Would we be better off with a severely restricted diet?
Having lost a brother to diabetes, it was only natural he should be petrified. His sugar had run high in the past, but he’d always managed to put things back in order by eating better and shedding a few pounds. Now we were a few years older and, after a couple of long and challenging Covid years, had let ourselves go. It was time to do penance for Chanukah donuts, Purim hamantaschen, and lotsa lotsa matzah.
A couple of days later, courtesy of our nephew Menachem, a book arrived in the mail entitled The End of Diabetes, by Dr. Joel Fuhrman. Dr. Furhman is an advocate of a “nutrarian” diet, i.e., a mostly vegan diet that promotes whole foods which pack the most nutrition into the least calories. We’d heard about this diet because Menachem had done it himself, for different health reasons, a couple of years ago. We’d watched him melt away until he was half his size, happily downing huge bowls of salad, whole grains, and nuts. But we also remembered the basic guidelines: No sugar. No white flour (almost no flour at all). No oil. No salt. Almost no meat, fish, or dairy — just plant-based whole foods.
Dr. Fuhrman claims that even his insulin-dependent diabetic patients, simply by following this diet, can reduce or eliminate their need for medication and will quickly shed pounds. We were desperate to get my husband’s sugar levels out of the danger zone. We had the book. We were going to give it a try.
Diabetes is no joke, and it’s only increasing in “well-fed” countries. The CDC says one in ten Americans has diabetes, with 90–95 percent of them having the type 2 version, which develops in adulthood. Our diet has much to do with it — we eat way too much of processed foods, which are full of sugar, salt, and fat.
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