Confessions of a Wannabe

I just watched Forks Over Knives, and I have to say it was really good. I was shocked. I was outraged. I was saddened. I was surprised. I really learned quite a few new things and really enjoyed that people were talking after the movie, trying to learn as much as they could.

The most alarming part of the movie was when a study was referenced that showed a direct correlation between the consumption of dairy products and the growth of cancer tumors. The study was done on mice that had been exposed to a known carcinogen. Then one group of the mice was fed 20% casein (milk protein) while the other was fed 5%. The group that was fed more casein developed tumors while the ones with the lower casein diet did not develop any. A second study was then done with just one group of mice that was exposed to the carcinogen and then fed a diet that varied back and forth between 20% and 5% casein. The mice did develop tumors, but it was discovered that the growth rate, and if I’m not mistaken the size, decreased when the casein was decreased to just 5% of the diet.

Now, what I want to know is, why the hell haven’t I heard this anywhere before? I know this was just a study done on lab mice, but if there’s a study that shows there’s a possibility that something in a diet will make tumors grow faster or slower, why isn’t that information shared?! When Mom and I asked Steve, one of the chemo doctors my Stepdad saw, if there were any changes in his diet that he should be making, Steve replied that diet was just “hocus pocus” when it came to cancer. Hocus pocus? Gah…I feel like I could punch him in the face. What if cutting diary out of his diet slowed the tumor growth? Or what if they recommended trying cutting out all animal protein in addition to the chemo and radiation? Would have there been different results? So many what ifs, and I hate that I’ll never know. I hate that Steve just dismissed our concerns and questions. Had they really looked into alternatives to chemo and radiation? No one once suggested he do anything with his diet, only that he eat ice cream bars to keep up his calorie intake or eat nuts because his magnesium was low.

I know I don’t know everything about the study and it’s premature to jump to conclusions. I’m definitely going to look more into it. Also, I want to check out more about that graph they featured showing death due to heart disease in Norway. It showed a decrease in heart disease related death when the Nazi’s occupied the country and confiscated all the livestock. Then, once the occupation was over and the people of Norway got their livestock back, death by heart disease increased. I don’t really know about what happened in Norway during WWII, but it’s certainly possible that a large number of people were killed by the Nazi’s and that’s why death by heart disease was so low during that time. Without all the information, it’s hard to make a definite conclusion from the graph.

Overall, I really liked the movie and highly recommend it to everyone. It should be obvious that the typical western diet is not healthy. We need to eat more unprocessed, whole foods. We need more fruits and vegetables!