I Followed the Plant Paradox Program for a Month, and My Body Began Working Better

Now I know what to do to keep it going

In 2017 I was 68 years old and realizing that things were not going all that well with my physical health. I had been doing all kinds of things to improve my health for years. I did strength training with a trainer, took yoga classes, tried to eat healthy organic foods which I cooked myself. I allowed myself plenty of room for treats and favourite indulgences.

I had also treated eating disorders professionally. I had led groups for eating disordered folks for years, following a non-dieting approach similar to that used in the inpatient eating disorders program with which I worked.

I had taught a course called Transforming Your Relationship to Food, which focused on emotional eating issues. Using mindfulness, cognitive behavioural therapy, and other techniques, I helped clients understand the connection between eating and their feelings. I encouraged people to eat what they wanted, what was nourishing both physically and emotionally to them. It was important to stop the guilt that accompanies eating for so many, to take the moral question out of food.

I had tried many, many diets in the past with the usual circular result of weight loss, weight ‘regain plus a little bit more’, accompanied by a hearty dose of guilt and self- hatred. I knew not to go on just any diet.

While this approach was helpful in many ways, and perhaps was a necessary first step, it was unsatisfying to many people, including myself. Though I stopped dieting and stopped gaining weight, I could not lose weight. I told myself that it didn’t matter, went through the whole gamut of arguments about loving oneself at any size. I stopped eating for revenge, or anger or sadness, or loneliness. I nourished myself and gave myself treats. I was happy in all the other areas of my life but I could not lose weight.

This was bad enough for my vanity, as I did not like the way I looked or felt. But, more importantly, every time I had an annual checkup and got bloodwork my A1C was at pre-diabetic levels, my cholesterol levels were too high and my blood pressure was borderline. I was borderline about to have to take a bunch of medications. I kept putting my doctor off, promising her I’d take care of this with lifestyle change.

Besides this, I had arthritis in my knees and ankles and the orthopedist said I should lose weight. To top it off, I had recently been diagnosed with a nasty autoimmune disorder, which the specialist said might be linked to prediabetes. It was maddening and embarrassing. Here I was this expert and I couldn’t help myself. Enough I thought!

I needed something different

I decided I needed to do something different than a diet. I had tried many, many diets in the past with the usual circular result of weight loss, weight ‘regain plus a little bit more’, accompanied by a hearty dose of guilt and self- hatred. I knew not to go on just any diet. But, though I refused to call it a diet, for obvious reasons, I finally decided to try the program by Steven R. Gundry, MD in a book called The Plant Paradox (2017). To put it simply, Dr. Gundry has a program that is based on eliminating all the foods, and other substances, that contribute to inflammation.

So, I read the book twice. I liked many things about it. First, it was meant as a lifestyle change. The book explained the science behind the theory, the author’s research, and the plan itself. There were two lists: the food you could eat and the food you couldn’t eat. In some ways, it was very restrictive. But there were quite a lot of the foods on the allowed list that I enjoyed (vegetables, dark chocolate, red wine) as well as many that were deal breakers for me (coffee, seafood). I figured I could try the first two phases of the plan for a month, as recommended, and see what happened. The third phase allowed more kinds of foods and was meant as a maintenance phase. If all went well, it might be fun to do the third phase too.

What is The Plant Paradox program?

Dr. Gundry’s plan eliminates all foods which his research has led him to connect to inflammation. That means all grains with a hull, most fruit, some vegetables, all kinds of sugar, all processed foods. It restricts meat and dairy and oils to certain kinds. What is left after all this restriction is a surprisingly wide variety of wholesome foods that support the superb functioning of all the systems of the body? There is also a keto version of his plan for patients who have a life-threatening illness such as cancer or kidney disease and need to take even more care against inflammation.

Why a plant paradox?

The paradox is that, while we need to eat plants to live, some parts of them are toxic. Dr. Gundry teaches which plants or parts of plants are friends and which are foe, how to avoid the toxic parts of plants through different methods of preparation or substitution, and how to make meals based on foods that are nourishing and sustaining.

“Some of the very vegetables and fruits that sustain us simultaneously contain substances that can harm us. We’ve been glossing over this paradox for literally ten thousand years. Gluten, of course, is one example of a plant component that is problematic for some people, as the recent gluten-free craze has spotlighted. But glutens are just one example of the kind of protein known as a lectin.”

Quite simply, plants don’t want to be eaten and who can blame them? Like any living thing, their instinct is to propagate the next generation of their species. To this end, plants have come up with devilishly clever ways to protect themselves and their offspring from predators.” The Plant Paradox, pps 5–6.

Why did I choose this plan?

If you are ready to make a change in your diet you face a lot of conflicting ideas. Food is important and many people have ideas about it. It is hard to tell the good from the bad. How did I choose? I did my homework and chose this author and this book for several reasons:

• The author was a cardiac surgeon who started out treating patients with diet who were unable to have heart surgery due to a high level of risk. His patients achieved a lot of success with simple dietary changes. He began studying his patients and the foods that caused them trouble as well as the other factors that contributed to inflammation. He eventually opened two clinics in California to treat illness with lifestyle changes. His book is full of references to the research of other professionals as well as his own.
• The Plant Paradox Program is not a weight loss program but a health program. Whether you are underweight or overweight this plan promised to eliminate inflammation and help you reach your own healthy weight. In addition, it promised to end my issues with not-infectious diseases. In particular, I wanted to avoid diabetes and heart disease, issues which my father had struggled with for years, and which were being increasingly linked to inflammation.
• It is a program meant to be undertaken for life, a lifestyle change, not a temporary change at all. For me, this meant that I would not diet and lose a bunch of weight then go back to eating in the old way and gain it all back. If I decided I wanted to make this kind of change, I would stick to it to see if it helped and then weigh the pros and cons of continuing on it. I was not trying to prove anything to anyone, I simply wanted to see if changing what I was eating would help me feel better and give me better results at the doctors’ office.

How did I prepare?

• I read the book through twice and found that it made sense to me. I looked up some of the references online and found a lot of people coming to similar kinds of conclusions about foods related to inflammation.
• I chose a good time to start. It was near the end of May and I had just come home from a weekend visit with family and had no other events planned for a month. My birthday is on the last day of June and it would be a good end-point.
• I bought all the ingredients for the food I would need for the first week.
• I determined ahead of time that I was not going to talk about my new plan unless I had to. I did tell my husband but urged him not to bring it up all the time. I felt that people quizzing me about what I was doing and why I was doing it, would get in my way. I would make myself the food on the list and eat it and act normally.

Someone on a diet can be a conversation bane. It either creates a bunch of guilt in the other diners who avoid talking to you, or it consumes the conversation. “Can you have this?” Are you allowed that? Why? Why Not? I’d been on diets for easily half of my life and dreaded talking about it. Instead, I told people I was doing an experiment and I didn’t want to talk about it. Who wants to talk about diets when getting together with family and friends? It’s just not fun.

• I decided I would focus on enjoying the good foods that were on the Do Eat list and not waste time and money pining away for the forbidden stuff. After all, I’d eaten enough candy and donuts in my life. Instead, I concentrated on the fact that I could have nuts and avocado and all kinds of vegetables. Dark chocolate and coffee with full-fat cream. A glass of red wine. Olives and olive oil. Fish and scallops and sardines. The occasional serving of pasture-raised beef. I tried hard to find recipes for making these foods taste great and to avoid feeling or acting deprived. I wanted to get behind this experiment totally.
• I bought a pretty blank book and began a collection of acceptable recipes and menus that I found delightful. Only a few of the recipes in Dr Gundry’s book were very appealing to me, as I come from a foodie family and culture. But I knew how to turn good ingredients into fantastic meals and the Can Eat list was full of good foods. So I took up the challenge of creating Plant Paradox foods that would be interesting and delicious.

What happened as a result of my experiment?

I started at the end of May. I followed the diet almost perfectly for a month: three days of Phase 1, four weeks of Phase 2. I began to lose weight almost immediately. This was unexpected. Plus the weight loss was evenly distributed throughout my whole body with no loose skin or evidence of weight loss. My knees got thinner, my neck, my arms, everything. This had never happened to me on a diet before.

It was pretty easy not to make exceptions for foods not on the list. I figured cheating here and there would ruin the whole experiment. So, I set my sights on my birthday celebration and stuck to my plan. One funny thing that happened was that some friends who didn’t’ know about my experiment, had planned an early party for me. Imagine my chagrin when I am surprised with an enormous carrot cake that they’d had shipped from my favorite baker in New Jersey about a week short of my goal. What did I do? Naturally, I exclaimed over it, thanked them profusely, and ate a hearty piece of carrot cake, saying to myself “oh well”. Then put it out of my mind.

At the end of the month, I was feeling really good about the whole experiment and decided to go into the maintenance phase. I had lost about twenty pounds, a full clothing size lower. The book had suggested that I stay in phase 2 until I reach my desired weight and all health problems had resolved. My desired weight was still about 40 pounds away but I was ready to move into the maintenance phase, figuring I’d lose more as I went along and could always go back to phase 1 and 2 again if needed.

Phase 3 allowed me to have more normal meals and I was excited to add beans and lentils and new vegetables into my diet. So, I started this maintenance phase which allowed more experimentation and also more leeway for treats. I’ve been doing my own version of phase 3 for the past three years.

At the end of the month, this is what had changed

*I felt pretty good about myself emotionally, of course. I had stuck with the plan for a month, with almost no exceptions or excuses.

* l felt full of energy.

* I was sleeping well.

* When I had my annual physical check-up a few months later I found that my weight was down 20 pounds, my blood pressure was down to normal. My A1C was down to normal levels. (My cholesterol levels were slightly better, but no big gain here)

* My hair started to grow in more luxuriously and curl a bit making my hairdresser ask about health changes (without my prompting).

* Skin tags and little precancerous bits on my face and neck disappeared.

* My dental hygienist remarked (without knowing about my experiment) that my gum tissue was in remarkable shape for my age.

Over the next few years, I’ve noticed other changes.

* The joints in my body don’t ache anymore, and when they do, I know why (I’m guessing pasta or bread overdose?)

* Though I’ve had the beginning of a cataract in one eye for ten years it has been stable, still unchanged in 2019.

* My seasonal allergies have just about disappeared. I was a regular Claritin D devotee for years because my sinuses and ears and nose would become so congested in the spring, summer and fall months without it. I haven’t taken any of that for three years now. I can sleep all night breathing through my nose.

* The fungus on my toe, which I’d had for 20+years and was very resistant to every kind of treatment disappeared.

There is no hard evidence that these changes are all linked to my new diet but I’ll bet many of them are. I think my body started helping me out by dealing with problems effectively. Instead of feeling like I was aging I began to feel great, like I could go on for another 30 or 40 years.

Decide you can do it, do whatever it takes to have a good attitude about it, and don’t let the beliefs or opinions of others get in your way.

How can you do it, too?

• If you want to try the program, buy one of the books by Dr. Steven Gundry called The Plant Paradox (2017). If you don’t care about the science behind it, just dive into the part about the program itself. The author has done several books since the original, tweaking the program and including more recipes (The Plant Paradox Cookbook (2018), or adapting it to a busy lifestyle (The Plant Paradox Quick and Easy in paperback (2019)).
• Make several copies of the eat/don’t eat food lists and place them in convenient spots.
• Follow the plan as closely as you can for a month or whatever your goal. Gather any unusual ingredients, prepare for success, give yourself a goal, and a reward at the end of it.
• Choose a sensible time to start, when you will be physically and emotionally up for the challenge.
• I think the mindset going into something like this is all-important. Do yourself a favor and work on your attitude before you even start. After all, no one is making you do this. If you decide to do it, why not give it your best? Decide you can do it, do whatever it takes to have a good attitude about it, and don’t let the attitudes or opinions of others get in your way. Focus on the foods you can eat, try not to indulge fantasies of other foods, it’s not going to help.

In the end, the results are what matter. Once you are feeling satisfied with your progress, you can adapt the plan to suit your own lifestyle and preferences to a degree.

For instance, I have been very good about eliminating sugar from my diet. I spent years with an addiction to sugar and know what sugar does to me. But I am a baker and have had a hard time enjoying grain-free baked goods. So, I make a slow rise type of bread with local flour that I love. When I bake it, I eat a little when it first comes from the oven if I want, maybe a piece of toast for breakfast occasionally. Mostly I eat rice crackers or rice cakes instead of bread. I also love pasta and will allow myself to have some when I want it. But I no longer eat a whole plateful and seconds, just a small portion. And not every day or even every week.

Don’t let the exception become the rule

One problem that arises when you stop following a strict plan and make small exceptions, is deciding when you’ve made enough exceptions. It is important to have treats and plan for special meals occasionally, but when the weekend treats start to bleed into the weekdays, you need to admit it and take some corrective action. Look for warning signs. Perhaps you are starting to feel less energetic or notice your clothes feeling tighter. Maybe some old ailment is resurfacing or your joints are hurting again. If this happens, resolve to go back to the original list of allowed foods for a time. Address any concerns promptly before they get out of hand.

With some perseverance you can find out what you must change to enable your body to function at its best.

Jean Anne Feldeisen is a licensed. clinical social worker, hypnotherapist and relationship coach. She writes about mental health, self-esteem, relationships and couples retiring together. Jean has been reading and writing poetry since age 5. The memoir Dear Milly is her first book. Jean is seventy plus years old

IwtOGSye