Healthy Living Means Making a Commitment Every Day to Make Healthy Choices
Healthy living has to be on my mind most of the day. That doesn’t mean that it is difficult to do. It just means that in this world there is unhealthy food, artificial sweeteners, cleaners containing harmful chemicals, skin care that is actually harmful, and so on. There was a time that healthy living was not at all on my mind! Most of my life I have eaten whatever I wanted, unless I was starving myself to lose a few pounds. I was raised in the South where we ate fried chicken, mashed potatoes and gravy, hot white rolls, and always a tasty dessert. Oh, and of course, sweet tea! We just called it tea because it was usually sweetened with sugar! It was a good life, but the healthy living part just wasn't there! Of course, there were not so many preservatives in the foods back then.
I was always a little overweight, I think due to low metabolism, not because of too much food. I would notice that my slim girlfriend could eat exactly what I ate, with no “fat” consequences. I married, had 3 daughters, and cooked for 25 years the same foods my Mama and Aunt had cooked for me. And, I usually cooked a tasty dessert! I loved to see my husband and girls enjoy things that I lovingly prepared for them. My girls stayed slim, probably due to cheerleading and playing basketball. At times through the years, I would buy health food books, go to health food stores and try to eat “healthy”. By age 42, my husband had been diagnosed with cancer of the kidney, pancreas, and lung. During the 2 years we fought the battle of cancer, I was eating very little. I had other things on my mind: taking care of him, keeping the house clean of every germ I could image, and taking him to the hospital after every chemo treatment. He wore a “chemo pack” that continuously pumped the awful stuff into his veins. After these treatments, hospital always followed. He was “living” (barely) on 2 small cans of Ensure a day. He didn’t have energy to get out of bed. Oh, if I only had known then what I know now.
He lost the fight early in 1993. One daughter was married, one engaged, and all three still in college. I was left in a “total” empty nest. I began eating junk food. I wasn’t really gaining weight so I just ate lots of sweets. I would eat brownies for breakfast, M&M’s for lunch, and maybe a cheeseburger for supper. I drank diet cokes and I felt great! I just forgot all I had learned about healthy living, well, healthy foods, for sure.
Time marched on. I moved to the city where 2 of my daughters had settled with their husbands. One grandbaby on the way, life was good. But my poor eating continued. Still, I felt good, although I was noticing some slight decrease of energy. Now I know that I was just tempting disease to attack my body. Thankfully, it didn’t.
By now I knew I would not take the hormone replacement pills that they had discovered were causing cancer. I had never even thought about hormones. They had never troubled me. But now I thought of them constantly because I knew that menopause was coming and I had to figure it out for myself. No doctor I visited could tell me much of anything about it.
I went around in a mental fog for 2 years. Gained weight, and couldn’t lose it! My daughters were concerned, but didn’t know how to help. I was very happily married and was seeing the birth of one grandbaby after another! I knew I wasn’t depressed, but I had no interest in anything or energy to be interested.
One day a friend of my daughter told her about supplements she took. My daughter is an R.N. and has always been interested in health so she began to check out this company. She learned that it was 50 years old, does clinical test, and checks out every ingredient that goes into their products. She was sold! She told me to start taking these
supplements.
I felt so bad that I didn’t think anything could help. Slowly, I began to take the supplements almost daily. Some days, I wouldn’t take them. Who knows why??!! But finally, when I started taking them regularly, drinking two soy protein shakes a day, and, of course, eating healthy foods, I began to lose weight and get my energy back! I felt younger than I had in years! Now I could really
enjoy life!
This convinced me that I had to stick to this healthy living lifestyle for the
rest of my life.
There is no way five years ago that I could build this website. I had no interest in learning anything new. Now I think that the fact that I am learning new things will keep my mind strong and sharp.
I am not a medical person and can’t make any promises but I am convinced that if I keep my body healthy, I can prevent cancer. I am putting good nutrition into my body everyday in the foods I eat and my supplements which come from whole foods. I call them my immune system supplements because I think that they are vitamins to boost the immune system. This is very important because if our immune system is strong, we just don’t get sick. This is very important for healthy living.
Raymond Francis, in his book Never Be Sick Again, reviews the biological basis of disease. The thesis is that there is only one cause of disease – the malfunctioning of our cells. And, there are only two reasons why cells malfunction:
1. Lack of Nutrients 2. Exposure to Toxins
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