The DASH Diet Mediterranean Solution: The Best Eating Plan to Control Your Weight and Improve Your Health for Life (A DASH Diet Book)

by Marla Heller

The DASH diet (based on the research, Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension) and the Mediterranean diet have both been acclaimed as the best of the best in the world.

Both help reduce inflammation and are associated with lower rates of heart attacks, strokes, heart failure, certain types of cancer, and a reduced risk of developing type 2 diabetes.

a plan that is sustainable, so that it will become your life-long healthy eating style while helping you reach and maintain a healthy weight.

The DASH diet and the Mediterranean diet are the plans that endure.

The DASH diet is extra rich in fruits and vegetables, low-fat dairy, and nuts, and includes mostly whole grains, lean meats, fish, and poultry, and moderate amounts of heart-healthy fats. The Mediterranean diet is also based on all those foods, along with an emphasis on seafood, olive oil, beans, herbs, and spices, and the optional inclusion of red wine.

A diet is a food pattern. An eating style.

For any diet or eating pattern to be worth your time and effort, it should be something you can live with for the long run, and it should make you healthier.

No plan should ruin your health.

It’s only a worthy plan if it makes you feel great and lets you truly enjoy eating.

This plan makes it easy to manage weight and reduces risk for heart disease, hypertension, fatty liver disease,1 and diabetes.

the Med-DASH plan is so satisfying that you will find it’s easy to stay on track with your goals.

This plan has been proven to lower cholesterol and blood sugar. Your waistline will shrink, which is a huge clue that your body is better able to metabolize carbohydrates instead of storing extra glucose in your abdominal (visceral) fat and your liver.

Forget struggling, forget “cheating,” forget counting calories, forget lists of allowed and forbidden foods, forget the battle to follow one more diet that gives guidance that completely conflicts with sound science regarding what your body does and doesn’t need to get healthy.

the Med-DASH plan provides all the strategies you need to facilitate your entry into the delicious new world of healthy eating.

Heart health is what garnered all the attention for the DASH diet and the Mediterranean diet.

Research shows that DASH is associated with improved brain health and reduced systemic inflammation, along with lower risk for type 2 diabetes, some types of cancers, and fatty liver disease.

We need to reexamine how we eat and find out how to make it easy to follow a realistic, healthy eating plan.

over two-thirds of women who have a heart attack will never fully recover.3,4

Heart disease kills more people than all types of cancer combined.

The DASH diet delivers the vegetarian benefits, but without making you give up some favorite foods (although it fully supports a wholly vegetarian eating plan, if that’s what you want).

The Mediterranean and the DASH diet plans are so similar that it seems perfect to put them together.

We want a plant-based diet, with some flexibility, and we are completely willing to incorporate olive oil to make our meals more satisfying.

1. The DASH diet—Developed in research, to provide benefits that were observed from plant-focused and vegetarian diets and designed to be America’s healthiest diet. 2. The Mediterranean diet—Discovered via observation of the habits of some of the world’s healthiest and longest-lived people.

Each is plant-focused and includes beans, nuts, and seeds; dairy; olive oil and other heart-healthy fats; as well as seafood and moderate amounts of m...

following the DASH or the Mediterranean diet is associated with lower risks for heart attacks, stroke, and heart failure.

it is associated with lower “bad” (LDL) cholesterol and better “good” (HDL) cholesterol.

Classifications of Blood Pressure (United States) Blood Pressure Categories: Normal (desirable) Systolic Blood Pressure (Top Number) in mm Hg: Less than 120 Diastolic Blood Pressure (Bottom Number) in mm Hg: and Less than 80 Blood Pressure Categories: Elevated Systolic Blood Pressure (Top Number) in mm Hg: 120–129 Diastolic Blood Pressure (Bottom Number) in mm Hg: and Less than 80 Blood Pressure Categories: Stage 1 Hypertension Systolic Blood Pressure (Top Number) in mm Hg: 130–139 Diastolic Blood Pressure (Bottom Number) in mm Hg: or 80–89 Blood Pressure Categories: Stage 2 Hypertension Systolic Blood Pressure (Top Number) in mm Hg: 140 or higher Diastolic Blood Pressure (Bottom Number) in mm Hg: or 90 or higher Table 2. Classification of blood pressure AHA, ACC, JNC8, 2017

Red Wine Wine is typically consumed with meals in the Mediterranean area. The red wine in the Mediterranean diet appears to reduce the risk of plaque rupture, although just in the short term. It is rich in antioxidant and anti-inflammatory properties. You can get much of the same benefit with red grape juice.

Controlling Triglycerides • Avoid processed carbs and foods with added sugars, and limit juice. • Drink alcohol only in moderation. • Exercise to help your body process blood sugar better. Your muscles will respond better to your natural insulin and burn more glucose as fuel.

One of the most common and devastating conditions that can ruin our health is metabolic syndrome.

It is possible to manage or even reverse metabolic syndrome. In order to understand how to do that, it is important to understand what metabolic syndrome actually is, and how it gets started. (A syndrome is a disease where you do not need to have each of the symptoms to be diagnosed.)

Metabolic Syndrome, Diagnostic Criteria (3 of more of the following symptoms) Symptom: Waist circumference American Heart Association/American College of Cardiologists8: 40 inches or more for men, 35 inches or more for women International Diabetes Federation9: Depends on ethnic criteria Symptom: Fasting blood glucose American Heart Association/American College of Cardiologists8: 100 mg/dL or greater, or receiving treatment for diabetes International Diabetes Federation9: 5.6 mmol/L or greater, or being treated for diabetes Symptom: HDL (high-density lipoprotein) cholesterol American Heart Association/American College of Cardiologists8: Less than 40 for men, less than 50 for women, or being treated for low HDL International Diabetes Federation9: Less than 1.03 mmol/L in men, less than 1.29 mmol/L in women or being treated for low HDL Symptom: Triglycerides American Heart Association/American College of Cardiologists8: 150 mg/dL or higher, or being treated for high triglycerides International Diabetes Federation9: 1.7 mmol/L or higher, or being treated for high triglycerides Symptom: Blood pressure American Heart Association/American College of Cardiologists8: Elevated blood pressure (greater than 130/85 mm Hg) or being treated for hypertension. International Diabetes Federation9: Systolic BP greater than 130 mm Hg and/or diastolic greater than 85 mm Hg, or being treated for elevated blood pressure Table 3

Using the optional Med-DASH jump-start plan in this book (see here) will help you go a long way toward shrinking your waist size, an easy, visible way to evaluate whether you are taking the right steps to help control this condition.

PCOS Polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) is very similar to metabolic syndrome in its presentation. However, it adds extra problems, such as difficulty conceiving and excess production of androgens. While it is a complex problem, the components related to metabolic syndrome (elevated glucose, excess abdominal fat, elevated triglycerides, low HDL, and elevated blood pressure) will respond to the Med-DASH plan to reduce or manage these symptoms.

One of the key ways the Med-DASH plan helps you lower your cholesterol is by reducing saturated fats.

choose lean meats and poultry when we have animal proteins. (Beans are good protein sources and do not contain saturated fats. Additionally, their fiber helps to reduce absorption of cholesterol and fats during digestion.)

Avoiding process...

Reducing cholesterol that comes from food may be beneficial for treating heart disease,

Sad, but True Taking artificial trans fats out of foods has been a great idea—until the food industry found a way to replace one bad fat with another. The palm oil that has replaced trans fats in most processed foods is highly saturated and likely to cause higher blood cholesterol. Currently, the United States does not allow any artificial trans fats to be used in food products, but when it comes to harmful fats in processed foods, we aren’t out of the woods yet.

You want to reduce harmful fats, not the beneficial ones.

So how do you avoid refined carbohydrates, extra sugar, and harmful fats? Don’t shy away from anything that has a higher fat content—just try to cut down on foods that contain palm oil or coconut oil.

The high levels of antioxidants found in plant-based foods are very beneficial for heart health because they reduce the body’s ability to oxidize cholesterol.

Have protein and fats to satisfy hunger more easily and longer, while also keeping blood sugar on a more even keel.

The Med-DASH Plan to Curb Cravings and Keep You Satisfied By choosing a diet without lots of processed carbs, you can avoid blood sugar rushes and subsequent crashes. The Med-DASH plan allows you to be satisfied without overeating. After so many years of following high-carb, low-protein/low-fat plans, you will find it much easier to achieve and maintain your desired weight. • Sugar cravings are reduced when you can avoid the blood sugar roller coaster triggered by diets high in processed carbs. Foods high in processed carbs can cause a blood sugar rush followed by a crash, which then leads to more cravings. • The plan encourages healthy protein-rich meals and snacks. Protein (either plant or animal protein) is digested more slowly than processed carbs and can get turned into glucose to keep blood sugar from dropping too low, thus providing energy when you have less sugar in your bloodstream (about an hour after eating). This satisfies hunger. • Avoiding surges in blood sugar helps lower triglycerides. • A fiber-rich diet helps slow digestion and the absorption of carbs, making it easier for your body to control blood sugar. • Heart-healthy fats improve satiety at the end of a meal or snack, and keep you feeling full longer.

The foundation of both the DASH diet and the Mediterranean diet is plant foods.

Women who are obese but “healthy” are at a 40 percent higher risk of developing CVD and an 84 percent higher risk of developing a metabolic disease that corresponded to at least one of the conditions of the metabolic syndrome. This was reported from the Nurses’ Health Study (NHS), which has been following over ninety thousand initially healthy women for forty-plus years.

1

obese men were 67 percent more likely to develop CVD and obese women were 85 percent more likely; both groups were more likely to develop it at a younger age...

Carrying extra weight around your waist is an indicator for when excess weight is associated with health risks and subclinical inflammation. BMI is not.3

Avoiding empty carbs is an easy way to start reducing that excess abdominal fat.