A Second Heart Attack & Becoming A Nutritarian: The Irritation of Truth

I wasn't worried during my second heart attack. I missed experiencing the first one, having gone immediately unconscious (and scaring my wonderful wife to pieces).

Honestly, I knew I'd survived worse things. I was glad to be in a learning experience, and pretty confident we'd figure something out.

But I was more than glad, I was thrilled when I read Eat To Live, and when I became a nutritarian myself.

Yes, I have to admit, I'm a nutritarian. I didn't think I'd like that title, and it's not the most important thing in the world to me.

Honestly, my family comes first. But the pursuit of truth and goodness in my life is most important only after that. Being a nutritarian furthers both goals, in fact keeps me alive.

The title of this blog, The End Of Disease, probably sounds overly optimistic. Even crazy.

It refers to my most positive hopes and dreams., for myself, my family and the world, based on what I've learned is possible. The truth, as a TV show used to say, is out there.

But thousand lies compete for everyone's attention. And we live in a world where lies are common and popular. But where lies have speed, truth has endurance.

Truth is an irritation because it calls on us to change. And most of us don't change until it's abundantly clear we have to. So I am also hugely grateful to:

• The ER docs who insisted I go for surgery against my will, which I thought was thoughtless and unnecessary but turned out to be just ineffective,
  
• My wife who was persuaded by them, and who threatened me with arrest if I tried to drive myself anywhere, and
  
• The team of doctors at the University of Utah medical center who tried and failed to surgically treat my heart disease, and then made it clear if I was going to get better, I'd have to find my own answers from that point.
  

Now I know the value of what they were trying to do, but at the time I was really, really irritated. I thought "with friends like these who needs enemies?" (But I needed 'em regardless, and I could tell they cared, though at the time I was an ornery patient).

I'm also grateful for my friend Chris Daines. The origins of this blog, and my introduction to nutritarian eating, come from walking with him as he cared enough after my heart attack to get me into the daily walking habit.

On those walks we resolved the problems of the world, for a half hour every morning. He recommended and loaned me the book Eat To Live, and we agreed that if it was true it was precious, and worth living. It was also obvious that if it worked, it needed to spread.

And so we talked about creating a blog about nutritarian eating, where I'd recount my experience of being a nutritarian so a few others could benefit.

If Dr. Fuhrman's claims are true, those that would benefit include everybody we know. Every single man, woman, child of every shape, age and size. And I think Dr. Furhman thinks so, as expressed by the title of his book that's been out a couple of years now, Super Immunity.

Bold stuff for such an awkward word as nutritarian! The first time I read it I was offended. What is this? I thought when I first came across the word.

Who is making this word up? Who needs it! Certainly not me. I’d never describe myself that way. I’m already labeled by too many awkward things already. I’m so much more than any of these.

Harrumph.

Then I read the book Eat to Live. I was blown away. And overcome with joy.

It gave me hope.

Nutritarian describes a plan of eating that makes sense. It combines best nutritional truths I knew about somewhat, but amplified my understanding ten times. It has the power to promote health, vitality, long life.

It's an essential ingredient that can cure the disabling and killing diseases around me, including those affecting so many people I know and love – and miss because they’re no longer around.

It has the power to cure me.

And when I saw it, what I consider the heart of the book, I was ecstatic. Finally I understood what to do. I understood how to do it. Everything I had done, read, studied and hoped for physical health-wise was embodied in a couple of pages of text. A list rating foods. A principle of truth. It is, it seems to me, a form of Truth.

Many of my friends and relatives think this already. Yes, I am nuts. I’m nutty about truth, head over heels excited about it. Especially great, healing truth.

There’s plenty of if out there. It’s not popular. But it’s powerful, it’s effective, it works every time, and it heals everyone and everything it touches, the sooner the more powerfully.

The title of this blog, The End Of Disease, is what I believe is possible because I'm a nutritarian. It's what I believe is true. What being a nutritarian means is not final for me, it's underdevelopment, in my life and even by its author, Dr. Fuhrman.

But it's far enough along to have proved itself in my eyes, and in my life.

If you think I'm nuts to be such a big fan, I have to admit, "Yes, I'm nutty about the truth."

So if you pronounce it "nut"-ritarian, then thanks.

The Power of Truth

In his exquisite book People of the Lie, M. Scott Peck describes the relationship between evil, lies and death. He identifies evil as a direct cause and inseparable from lies and death.

This is powerful reality, but I find it best to focus my attention in the other direction. Truth, goodness and life also run in a pack, reinforcing and causing each other.

I love to reflect on these associations as I contemplate the effects of nutritarian eating. These effects are strong indications the nutritarian diet is based on truth. Truth supports life, and nutritarian eating promotes better health, longer life and more sure recovery.

It appears to me to be more effective than medications in both preventing and healing disease. But it also can be used as an adjunct to all medication, making them more effective. It therefore ought to be a first line defense of every family hoping to raise truly healthy children.

It should be the first thing anyone confronted with any illness should be taught and supported in. It should form the foundation of any and all medical treatment, as it supports and makes more certain all medication and medical technology is intended to accomplish.

The healing power of good nutrition is much more powerful than what is currently taught in medical schools.

The reality is, it’s all but ignored. This is, it appears to me, a direct result of the rat pack from the first paragraph.

Part of the lie is good nutrition is all about making a few changes to your diet. The reality is, our normal American diet, also called the Standard American Diet or SAD diet (for good reasons), is, literally, a killer.

Even a lot of changes, but keeping the same basic diet, does not make much difference.

Real healing and real prevention takes a total paradigm shift.

The nutritarian path is the most complete and well founded eating paradigm shift I’ve ever seen.

Here’s an example we experienced (in more detail).

In late 2007 my wife was diagnosed as firmly diabetic, referred to a local hospital diabetes education program, given a blood sugar monitor and told to prepare for a lifetime program certainly leading to insulin. Maybe, just maybe she wouldn’t die early, if she learned and followed the American Diabetes Association diet and recommendations.

This was bunk, a form of lies. Not deliberate lies, not lies from individual diabetes educators, doctors or the hospital, but major, culturally based, research reinforced, medically supported lies.

Those lies would have led to her death. Maybe not by now, but certainly over time, they would have shortened her life.

We attacked her diabetes, not with the full nutritarian plan, but with a few ideas based on The China Study, and a brief reference in the main Wikipedia article on diabetes. It told about a low-fat, vegan, low glycemic approach to dealing with diabetes, based on research by Dr Neal Barnard (we knew nothing about his books or anything else about him until later).

Three months later, her blood sugar was normal. When we told what she’d done, her doctor said, ”I’ve heard of people doing this but I’ve never actually seen it.”

A year after that, her doctor declared “You haven’t had any symptoms in over a year – I’m taking the diagnosis off your chart.”

We call her cured. Cured from a dread disease kills lots of people.
We were told it was incurable and always leads to insulin use. We were prepped to become steady consumers of diabetic testing supplies, insulin, the whole gamut of normal diabetes progression.

Instead, she was cured by nutritarian principles before we ever knew what they were.

A few years later, Larry H. Miller, a local multimillionaire business owner, died a miserable, hacked off (literally) early death from diabetes. He went through one amputation and hospitalization at a time though it was, perhaps mercifully, a relatively short time. He could afford any kind of treatment, any kind of advice, anything at all that would have made a difference.

He was never a nutritarian.

I didn’t know him personally, but it's unlikely he was ever given a real chance or medical advice to become one.

It can be, it really is, lies/death vs. life/truth.

And the reference in the Wikipedia article on diabetes to Dr. Barnard's research has been removed, by the way.

Creamed Kale

A big part of our success is having some choice recipes that we enjoy, and also create lots of variations based on the original, according to what's on hand. This is a recent addition to that select group.

Ingredients:

• 1-1/2 c. water
• 3/4 c. raw cashews, or 1/2 cashews and 1/2 sunflower seeds
• 2 bunches (10-14 oz.) kale, ribs removed and chopped, or similar amount of just about any greens (cabbage or broccoli are frequent substitutes here)
• 1 level tbspn. (or less) no-salt seasoning
• 2 tablespoons raw onion, or dried onion flakes

Directions:

Remove solid stems and ribs from the kale, chop the kale. Steam the kale in a double boiler (or better yet, flash steam) until it's tender.

While kale is steaming, heat the water and cashews in the microwave to boiling. Blend the hot water-cashews/sunflower seeds, then add no-salt seasoning and dried onion flakes in a high-speed blender. Go slow with the blender at first so the boiling water doesn't explode (or bulge the blender - it's a sore point as to how I learned this).

Blend the stems into the cream for the most nutrition, or save 'em for a smoothie if you don't want the green color. Add a little water if it's too thick, then pour the cream over the kale.

Variations are endless. This works for any greens, cabbage, mixed steamed veggies or green beans. A variety of spices works as well (curry powder, parmesan and chicken base are favorites).

Here's a picture of ours, on a bed of kale and swiss chard and garbanzos on top. Honestly, Annette had to have a little salt with it.

You'll find "Creamed Kale" recipes online that show this type stuff served on rice or other grains, but it spoils the health aspect.

Happy healthy eating!

Annette's Story: Diabetes Cured by Nutritarian Eating (that we hadn't even learned about yet)

So there's a story behind our finding, believing and acting on a cure for my heart disease.

It was the cure for my wife Annette's diabetes, through eating basically like what Dr. Fuhrman teaches, though we didn't know about it at the time.

In December of 2007 she was diagnosed with type 2 diabetes. Three months later her blood sugar was normal.

We were hopeful and excited. This was way different than what we’d been told to expect.

Before the diagnosis we only knew Annette didn’t feel good. When her doctor told her she had diabetes we were stunned. Eat too much of the wrong thing, and KABOOM, she felt sick. Not much fun.

Annette went through the standard treatments, took diabetes classes at the hospital, learned how to take blood samples, kept track of blood sugar measurements and what she ate, all the standard stuff.

We realized Annette had it for some time. Her lack of energy and sickness when she ate or when she went too long without eating were all signs of this that we didn’t recognize.

So fast forward to February 2009. Her doctor said, “I’m taking the diabetes diagnosis off your chart. You haven’t had high blood sugar in almost a year, AND YOU’VE DONE IT WITHOUT MEDICATION.”

People tell us it’s unheard of. We think it’s only because they haven’t heard how simple it is, or known anyone who tried the things Annette did.

We spent most of the last two years finding out more and confirming this is valid. We found the proof, confirmed what worked, and more. Part of that proof comes from Dr. Fuhrman, but there's more.

You won’t find this information at the American Diabetes Association or your local diabetes education class.

We were given a book at Annette’s class with a whole bunch of information that we didn’t use. Most doctors don’t know how to do this either.

When Annette’s symptoms went away, her doctor said “I’ve heard of this happening, but I’ve never seen it myself.” And her doctor is a great one, she’s well respected in our community and been in practice for years.

When someone asked “Does that mean the original diagnosis was wrong?” we assured him that no, it wasn’t wrong. That’s how rare recovery is. You tell people you don’t have diabetes any more and they don’t understand.

The answer is no, the diagnosis wasn’t wrong. Annette just didn’t have diabetes long enough for it to get worse or to have any complications. It wasn’t a huge deal because we stopped it, dead in its tracks.

The regular treatment people go through is the wrong answer. We found out that everybody on the American Diabetes Association diet gets worse.

Annette wanted to get better, and everything we heard from the doctor and hospital was there was no feeling better without meds. As for actual healing?

Forget about it, according to standard medical advice (healing is forbidden and controversial word from that perspective).

It turns out what we did was on track, and it worked. It wasn’t an accident either. We found great information, acted on it quickly, with perfect results.

To tell the truth, we had a head start because we had already read The China Study. Then we got lucky and found more helpful information.

We’re glad we didn’t spend a lot of money on expensive treatments, and especially, have the complications of diabetes. We didn’t even spend much on doctor visits. Annette saw the doctor just three times by the time her symptoms went away. Too fast to even get put on meds.

We don’t blame the doctor. Few doctors know about this. We’re just glad we found a better way.

We also didn’t “feed the machine” that advertises and makes billions of dollars off treating diabetes. We also found information that shows it works this well 90+ percent of the time - when you're willing to eat this way.

That’s a win on many fronts. A low-cost cure, that’s medically monitored, safe, consistently effective and benefits us, not some big pharmaceutical company or even insurance or doctors.

If you ever try this, you should definitely tell your doctor. There’s nothing weird or something to hide. Just don’t expect a lot of understanding or support, because if they knew how well this works, they’d be recommending it (and doing it) themselves, thereby losing all professional credibility.

Well, maybe not all. I know many patients would be grateful.

David's Story: Thirty Six Words

The look on their faces said it all.

I fought going to the ER during my second heart attack in October 2011. I was a very difficult patient when I got there. But they scared my wife, and she insisted.

So I was flown by helicopter to the University Hospital, where after hours of trying, the finest docs available (all on staff at the medical school) said my condition was inoperable.

Their faces told me they didn’t believe I'd live long.

The fix, a stent to open up my “Widowmaker” (LAD) artery that was 80% closed off, proved impossible. A prior stent from my heart attack 6 1/2 years previous blocked all attempts. Ominous.

For good reason. In my first heart attack three arteries were 99% blocked and one was 75%. Two blockages were in the "Widowmaker" artery.

I asked my cardiologist back then if I should change my diet and he said, “Nah, you can’t change heredity. Arteries always close up again. So exercise and take medications, and when it closes up again we’ll just put more stents in."

He was wrong. But now, I might well be dead in a year or two if I didn't find answers.

State of the art, modern, up to date medicine at its best (or really, worst).Hard to blame the doctors when that's the standard of care.

But I now call it foolishness.

I even called an old friend, who majored in nutrition (so I figured if anybody knew he would) before he went to medical school. I asked him if there was anything new, different or more effective. He answered there was not.

I took his word for it, a mistake. I wish I’d kept searching.

So with this recent heart attack, when they couldn’t operate, I knew it was serious, even fatal, if I didn’t figure out better answers. I also knew meds wouldn’t cut it. So when a new friend whose daughter was studying nutrition, told me about Eat To Live I was interested.

In fact I was desperate.

You see, for me it really is a matter of life or death.

I got the book, and it was everything I’d hoped for, and more.

The first part of the book is testimonials from people like me. Lots of medical and health situations had proven difficult to handle otherwise. They found answers through nutritarian eating. I’ll summarize:

• Weight loss after years of trying, and the weight stays off. Amounts of 15 to 150 pounds, in two weeks to a couple of years.
• Major cholesterol reductions, often over 100 points.
• Many otherwise incurable diseases, ranging from hepatitis C to diabetes, were effectively treated.
• Many other difficult health issues turned around, like depression, migraines, blood pressure, diverticulitis, sleep disorders, digestion problems, back pain and more.

So here’s my statement in the thirty six words below, a little like what you’d see in Eat To Live:

My doctor said I’d need repeated heart catheterization as a genetic certainty. He was wrong. With the answers in Eat To Live, I 'm healing my own heart disease.

– David Higbee, 45 pounds in 18 months