is repeatedly fed the junk.  When you are healthy, you don’t want junk.

If you are overweight or obese, you got there by starving yourself from high nutrient, natural foods.  Most likely your body has been fed unhealthy, chemically sweetened and flavored processed foods.  Your body size is the by-product of being chronically deprived of excellent nutrition. 

You need a paradigm shift.  A permanently transformed body is the result of a changed mind.  Focus your thoughts on putting nutrient dense foods into your body.  Fill your nutritional needs. 

I challenge you this New Year to forget about the all-consuming drive to lose weight by deprivation (which, by the way, takes a lot of psychological effort to get psyched up for and is never permanent), and focus instead on putting lots of nutrient dense foods into your body.  Fill your nutritional needs and your body will naturally decrease its drive to overeat calories.  

Do you make the salad the main dish?; including lots of raw vegetables such as shredded cabbage, carrots, sweet peppers, tomatoes, and beets?  Are you using Dr. Fuhrman’s healthy salad dressing recipes?  Don’t forget the central core of nutritarianism is eating large raw salads; including greens such as lettuce, kale or spinach in a fruit smoothie once a day, if desired.  Without the salads, it's likely that you're not interpreting Dr. Fuhrman’s guidelines accurately.  

“By teaching you how to achieve superior health, your ideal weight will follow naturally.”  -Dr. Fuhrman

Let's dialogue.  Do you focus on deprivation, or do you focus on eating a sufficient amount of high nutrient vegetation to achieve optimal health?

Image credits:  corporatemonk.com; healnh.org; purpletrail.com

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Whether we are single moms, full-time working moms, stay-at-home moms, mothers to many or a few; we have the most influence in our children’s lives. 

We are the primary role models and educators in teaching their values concerning food and establishing their eating habits.

We set the stage for planning meals and creating holiday food traditions. 

Women are the primary food industry consumers who stock the refrigerators and pantries of America.  We purchase over 90% of the groceries in the United States.¹ 

At the end of the day, when it’s all said and done, it’s what little Johnny repeatedly sees when he opens the refrigerator and cupboards at home that’s going to have the most influence on his food values and health.

It would be ideal if every pediatrician would instruct their young patients about the health promoting benefits of nutritarian eating.  It would be beneficial if every daycare, school and church would educate children about the life-damaging effects of eating for disease.  It would be wonderful if every youth activity, from nursery to college, could teach the importance of eating nutrient dense foods for developing bodies. 

Reality is, moms, we purchase the food and set the example.  We are the primary educators and role models that will have the most influence in establishing our children’s long term eating habits and health.

“The key to raising a healthy family is not letting unhealthy food choices enter the house. Because when they do, the kids will seek them out, like flies to honey and fill their caloric requirements with junk; crowding out anything health supporting. (Wheat flour listed as a first ingredient means it is junk food. It must be ‘whole wheat flour.’)”  -Dr. Fuhrman

Are we teaching, by our example and purchases, to eat for disease or to eat for health?

Reference:  1. Too Busy to Shop; Marketing to “Multi-Minding” Women  by Kelly Murray Skoloda  

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Stephanie began the journey to get her health back on November 1, 2009.  After one month of nutritarian eating she has lost 16 lbs and has energy and stamina for the first time in her life!  To learn more about Stephanie, including her starting medical stats, click here. 

How do you feel after one month of nutritarian eating? I feel like a completely different person!  I have energy and stamina that I’ve never had before in my life.  When I began, I had severe swelling in my lower legs, ankles and feet.  Now I have no swelling and all the inflammation in my body is gone. I  can stand without pain, and I can move around easier. 

My whole demeanor has also changed.  Relatives and close friends notice a big difference.  They say there was this “darkness” about me that is now completely gone.  I’ve had so many people ask me what I am doing.  

What has been your greatest success so far?  I’ve been learning to talk myself through the rough times when I want to eat for emotional reasons.  I tell myself that what I’m feeling is toxic hunger and will pass soon.  My faith has given me strength and courage to persevere through those times.   

Do you have any thoughts or success tips to share?  Yes!  Give yourself permission to be in control of your outcome.  Your success with nutritarian eating truly depends not only on the choices you make, but the choices you don't make.  One day this past month I was in situation where I felt that I did not have any other choice but to eat the standard American food that was offered to me.  I ate the food and felt lousy afterwards.  Dr. Fuhrman reminded me that I had blamed the situation and not myself, and that really put things in focus for me.  Nutritarian eating has to be a conscious choice every day. 

Cravings do go away and emotional eating can be stopped.  I just want to go out and shout to everyone that they need to make this change in their own life!   

Congratulations Stephanie! Keep up the great work and we look forward to following your monthly progress as you get your health back! 

To be continued . . . . . . .

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Amongst the warm fuzzy feeling of Christmas lights, tinsel and a perfectly decorated tree, let’s take a moment to have a gut level, reality check about food addiction.

In our culture we tend to “categorize” addictions by the priority we place upon them. 

We have programs in public schools to teach students to say no to drugs.

We encourage teens not to smoke or drink.  We’ve even established laws to prevent them from purchasing the destructive items. 

As a nation, we’ve put a high priority on educating the culture about the life controlling power and damaging effects of drug, alcohol and cigarette addiction.  We’ve heard the stories.  We’ve seen the graphic images.  We’ve developed special care for crack and fetal alcohol syndrome babies.  We’ve even put Surgeon’s General Warning labels on packs of cigarettes.   

We understand the concept that once an individual makes the decision to stop nicotine addiction, there’s no going back to smoking just one cigarette. 

We understand the dangers of a recovering alcoholic having that innocent sip of wine at a cocktail party.

We wouldn’t think of putting a recovering drug addict back on the streets to sell cocaine.

Unfortunately, as a nation, we’ve put a low, almost non-existent, priority on the life damaging effects of food addiction.  We think nothing of grooming the taste buds of children for a lifetime of addiction to salty fries, donuts and Big Macs.  We think nothing of celebrating the holidays with a month-long food binge. 

Just because Christmas cookies, fudge and cheese balls don’t have a Surgeon’s General Warning label on them, doesn’t mean they’re safe to put into the body.

Food addiction is serious stuff.  Because it’s both psychological and physiological, for many, it only takes one bite to unravel weeks and perhaps months of nutritarian progress.  For most, it's unwise to enter the traditional, holiday feasting arena; even an occasional detour.       

If you are caught in a situation this holiday season where food choices are life threatening to your commitment to health, are you prepared to JUST SAY NO?  (You will not die if you have to wait until you get home to eat.  Better yet, keep apples and almonds stocked in your car for those emergencies.)

Are you intentionally planning and preparing your own health-promoting food to take with you when you attend a holiday party?

Be proactive.  Don’t allow the month of celebrations unravel your commitment to optimal health.

Diabetes is serious.  Heart attacks and strokes are real. 

Food addiction kills.  It strangles the very life out of a person; destroying health and ruining precious relationships. 

If food addiction isn’t taken seriously, repeated compromises will lead to addictive necessity.  Guaranteed. 

It’s important for each of us to know our limitations, establish clear boundaries and live within them.

That is where freedom abounds; and freedom is where health abounds.  

Freedom to all this holiday season!

Be honest, do you take food addiction seriously?  Do you have clear boundaries established this holiday season, and if so, what are they? 

image credits: computerpartsgames.wordpress.com; markhoustonrecovery.com

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