Can you reverse heart disease?

Never say never. Just do these and your heart will love it.

1. Reduce your cholesterol level with a low-fat, high fiber diet and your medication (if you are on medication).
   A target of below 160 mg% is good.
2. Eat more natural foods , which will help you lose excess weight.
3. Cut the salt intake (5 grams per day) is good, AND exercise daily. And you don't have to join a health club either - simple walking will do.
4. Stop smoking (if yo do) and avoid alcohol, coffee and other stimulants.

If you can do these simple things, then America's leading cause of death doesn't have to be yours. Just do it. You'll be very glad you did.

Should you lose it fast or slow?

A lot of people are thinking, planning, aiming, and wanting to lose weight right now. Simultaneously, they are being pelted with ads promising effective and quick weight loss.

How long would it take you to put on 100 lbs if you were not trying to gain weight? Certainly months or years.

So why do we believe we should drop the weight as if it can just free fall under gravity?

When the body senses rapid weight loss it goes in a defensive mode after a while. It is similar to that which happens in starvation. It's the same mechanism that helps to save a victim trapped in an earthquake rubble, for example.

Never go on a diet you cannot maintain for the rest of your life because the pounds will come back, especially as you get older.

Most QUICK weight loss programs cause you to lose fat and muscle. When you lose muscle, it means you are losing your fat-burning capacity as well.

A lifestyle change is the safest route

Eat high fiber foods, don't snack, AND use natural food supplements that will regulate and optimize your metabolism. I use the Limu product (http://choosenow.originallimu.com/), a seaweed extract because of it's benefits beyond weightloss.

Both my sisters tell how limu regulated their cravings and helped them to stay on regular eating schedules.

My suggestion is to go the healthiest, safest way - a change in lifestyle. This is not the quickest way, but by this time next year you will find yourself having the nicest gift you could ever have - a new body.

Remember, you can put down the weight and still keep your shape. But you've got to do it the healthy way - the natural way.

Diet and Grazing

It is popular practice in some weightloss programs for participants to graze. By the way, should I say participants, or patients, or losers? The popular reality TV program calls them losers. To me, that is a misnomer, since every pound of extra weight lost holds so much gain in health benefits and overall quality of life.

As I was saying, people like to graze (like cattle). They are just snacking all the time. Even though the food or snacks are considered healthy stuff, there is something wrong with this habit.

Just think of it. The stomach is an organ - just like the eye, or the heart. Each organ needs a certain amount of rest. How much rest do the stomachs of grazers get during the day if they are constantly snacking?

Consider that food takes some 4 hours or so to leave the stomach, doesn't that lead to indigestion?

I read about a study done to investigate this snacking or grazing habit. The study says that eating between meals, e.g. eating a snack within two hours after breakfast prolongs the digestion of the food ate at breakfast time by several hours - more than 7 hours (I'm remembering).

Our stomachs need to rest. Additionally, the healthiest peoples eat no more than three meals a day. Some eat just two meals per day. I believe if we eat the right foods - high fiber foods, high carbohydrate foods - we won't need to snack. What do you think?

No More Diabetes?

What a mega-event the last week has been? I have been away in St. John, Virgin Islands, but I was not parasailing, snorkeling, or tanning.

It was a week of lots of work and little food. Imagine a year ago, I could not have done this. No way! I would have died.

There was a lot of food at the Westin, St. John Resort. Sad thing is it was mostly what I don't eat. Meats, seafood, fried foods, you name it. And the vegetable salads were mixed with egg, crab, or shrimp.

It was easy to find popular foods, BUT not the foods (or meals) that are anti-diabetic. I resorted to 'I-can't-even-recall-what-I-ate'. Good news is, I had no hypo's, no ill effects, even though I had to stock up on orange juice, peannut butter, soy cheese, and bread for a whole week.

Now I'm back. I must confess I ate too much this morning and I feared I might have had a high postprandial reading two hours later. No! It never happened. This is truly amazing!

There is no way I could go back to eating like I used to up to a year ago - NOT AFTER seeing these results. No more diabetes!

For those of you out there toying with this disease - stop. Do yourself a favor. Choose health. Choose the anti-diabetes diet and kick the disease for good. It works for me. You should, at least, give it a try.

Then you might be able to go on an adventure vacation in the Virgin Islands and forget your medication. That's a nice thought that can certainly be a reality, IF AND ONLY IF you choose health.

My Zero-cholesterol High Fiber Food

I have to invite you to look at one of my favorite zero-cholesterol high fiber foods - home made granola. Here is a picture of what it looks like.

To find out how delicious this thing tastes, you have to make it yourself. Try the no-oil granola recipe, you'll love it. Actually, the picture you're looking at has extra stuff. Lot's more stuff.

I threw some my favorite nuts in there and created a whole new unique irristible blend. You may recognize the shredded coconut, pumpkin seeds, pecans, walnuts, and even sesame seeds. But how did I know it tasted great?

Well, I tried it on my neighbors, they loved it. Visitors to my house and co-workers all could not stop eating, once they started. But the real test...

The real test came when I tried it on my three kids. Wheeewww! That's the proof. When they asked for more... when they begged for more, then I knew it was tops.

It's my zero-cholesterol, high fiber food. And it's really healthy.

Today is Friday. I have to make some again this weekend. It's gonna be great!

Walk away from osteoporosis

How much milk do you need to drink in order to prevent calcium deficiency?

How much calcium supplements do we need?

How much cattle brain matter (or that of any animal) do we need to consume in order to become smarter?

Osteoporosis is an abnormal loss of bony tissue resulting in fragile porous bones attributable to a lack of calcium; most common in postmenopausal women.

All three questions (above) can be answered using the same logic. Osteoporosis is due to a deficiency - resulting in an abnormal loss of bony tissue.

If you exercise your brain, you become smarter. You muscles? Exercise not only makes our muscles stronger, it makes our bones stronger as well.

How?

Exercise is a signal to our bodies to use the nutrients we take in our food. Taking hundreds of dollars of calcium supplements is not the way to strengthen our bones - it's regular exercise.

Without physical activity, our bodies will not sense a need to use all that unnatural source of calcium in those pills or shakes or concoctions that we call supplements.

Our food already has enough nutrients. It's the lack of exercise that is the biggest disease problem in a society filled with cars, escalators, elevators, and many unused walking trails.

We can get out and wake up our bones. Walk. Let your bones "feel" the need for more calcium.

Potato salad, ribs, and white bread

Look at this meal one of my friends had. Potato salad, ribs, and white bread, and "no one" from the vegetable salad family was invited to this dinner. That category was left behind.

How long would I last if I had something like this for lunch every day for one whole year? I imagine I'd have cholesterol deposits lining my arteries, and a pretty rough time when I go to the toilet, given all this low fiber stuff.

Does all this stuff taste good? I think so. And I bet this is the catch. This is what most people on this kind of diet fall for - the taste of the food.

Ahhh. But there is more to good food than taste. That's why I love the principle: Eat to live, don't just live to eat.

And what a big difference this rule can make in controlling our weight, overall health, and even our productivity. Eat to live, don't just live to eat.

Sounds like a good resolution to adopt for the New Year as well. May you prosper and be in good health throughout this year and always.