Anchorage Daily News

Are you feeling vulnerable these days? The global economy seems to be collapsing, many are losing their jobs, health care costs continue to rise while good medical insurance coverage is harder to get, and good health seems to be increasingly elusive. More and more people are becoming obese, the incidence of diabetes is rising, and heart disease and cancer continue to take a devastating toll on individuals and families. If we lose our jobs, we’ll also lose our insurance, and then we’ll be living in fear that our health problems may also cause our financial ruin. Feeling helpless to do anything about the situation may be the worst part of it all.

In the midst of all this doom and gloom, I want to offer a huge ray of hope.

Even though we may not be able to change the economy, we CAN change the likelihood that we will suffer from the most common health problem in America. These problems are not caused by bad luck, or even primarily by bad genes. The most significant contributor to all these problems is something that is totally within our own power to control: the food we eat.

The National Cancer Institute estimates that between one-third and two-thirds of cancers are caused by our diets. This is far more than that caused by tobacco. We all know that if we smoke, we need to quit, but we don’t often hear much about how important it is to change our diet.

The Standard American Diet (the SAD diet) is based upon fat-laden animal products and processed foods. The closest many children get to a vegetable is French fries. The saturated fat in the SAD diet clogs our arteries, impairs our immune system, interferes with our bodies’ utilization of insulin and leads to overweight. The SAD diet is also extremely low in fiber, or naturally occurring plant roughage. This not only causes sluggish elimination, but also contributes to a build-up of toxins in our bodies.

The solution is to build our diets around the foods that are naturally low in fat and high in fiber: plants. If we build our diets around the “new four food groups:” vegetables, fruits, grains and legumes, we will begin seeing and feeling positive changes in our health almost immediately. The fiber fills us up so we feel full, and yet the calorie content is low because the fat content is low. We begin to lose weight, our immune system gets a boost because of all the antioxidants and phytochemicals found in plants, and we utilize insulin better, which can prevent and even reverse diabetes. Our cholesterol drops and our previously clogged arteries actually begin to open up again. The meals are colorful, flavorful and varied. And to top it off, our grocery bills usually actually drop!

There are many good books that can help you learn how and why to change from the SAD diet to a plant-based diet of minimally processed foods. One that I highly recommend is The China Study, by Dr. T. Colin Campbell. Other great books include those written by Dr. Neal Barnard, Dr. Caldwell Esselstyn and Dr. John McDougall. You can also take a series of classes to help you change your diet, such as those offered locally by The Cancer Project.

The best insurance plan in the world can’t make us healthy, but if we give our bodies the nutrition, exercise and rest they need, we have amazing recuperative abilities. We don’t need to live in fear. We can take charge of our own health by eating an optimal diet and getting healthy exercise. Let’s do more than make New Year’s Resolutions; let’s make changes in our lives!

Delisa Renideo resides in Wasilla and is an instructor for The Cancer Project. You can reach her at delisa@YesToLife.info.

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