Esselstyn, Campbell, Esselstyn, Greenlaw & Esselstyn, oh my

I've been so busy with the horses this summer, I've neglected my blog and have much to catch up on.

Here is the continuation of my notes from the 'Healthy Living Workshop' I attended in southern Ohio this past May.

T. Colin Campbell

Each speaker was only given about an hour and Campbell wasted no time in jumping right in to all the ground he wanted to cover.

He pointed out something very interesting about the studies that are often quoted and suppositions deduced from; he said that most, in fact virtually ALL, studies are done on populations who consume the western diet.  Whole-food, plant-based diets are not included.  So conclusions are based on changes made in the people already eating an unhealthy diet.  Interesting.

He spoke about the 'affluent' diseases and how they correlate with each other.  Lung cancer, colon cancer, breast cancer tend to group together and also correlate with elevated blood cholesterol.

In the USA, the typical range of cholesterol is 170-270.  In China, the range is 90-170, or so with an average of around 120.  In many other countries, the average is even less than 88!  And, in rural China, heart disease is nearly non-existent.

There is a direct correlation between the consumption of animal protein and the rise in cholesterol, and a direct causal relationship between the consumption of plant protein and the lowering of cholesterol.

Dr. Campbell shared an interesting tid-bit about the title of The China Study.  This is a book that I revere and is the one that set me so solidly on the whole food, plant-based diet.  Well, it turns out he didn't want that title at all.  He wanted any number of other titles and had as one choice, "Food Sense and Nonsense"......I really like that one myself.  But publishers dictated and we have his phenomal work today as The China Study.

He went back to the subject of diseases and said that they do tend to cluster....cancer, heart disease, diabetes and so on, but that there probably is only one disease....that it is all the same. 

He spoke of the exposure that western women get to estrogen over the course of a lifetime.  Western girls start menstruation much earlier than in other parts of the world where the age span is 15 - 19  years, with an average of age 17.  These populations also show menopause coming earlier at around age 48, so western women get it at both ends.  Dr. Campbell says that milk and dairy are big factors.  Rate of growth is the biggest factor for starting menstruation, and the consumption of milk causes an accelerated rate of growth. 

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Dr. Caldwell Esselstyn

Dr. Esselstyn immediately launched into his passionate belief of coronary artery disease being a disease that need not exist.  He classifies it as a food borne illness and cites the populations of Papau Guinea and Tarahumara, among others, as having virtually no such illness.

Historically, in World War 2, the axis powers took over rural farming communities and took all the animals.  In Norway, in 1940, there was a huge drop in heart disease and stroke which was directly related to the reduction of the consumption of animal products.  The previous levels of the disease returned when animals were once again available.

Endothelial cells, the one-cell width lining in our blood vessels are the "life jacket" or guardian of the blood vessel.  Nitric oxide is produced by the endothelial cells which helps to keep the vessels pliant.  Dr. Esselstyn talked about the risks of juvenile plaques that can form and then the body's defenses scramble to repair creating a plaque which can then rupture, block an artery and have catastrophic results.  Dr. E maintains that one cannot rupture a plaque if on a plant-based diet. 

Other highlights from Esselstyn:

If one is consuming animals or their products, one is damaging HDL. 
45% of  Medicare goes to 'treat' heart disease
Heart disease is not being treated today.  Stents and surgeries do not cure the disease.

Avoid:  oil, fish, fowl, meat, dairy.
Consume nothing with a mother or a face.

Also, no caffeine.
Eat greens all day if you have heart disease and NO OIL! 

In 3 weeks, you can be heart attack proof!

....to be continued.....

RE-Education & re-alignment

I remember quite clearly the exact moment when I knew I would change my diet forever. I had been reading quite a few books (some of which I had read a year or so earlier, but hadn't been ready to embody the message) and had been trying to get my mind around some of the concepts. I had pretty much committed to going vegetarian, something I had done previously in my life, but hadn't considered vegan as a diet option (how could I possibly live without cheese?!?!?).

I was standing in our barn and the equine dentist was out to do our horses' teeth. In case you aren't familiar with this procedure, it is quite the ordeal. The horse is sedated enough to make the procedure tolerable for him and his head is supported while a large speculum props his jaws open so the dentist can work on his teeth.

We have 5 horses, so quite a bit of time was going by while I was just leaning back and observing. About on the 2nd or 3rd horse I remember having the realization of how similar equine teeth are to human teeth; down to even the presence of a singular canine tooth. You could have knocked me over with a proverbial feather. I thought: I DON'T THINK WE ARE SUPPOSED TO EAT MEAT!!! I continued pondering this thought off and on throughout the rest of the dentist's visit and considered things like the mammoth size and strength that my horses have managed to attain while ingesting only hay and fresh grass. Hmmmm.

I began to really feel a shift to an alignment with the plant-eaters of the world and it felt just very right; I could feel the truth of it in my core.

But the scientist in me wanted to learn more and to find some cold, hard facts (plus I knew I would be questioned and questioned hard by relatives and friends) and would need data and lots of it. I came upon (via The Healthy Girl's Kitchen blog) the book that pushed me firmly over the vegan cliff: The China Study, by T. Colin Campbell. This book is so compelling I simply do not know how anyone could really process the information contained in it and not be motivated to make a change in the direction of a plant-based diet. It should be required reading for certainly all Americans, and better yet, for all of humankind.

Of course then as I read more and more, I learned of all the other parallels between the human body and other herbivores: intestinal length, taste buds, chewing action of the teeth and so on. I looked at the mouths and teeth of our many barn cats and our dutiful dogs and again saw that we are so much more similar to our horses than to our cats/dogs. It is these simple and irrefutable differences that I tell people about who question why I have chosen this diet. You can see the instant that most of them ponder their own teeth and for a minute grasp the truth of it. Of course upbringing and years and years of programming are hard to combat. (But, 'we've always done it that way' has never been an adequate argument for continuation on a given path). And so, when I present these observations to friends or interested parties, I watch for that flicker of light as, just for a moment, they too wonder....hmmm....maybe we aren't supposed to eat meat.

I'm continuing my education and it is great to see so many other esteemed professionals coming out in support of plant-based diets for health. It's an exciting time and I am hopeful that the disease epidemics that currently plague our country will be overcome. It's good to be vegan.

Sue - firmly on the plant-based path, in Ohio

Other books that had a huge influence on me were Alicia Silverstone's The Kind Diet, Rip Esselstyn's Engine 2 Diet, Skinny Bitch by RoryFreedman and Kim Barnouin, and many more.