Now, Here’s what I did! (Diet and Supplements)

Right away, I went on a very healthy diet! I came up with this diet with the help of my great doctor and several books including The Cancer Prevention Diet, Eight Weeks to Optimal Health, Food Rules & Kris Carr's Crazy Sexy Cancer Diet. I also spoke with a famous healer in the Colorado Springs area, Vivian Rice, who has been studying nutrition and Native American healing for nearly 60 years! She helped my mom 30 years ago when she was having trouble with pregnancy. The diet is really quite simple. Eat food (real food). The kind of food your great grandmother could recognize the name of. That means no Cheetos, no Toaster Studel, etc. Along with the elimination of a few food items of course, tons of veggies, and ORGANIC as much as possible. I got very excited about cooking because I knew that diet was going to have a lot to do with my healing process! (Please see some delicious recipes below). 


The foods I completely avoided were:

Animal protein (with the exception of organic eggs & wild caught fish)

Sugar 

Processed foods (Avoiding artificial ingredients and preservatives) - stop eating at Subway and start eating at the local health food cafe!

Wheat (unless completely unprocessed and organic and you know you do not have a wheat allergy).

Dairy (with the exception of occasional delicious raw goat’s cheese and raw goat’s milk)

Alcohol (with the exception of an occasional glass of red wine)

And by all means, no artificial sweeteners EVER!


The foods I focused on were:

Vegetables! (These tasty things make up at least 50% of my entire diet). Mostly raw with nutrients intact, juiced or lightly steamed.

Fruit

Vegetarian protein - grains, legumes, nuts & seeds (qunioa, brown rice, beans, eggs, almonds & flax).
Raw Foods / Super Foods as much as possible! (Raw nuts & hempseeds, sprouted grains, raw honey, goji berries, cocoa, etc.)


I also drank TONS of Green Tea and started each day off with a large glass of Essential pH water mixed with half of a squeezed lime & fresh juiced vegetables (green juice!) In addition, I drank one or two glasses of MacroLife Naturals - Macro Greens each day.


Zoe's Kitchen!

Here is a list of foods I tried to always have in the house (organic and without sugar):
Breakfast: Veggies (for juicing), Eggs, Brown Rice Pancakes, Steel Cut Oats, Granola, Beans, Potatoes, Goat Yogurt and Fruit! (Peaches, Bananas, Berries, Grapes, Kiwi, Cantaloupe, Oranges)
Lunch / Dinner: Brown Rice, Tinkyada Pasta, Red Quinoa, Beans, Soup, Potatoes, Salmon, Annie's Mac & Cheese, Brown Rice Tortillas, Spring Rolls, Sushi Rolls, Veggies! (Spinach, Peppers, Onions, Carrots, Cucumbers, Lime, Asparagus, Salad Mix, Celery, Broccoli, Tomato, Ginger, Avocados, Sweet Potatoes, Beets)
Snacks: Brown Rice Crackers & Guacamole / Salsa, Fruit and Almond Butter, Seeds and Nuts, Yogurt, Hummus & Veggies, Cereal.
Drinks: Green Juice, Green Tea, Macro Greens, Lemons & Limes for Water, Coconut Water, Rice Milk, Essentia.
Condiments: Agave, Olive Oil, Braggs, Apple Cider Vinegar, Catsup, Mustard, Honey, Lemon Stevia, Hot Sauce, Marinara, Pizza Sauce, Salsa, Butter.
Additions: Curry, Pesto, Seasonings, Cilantro, Black Olives, Artichoke Hearts, Coconut Milk, Cinnamon, Jam.


I was able to become friends with my new diet and not let it stress me out. Hopefully you can too, but if you find that this diet is frustrating you often, then splurge sometimes! You need to learn to balance stress with eating healthy in your life and it's different for everyone. When you do splurge, be smart. Maybe you'll get an organic cookie at the health food store or have half a turkey sandwich rather than a whole turkey sandwich. You'll figure it out!


Some things about food that I didn’t know:

Yes, you can get plenty of calcium without eating dairy!

Yes, you can get plenty of protein without eating animal meat! 

Eating Tips: Two things that make this diet easier and so much more fun for me are a food processor and a juicer. If you can come up with a couple hundred dollars you may want to invest in these! A Vitamin or similar blender can also add a lot more creativity to your new diet, but a bit more costly. If you’re a pasta lover, you should know that brown rice pasta does exist! It’s called Tinkyada pasta and it’s delicious. For those of you with a sweet tooth, sugar is not the only sweet thing but it is the main sweet thing that is bad for you. Try honey, agave, pure maple syrup and stevia. These tasty sweets are great in beverages, on cereal and more!

Each week (Sunday morning), I would cook for the week. I think the key for this diet is to have food READY to eat. I would cook up a big batch of brown rice that I could add veggies to and toss up in the skillet for dinner. I would chop up a million veggies and stick them in a big container that I could just grab along with some hummus for a snack. I also always had a salad handy with some great homemade olive oil, lime and cilantro dressing. It's also nice to have some brown rice crackers and other snacks handy so that you can grab THEM instead of the candy in your kitchen cabinet!


In addition to a healthy diet, each day I took many SUPPLEMENTS! (This is where Tori Hudson's book becomes necessary. She outlines a specific protocol for each level of Dysplasia, suggesting which supplements to take and how many milligrams). Once you know which supplements you need, you can buy most of them at your local health food store. Folic Acid, Betal-Plex and the Botanical Blend will need to be ordered (links below). I divided the following supplements between breakfast and dinner and always took them directly after meals. They are all based on research and studies that Tori Hudson has done. I added a few extras (Fish Oil, Mushroom Immunity, Vitamin D and B-12 for stress) based on my own research and additional advice from my doctors, but there is no evidence that the extras actually help with HPV. To make things really easy, I bought a couple weekly pill cases! I know it sounds silly but it really helped me keep my health stuff organized in the midst of all my schoolwork. This way I could just grab my morning supplements after a bowl of cereal and run out the door for class!


These are the amounts I took daily:

Multi-Vitamin: Women’s One Daily (1)

Folic Acid (10mg) - you will need to order it here.

Beta-Plex (180,000 IU) - you will need to order it here.

Vitamin C (400mg)

DIM (200mg)

Vitamin E (800IU)

Green Tea (400mg)

Selenium (400mcg)

Curcumin (350-500mg)

Zinc (30mg)

Omega 3 Fish Oil (2)

Mushroom Immunity (1)

Vitamin D (1)

Botanical Blend (From Doctor) - Licorice, Red Cedar, Echinacea, Goldenseal & Osha (3  Dropperfuls) - you will need to call to order from Backcountry Herbal Apothecary.

Vitamin B12 Liquid (2,000mcg)

I only took these amounts until I got a normal pap. Maintenance plan for one year only involves the Multi Vitamin, Vitamin C (3g) Beta-Plex (150,000 IU), Folic Acid (2.5mg), Green Tea (300mg) and continuation of the Vegetarian diet with light amounts of wheat, sugar and alcohol, processed and dairy. PLEASE REFERE TO TORI HUDSON'S BOOK FOR MORE SPECIFICS.

A NOTE ON YOUR MEDICAL DOCTOR'S OPINION... You may be surprised and disappointed by your MD's response to this dedicated approach. Here are MY thoughts... I believe that Medical Doctors are very useful in the way of diagnosis. The technology available today is incredible for that purpose. I do not, however, believe in MOST Medical Doctor's suggestions for TREATMENT. This is because MD's are taught to treat the symptoms rather than the cause, and I just don't agree with that philosophy... I'd rather go with an approach that humans have been using successfully for thousands of years. Unfortunately, MD's are completely uneducated about nutrition, herbs and the incredible natural healing powers within the body, so it's no wonder that this approach scares them... They simply don't understand it or have the knowledge to support it. Because of this, they will most likely shut it down, tell you there's no cure and recommend that you go ahead with some kind of conventional treatment. I hope that you can sit back and listen to your intuition, and if that is to follow the orders of your MD, please do! If it is to follow a more holistic and natural approach, I hope you honor that and don't allow your doctor's fear of what he or she does not know influence how YOU feel about your personal healing process and the research you've done. Remember, YOU are in charge of your body.