by milsdj » Mon May 25, 2015 11:51 am
Last month my wife and I celebrated our 1 year anniversary on a plant based / starch based diet. So, I thought I'd share my testimonial:
First, I must say that this journey towards better health has been a wish of mine for years. In fact, from toddlerhood on up I have been overweight and can remember in Junior High wishing I could lose weight. By my 45th birthday, I found myself tipping the scales at 355 lbs. It was discouraging as I had tried diet after diet, and had asked doctors for years to help and all I ever got from them was, “eat less, get more exercise”. Nothing seemed to work, but I remember thinking there has to be a solution.
In my early 40’s I was given the diagnosis of high blood pressure and put on medication for it. Along with that I received a diagnosis of sleep apnea and began using a CPAP machine at night. Somewhere in that time frame I started having really bad pain in my foot and the foot doctor informed me that I had a case of Plantar Fasciitis. Then at 46 years old my Doctor told me that I had Type 2 Diabetes; with an A1C level of 9.8. With the Diabetes diagnosis I ask about using diet and exercise to help or eliminate any of my problems and the Doctor said without any hesitation that I could not use diet and exercise to fix any of my problems and that I just needed to accept them as a part of my life and take my medication.
To add insult to injury, I began to put on additional weight after starting the Type 2 Diabetic medication and following their recommended diet. I topped the scale at 375 lbs and was more miserable than ever. I started researching a healthier lifestyle and began experimenting with a low carb diet; not as restrictive as Adkins but still involved high animal protein and high fat. I did lose about 70 lbs. over the course of a year, but then stopped losing. Even with the weight loss, all of my illnesses listed above were still present and I really felt like I had done about all I could. After about two years, I had slowly gained some weight back. I was planning surgery to have the tendon in my foot surgically cut to relieve the pain, and was beginning to think the Doctor was right when he told me that I could not cure my ailments with diet and exercise.
Then, around my 49th birthday, some friends told us that they had begun a plant based lifestyle. They had us watch the “FORKS OVER KNIVES” documentary so we could understand their reason for making the switch. We were convinced, but were not sure how to get started. These friends introduced us to others who were involved and took us to a workshop in April 2014 where we were able to learn even more. We learned about the need to feed the body what it was designed to eat. At that workshop, I decided that I needed to make the switch and to go all in.
Two weeks after totally eliminating meats and dairy and following a plant based / starch based diet; my foot pain just stopped. By week 4 in this new lifestyle I had stopped taking my blood pressure medication and my diabetic medication because my blood pressure and blood sugar normalized without the medication. Please note; I monitored my blood pressure and blood sugar several times a day to make sure it was stable, but did not tell my Doctor (maybe not a great idea, but didn't think he would be OK with it). After 18 weeks of a 100% plant based lifestyle, I visited my Doctor. After looking over the lab work, which had been done in advance, he walked into the examination room, looked at me and asked, “So what have you been doing?” I was worried based his past comments, but I told him about being 100% plant based, losing a total of about 115 lbs.,and finding the need to discontinue my medications. He reviewed the lab results with me, stating that my A1C (indicator used to diagnose diabetes) is now 5.3 which is well in the realm of normal and that my total cholesterol was 120, well below any concern. He noted that my blood pressure looked normal and commented that my medical chart confirmed the major weight loss. He congratulated me on the hard work and said that I was in the 0.1% of people who will actually do something proactive for their health; he seemed genuinely pleased. When I told him that my sleep apnea and my plantar fasciitis was gone, he said, “Of course they are, that makes perfect sense”. He told me that there's no doubt in his mind that I had cured myself of all my ailments, and there was no reason to continue any medication! I guess he’s a believer now…
I have lost an additional 15 lbs. since that Doctor appointment, but the last 3-4 months have not lost anything. I think I need to loose about another 20 to 30 lbs and am hopeful that this will happen. I feel great, better than I have in a long time... with one exception that I'll get to in another post...
I feel very blessed to have family who have supported and participated in this transition into a new way of life.
Thanks for reading,
Doug