Early in 2012 I was in a little town in western Colorado called Rifle. Now you can imagine the population who lives in rural western Colorado in a town named after a gun. A town where there is a cafe where the waitresses wear guns. A town where kids are taken out of school for a week at a time during hunting season.
This is where a patient came in one day who complained to me that she would have severe pain whenever she ate meat and dairy. Now, of course, I told her to stop the meat and dairy. (Yet, somehow it escaped my conscious brain this left her a plant based diet.) This was a logical conclusion to the problem but I told her to return in 30 days and she did. However, she did not return alone, instead she brought her 16 year-old daughter with her to the appointment.
Her daughter told me that she has stopped two ADHD medications in the previous 30 days because after changing her diet to support her mom she didn’t need them any longer. Her mom asked me what was going on? How did this happen?
I looked at her and said, “I don’t know, but I will figure it out.”
Thus, began my quest into finding the truth of nutrition. That the foods we consume are often more powerful than the drugs I could prescribe for many conditions. I was so amazed at the information I thought that I should test it on one more patient prior to committing to the dietary change myself and that is what I did. Two weeks later a lupus patient came to see me. She was 40, on 12 medications and complaining of headaches. I convinced her to try the diet and in 2 weeks her inflammatory markers dropped from 3 times high normal to just outside normal. She was eight pounds lighter and headaches were better. Five months later she was 50 pounds lighter, kidneys had improved and she had stopped 7 of 12 medications. She has even had periods of remission of the lupus.
Now I was convinced and I literally went home that same day and dumped all animal products into the trash. However, I had a 1/4 of a grass fed beef in my freezer and 2 days later that freezer broke and all that meat had to be disposed of. I never looked back. Now 5 years later I am allergy free and my thyroid dose has dropped after being hypothyroid for 20 years. My husband has lost 65 pounds and I feel better than I ever have.
Life would never be the same. I changed how I looked at chronic disease. I sought after those who understood the significance of a healthy plant based diet and was welcomed with open arms by many. I have been blessed to help many many patients reverse their chronic disease like diabetes, high cholesterol and hypertension.
Now I am on a mission to share the urgent message that we really are what we eat! I hope you can understand why it is so important to deposit healthy foods into your health savings account because all those deposits add up and start generating interest!
Basically eat your veggies, fruits, beans, whole grains, nuts and seeds and you will be fine. (well with a B12 supplement too)
Have a blessed day everyone!
Laurie
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