Hope for Type 1 Childhood Onset Diabetics
Health-supporting lifestyle offers the very real promise of a normal, disease-free life.

By Joel Fuhrman, M.D.

Ioften am asked, “Is your program appropriate for type I diabetics? Aren’t they going to require insulin forever, no matter what they eat?”

A type 1 diabetic can never stop taking all insulin entirely like a type 2 diabetic can. Even after adopting a high-nutrient, Eat To Live (ETL) dietary approach, they still will need to take regular injections. However, stopping insulin is not the reason for the type 1 diabetics to adopt this approach.

Conventional care

With conventional care, the longterm prognosis for a type 1 diabetic is dismal. More than one-third of all type 1 diabetics die before the age of fifty. I contend that this need not be the case. Type 1 diabetics need not feel doomed to a life of medical disasters and an early death sentence.

A different approach

I find that when type 1 diabetics adopt the ETL program, they can lower their insulin requirements by about half. They no longer have swings of highs and lows, and their glucose levels and lipids stay under excellent control. In other words, it is not Type 1 diabetes itself that causes such negative health consequences. Rather, it is the combination of the diabetes and the typical nutritional “advice” given to these patients—advice that requires them to take large amounts of unnecessary insulin.

The extra insulin and the high glucose levels raise lipids,accelerate atherosclerosis, and damage the body. With this in mind, it should be clear that while the Standard American Diet (SAD), which has spread to all industrialized nations, is dangerous for everyone, it is particularly deadly for diabetics.

With a truly health-supporting lifestyle, including exercise and real food designed by nature, the type 1 diabetic can have the same potential for a long, disease-free life as everyone else. Even though the type 1 diabetic still will require exogenous (external) insulin, they will no longer need excessive amounts of it.

Powerful treatment

The vegetable-based, nutrient-dense, Eat To Live dietary program I recommend is designed to be the most effective treatment available for those with diabetes. For the vast majority of type 2 diabetic patients, this approach results in complete reversal of the diabetic condition. For type 1 diabetic patients, it solves the problem of excessive highs and lows and prevents the typical dangerous complications that too frequently befall those with this medical condition.

A total approach

Of course, no dietary approach to diabetes will succeed without attention to other risk factors— especially sedentary lifestyle, smoking, and lack of sleep. The road to wellness involves making a commitment to a new lifestyle.