If you’re not familiar with MS (multiple sclerosis), it’s a disease of the central nervous system that affects around 350,000 Americans, mostly Caucasians, and more often women than men. Its numbers are higher in populations where typical diets are composed of lots of beef, butter, cheese, and other saturated fats. 

MS is often treated with expensive and toxic drugs, but Dr. John McDougall (you may recognize him from the film Forks Over Knives) has successfully treated many MS patients with a plant-based diet, based upon the low-fat, whole foods diet pioneered by his mentor Dr. Roy Swank. 

Today, Dr. McDougall’s patient Donna shares how she went from feeling devastated by her MS diagnosis to hopeful, happy and healthy, first by following a low-fat/whole foods diet, then by adopting a 100% plant-based diet. Here’s an excerpt from her story (you can read the whole story here):

How Food Became My Medicine
By Donna McFarland

“I woke up on April 17, 1989 to one of the darkest, most life-altering days of my life. As I got out of bed I was shocked to find that my left leg collapsed under me. It felt heavy and would not support my weight. I erroneously passed it off as a pinched nerve. My doctor couldn’t find any cause for it, so it became a ‘watch and wait’ situation. I dragged that leg around for more than six weeks. 

Finally, my family doctor scheduled an appointment with a neurologist in Phoenix, Arizona at a well-known neurological institute. My doctor warned me ahead of time that the physician he was referring me to did not have a pleasant bedside manner but that he was very proficient in his field. 

An MRI was performed and the follow-up meeting with the neurologist went something like this: ‘The MRI shows that you have multiple sclerosis. You are among the top third of the worst cases we’ve ever seen here. You have a few good years left.’ The neurologist delivered the news with as much compassion and sensitivity as a weatherman might deliver the day’s highs and lows. Talk about devastating! 

Fortunately, within a short amount of time, I discovered Dr. Roy Swank [Dr. McDougall’s mentor]. I learned that he had studied multiple sclerosis (MS) since 1946 and, based on his scientific findings, had successfully treated MS patients through a healthful diet. I studied his program intensely, adopted a very low saturated fat diet (15 grams max a day), and ate lots of clean, whole foods. I didn’t look at it as a diet but as a lifestyle, one that I enthusiastically embraced.

It’s been eighteen years now since I first met with Dr. Swank, and today I do not use any kind of aids or devices (such as a walker, cane, or braces), but I do eat Dr. McDougall’s low-fat, plant-based diet, and I take the daily rest breaks that Dr. Swank strongly advised. I am grateful for each day of health that I enjoy, and only occasionally do I feel some extremity tingling (when I’ve allowed myself to overdo it without rest). 

To quote Hippocrates, the Father of Medicine, ‘Let your food be your medicine and your medicine be your food.’ This is certainly the message in the work of Dr. Swank and Dr. McDougall.”

Congratulations, Donna! If you would like to read more inspiring success stories about managing MS through a kind diet, read Kind Lifer Tevia’s guest blog here. 

If you know anyone who suffers from MS, Dr. McDougall has a wonderful website with lots of information, and programs for getting started on a kind, low-fat, plant-based diet. You can also donate to Dr. McDougall’s ongoing research efforts here. 

Thank you for sharing your story Donna and thank you for all the kind work you do, Dr. McDougall! Do any of you kind lifers struggle with MS or know someone who does?

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I hope you have a happy Mardi Gras! Its name "Fat Tuesday" refers to the feasting that would take place on the Tuesday before Ash Wednesdsay, when fasting for Lent would traditionally start. Whether you're Catholic or not, it's always fun to celebrate with yummy food. Here's the recipe I posted recently for Vegan Jambalaya so you can get in the spirit – bon appetit!

How are you celebrating Mardi Gras?

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Last time I posted about vegan bodybuilders, lots of you kind lifers asked for more! Now the New York Times has picked up on the veg bodybuilding trend, profiling a few names that will probably be familiar to you, including Robert Cheeke and Giacomo Marchese (sorry ladies, he’s engaged now!).

The article includes perspectives from both the bodybuilders and nutritionists who support a veg lifestyle…as well as those who question it. Read the full article here, then email the article’s author, Mary Pilon, to let her know how much you enjoyed the article, and why you are committed to a veg lifestyle.

Who are your favorite vegan athletes?

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My friend Missi Pyle is journeying on! In her latest guest blog update, she gives the scoop on her favorite vegan breakfast, and is even inspired to live a little kinder outside of her diet. And even though she still has occasional moments of weakness, she should be proud of how far she's come. Check out the latest in her vegan voyage:

Vegan Blog #7! aka Sorry it took so long! aka I'm really kind of a fake Vegan aka Vegan Breakfast Goulash aka the paper towel conundrum aka Why so many Aka's?

Dear Best Friend!

First of all I just want to say, OMG. Some of you have been so agitated that I have not blogged in so long. To that I say. AWWWWW. Finally someone who cares! Yessssss! Well Suckas I am back. With so much incredible knowledge and wisdom to impart! Let's do this!

So where to begin. Meredith and I left Alicia Silverstone's house shortly after the gorgeous GIGANTIC family of rats left her house.  PS. We were mind boggled as to how on earth they were getting in.  Here's a tip. If you live in the canyons of Los Angeles and you DON'T want rats to come into your house. Don't leave the door open after say 4pm. Yep that's how they came in. Through the front door. I am a genius.

But I digress.

Where are we now? You might ask? Well. We had kind of special needs in that we have 2 giant kind of scary looking dogs, a rottie mix Ellie and a pit bull mix Sunny, two very nice girls*. So we needed a back yard. Because there is no way I am living with 2 giant dogs in an apartment. Mostly because I have no desire to get up and put on pants to let them out.**

Special need #2- we don't have a lot of dough since Meredith is but a new college graduate and I am broke, bad with money, and paying for half a geodome in Montana. Sooo we looked on craigslist and found this tiny house with a gorgeous backyard with lots of tropical plants, an illegal bonfire and the worlds most disgusting outdoor futon. It is HEAVEN. Really. It also comes with an extremely green pagan landlord who lets us babysit his alpha pit bull Tony*** all day! Party!


When they are not lazing in the sunshine, the dogs, and meredith, are usually lazing on my bed. tho my bedroom is the size of most of your closets, it has a door to the garden which is incredible. So at any given time, every living being in the house is IN it.

And the kitchen. OMG. the counter tops are concrete. So manly. So cool and since we are broke, all we do is cook. Meredith is not quite vegan. Lets be honest neither am I, I have been eating fish. But its a process. And Alicia says its ok. Be nice to yourself. I adore her. And I try to only eat the wild caught stuff and only once in a while. Don't judge me.

Anyway. In the morning, the backyard is stupidly sunny and beautiful. So we like to cook and eat outside when we can.

So I wanted to share one of our favorite breakfast dishes with you that we make probably 2 to 3 times a week. it's our vegan breakfast goulash/hash/breakfast tacos. Or Yum tacos, for short. We came up with it by just looking in the fridge and seeing what we could use to make breakfast with. Here's what we came up with:

1/2 yellow onion diced
1/2 red pepper diced
1/2 zucchini sliced with the large slicer on the side of the cheese grater which i have NEVER used. but omg it slices zucchini like fine slices of a baby's ass. Sorry.
4 or 5 1/4 inch thick slices of polenta
about 4 oz soy chorizo
1 tomato diced
olive oil
salt
pepper
daiya cheese
corn tortillas
avocado
hot sauce

What we do is saute the onions and peppers in olive oil till the onions are clear. then throw in the zucchini then the polenta and tomato, then the chorizo, and finally the cheese till it looks melty.

in the meantime we heat up the tortillas one at a time on the burners. i usually get distracted and burn them. this makes meredith angry. but actually the really burned ones taste super yummy so then I like to rub this in her beautiful, much younger, face.
then we scoop them into the tortillas and finish off with hot sauce and slices of avocado. Then we go and sit in the sunshine and eat them on the picnic table in the back yard and drink lots of coffee and talk about how cool we think the other is.

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Which brings us to part 2 of our Not so Vegan Vegan Blog. The Great Paper Towel Conundrum of 2012(almost).
Dum Dum Dum!

Apparently paper towels, which have so lovingly cleaned the shit off our counters, cabinets and dirty kitchen floors are controversial! Who knew? I knew Alicia didn't use them. She has a drawer of old rags she uses instead but she's Alicia Silverstone. Kind of the Jesus of the conservation movement. I thought everybody else still used them!


So when we were at her house, we snuck some in that we got from trader Joes, the 100 percent recycled kind, mind you. But we did try to hide them from her assistant. On top of the fridge, roll lying discreetly on its side.

But now that we have moved in with our Pagan Green Landlord. Who we call Pagan Frank, because he is bossy and reminds us of our Dad. But if Frank were a pagan.****
Anyway. He told me he ALSO doesn't use paper towels.

Wtf?? He too uses old rags and shirts.
Holy Guacamole! He suggested we do the same. I told him I didn't HAVE any old t-shirts to rip up.
He then gave me a baseball cap for my birthday wrapped in a blue piece of t-shirt. He said. "why don't u use that? I said. why don't you go f yourself. just kidding. he IS the landlord after all.
Here is Ben. Meredith's new "special friend" holding up the old shirt scrap and the crispy white disposable paper towel.


What to do...? Well. since we Pyle's never shy from a challenge...
the new challenge for Meredith and I is to use rags and old shirt scraps for the entire month of January. We will see how it goes. And let you know. Ps. Meredith is furious about this.***** But we are doing this for you and for the planet and for our eminent fake vegan fame.

pss. i thought since we are always looking a little rough in these blogs, kind of like we just woke up, which we usually did, and one of us did NOT take off her makeup the night before.******
I thought I would leave you with a picture of us having had our hair and makeup professionally done for the LA premiere of The Artist which I am in.


psss. Please go see it. It's a beautiful silent film. Ironically the biggest movie I have ever been a part of. One in which I am only in for like 10 minutes******* and where I don't make a sound.
Alas. Life can be weird.
But not as weird as you.

Until the next time. think about cutting up some old shirts and using them as paper towels. or making our sexy morning hash.
WE LOVE YOU
xox
Missi and Meredith

* They are mostly nice except when Ellie tries to kill Sunny because she is younger and has real legs.
**I am wearing pants right now. Don't worry.********
***Tony is actually an incredible dog. He likes to howl along when there are sirens, which is almost every day because we live deep in the hood in echo park.  And we LOVE having him around. But not as much as Sunny. They hump all day. Actually, it's pretty gross.
****he's actually cool. for a pagan and inspiring and gets shit done. so woo hoo. i guess right?
*****well i haven't told her yet. but she WILL be furious when she reads this. hehe.
******i'll give you a hint. it's usually the one of us who is laying in bed with 3 dogs and a nice glass of pinot noir.
*******it's actually more like 10 seconds. but who cares! go see it. pretty please!
********i'm lying.

Thanks, Missi! Side note about the fish – I think Missi's doing great with all of the huge changes she is making. i think she knows I don't mean "hey, eat fish, it's ok," I just mean celebrate the success. This girl is from Texas for God's sake…and she will let go of fish when she is ready. Until then, she should be proud of how far she has come. Missi recently shared with me that she's still vegan and has lost the eight pounds she's been trying to shed for the last three years. She's also converted a few friends…yahoo Missi!

What was the hardest thing for you to let go of when you were starting out?

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Mardi Gras is just around the corner, so I thought I’d share a little Cajun-inspired fare. Aine Carlin's veg jambalaya looks festive. Check it out, and let me know how it is if you make it!

Vegan Jambalaya

Prep time: 15 minutes  |  Cook time: 35 minutes    |    Total time: 50 minutes    |    Servings: 4

Ingredients

• 1 onion
• 1 red pepper
• 4 slices vegan bacon or vegan chorizo
• 1 cup vegan chicken style pieces
• 1 cup short grain brown rice
• 1 cup frozen peas
• 1 cup sweet corn (canned, fresh or frozen)
• 11/2 cups chopped tomatoes (fresh or canned)
• 1 tsp tomato/vegetable puree
• 2 or 3 cloves of garlic
• 1 red chili
• 1 tbsp smoked paprika
• 1 tsp chili flakes
• 1/2 tsp blackstrap molasses
• Tabasco sauce (as much or as little as you like)
• Large handful of freshly chopped flat leaf parsley
• Olive oil
• Salt and pepper

Instructions

1. Heat a little olive oil in a pan. Finely dice the onion and add to the pan along with some seasoning. Allow to soften for a few minutes. Mince the garlic and finely chop the chili and add to pan along with the chili flakes.
2. Cut the ‘bacon’ into chunks or if using vegan chorizo pieces add to pan along with the paprika and cook until it starts to color.
3. Cut the pepper into large pieces, add to pan, season and allow to soften with the other ingredients.
4. Pour in the brown rice, give it a stir and then add the tomato puree and chopped tomatoes. Season, add the molasses and one cup of water. Shake in a good amount of Tabasco sauce. Fill the cup with water and set aside – you will use this water throughout.
5. Allow to gently simmer for 30mins before adding the frozen chicken style pieces – if using refrigerated pieces they will take less time to cook. If it becomes too dry add more water – like you would do a risotto. Cook for a further 15 minutes or until the rice is fully cooked.
6. A few minutes before serving add the peas, sweet corn and allow them to gently cook before sprinkling in the parsley ensuring to reserve some for when you plate up. Season and/or add more Tabasco if necessary.
7. Serve in bowls and sprinkle with the remaining parsley.

Are you making anything special for Mardi Gras?

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Photo Source:  Aine Carlin

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These are my favorite toiletries.  What are yours?

Toothbrushes

-Preserve Personal Care Toothbrush

-Fuchs Duo Plus

Toothpaste

-Jason Natural Cosmetics Sea Fresh Toothpaste (not the one with coQ-10 in it)

Deodorant

-Naturally Fresh Crystal Roll-On Deodorant

Face Pads & Q-Tips

-Organic Essentials Brand Certified Organic Cotton Products



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Catskill Animal Sanctuary founder Kathy Stevens has written a book called Animal Camp, about her daily life at the sanctuary. Included in her book are stories of just-in-the-nick-of-time rescues, incredible recoveries from animal cruelty cases, and heart-melting instances of animals showing love, compassion, and friendship. 

This book is for any animal lover, or anyone curious about how animal sanctuaries operate. It’s for flirts and animal-loving / non-veg friends too.

You can buy a copy of Animal Camp here – and if you live in New York, I highly recommend visiting Catskill Animal Sanctuary. You can read my blog about it here - it’s a very, very special place. 

Do you have a great animal sanctuary near you?

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For my thirtieth birthday, my husband gave me this great clothesline. Now, instead of using a dryer, I hang my clothes using recycled clothespins. It’s fun, I swear! I'm not gonna be able to let my children do chores that are this fun!

What’s your favorite chore around the house?



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In this edition of Missi Pyle's guest blogs about becoming vegan, my witty friend is faced with the age-old dairy argument we've all heard before:

Wary about no dairy? aka Fred the Dairy Fairy aka Vegan blog #6! aka rip steve jobs. Sigh

The thing about being a vegan is, everybody has an opinion about it. Especially the bartender, at The Buggy Whip. Who incidentally is not only a bartender but also a professional nutritionist and architect with his very own clothing line. Hmmm. I guess business must be slow. or he just bartends on the side for funzies. Anyhoo. I was waiting for Megan and Meredith at the bar and looking over the menu for something vegan to eat. They had broccoli sauteed in garlic. yum. and a beet salad. I told the bartender, Fred, that I'd like both but that I was a vegan and just wanted to make sure both dishes were, you know vegan.

fred looked at me and shook his head. "being a vegan is not healthy." wow. thank you so much for your opionion fred. tell me more. "i am a nutritionist, a professional nutritionist and if you don't have dairy from a cow you can't get enough calcium and will get osteoporosis and weak bones." and shrivel up and die? ok, i get it. again, thank you for your opinion. I'd still like to have the broccoli and the salad. fred stared me down cold and hard like john wayne in some vintage western. i thought maybe he'd draw his pistol on me. but no. he just tore the ticket off his ticket order pad, slowly turned, glared at me one more time and walked into the kitchen.

wowzers! while fred was gone. i decided to do a little googling about this whole cows milk- osteoporosis thing. on my iphone. (sigh rip steve jobs... you will be eternally missed) Turns out there are an ass load of other ways to get calcium. Broccoli being one of them. suck on that fred! and look at all these other vegan foods that have calcium:

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i have no idea what blackstrap molasses is. it sounds painful. but dang theres a lot of options.

when fred came back he brought me my broccoli which was sauteed in olive oil and an extraordinary amount of garlic. awesome. and my beet salad covered in cheese. i just looked at him. "really fred?" do you not remember the conversation we had 5 minutes ago? is this why all your other businesses are in the shitter? fred again looked at me like i was the dumbest a hole on the planet and said. "well i guess the cook might make you another one." amazing.

he brought me back the salad with beets this time with no cheese and no salad dressing. i guess to teach me a lesson? and simply walked away.  then meredith and megan arrived. meredith ate most of my broccoli. she is so cute, i didn't mind. then we slammed a glass of vegan wine and took megan to the airport. which incidentally is right around the corner from the Buggy Whip. We did not take a buggy to get there.


alas. i wondered if you, my best friend, have thoughts on the calcium vegan conundrum. maybe you wanna share them with me? so i can go give fred the what for the next time i see him


that's for fred. not you

until then

in the words of steve jobs...

stay hungry, stay foolish

ps. steve jobs gives this speech to the graduates of stanford. it is the most inspiring speech i've ever heard. I think i've listened to it at least a dozen times. it gives me hope when my heart feels heavy and i feel, you know, hopeless.  if you have 10 minutes check it out.

For more info about calcium and why dairy is nasty, check out my blog post about organic dairy here, or page 34 of The Kind Diet.

What food myths were you surprised to discover?

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