Meltdown in the Grocery Store Parking Lot

We're about to have some fun, you and me. Remember that Sesame Street game titled, Which One Doesn't Belong Here? Here's your chance to play the adult version. Pick the one that doesn't belong in our everyday diets. I went easy on you this time. No guarantees for next time. Photo by Amy Rauch Neilson.

Last Saturday morning began easy and laid back. All of us slept in til about 9:30 — quite unusual for Theo. We three then snuggled up on the couch and watched the World Premiere movie of Phineas and Ferb in the Second Dimension. I’d tivo’d it the night before. By the time the movie ended, the decision as to whether it was breakfast time or lunch time was a bit nebulous. We decided to move on to lunch.

I opened the fridge. Not a lot to choose from as I’d only dashed into the grocery store once that week, after returning from our trip to Indianapolis, to pick up some basics. Today was going to be the Big Grocery Shopping Day. But first, lunch.

Ewww. The contents of the fridge were not an appealing sight. Not because there was anything wrong with the food that was in there, but because of the type of food that remained. Our best option for sustenance was hot dogs. Don opened the package and threw them on the outside grille. Usually, I find them quite tasty. Today, the thought made my stomach turn. All I could think about was the nitrates they contained and how bad those nitrates are for my body.

He brought them in and fixed them in white buns. I tried to save the day (or at least, the meal) by slicing up some peaches. They were mealy and inedible. Don and Theo wolfed down their dogs. I squirted mustard on mine, took a bite, and couldn’t go any further. I had an aversion to hot dogs and pretty much everything else left in our kitchen.

“Is there something wrong with your hot dog, honey?” Don asked.

“Nope. It’s me, honey. Sorry.”

The “something wrong” was a culmination of months of reading various opinions by holistic and traditional Western medical doctors alike, finally coming to a head that morning in our kitchen. I had nearly finished the book Anti-Cancer, the one that of all the books I’ve read since my diagnosis, truly makes sense. It’s well balanced. It doesn’t pooh-pooh Eastern Medicine or Western Medicine, but illustrates how each of us can tap into the benefits of these different approaches to healing as complements to one another.

The author of Anti-Cancer, who is both a biochemist and an MD, figured out how to heal his own brain cancer through a combination of chemotherapy, supplements, and nutrition. The book not only follows his journey back to health, but he describes how he’s never been so healthy in his life.

I can’t do this book justice in six blog posts, let alone one. But I will say this — the changes in our food production and the increasing incidence of a wide variety of cancers, striking people who are younger and younger, is a major problem that we need to address in our country’s food supply. And if we can’t at this point address it on a national level, we can certainly start at the grassroots level — our own food choices.

Some of the changes that have brought us the most harm post World War II:
1. The staggering amount of refined white sugar in our diets, which grows every year;
2. The processed, bleached foods and preservatives we eat, like the bleached white flour that we can find on the ingredient panel of so many of our foods;
3. The changes in how our chickens are fed and treated (think egg supply), as well as how our sources of meat are fed and raised.

When you read about this and the long-term studies that back up how these changes are affecting our health, it’s not only staggering, it’s nauseating. This is the very same message that the doctor from Indianapolis is sharing with me. If I want to get healthy, I’ve go to change my diet, take the supplements that my specific body needs, continue chemotherapy (the diet and supplements dovetail nicely with my chemo regimen), and walk 30 minutes a day, at least six days a week. That’s for starters.

Sound like a lot to take on? It’s not. As I explained it to my friend Jennifer Amprim Wolf today, it’s all about the source of your motivation. For example, following the above protocol might be a passing thought if I was looking to drop 10 pounds for an upcoming wedding or high school reunion. But when it literally is a matter of life and death, well, it takes on a whole new meaning.

That brings me to what happened in the Meijer Parking Lot last Saturday morning. I drove in, parked, and began sobbing out of frustration and confusion. What am I supposed to be eating? How will I know when I get in there what to choose and what not to? Where’s the hidden refined white sugar, bleached flour, nitrates, poorly fed beef and poultry, eggs from caged chickens, organic vs. non-organically grown fruits and veggies? I was overwhelmed.

So, I called my cousin Lori Parker. Sobbing uncontrollably.

“What’s wrong, Aimers?” she asked.

And I’m quite sure that my response was anything but what she was expecting.

“I’m afraid of food!” I told her. And I went on to explain, as rationally as I could, that what I was about to put into my cart felt like a matter of life and death. Yet, I’m new at this and I’m not sure how to go about it.

We had a long chat there, me sitting in the Meijer Parking lot. And when we were done, I’d calmed down considerably and felt I’d gained back a little of my control. We brainstormed some ideas for good choices I could make in each department. With a new sense of confidence, I got out of the car and headed into the grocery store, where I found that I naturally gravitated toward the “good stuff” about 80 percent of the time.

I’ve never been a junk food eater, so it was no problem to pass up packages of Chips A Hoy, pastries, potato chips. I found myself naturally reaching out for fresh strawberries, organic peaches, blueberries, a seedless watermelon. I also craved green pepper, cucumbers, organic carrots. Mushrooms would also be of great benefit to me, but I loathe them, always have. So, we’ll work on that aspect of my diet some other day.

As I made my way through the store, I realized how many good choices I could make and how easy it really was. Whole grain pasta. Grass-fed beef. Organic eggs from free-range, properly fed chickens. Whole grain bread. Organic milk. I checked out and left the store feeling a bit more confident that slowly, I will learn how to choose and eat the foods that nourish my body, build my immune system, strangle off the blood supply to my tumors. I’m on a roll.

But you just can’t learn enough about this life change and how important it is to each one of us, whether we’re fighting cancer, another disease, or are enjoying a healthy part of our lives. That’s why I can’t encourage you enough to consider, really consider, attending The Pink Fund Luncheon on Saturday, October 1. I’ll be there for the full sha-bang, from the yoga class in the morning to the luncheon, the premiere showing of The Pink Fund national awareness and donor video that I was a part of last week, and the book signing by Kris Carr in the afternoon.

Author Kris Carr, a NY Times best-selling author of the Crazy, Sexy Cancer series, wellness warrior, filmmaker, and an irreverent foot soldier in the fight against cancer, will be the featured guest speaker. She has kept Stage 4 cancer at bay for many years and if you have not yet read her books, check them out. She has acquired an amazing knowledge of food, diet, nutrition, the mind-body connection — you name it — and the impact on the short-term and long-term health for each and every one of us. She is spunky and beautiful, and she’s put a whole new face on what it means to have — and live an amazing life with — Stage 4 cancer.

I urge you to attend. For more information, check out The Pink Fund event info. Tickets are going fast, so don’t dilly-dally.

P.S. The answer to the question posed in the photo caption is the bag of pure, refined white sugar. But you probably already guessed that.

Copyright 2011, Amy Rauch Neilson