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By
Colleen Huber, Naturopathyworks
 What
do laypeople know about nutrition? Perhaps some know quite a bit
as evidenced by the way they keep themselves healthy. On the other
hand, Andrew Weil, MD, the famous alternative medicine expert, blasted
conventional medical schools earlier this year for not teaching
nutrition, and for churning out physicians who are ignorant of basic
food-body interactions. Weil said, "The current state of nutrition
education of health professionals is non-existent to substandard."
As little as our doctors have helped us make good food choices over
the years, we have had to learn to make our own best choices.
Fending for Good Nutrition Advice
 Having
been left to our own inner wisdom for dietary choices, many people
have chosen poorly, however many others have chosen well. The problem
here is that the anonymous and barely visible "man on the street"
is difficult for researchers to observe over many decades. Whatever
that faceless man or woman has been eating for his or her entire
life is largely forgotten, even by those who are doing the consuming.
This is not to mention the fact that the course of his or her health
and well being over that time are equally unknowable.
For these reasons, this article is devoted to the food choices
of highly visible celebrities.
Famous people make some of the most divergent food choices. And,
fortunately, because of their broadly publicized lives, we can watch
and learn the effects of their food choices on their bodies, activities
and longevity. On one hand, we have seen famous entertainers who
eat, drink, smoke and inject some of the most noxious substances
available to them, then burn out and expire at an untimely age.
 Do
the Celebrities Hold the Answers to Staying Young?
Then there are those celebrities, notably Suzanne Somers, Goldie
Hawn, Cheryl Tiegs, Christie Brinkley and others, who have maintained
great health and amazingly youthful faces and bodies while choosing
healthy foods. Fortunately, they have shared their food choices
with us.
Hawn and Somers are both 58 years old, Cheryl Tiegs is 56 and Christie
Brinkley is 50. All four women avoid sugar and other refined carbohydrates.
Goldie Hawn follows a wheat-free, sugar-free and dairy-free diet.
Suzanne Somers, in her Somersizing Diet Book explains why sugar,
not fat is responsible for weight gain. Like many healthy people,
Somers shops the periphery of supermarkets: vegetables, fruits,
dairy and meat, and that's it. Her focus is: "keeping myself
healthy internally so that it manifests on the external."
Many people, on learning about the negative health effects of sugar,
think, "I just can't give it up."
Here is what Suzanne Somers has to say about "can't":
"I will not start any sentence with the words, 'I can't.'
If I do, my mind will accept it as so, and then I won't be able
to accomplish my goals. Instead I will tell myself, 'I can,' or
'I will.' In this way success will come to me."
Even more remarkably, Somers was diagnosed with breast cancer in
2001. She made headlines at the time for choosing homeopathic treatment
over chemotherapy and has survived healthfully.
Undoubtedly, her diet played a role, because sugar feeds cancer.
In fact, glucose is the number one fuel for cancer and Somers decided
to deprive her cancer of it.
 Practicing
Good Nutrition Doesn't Take a Rocket Scientist
Certainly, the above-mentioned celebrities never attended medical
school, nor studied the intricate details of biochemistry to appreciate
just how health-destroying sugar is, or how necessary whole foods
are. But from the available evidence of their youthfulness into
the sixth decade, it's not rocket science to figure out that they've
been doing something impeccably correct: They've been treating their
bodies in such a way as to enjoy every part of a long life.
To me, their life experiences, the act of putting their own well
being on the line and demonstrating the results over decades of
public life, makes them much better teachers of nutrition than those
conventional doctors who struggled or half-dozed through biochemistry
in med school, while never really understanding how nutritional
choices impact our lives.
Looking at these photos, it seems clear who the better health experts
are.
However, in order to get from here to there, it is often helpful
to consult with a naturopathic physician or other natural health
care provider, such as Dr. Mercola,
who does have an extensive knowledge of nutrition. Together with
such a physician, you can determine an eating plan that is right
for you while working toward your weight and health goals.
To locate a naturopathic physician near you, consult the database
of the American
Association of Naturopathic Physicians.
 Colleen
Huber, 46, is a wife, mother and student at Southwest College
of Naturopathic Medicine in Tempe, Ariz., where she is training
to be a naturopathic physician. Her original research on the mechanism
of migraines has appeared in Lancet and Headache Quarterly, and
was reported in The Washington Post.
Her
double blind placebo controlled research in homeopathy has appeared
in Journal of the American Institute of Homeopathy, European Journal
of Classical Homeopathy, and Homeopathy Today. Her website Naturopathy
Works introduces naturopathic medicine to the layperson and
provides references to the abundant medical literature demonstrating
that natural medicine does work.
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