Prescription For Life is a review of the medical literature, written in layman’s terms. It covers three lifestyles you can control to keep you as young physiologically as possible. There are certain times in life we look back and see “moments” when we made a decision that changed our lives from that time on. One of those moments in my life was when I read an article in the medical literature that pointed out that the saturated fat in foods we eat was the main cause for the bad “lethal” LDL blood cholesterol in our blood. This LDL cholesterol gets into the walls of our arteries, resulting in inflammation and plaque formation resulting in blockage of blood flow. The piece also pointed out that over half of those reading the article would die of a heart attack or stroke because of such blockage of arteries resulting from the excess LDL cholesterol floating around in their bloodstream. Over half of all Americans die from either a heart attack or stroke. I accepted all this about LDL cholesterol as medical fact. After all, the one drug that more Americans take on a daily basis is a statin to help lower that “lethal” LDL cholesterol to help prevent having a heart attack or stroke. But then I read the rest of the article. It stressed that cheese was the one food we eat the most of that gives us more saturated fat than anything else we eat. At the time, cheese was my favorite food. My friends knew that. My patients knew that. They would bring me cheese for Christmas. I would get all kinds of different cheeses and would eat on them for months. At the conclusion of that article, at that “moment”, I decided to quit eating cheese. It was difficult at first but became easier and easier to give it up, as I reminded myself what the saturated fat and LDL cholesterol was doing to my arteries. The following Christmas, I filled the table in the office kitchen and told all the employees about the article I had read and that they shouldn’t eat it but it would be their choice. They could have my cheese. Most of them did not experience any “moments” because once word got around, the cheese was gone in fifteen minutes. However, I encourage you to read Prescription For Life and see if there are some “moments” waiting to happen in your life. The right decisions could add many active, quality years to your life.
