It was reported in the Associated Press that breast cancer survivors who went on a low-fat diet helped prevent a return of the breast cancer by as much as 66 percent. The results from the Journal of the National Cancer Institute showed that after 2 years, a low-fat, high-carbohydrate diet reduced the area of mammographic density, a radiographic feature of the breast that is a risk factor for breast cancer. However, for women whose cancers are fueled by hormones, the diet change seemed to make little difference in the risk of recurrence or survival. It is theorized that hormones might play such a strong role in some cancers that low fat dietary changes have only weak impact on future risk. What is really going on here with hormones and the role of diet? This raises many more questions that need answering. Like, what about the type of food in general and not just limiting the fat intake but carbohydrates as well? Let’s take a closer look…

My position is that the rate of the digestion of carbohydrates could have a larger impact on your health than what doctors are ever going to tell you. This is generally due to the myopic approach of physicians operating only in their specialty, and in treating the symptoms, not the cause of your disease. But what you put in your body may have more to do with your illnesses such as joint pain, acne, cancer, respiratory ailments, etc., than anything else.

Let’s take a look at one health condition over the last 50 years as an example. Have you noticed that there are more and more people with allergies today compared to 50 years ago? Ask anyone who is older than 50. They will tell you that when they were a kid, there was only the one kid who was always blowing his nose in school. Compared to today where there is only one person who does not suffer from some type of allergy. So what has happened? What has changed? The two biggest things I can think of are stress and diet. Now let’s take a closer look at the link between these two.




What most people don’t realize is how stress can create an environmental storm inside your body. Stress has a nasty tendency to stimulate our adrenal glands. When these glands are stimulated they release cortisol and male hormones called androgens. Both of these hormones are pro-inflammatory. This means that as soon as they are released into the body, it causes the body to react. On the cellular level, inflammation starts to ensue. If you want a great example, have you ever noticed how acne will flare up at the worst times — like picture day when you were in school, or your wedding day? Well, what do you think acne is? It is an inflammation of the skin’s pores.

This might be something you never thought about but food can have a similar effect on stress. When you eat anything that is a carbohydrate, no matter if it is a starch, a soda or a piece of candy, it is going to be converted into blood sugar or glucose. It is the rate in which these carbohydrates are digested that makes them bad or good. Good are the ones that are digested slowly, and bad are the ones that are digested quickly. For a full description of this subject read this article. When you consume a carbohydrate that is quickly digested, you not only get a spike in glucose, but you also get a spike in insulin. Insulin is the body’s way of delivering glucose to the cells of our body. The more the glucose we have, the more insulin that follows.

Now the danger comes from high levels of insulin. And since the average diet today is full of bad carbohydrates, this is bad news for the body. On the cellular level, high quantities of insulin cause stress on the body. This small amount of stress will stimulate the adrenal glands which in turn releases cortisol and androgens. If you continuously eat unhealthful food, you are putting your body in a constant state of stress which is pro-inflammatory — which createse a vicious cycle.

Inflammation is a precursor to many things. Acne, premature aging, allergies, autoimmune disease, and cancer can all be encouraged by inflammation. In people who may have an inherent predisposition for cancer, chronic inflammation can cause permanent cellular stress and hormone changes. When this person has precancerous cells, the chronic inflammation will create a perfect environment for it to proliferate. If we are talking about women and breast cancer, we are to be especially concerned with stress and inflammation and the increase in hormones. This may contribute to why women whose cancers are driven by hormones do not get positive results from the low fat diet. It’s all interrelated.

The bottom line is we need to become more mindful of what we put into our bodies, and the link between food and stress. If we continually eat unhealthful food, we will continue to stress out our bodies, putting into motion the perfect storm for diseases of all types, even cancer.

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