My friend, Rosse G., told me this week she has decided to have a clean plate. “Uh, like you never wash your dishes? You eat out of paper plates now?”
“Don’t be silly,” she said. “My dinner plates are clean. I meant healthy eating.” “Oh, I’m sure your cardiologist told you you’re a borderline case.”
Rosse told me she was in the pink of health. What made her rethink what she puts on her plate is self-love.
“Yes, Lith, if you really love yourself, you will nourish your body in the best possible way.” So far so good in our conversation until she shared about a video she watched on YouTube. “Here I was trying to switch to eating more fruits and veggies to cleanse my system when this video that a friend of mine sent me told me to avoid certain fruits.”
I urged her to continue. The video was from Wise Advice, wherein the host explained why certain fruits are counter-productive for people taking medication to lower bad cholesterol and to control blood pressure.
For fear of being quoted as the source of data that the show host presented, I will skip listing down the fruits. This makes today’s column useless and irritating because I am sure you want to know what these fruits are.
“Yes, Lith, tell your readers what I told you,” Rosse urged me. I wanted to oblige her, although one part of me resisted.
She asked me why. I told her I did not have time to verify the data on the video. I have read some information regarding some of the fruits discussed in other online journals but I needed more proof.
Rosse said she felt discouraged after listening to the video. Although she is not on medication, and she believes that prevention is better than cure, she feels truly fruitless now. We laughed at her pun. “So what do you plan now?”
She said she would do what she has always done, and that is to have a balanced diet but this time add one type of fruit in every meal anyway.
I applauded her. As I did, I asked her about the big, brown paper bag she placed on my table when she arrived earlier.
“Oh, snacks!” she replied.
In the bag was indeed a “balanced meal” of chicken nuggets, fruit pies, burgers with lettuce and bottled fruit juice. I imagined the health video host shaking his sensible head and saying, “Shame on you. Good nutrition down the drain.”
I brushed off the thought as I told Rosse, “Let’s eat.”