September 2, 2014, will be the 3-year anniversary of my wife, Anita Gayle, and I adopting a strictly plant-only way of eating. We both couldn't be more pleased at the results in improving our health in many ways.
When we started in September 2011, one day after Anita Gayle's birthday, we were both on blood pressure medications to control our hypertension and a statin drug for high cholesterol. (Even though neither of us had high cholesterol our doctors put us on those powerful drugs because we were both over weight, Caucasian, and over 60).
Withn only a few days of starting our new way of eating, we began losing weight. Within 45 days of beginning to eat only plants and no processed foods (including no processed oils) our BPs were in the normal range WITHOUT medications and we were able to get off all our meds. We have been in that happy situation ever since.
Sure, eating only plants is not easy, especially given the fact that most restaurants don't have very many (or no) menu items containing no meat, eggs, cheese or oils, but Anita and I refused to give into the ease of consuming food items that fall into the category of the SAD (Standard American Diet). Reading labels at grocery stores, researching diet practices, and asking questions at restaurants became our standard "modus operandi" and it has definitely been worth all the work.
By eating nothing but vegetables, fruits, legumes and whole grains we've totally reversed our increasingly fast decline into old age and may even have increased our lifespans.
Of course, this being totally our personal experiment on ourselves, we realize that our experience thus far may seem anecdotal, and too good to be true. But, watching our BP numbers steadily go down over the past three years, and my latest measurement in the above photo taken today might help prove my point. My consistently low blood pressure measurement (which I take every few weeks) in the "desired" or normal range is proof enough that our plant only way of eating works for me.
