My friend William Sears, MD, and his wife Martha Sears, RN, both cancer survivors, have recently released an excellent book on the best nutritional approaches for preventing and treating cancer. The book is titled: Help Heal Yourself from Cancer: Partner Smarter with Your Doctor, Personalize Your Treatment Plan, and Take Charge of Your Recovery. The Sears were kind enough to provide an excerpt from the book so that I can provide my readers with this valuable information.
How Food Fights or Feeds Cancer
Because they multiply so fast, cancer cells are ravenous eaters. Cancer can only spread if its cells have what they need to grow. Imagine a conference of cancer cells getting together to design the diet they like. After hearing from each cell what their favorite foods are, the biggest and baddest cancer cell concludes: âWe donât have to design a new diet to feed us, weâve already got oneâthe standard American diet (SAD).â Cancer cells crave carbs. They love high blood sugar spikes. The SAD is high in carbs that spike blood sugar.
How SAD Feeds Cancer
- High in added sugar
- Low in antioxidants
- High in animal-based foods, low in plant-based foods
- Low in fiber
- High in chemical food additives that throw the immune system out of balance
- Has an omega imbalance: high in omega-6 fats, low in omega-3 fats
- Encourages gorging, which results in sugar spikes
- Less filling, so you eat more
- Tainted with carcinogenic pesticides
How Our CCD Fights (and Prevents) Cancer
- Low in added sugar
- High in antioxidants
- High in plant-based foods, low in animal-based foods
- High in fiber
- Rich in real foods that promote immune system balance
- Has a smart balance of omega-3 and omega-6 fats
- Encourages grazing, which balances blood sugar
- More filling, so you naturally eat less
- Cleanerâfewer carcinogens
Grow your conquer-cancer garden inside.
Cancer cells grow ands pread when the soil theyâre in is fertile, or cancer-friendly. The SAD
diet is like adding chemical fertilizers to a cancer garden. Eating a cancer-healing diet starts with leaving out what cancer craves, by eating smarter and lower carb.
When Bill had his first cancer back in 1997, the conventional wisdom was low-fat and high-carb eating. Science has since revealed that fad was a big, fat, sweet lie. You donât get fat by eating smart fats. You get fat by eating dumb carbs. And when you take the fat out of food, you have to fill your diet with more carbs to get enough calories.
Replacing healthy fats with unhealthy carbs gives you a double fault that fuels more cancer. Supporting the ISA lesson âFeed us well and weâll fight better for you,â smart fats smarten the cancer-fighting NK cellâs cell membrane, which is mostly made of fat, by making it more selective and protective. Remember our mantra: âEvery organ of the body is only as
healthy as its cells, and every cell is only as healthy as the membrane protecting it.â Could a low-fat, high cancer-feeding diet weaken cell membranes, and therefore NK cells? We believe so. You can remember a cancer-feeding carb by the four Fs: itâs fake, fast, fiberless, and factory-made.
We have chosen the following foods because they have these conquer-cancer biochemical effects:
- Artichokes
- Asparagus
- Beets
- Beet greens
- Berries, especially blueberries, tart cherries, strawberries, raspberries, cranberries
- Broccoli
- Brussels sprouts
- Cabbage
- Capers
- Cauliflower
- Chili peppers
- Cocoa
- Garlic
- Ginger
- Kale
- Kiwi
- Leeks
- Lemons
- Mushrooms, especially shiitake, chaga, reishi
- Olive oil
- Onions
- Pomegranates
- Radishes
- Salmon (wild, not farmed)
- Scallions
- Spinach
- Tomatoes
- Turmeric and black pepper
More color, less cancer
Remember Momâs advice to âPut more color on your plateâ? Dr. Mom was right. Our conquer-cancer plate is color-full. The nutrients, called antioxidants, that give foods their color are also the ones that fight cancer best. And the deeper the color, usually the richer the antioxidant content of the food.
Help Heal Yourself from Cancer: Partner Smarter with Your Doctor, Personalize Your Treatment Plan, and Take Charge of Your Recovery by William Sears, MD, and Martha Sears, RN (BenBella Books, Inc). Available at Amazon.com and other major book retailers.
Dr. Mark Stengler NMD, MS, is a bestselling author in private practice in Encinitas, California, at the Stengler Center for Integrative Medicine. His newsletter, Dr. Stenglerâs Health Breakthroughs, is available at www.americasnaturaldoctor.com His clinic website is www.markstengler.com
