Southwest Florida's Health and Wellness Magazine Health and Wellness Articles
By Tammy Provence, Founder of Good2Go Healthy Take Out –
Type 2 diabetes is epidemic in the USA and starting to spread around the globe. Across the board in all age groups, the numbers are staggering. Do you know someone with type 2 diabetes and why is this chronic condition on the rise with no end in sight? The easy answer is that our population is growing more and more obese in all age groups. And diabetes and obesity are partners in crime.
There are simple dietary solutions to managing and reversing diabetes. Did I say simple? Yes! But the complicated part is that this is easier said than done! Why? Habits; eating habits we learned from our parents or have gotten into out of convenience or, dare I say, laziness, and many of you will also add cost as a factor. Now I’m going to disagree about the cost factor later, so for now, let’s talk about habits and choices.
When I was growing up, I had Home Economics classes where I learned about food groups (45 years ago), carbohydrates, proteins and fats as well as their food sources. I’m pretty sure home economics isn’t even offered in the school system today. Also, my grandmother was a type 2 diabetic (overweight, of course) and from the age of 5, she started testing my sugar levels because she was told diabetes is hereditary, which most people today still believe. Well actually, food and lifestyle choices are what we actually ‘inherit’ or learn, and they are the foundation for diabetes, not faulty genes. So you can nix the “I’m cursed with heredity” excuse for being diabetic.
Refined and processed food has been available for decades, but it was not chemically enhanced to the degree it is today. Sugar was sugar, not high fructose corn syrup, the cheap industrial super sweetener added to almost all processed sweets and beverages, yogurt, applesauce, ice cream, etc. HFCS was a game changer and is a killer that is known to cause obesity and diabetes and heart disease, not to mention being contaminated with mercury. So the corn industry has this friendly public relations campaign renaming HFCS “corn sugar”, stating it’s just sugar. This is a blatant lie meant to deceive and mislead, making you feel okay about guzzling a 48 ounce soda. Ask you doctor, who will absolutely confirm this. So drinking a soda 40 years ago is significantly different than drinking a soda today because of the chemicals, sweeteners, etc. Do some research. You’ll never touch the stuff again.
Cheap, processed, sugar laden foods are EVERYWHERE in our culture from the grocery store, the school cafeteria, the upscale coffee retailers, fast food and chain restaurants blanketing our country. They serve ridiculous portions with huge caloric, carbohydrate and sodium counts. And we buy it because it’s convenient or appears inexpensive, compared to whole, clean, aka healthy food. Over eating and eating sugar laden, diabetes causing foods are a family affair and, dare I say, a national pass time. We eat too much of the wrong things repeatedly, get fat and wonder why we have children with adult onset diseases. Further, children growing up with obese parents don’t even know obesity is a catastrophic, unnatural condition. They think being fat is normal. Wow….what a mess we’ve gotten ourselves into!
If this is uncomfortable, it needs to be. The message is this. Learn about how simple carbohydrates cause you to get fat. And how being overweight results in diabetes, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, and yes Alzheimer’s disease, to name a few. Do you know that wheat products, white or whole, are simple carbohydrates, also known as SUGAR? And that artificial sweeteners are so toxic that trying to navigate around sugar intake by eating chemically sweetened products made from wheat is totally counter productive? You simply MUST eliminate simple carbohydrates from your diet. This is a lifestyle choice that can reverse the aforementioned health conditions and save the life of you and your children.
Do you hate to cook? Please ask yourself why. No time to shop? Is clean whole food too expensive? Please don’t fall prey to this misnomer. Cheap, empty calories are literally addictive, leave you hungry and make your blood sugar go wild, spiking and crashing, making you literally a slave to gobbling anything in sight and is very expensive. Preparing very simple, clean (hormone, antibiotic and pesticide free) whole foods such as grilled chicken, lowfat ground beef, stif fried, steamed or even raw veggies provide nutrients unavailable in the processed food discussed in this message. And when you eat them, you require less because your body recognizes the nutrients and your hunger is curbed. I’m telling you, eating healthy food costs less! But wait, the real savings is in your future.
You know, at some point, if you continue to eat yourself into a state of disease and expect your insurance to pay for it, there is going to be a wake up call. Companies already can’t afford to hire sick people because employee benefit costs are bankrupting them. Our medical system is being crushed by the cost of obesity related diseases. Don’t you think it would simply be easier to just eat less and eat healthy foods? Isn’t this what you want to teach your children and grandchildren: how to be self sufficient, independent healthy people? If you lead by example and eat stuff that will kill you and offer that to your family, the outcome isn’t going to be good. On the other hand, you can make a decision to take control of your pantry, learn about the catastrophic side effects of eating a high sugar, simple carbohydrate diet and simply make a choice to save your life and the life of your family. If not, you will simply become a financial slave to expensive medications that don’t make you live longer, just die slower…and broke.
With all this being said, if you take away one fact from this message, it’s that type 2 diabetes can be reversed with diet. Don’t let anybody tell you that you are too old, too sick or too anything to accomplish this. By doing so, you will take back your health and your independence, both physical and financial. Learning more and making a few simple lifestyle and food choice changes will be the best investment you can possibly make in yourself and family. To learn more, search the internet about low glycemic nutrition. Start slow, make small changes and be amazed with the positive health affects you can achieve with time and patience.
To learn more, please call the G2G Team, at Good2Go Healthy Take Out at 239-561-8646.
