How to Avoid Diverticulosis

My husband recently had a colonoscopy. He had been putting it off for several years. With COVID going on it was super easy for him to do so. The hospital was basically on lock down for all ‘extra’ procedures.

Getting him to go for a colonoscopy got to be like convincing a cat to get in the bathtub. It was a fight. But anyway, it was finally done and I am so happy he had it done as it has changed everything for him as far as food goes. He had good news and bad news.

The good news was that he only had three non-cancerous polyps. As an aside, the two ‘foods’ that you should avoid to prevent colon cancer are red meat and alcohol. This is according to Dr. Alan Desmond in his talk on Plant Summit 2021. 

​The bad news was that he had something called diverticulosis. Now what the hell is that? I had heard of diverticulitis. And I knew with the word ‘itis’ on the end it meant inflammation but that was about all I knew. So, what is diverticulosis?

It turns out that our colons can form these protruding pockets like bubbles. You can be symptom free unless they get inflamed or infected. This is caused by undigested material getting trapped in the pockets.  And this could mean a long stay in the hospital until the inflammation goes down.

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BREAK THE CYCLESo, diverticulosis is the formation of these bubble-like pockets. It’s more common in people over 60 and men tend to be more prone to it than women. The most common contributing factors are:

• Being extremely overweight
• Eating too much fat and red meat
• Smoking cigarettes
• Using anti-inflammatory drugs like ibuprofen and naproxen.
• And, of course, the low-fiber Standard American Diet

For more information check: (Diverticulosis: Symptoms, Causes, Diagnosis, Treatment, Prevention (webmd.com)

So, what can we do about it?

It just so happens that the perfect diet to adopt is a whole food plant-based diet. Your colon and gut microbiome love fiber. Fiber and water bulk up the stool and make it much easier for you to pass the toxins out of your body.
 
So, the way of eating that I promote in my book BREAK THE CYCLE, turns out to be the perfect way of eating for colon and gut health.

GET THE BOOK

​The four food groups I recommend are:

· Vegetables
· Fruit  
· Whole grains
· Legumes

They are all LOADED with fiber and water. The Standard American Diet is loaded with meat, dairy and oils which contain NO FIBER.  Health promoting fiber comes from PLANTS.

By adopting a high fiber diet, you won’t be able to reverse these bubble-like protrusions. But you will be able to vastly improve your colon’s health and also the health of your entire body.

If you don’t want this to happen to you, be proactive. Start flooding your body with nutrient rich, high fiber and water content foods. You can avoid this issue entirely.  And as an added bonus you can lose any excess weight. I am confident that with every day that I eat this way, I am avoiding this type of lifestyle illness.

I alluded to positive changes in my husband’s diet in the beginning. Although the changes we’ve made are small, they are also significant in increasing his fiber intake. These changes are great for me too as there are no longer ‘dangerous’ foods in the house. (By dangerous I mean addictive because they are so highly processed.)

Nice cream (pineapple-banana-nice-cream.html)  has replaced ice cream. It's made with fiber-rich frozen fruit. And cookies are replaced with high fiber baking like Chef AJ’s banana muffins (chef-ajs-banana-muffins.html). 
 
It seems that a lot of people don’t want to improve their diet until there is a legitimate threat to their health and quality of life.

And a lot of the excuses we use are to cover up for our food addictions. It’s like being a smoker unable to quit until they get a cancer diagnosis. The drug-like effects in processed foods can keep you trapped for YEARS.

BREAK THE CYCLE of food addiction before it causes irreversible damage to your health and quality of life. You can do it!