Ever-Changing Ichabode Health Ideas

 

"Mom, I am only going to eat one at a time."

I could  conjure up a number of dazzling recipes and diet catastrophes. Instead, I am going to list some basics that are easy to follow and use with steady (not roaring) success.

1. In early 2022, I began weighing myself daily and posting it on Google calendar, using lb to accumulate ups and downs. 215 lb was the starter, though I recall it being higher but not written down earlier.

2. I read Dr. Joel Fuhrman repeatedly, which opened my eyes to the value of basic nutrition and the folly of my Standard American Diet (SAD). I still read Fuhrman and added Dr. Michael Greger to my row of nutrition books.

3. I was eating walnuts daily (YAY!) but I always used them on ice cream (BOO!) My cholesterol went down and I was diabetic on the blood test. 

4. One day I bought some ice cream that really appealed to me (carton graphics). It was truly horrible and probably not real ice cream. I gave it to the squirrels and they would not touch it. Though I wavered, the ice cream deep freezer was converted to bags and bags of frozen chopped greens and vegetables. No more ice cream, pies, or frozen pizza. McDonalds? Nope.

5. I was staggered at the relationship between basic foods (chopped greens, vegetables, fruit) and SAD (cow and chicken products, bread, candies, fried chips, fried everything, desserts, sugared and dietetic drinks).

6. Greens, fresh fruits, and vegetables were filling and often delicious.  I kept trying new/old foods and found them very tasty in time. My vegetable consultant urged me to also try spices, so I now store and use many kinds - mustard, ground black pepper, turmeric, cumin, allspice, bagel spice, etc. I have one sausage serving in my patented Creation Super Stew. Meat is essential but we mostly overdo it.

7. Shocking facts - The SAD Diet is very expensive, especially since we add fast food restaurant items to the sugar-fat-salt prepared foods from the grocery store. Prepared food (microwave and fast-food) can be delicious when everyone is starving or at least feeling starved. Once away from sugar-salt-fat enhancers, returning to them is painfully disgusting, even when venturing back just a wee bit.

8. Encouraging facts - God has already arranged a vast array of healing medicines in greens, vegetables, fruits, and meats. I need eye drops (cataract surgery) so I see the pharmacists once a month. I said to the pharm tech who has waited on me since the Walmart opened nearby, "You have very few cures in your department, especially the over-the-counter things." She said, "I know." I asked, "How did I get perfect blood results?"

"I'm not getting paid?!"

What Is New in Nutrition? Answer - We Have Been Doing It All Wrong, Based on the Food Media

 

I continue to learn a lot from the Dr. Joel Fuhrman and Dr. Michael Greger. The best and quickest source is Greger's enormous website of articles and videos at NutritionFacts.org.

 For example - 

Eggs and chicken, which have lots of fat and choline are bad for men.

Here is another view:

We can also take the positive side of nutrition - What works the best for us?

The best things we can eat on a daily basis are:

I am working on several of Greger's books right now, and I use his website.
He is a lot of fun and cannot resist  medical jokes.

1. Leafy greens - Kale, spinach, turnip greens, collards. Two of them are crucifers and therefore the best for our health. 
2. Beans - (read the sodium label) - Beans provide protein and fiber, satisfying and very good for our gut. 
3. Fresh fruit and berries (frozen counts) - They are a medicine cabinet full of ways to keep us healthy and to heal us from grease, salt, and sugar.
4. Nuts - walnuts and almonds (uncooked, best unsalted) are powerful sources for additional healing. A few walnuts a day keeps my cholesterol perfect. A handful can easily replace a meal. Salted, cooked, and sugared nuts are not a smart move.
5. Seeds and spices. Some seeds, like anise, have a great flavor and nutritious ingredients. Ground mustard seed energizes crucifers (especially good for blanched frozen crucifers which are neutered unless mustarded). Scientists do not know what all the hundreds of plant/seed/fruit/nuts create in their cells for us. They are way behind the Lord of Creation, who fashioned all this from the beginning - Genesis 1, John 1. 

I recently stopped eating eggs altogether, just as I stopped with butter. Both are in the fridge - as a reminder - and I am down roughly 40 pounds. More importantly, the change made my blood sugar, kidney, cholesterol, and other tests perfect, except for blood pressure. 

I slowly improved in many areas. We all love eating good food, even bad and horrible food, but the bulk of the body's use of food is in the stomach, liver, kidneys, and gut. 

The liver is a massive chemical factory that breaks down ingredients and even addresses new things never invented before (drugs). Drug addiction and alcoholism come from the liver's ability to get better and better at breaking down the ingredients. The more we smoke and drink, the more we want, because the essential organs get better and faster at breaking them down. 

Our livers and kidneys do not complain openly for a long time, from breaking down toxic combinations. One problem is that the food industry portrays all their fat-sugar-salt foods as nutritious because - hey - they taste good. The Nutritious Five all taste delicious when eaten on a regular schedule. Hint - junk food gets worse and worse when neglected. I have put gift food out for the birds, who refuse to eat it, and that food sold retail!

Think of the Nutritious Five as the pharmacy - and the pharmacy as good primarily for addressing symptoms, one at a time. I had to tell doctors not to give Christina statins because they were horrible for her. One specialist even said, "But if we can get rashes from the new one, that will help the study." I lit a few fires on that attempt and the doctor, a 350 pound cardiologist, retaliated.

Even if we avoid the pharmacy window itself, the pharmacy area is filled with shams, scams, and sugar-coated poison. Anything food related - often milk based - is sold at fantastic prices in relation to its basic ingredient, with sugar, salt, and fat added. All the protein they need is from the Big Five above. Many long-term and short-term maladies are fixed fruits and vegetables. Most vitamin pills are priced for millionaires but almost worthless and probably badly mixed. Grab four vitamin bottles in two hands - add up the cost, then put them down and go to produce and frozen vegetables/greens (no seasoning please).

Please do not laugh. I love shopping for groceries because I prepare an economic and delicious feast for Charlie and me. When I got home today, I realized the former Ice Cream Freezer was already filled with greens, mushrooms, and vegetables. 

Gone were the frozen pizzas. Gone were the drumsticks (sundae cones). Gone were the vanilla and chocolate ice cream containers. Gone were the specialty ice creams. Gone were the push-up ice cream, the chocolate covered ice cream bars, and the fudge bars. Gone were the ice cream bon-bons. 

Most ice creams are not ice cream. They cheapen the product and make it seem like ice cream, making it up with extra sugar and using oil to imitate cream. I learned that on a documentary about ice cream wars. Soon after that I bought one last chocolate ice cream half-gallon - so bad the squirrels ignored it. Squirrels!  They eat anything but not that name-brand "ice cream." Iced milk and fake chocolate.

Gone were the prepared meals, Schwan and Marie Calendar. I read sodium for all foods. I gave the last Marie Calendar chicken pot pie to the birds because the serving was 500 mgs of salt. No regrets.

Fuhrman's Eat To Live got me going on this topic, and Greger's books, website, articles, and videos are giving me even more information. Charlie Sue and I eat some sausage every day for lunch, in the stew I fix for both of us. The best answer to all this is to know as much as possible.

Most doctors know very little about nutrition. 

Eat To Live woke me up, after my blood panel showed I was diabetic, but no more.
Body fat feeds diabetes, and insulin makes diabetes progressively worse.

I would start with this Fuhrman book, because the information is more stream-lined and easy to follow. I began with almost no appreciation for nutrition.