A small helping hand, etc.

These boxes are full of canned goods or non-perishible items for the food pantry at Swannanoa Valley Christian Ministries. I brought a bag to include in these boxes at my church. Thinking of families who might find some canned goods welcome at this time.

Our state, and our area have many people identified as having food insufficiency. When I first heard the term I was eating at a site which provided low cost nutritious lunches for seniors. That was last year. 

I've become vegetarian in 2020, which meant I couldn't get nutrition from these lunches which were oriented around an animal based protein. I'm happier making most of my meals now with low-fat plant-based choices. This was recommended by my cardiologist and the Ornish Heart Rehab program.

Warning, a rant shall follow!

 Mission Hospital System, which has become a for-profit member of the HCA corporation, is closing down the Ornish program. I don't know the reason why, but can guess. We survivors of heart conditions were learning new lifestyle choices including stress reduction with meditation, exercise, and eating low-fat plant-based diets. We also formed small groups that could help support our emotions with a counselor facilitator. A lot of healthy choices. 

The only choice the next survivors will have will be a version of the standard rehab class that includes 40 minutes of exercise with a heart monitor, then about 20 min. to sit quietly and be meditative. They may be recommended to eat plant-based diets, but they won't have one served for lunch as well as be given instructions how to cook low-fat. I learned how to sauté vegetables without any oil...and now can cook completely oil-free. I have good friends to offer me a support system in a time when more people are isolated from each other...and I do a daily meditation, which we spent an hour a day practicing during Ornish Rehab. 

I am really dismayed that this wonderful program has ceased to be supported by the corporate hospital system. I know certain cardiologists do support it, and I hope they will offer it somewhere else soon. This is the only cardiac rehab plan that has statistical evidence of reversing the symptoms of heart disease. One of my cohorts had not been considered eligible for surgery for his heart problems, so his alternative was the Ornish program. He visibly became much more fit, lost a lot of weight, and he stated he was eating very differently from his normal southern cooking lifestyle.

And in case you're thinking it has to do with insurance, I was told all insurance covers the Ornish Lifestyle Rehabilitation Program, including Medicare. Makes sense, since many elders were in this group...mainly those who had had heart attacks and some form of surgery. 

I've seen a statement that the "new" Cardio-Rehab will have more of the Ornish training in the future. I guess they can do a lot of these things without calling it Ornish. There's another plant-based famous scientist, Campbell, who has provided lots of good recipes. (That's where I got my potato and bean recipe earlier in the week.)

I must also include in my rants, how I've adapted to having only texts, emails, blogs, and zooms to connect with people. Oh, and a few phone calls. I love talking one on one and having a conversation. As a senior living on my own, I limit my encounters, as I've been warned to do. But first I missed the hugs. Now I miss conversations. OK, I can still pick up the phone myself!

Quote for today:

For the future residents of the earth: may their world still be packed with mysteries.  May they still grow giddy on the eve of a great adventure.  May they become more responsible to one another and the planet.  May they keep their taste for the renegade.  May they never lose their sense of innocence and wonder.  May they live to chase brash and astonishing dreams.  May they return to tell me, if such a thing is possible, so that I can know the answers to a thousand scrupulous puzzles, hear of whole civilizations that bloomed and vanished, learn what travel to other solar systems has revealed and behold the marvels that arose while I was gone.  If that’s not possible, then I will have to make due with the playgrounds of mortality, and hope that at the end of my life I can say simply, wholeheartedly that it was grace enough to be born and live.

Diane Ackerman, Deep Play