The Evil Beavers and My Cancer Fighting Diet

Happy Tuesday Everyone,

So as you can imagine, not only does Cancer cause you to drastically rethink what food you put in your body and how you treat it, having Cancer in your digestive organs makes it a bit more complicated. I decided on day one that I am going to win this challenge and obviously the best course of action would be to follow my childhood heroes motto of “knowing is half the battle.” Since that point I have been ...

reading everything I possibly can about combatting this disease.  Of course I don’t think Barbecue (a G.I. Joe) would have a PSA about what to do if your butt gets sick, but I think they would still recommend learning about it. =-P

Anyway, having a tumor in your colon can cause some complications. Basically just imagine some evil beavers down there building a dam in my intestines, the more food I eat that is harder to digest, the more material I give them to build with. The more high fiber foods I eat, the more the river keeps flowing. I did my best to describe that in the least disgusting way possible. During my life I have definitely taken some jabs at my friends (especially the guys) who were following a vegetarian lifestyle, ironically enough, that lifestyle is what now keeps me healthy. Maybe its Karma, but it could also have prevented this from happening, and more amazingly, help me cure it. I’ll touch on both of these subjects further.

While learning about the food that will keep me healthy, the question that kept coming to the front of my mind was: Are humans naturally herbivores? I know we have all been taught since we were little that we are omnivorous, but is that what we decided or what we were designed to do? I learned that even though humans can digest meat, our anatomy is much more similar to plant-eating creatures. Herbivores categorically have colons that are longer and more complex, their intestines are ten to twelve times longer than their bodies, opposed to carnivorous animals who’s colon’s are short and their intestines are three to six times their body length. I will let you guess which one humans resemble. With a long digestive system, meat can decay as it moves slowly and your body will often produce an unhealthy secondary bile to help break it down. As you can imagine, people who eat larger quantities of meat tend usually tend to east less fiber, because meat contains no fiber. As I said earlier, fiber keeps the river flowing and people in high meat-eating cultures have higher rates of colon diseases, one of them being *ding ding ding* cancer.

Not convinced?  Here are a few more fun facts. Human saliva contains digestive enzymes that make it alkaline to help digest plants, carnivores saliva is acidic to help break down meat.  Carnivores canine teeth and nails are long, sharp and curved, with the purpose of latching onto and subduing prey. Their incisors and molars are sharp, designed for cutting and tearing.  Human teeth like other herbivores are broad and dull, designed for chewing and mashing. Our nails could hardly resemble talons, they are soft and brittle and can hardly hold open a soda can never less subdue anything without breaking, as we have all heard “arrgh, I just had my nails done and I already broke one.” Now listen, I am not saying “don’t eat meat,” as it obviously tastes great and is a good source of protein. I just plan on getting the majority of mine from more “natural” sources. I mean, did you ever find it strange that we are the only animal that has to cook our food to be able to digest it without risk of infection?

If you were to take anything from the blog today I would definitely recommend upping the fiber in your diet, cutting down on fatty meats and avoiding white bread. Get some good healthy whole grains in you! Here is good general list of items to stock up on:

Large Meals:

• Bran Muffins
• Bran/Whole Grain Cereals
• Legumes / Peas
• Peanut Butter and other nut butters. (Umm I put this on every food imaginable)
• Vegetable Soups
• Whole Grain Cereals/Bread/Pastas

Fruits & Veggies

• Apples
• Berries
• Broccoli
• Cabbage
• Corn
• Dried fruits like raisins.
• Green leafy vegetables like spinach, lettuce, kale and collard greens.
• Peas
• Potatoes with Skins
• Yams/Sweet Potatoes

Snacks

• Bran snack bars
• Granola
• Nuts
• Popcorn
• Seeds
• Trail Mix

Oh yea, I mentioned earlier that eating healthy could help me cure it? Well, I found a list of cancer fighting foods and the one that really struck a nerve with me was figs. There is a chemical in figs called benzaldehyde and it has shown in a couple studies (one and two) to actually shrink tumors! So I took a trip to Fresh Market down in Hingham, and have been dropping litte fig bombs onto those evil beavers dams morning, noon and night. Sorry to say little beavers, but looks like your gonna have to find a new home soon!




Much Love – Teej