Are You Ready For Your's? Our 50 Year High School Reunion is in 6 Months!

I wrote this blog 10 years ago, just after my 40th High School reunion. The guy in the picture with the red face didn't want to go. The shorter guy in the other picture couldn't wait to get there! Everything in the blog from 10 years ago still holds true today...

Eight Months A Vegan  (originally published 9/2/2014)

Me eight months before our reunion

Me with my friend, Dr. Goldstein at our High School reunion

I have been totally plant based for 8 months.  No animal products at all. Now I do a little exercise, not because I like it, but because I should and I can. Honestly, I feel great!

I had a conversation with a patient today who underwent gastric bypass surgery about 16 months ago.  He's lost 125 lbs! All he had to do was find a doctor, get all the pre surgical lab work, EKG, stress test, Psychological evaluation, prove that he failed at a structured diet and exercise program, meet with a Dietician, quit smoking for 6 months, follow the Dietician's food program for 6 months, go to the hospital for 4 days, be intubated under general anesthesia, have surgery to make his stomach smaller, take off work for a month, go on a liquid diet for 8 weeks, get back on the Dietician's structured post op food program, change his portions to avoid throwing up everything if he eats too much, eat only the foods that the dietitian  allows, start an exercise program and pay the portion of his medical bills that were not covered by his medical insurance.

.....or he could have gone on a Vegan diet, but that would have been too extreme.                                                                                                                                                                                                            

 Our 50th reunion was delayed by a year and is being held at the end of this summer.  Like everyone else, I've aged, but the clothes that I was wearing at our 40th reunion still fit! 

How about you?  If you have a special occasion you are looking forward to this summer and you want to look and feel your best, now is the time to get started.  There is no magic pill, device or single ingredient that is going to help you get into shape and lose weight. Moderation is meaningless and arbitrary. The foods you eat are 90% of the problem. They have become an addiction, stimulating the pleasure centers of your brain, releasing Dopamine and making you want to feel that pleasure every time you eat. So continuing to eat the same things that got you and your body to where you are  currently, but expecting different results is the definition of insanity. What you eat is key to how you feel and look. The best thing you can do is to educate yourself on the foods that have been making you gain weight, raise your blood pressure, disrupt your metabolism, tax your heart and vascular tree and prevent you from being the person that you deserve to be. Once you break the cycle of eating highly processed foods, your brain will adapt and the Dopamine with continue to give you that feeling. 

A Whole Food Plant Based Diet with no processed oil is the safest, most effective, least expensive pathway to optimize your health. 

Dr. Michael Gregor wrote a book, HOW NOT TO DIET, that explains everything you need to know including the reasons you have not been having any luck with food. 

There is also a  HOW NOT TO DIET COOK BOOK with 100 simple recipes. I like the spiral binding for a cook book like this. 

Another great choice is THE HEARTS QUIET KILLER by Dr. Joel Kahn M.D. which is geared toward the number 1 killer, Heart Disease. It's full of great information and great recipes as well. 

Most of the food is not labeled "Vegan", because it's things like fresh produce, brown rice, whole grain pasta, tomatoes, colored peppers, carrots, cucumber, peas, lentils, baked beans, lima beans, chickpeas, broccoli, brussels sprouts, onions, garlic, mushrooms, sunflower seeds, chia seeds, peanuts, walnuts, cashews, corn, squash,  flaxseed, citrus fruit, pears, apples, bananas, strawberries, blueberries, oatmeal, potatoes... You get the picture. The largest, strongest animals, like elephants,  rhinos, hippos, giraffes, elk, panda bears, gorillas and most apes are all plant based eaters. Even the largest dinosaurs were plant eaters. The plants are all nutritionally dense with all the protein, vitamins, carbohydrates, fats, iron and other minerals that you need with none of the cholesterol.  Whole foods with no processed oil is the key. You can eat olives, but not olive oil. Vegetables but not vegetable oil, peanuts but not peanut oil, avocado but not avocado oil, etc. The closer the food is to the way it was found in nature, the better. The hospital beds are filled by people with heart disease, high blood pressure, type 2 diabetes, cancers, kidney disease and obesity related problems, not by people who ate too many apples.

What you need to prepare your food at home depends on what you want to make. In my kitchen that would include a sharp knife, a decent blender, an oven safe non-stick pan with a lid, an air fryer/toaster oven to replace that toaster on the counter and a pressure cooker. If space is an issue, you can get an    air fryer/pressure cooker combo (GREAT DEAL!). If you don't like chopping veggies, get a simple chopper.  None of these things are deal breakers. When I started out, I used what we had in the kitchen already and upgraded as time went by. 

Learn as you go. If you make mistakes, learn from them and move on. Nobody is perfect!  Its fun and it's something you are doing for yourself. Plus, when you're done, you get to eat it!

The fastest way to get  to where you want your health to be is start now!