Thoughts on changing diet?

I think the majority of the survivors on here have changed their diets substantially. The first thing, and maybe most important thing you can do is cut out sugar as much as possible. This is good anyway, but important for cancer patients. The theory is that cancer cells readily absorb sugars in the body. That is why a PET scan reveals cancerous tumors, because they suck up the radioactive glucose. It is true that many foods, all carbs for that matter convert to sugar in the blood stream. The thing is that some are more readily absorbed into the blood than others. WHITE sugar, bread, rice, pasta, etc. are all very bad. You may as well be eating a piece of birthday cake.
On the other hand, anything with the fiber still intact, such as WHOLE GRAIN pasta, brown and wild rice, and very heavy, seed laden breads digest more slowly and do not affect the blood sugar so drastically.
Try to get him eating as close to natural as possible. Juicing green foods is a good idea, I do not really agree with juicing fruits, carrots, beets, etc. because of the sugar content, but it is not refined sugar and these veggies certainly are beneficial. That is up to you personally to explore.
AVOID high fructose corn syrup, partially hydrogenated oils, processed meats including bacon, lunch meat, summer sausage, Canadian bacon, hot dogs, etc. unless you get them from a health food store and they state NO NITRATES. Processed meats have been confirmed to be linked with colon cancer....because of the preservatives.
Cutting back on red meat, obviously is a good idea and eating more fish like wild salmon is a good thing.

Another diet you might consider is one that cuts down on inflammation in the body, like the Perricone Diet. Another good book is called WIn the War Within by Floyd Chilton, Ph.D.
This is a difficult thing to explain, but angiogenesis (tumors creating a blood supply) is often dependent on inflammatory enzymes, such as the Cox-2 enzyme. That is why meds like Celebrex prevent polyps from forming and in some tumors (like mine which was tested to be Cox-2 dependant) can help prevnt recurrences. However, taking Celebrex is not the only way to stop inflammation, as these books explain.

I hope that gets you started. If your husband goes on a Low GI diet (glycemic index), his blood sugar will stabilize and I am quite sure he will be at a good pH as well.

I hope that gets you started,
Susan H.

Hi,
My Dad was recent dx with stage 3. I am a dietitian and have been putting together a diet for him. I have found the Cancer Nutrition Info web site extremely helpful. Here is the link.

http://web.cancernutritioninfo.com/main.cfm?id=1

Also there is a article about the acid-base balance that I found helpful. It is in the Q&A section.

http://web.cancernutritioninfo.com/main.cfm?id=1537&display=yes&RequestTimeout=500

I wish you and your family all the best on this difficult journey!

Hi there,

i defintely tweaked my diet to focus on curing cancer. I say "tweaked" because I already was a "crunchy granola" type who hadn't had refined sugar or dairy products for 20 years when dx'ed. But I didn't follow an alkaline diet and wasn't balanced. I was heavy on the carbs even if they were whole grain etc.

I did not do any chemo for my Stage 3 colon cancer and opted to cure my cancer through nutrition and lifestyle changes. After my tumor was removed I went home and started juicing like crazy--up to 3 quarts of carrot/veggie juice a day mixed with protein powder and flax seeds. (the only fruit I juice is an apple). I based my veggie choices on digestive properties such as parsley, ginger etc.

Carrot and beet juice are usually the cancer curing and liver detoxing poster children in the juicing world. Like anything, there are differing opinions. All I know is what i did and it has worked for me as I remain cancer free for 5 years and was declared CURED last week! All with never having done any chemo.

Added to the juicing protocol, I followed a macrobiotic diet (The Cancer Prevention Diet by Michio Kushi). It is a gentle plant based diet that helps the body detox and repair itself. It i s also an alkalizing way to balance the body.

I agree with Susan that reducing inflammation is key also. These things all work together and while the diets may differ in focus the outcome can be the same---reduce inflammation.

I have an article in the Resource Library on this site that will explain the Secret Weapon of healing the body and that's LIVE ENZYMES. Do a search--it's listed as Juicing I and Juicing 2 put up by nanuk.

Cancer likes acid based bodies and those are ones that usually are fueled by sugars and simple carbs, meats and dairy products, processed and fried foods.....basically the Standard American Diet.

I hope this helps.

peace, emily who also likes the book The Makers Diet for wonderful intestinal health information