• 28Apr

    Life races by yet there doesn’t seem enough hours to the day…no wait a second – I sometimes barely have enough energy to get through the day so scratch that. My better half always says, “you just have to prioritize.”

    Easier said than done! or is it?

    The past two weeks since my last posts have been jam packed…(truth be told when you see a flurry of posts it means I am procrastinating…I’ve got two papers due – one on allergies & immune and another on cancer, then my final project on Type II diabetes. All this by the end of June!). Another by-product of the big P – The garden is looking better than ever – tomatoes, squash, peppers, pole beans, chard and kale are all in. The baby bok choy is starting to sprout their third leaves. The keffir lime tree got a nice hair cut and shampoo (to try and rid it of weird looking bugs that took up residence). Next up as I recover from being sliced up from weeding the patch of lemon grass, is transplanting of the garlic chives, planting the basil and readying a bed for beets, carrots and sugar snap peas.

    Any way let me procrastinate some more as I’ve been bursting with thoughts and things I’ve been wanting to tap out on blog.

    First, I had a chance to have a lovely lunch last Friday with Eggbeater at Cafe Gratitude. You can read EB’s review at Bay Area Bites. Food and company were great. I’ve even been making my own rendition of their “I am Giving” salad at home…I call my version “I am a Copycat”. I encourage you to read Eggbeater’s review and comments – lots of food for thought.

    Made me think about food as medicine. As Hippocrates, the father of modern medicine, said, “Let food be your medicine and medicine be your food” Wow, modern medicine must have veered off that road like some pharma drug crazed addict on a bad trip! But that’s another rant.

    It’s very well accepted these days (so says Dr. Mehmet Oz who co-wrote You: the Owner’s Manual) that while genetics plays a part in whether we are stricken by illness – we – yes, you – can control at least 80% (some scientists say 95% but let’s be conservative here) of your health outcome. How you ask? Well, those genes may exist within us ready to throw us a curve ball but they don’t have to express – that is become diabetes or cancer or lupus or…

    Your actions – whether you smoke, drink, live in a smoggy city, decide to sand that lead paint off that old dresser, exercise enough or too much, get enough sleep and a hundred other things all contribute to whether those errant genes become alive…. But let’s not forget one major contributor to your health – what you eat!

    This from Deepak Chopra’s book Quantum Healing,
    98% of the atoms in your body were not there a year ago
    In 3 months your entire skeleton is replaced – unless you are on fos@max(my comment)
    6 weeks your liver
    1 month your skin
    4 days your stomach lining

    So what does that tell you-
    Everything you put in your body is processed – it’s used as building blocks or passed

    What would you want your building blocks to be…

    nutrient deficient mass produced “food” that contains enough preservatives to stay ‘fresh’ for years…

    Or wholesome foods, vital and alive with nutrients that your body can use to keep you healthy

    One of the comments raised from Eggbeater’s review of Cafe Gratitude was that the prices at the cafe were criminally high. EB’s reply touch on many points – one was that food should cost more that it does. Big Food with the help of govenment subsidies has so cheapen what is packaged as food we might as well be eating packing peanuts. Yes, I agree we need to pay the true costs and get food that nourishes us and supports life! And I don’t think it is a mere coincidence that many of the illnesses that ail modern society today came about as our food supply became cheapened.

    I am so grateful to have grown up learning that there is a connection with food and our bodies – that food is medicine. I’ll never forget when my brother broke his leg and mom made pot after pot of frog’s leg baked rice. Or fearing that we weren’t doing as well in school as we should, we’d sit down to steaming bowls of calves brain soup – this on more than one occasion. I still can’t figure out that stretch of periwinkles though…

    Which brings me to what I fear will express…what lurks in that genetic soup I have swirling around inside…

    Type II Diabetes is on both sides of my family – uncles and aunts, a grandmother died after suffering many complications including a stroke and amputation of a leg, a parent was recently diagnosed and a sibling who is prediabetic…On top of that Asians are 1 1/2 to 2 times more likely to develop type II diabetes that Caucasians. There are estimates that 3 in 5 or up to 1 in 2 Asian children today will develop type II diabetes in their lifetime.

    I recently purchased a blood glucose meter for a family member and while testing it on myself, I’ve discovered numerous morning fasting blood glucose levels to be a tad high…yikes! I will be at the doc’s come Monday morning!

    Well, there is lots to be done and according to Dr. Anne Peters, a well respected expert on diabetes, the condition can be reversed or very well managed through diet and exercise.

    So as I delve deeper into this subject for my final project, I will share what I learn. Separating the foods that are medicine and those that are not. From my experience change is not an easy thing, habits become so ingrained, and the foods -we love- that we may have to give up for some have so much memory and history attached that they will be difficult to let go. For now I must end my procrastination and get back to the books.

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3 Responses

  • Hey Sandy,
    I’m really interested in your studies re typeII diabetes. I have high sugar and am trying to control it with diet. My problem is that I do OK during the week but on the weekends I want to eat junk, probably because my diet during the week is so boring.
    I just signed up to get a e-mail when you do a new post. Your doing a real service with this blog.
    Hugs
    Wez

  • Hi Wez,
    Thanks for signing up for the emails.
    Controling blood sugar through the diet is very realistic – I will send you via email some info on creating meals. Basically it’s low on the carbs (around 80g/day) along with good proteins and fats. Maybe I can help with some ideas to help curb those cravings too.
    Exercise is also key – brisk walking to get the heart rate up for 20-30 minutes, at least 4 times a week is a great goal. I’m working on that myself!
    Look for my email.
    Hugs, Sandy