Friday, November 29, 2013

Sober Day #31- Eating to support Sobriety

Being a somewhat insatiably curious person, I find myself wondering about how we in early sobriety can use nutrition to support ourselves, how food and supplements might hasten our return to vibrant health.  And there is a ton of information available, as my initial google searches have identified.

On the other hand, as a scientifically-trained physician, I am highly skeptical of unattributed blanket claims.  Things like:  Eat more vegetables, Never eat xxx, always eat a lot of yyyy- grab my attention in a bad sort of way.

So I have given myself a new task:  Developing a health assessment useful for establishing a health baseline on quitting alcohol, and coming up with evidence-based recommendations for food and supplements.

Evidence-based means that I can show you (a) specific article(s) from peer-reviewed medical journals that provide good evidence to support that recommendation.  It is the opposite of the 'snatched from thin air' recommendations found proliferating on the web.

As soon as I figure out how to do it, I will make a separate page summarizing these ideas, with references back to each specific post detailing the scientific evidence for this particular recommendation.

My Thanksgiving, BTW, was alcohol-free and pretty awesome.  This was my first major holiday without alcohol, and it went pretty smoothly.  Thank goodness I have a relatively drama-free family, so I didn't have to cope with the massive drinking around me or other major crazinesses that many of our community had to face, and I am grateful for that!!

4 comments:

  1. "Insatiably curious." Me too! Because I suffer a hereditary condition with no known cure or effective treatment, I have PubMed'ed myself to sleep many nights :) No University of Google for me haha.

    I am particularly drawn to emerging genetically tailored medicine. Dr. Ben Lynch is a good example of someone who has a pet gene. He has done fascinating work on the MTHFR gene and the methylation cycle (he backs everything he does with peer reviewed literature and/or clinical knowledge. It's amazing where the coding of the genome has taken us and where we can go in the future.

    Congrats on a good Thanksgiving! Onward and upward, my friend!

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  2. Oh my gosh... you have met your polar opposite in me. I live my life based on what seems to be common sense to me. lol The simpler the better.

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  3. Haha, Annette- The world needs both of us! Science Nerds and Common Sensers both bring richness to this tapestry of Life (wow, I am apparently feeling very poetic today too, lol!)

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I'd love to hear about your journey, and hear your take on my journey. Comments are very welcome!!