A Newer and Kinder Medicine

The Carbohydrate Addict's Healthy Heart Program : Break Your Carbo-Insulin Connection to Heart Disease
by Richard F. Heller, M.S., Ph.D., Rachael F. Heller, Ph.D., Frederic J. Vagnini, M.D.

Compatible with the American Heart Association guidelines, The Carbohydrate Addict's Healthy Heart Program is a carb-smart plan designed to correct the cause of your carbohydrate cravings and weight gain while cutting your risk for high blood pressure, high blood fat levels, adult-onset diabetes, and heart disease-without sacrifice and without deprivation!

Are you a carbohydrate addict at risk for heart disease?

Take this quiz and find out.

1. After eating breakfast, are you hungry before lunchtime?

2. Do you get tired in the middle of the afternoon and find that a snack makes you feel better?

3. Do you eat or snack when you're really not hungry?

4. Once you start eating snack foods or sweets, is it hard to stop?

5. Does stress, exhaustion, loneliness, or boredom make you want to eat?

6. Have you been told that you're overweight or have high blood pressure or adult-onset diabetes? Or do any of these disorders run in your family?

Scoring: Count your "Yes" answers:

0-1 Probably not carbohydrate addicted
2-4 Mild or moderate carbohydrate addiction
5-6 Severely carbohydrate addicted

There was a time when we ate food simply because it tasted good and gave us pleasure. There was a time when we walked just for the enjoyment of it, and when we were done, we felt relaxed and happy. There was a time when we viewed our bodies as givers of pleasure and life, and we felt good and secure knowing that our bodies could be trusted and relied upon. There was a time when our doctors, and medical science in general, were held responsible for finding the source of our physical ailments, and it was expected, their job was to cure us as well.

Now, it seems, a most amazing transformation has taken place. Food is viewed as medicine, chosen for its ability to ward off an impending state of ill health rather than for the pleasure or satisfaction it gives. We keep our bodies under strict surveillance, and act as if they harbor some untrustworthy beast waiting to attack us from within-one that requires a strong hand and a disciplinarian's watchful eye. Activity, now in the form of regimented exercise, has become arduous and demanding. Pleasure has been replaced by a self-righteous sense of sacrifice and society's confirmation that by giving up all things enjoyable, we offer proof of our goodness, dedication, and self-discipline.

Each media message reinforces our sacred responsibility to fight, at all costs, the physical changes associated with growing older gracefully. In virtually every little action-or lack thereof-we live in judgment both of one another and of ourselves. In the end, in a frenzied quest for a longer life, we have lost some of the pleasure and joy that once filled our days and which made life worth living, too.

Even in illness, there is no respite. The media carry the message that according to the evaluations and statistics of some faceless group of scientists, it is we who are responsible for our own health and for our ill health as well. Although the burden of our physical well-being can be linked in part and to some degree to our own actions and choices, in the extreme this kind of thinking frees the medical establishment of virtually all accountability. Logically, this kind of responsibility shifting makes us into the presumed-guilty perpetrators of crimes against ourselves. It is time to stop blaming the victim.

All too often, we as patients are made to feel that we are to blame for getting sick in the first place. We get the message, especially in the area of heart health, that we were given a perfect body to begin with, and had we not abused it, it would not be giving us problems Our concerns go unaddressed, our needs unmet, and when we are unable to achieve ideal health, we are seen as "our own worst enemy," for in the end, we have moved into an age in which we are being told, "Patient, heal thyself."

Nowhere is this struggle more intense than in the area of heart health, and for none is heart health more elusive and failure more prevalent than for those who suffer from the hormonal imbalance that leads to an addiction to carbohydrates. With cravings that virtually overpower them, the carbohydrate addicts have little chance of being successful with traditional weight-loss or health-enhancing eating programs. Their biology literally sets them up for failure, and instead of their intense cravings' being treated as evidence of the physical problem it is, these victims are blamed and shamed by friends, family, media; by the medical establishment at large; and even by themselves.

It is time for a change-for a new and kinder medicine, one more like the medical treatment we received when many of us were kids, a type of medical care that offers help instead of blame, support instead of judgment, information rather than condemnation, understanding, empathy, and the facts and simple strategies that can be used by real people, in real life, to make a real difference in their heart health-without deprivation, struggle, self-blame, or sacrifice.

In the pages that follow, you will learn about some of the most exciting and promising approaches to heart health that we have found to be especially important to the carbohydrate addict. Taken from Eastern and Western disciplines alike, from both traditional and evidence-based complementary approaches, from holistic to high tech, these remarkable advances will offer you a world of powerful alternatives you might otherwise never have discovered. The information and recommendations you will find in these pages may surprise you. They will offer you a front-row view of the newest approaches, scientific findings, and programs that are emerging on the cutting edge of heart health research especially relevant to the carbohydrate addict.

This, then, is not another if you just did what you know is right you wouldn't be killing yourself health book. This is a down-to-earth, back-to-basics survival guide that will help you discover current, state-of-the-art medical breakthroughs that can help you reduce your risk for insulin-related heart disease, get healthy, and stay healthy-without blame, shame, or impossible demands. We will help you determine your probable risk for insulin-related heart problems and identify which simple, struggle-free steps can help you-without deprivation.

The book you now hold in your hands was written in celebration-a sharing of the most up-to-date heart health research findings available to bring you both health and happiness. The recommendations you will find here are simple and fun, and are designed not only to make you feel good and look good but to help you stay healthy as well. Standard, one-size-fits-all programs usually require you to make sacrifices that are impractical or genuinely not doable in the long run, especially for the carbohydrate addict. Most programs ask you to live by the numbers: counting calories or fat grams, dealing cards, measuring, or figuring percentages. Naturally slim, naturally healthy people don't live by the numbers. Neither can you-at least not for very long-for you, as a carbohydrate addict, have a physical imbalance. That imbalance must be corrected in order for you to achieve an easy and lasting success. We know what causes your addiction, and we know how to correct it.

From Trade Paperback edition

Excerpted from The Carbohydrate Addict's Healthy Heart Program by Richard & Rachael Heller/Frederic Vagnini Copyright © 2000 by Richard & Rachael Heller/Frederic Vagnini. Excerpted by permission of Ballantine Books, a division of Random House, Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.

About the Author

For more than a decade, Richard F. Heller, M.S., Ph.D. helds a professorial appointment and conducted research at Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York City. Dr. Richard Heller holds a third appointment as Professor Emeritus at the City University of New York.

Rachael F. Heller, M.A., M.Ph., Ph.D. helds a professorial appointment at Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York City and in the Department of Biomedical Sciences in the Graduate School of the City University of New York. With Richard F. Heller they are coauthors of many books, including the bestselling Healthy for Life and The Carbohydrate Addict's Diet.

Frederic Vagnini, M.D., is medical director of the Cardiovascular Wellness Center in New York City and was clinical professor of surgery at Cornell University for twenty-five years. Dr. Vagnini has a great deal of media experience. For years, he was a frequent guest on local and national radio and television. He presently hosts "The Heart Show," a live, call-in program on WOR 710 AM in New York, every Sunday from 4 to 5 p.m.