This week has been dedicated to mind, body and health. But writing about this blog made me uneasy for reasons that it forced me to change my eating habit. The last thing thing I want is to cause our children hardship from old age. If I get too sick and crippled, the biggest blow would be to end up at a rest home for geriatrics. I’d rather be vacationing in Hawaii with my husband at the age of 70.
I am blessed to have a mother who, at the age of 75, is in great physical health. Knock on wood, she never had any acute or chronic illness of any kind except for cataract surgery. Thanks to her decades of extremely neurotic eating habits (shave the fat, no grease allowed), abstaining to alcohol or sweets, no smoking, and always always being kind to her body. This is a typical characteristic for asian women, who follow the strict guideline of being and eating healthy, without ever indulging on KFCs or dessert after every meal. But we asians are no vegetarians… I’m Korean, and most Koreans love their bbq beef, more than their miniature white poodles. Therefore, today’s blog has it’s personal ups and downs for me.
Kathy Freston, a health and wellness expert, calls out a cure for cancer by eating plant based diet. Kathy has every reason to look closely into this finding when one out of every two of us will die from cancer or heart disease – ouch, and one out of every three children who were born after the year 2000 will develop diabetes. But she says this epidemic can be easily cured and controlled based on what we put in our body, on what we eat. Our food choices can either kill us or save us. Period.
When 2-3% of cancers are due entirely to genes, and the rest of 98% is due to diet and lifestyle factor, we can no longer blame our diabetes or cancers on our parents or ancestors.
Ms Freston states that consuming plant based foods offer the best hope of avoiding cancer, perhaps even reversing cancer in the early stage. Because cancer proceeds forward or backward as a function of the balance of promoting and anti-promoting factors found in the diet, consuming anti-promoting plant based foods tend to keep the cancer from going forward. She states that although we cannot alter the pollutant air we breath, we can do a lot about preventing promotion (development) of cancer cells within our control.
The scientific evidence has proven time and time again that red meat and saturated animal fat increases heart disease and cancer, but many people are unaware that that the amount of red meat you consume is a risk factor too, whether or not the meat contains a lot of fat or very little. Furthermore, heavily cooked or well-done meat, in which the surface is browned or blackened, raises the risk of cancer more so.
I can attest the older group of people with lean diet or strict vegetarian diet are healthier, stronger, younger and live longer. My son’s best friend’s grandfather, who’s been a vegetarian his whole life, is 85 years old but looks and acts 20 years younger. I would totally set him up on a blind date with my mother if she spoke a word of English. Anyway, I have altered my family’s diet the past 5 days by serving brown rice, whole grains (nothing bleached), fruits and vegetables, tofu and fish as a side-dish, plus multi-vitamin supplements and plenty of water. Have to admit, so far I feel lighter and mentally shaper, and my skin is more even and dewy. My kids haven’t noticed much difference during dinner, and as long as they are treated to a few chocolate chip cookies daily, they won’t fall apart either.
All I know is that what’s healthy won’t kill me too soon. But how long before I devour a juicy piece of steak…? Only time will tell.