This is an excellent
book that adds important new information.
The most important tip is that we have an additional type of starch
process that has been unrecognized and is important. It turns out that complex starches do not
break down at all in the stomach (sugar) or the small intestine but must pass
to the large intestine where they are fermented to break down. This has a major effect on uptake and fat
management.
Quite simply eat nuts
and beans and load your near vegan diet with complex vegetables to maximize phytonutrients.
The key take home is
that even a well-organized vegan diet needs to be fine-tuned more than one
would expect and it is possible to get completely off medication and restore
health.
BOOK REVIEW: “THE END
OF DIABETES” BY JOEL FUHRMAN, M.D
By Carrie Forrest —
February 19, 2013
The
End of Diabetes
Reading
Joel Fuhrman, M.D.’s incredible new book, The
End of Diabetes: The Eat to Live Plan to Prevent and Reverse Diabetes (HarperCollins
Publishers, 2012), was both a bittersweet and hopeful experience for me. It was
difficult because the first anniversary of my father’s death from complications
of diabetes had just passed, and by reading it, I revisited my feelings of
helplessness as I watched him suffer from this horrible disease. That being
said, I am deeply appreciative of Dr. Fuhrman for having written this book
because it will undoubtedly save the lives of many other people who adopt his
guidelines to prevent and reverse diabetes.
The
statistics tell us that we should all be worried about this chronic illness
because it is likely that many of us will either have prediabetes or diabetes
ourselves, or will have a close friend or family member diagnosed with it.
Consider that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports that 26
million Americans have diabetes (11.3% of adults), and nearly 80 million (35%
of adults) have prediabetes. If the trend continues, an extraordinary one
in three American adults could have diabetes by 2050. It would not be
hyperbolic to call this an epidemic.
So
what exactly is diabetes? Stated simply, it occurs when there is too much
glucose, or sugar, in the blood. Dr. Fuhrman explains that with the most common
type that afflicts Americans, type 2 diabetes, this condition is a result of
the body’s failure to respond adequately to the insulin that is produced for
the very purpose of taking glucose out of the bloodstream and into the body’s
cells where it is used for energy. The insulin is there, but the body is not
using it properly. And the implications are drastic. Diabetic patients are at
higher risk for serious medical complications, including heart disease, high
blood pressure, blindness, kidney disease, amputations, and cancer. Typical
treatments include medications that may ease some of the effects of the
condition, but do not treat what Dr. Fuhrman reports is the root cause of
diabetes: excess body fat.
With
the plant-based dietary approach and a call for daily exercise outlined in The
End of Diabetes, Dr. Fuhrman claims that, in most cases, patients can reduce
the need for medication, and even reverse type 2 diabetes completely.
For someone newly diagnosed, or for the patient currently suffering, The
End of Diabetes may be nothing short of a miracle, with its guidance on
how to improve the body’s ability to handle glucose while actually reducing
medications. In addition to being an important resource for patients, the book
also includes a commentary for physicians looking for effective treatments.
I
first discovered Dr. Fuhrman just over two years ago – a few months after I had
gone vegan – when I heard Colleen Patrick-Goudreau mention him on a Vegetarian
Food for Thought podcast episode. Overweight and suffering from
migraines and other health conditions, I was immediately intrigued. After I
read his bestselling book, Eat to Live, and started following his
recommendations with tremendous success, I had a true health transformation.
Although
I was not suffering from diabetes (yet), it is not surprising to me that the
basic guidelines for an essentially whole-food based vegan diet with the
emphasis on green vegetables that is outlined in Eat to Live can,
with a few refinements, also be effective in preventing and reversing
diabetes. But Dr. Fuhrman does not ask you to take this on faith. For skeptics,
he goes into great detail on why a high-protein diet including animal products
is dangerous, and cites research that for every 5% of calories consumed from
animal protein, the risk of diabetes increases by 30%. Another cited research
example shows that of the more than 60,000 men and women studied, those
following a vegan diet had diabetes prevalence that was only one-third of
non-vegetarians. Dr. Fuhrman also addresses myths that fish and eggs are
healthy components of a disease-preventing diet, and emphasizes the need for
the inclusion of healthy fats from nuts and seeds.
Certainly,
for someone who is not vegan and is currently eating the Standard American
Diet, Dr. Fuhrman’s plan is radically different. However, desperate times call
for drastic measures, and a diagnosis of diabetes should be seen by anyone as a
moment of desperation. The temporary discomfort of making changes in habits and
taste preferences is nothing compared to the pain and suffering that having
diabetes will inflict. For those of us who are already living a lifestyle
without using animal products, this book serves as further confirmation that a
whole foods plant-based diet is ideal.
The
sad truth is that even though this life-saving information is now available in The
End of Diabetes, there are many, many people who will not take advantage of it
and who will suffer needlessly. My dad was one of those patients who continued
to drink soda and eat sugar- and fat-laden foods in between giving himself
shots of insulin. His food addictions and inability to change cost him his life
and caused enormous pain to his family and friends. For people who are looking
for a way to confront their disease and take control of their health, my hope
is that they will read this book and turn to a healthy, vegan diet to transform
their lives.
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