Food

Last night I watched a documentary titled Food Matters. I thought it was going to be about the food industry and factory farms, but it was about food being our medicine and that old but very true addage: "You are what you eat." I like the way Kris Carr says it: "Your body is a temple and your mouth is the altar." The film talked a lot about vitamins, nutrients, and the drug industry. The gist of it is that Americans are suffering from ill health because, despite the rampant obesity, we tend to be malnourished. If we focused on nutrition and gave up the processed foods, there would be less disease. People have reversed heart disease, without drugs or surgery, by eating a plant based diet, exercising and meditating. Japanese women who eat the standard Japanese diet have a 1% chance of getting breast cancer, but if they switch to the SAD diet (standard American) their odds shoot up to the same as ours, which is 13%. As I watch these documentaries and read these books, a few things stand out. One is that these industries are policing themselves. This is true of the food industry and the pharmaceutical industry. No independent oversight...it's all corrupt. Another is that what's going on in the food industry is not sustainable. We're cutting down rain forests and destroying the environment so the world can have big macs, which are toxic and are killing us. I believe people are waking up, however. I keep thinking about that organic aisle in Walmart.

For myself, it's rewarding to eat whole, healthy, organic foods, and know that it's fighting the cancer. I feel fortunate that my oncologist, Dr. Spillane, believes in an integrative approach and sent me to a naturopathic doctor in the beginning. He discusses nutrition with me, unlike many doctors. Did you know that most medical schools offer no nutrition in their curriculum? Instead it's a pill for every pain, disorder, or ailment.

When I finish my treatment, I plan to do the Crazy Sexy Diet's 21 day cleanse. I am pretty toxic after all this chemo. In June I'm going to the Dancing Deer Farm for a 6 day raw foods retreat. It's located on highway 46, close to home. After that I will eat an organic, plant based, mostly raw diet. I will do whatever it takes to make sure I am healthy for the rest of my life.

Namaste,
Jill