Plant-Based Eating: Re-set your Body (and Budget) after Divorce with author and nutritionist, Kathryn J. Pollard, MS

If you're in the process of , or considering , divorce , now is the time for you to take a deep breath and give yourself permission to find clarity on the financial issues you're facing . Rich means many things to many people . I believe the best definition of being rich is someone who has access to many resources .

Along with my guests on this podcast , I will be bringing you a wide variety of information so that you can make sound and informed financial decisions for your financial future . Welcome back to the Divorce Rich Podcast . Today's episode is one that is very personal to me .

When I was getting divorced many years ago , I really felt out of control in my life , and one of the ways that I was able to take some control in a time that was very traumatic and difficult was by taking a look at how the foods that I put into my body impacted my energy level , my health , my weight , my migraines that I was having at the time , my

skin , everything . That was one way that I could really change and take some control over the trajectory of my life post-divorce . Our guest today is Katherine Pallard . She's an author and a nutritionist and she is here to talk about her new book , eating Does it , which is a great book .

She won the 2024 Living Well Book Award for this book and it really goes into a lot of detail about some smart and simple ways that we can take control back . This is one of those episodes that I invite you to just sit back , take a deep breath and open your mind to some new ideas . So welcome , catherine .

And then he also facilitated the largest population study , or one of was done back in the I think we'd say the 80s in china , called it's . It's referred to as the china park project , where he looked at the dietary patterns of rural chinese people who have been eating and staying in one place and eating like their their ancestors had for generations .

And what he found in years and years of research , both in the lab and in population studies , is that the closer to a whole food , plant-based diet , the healthier people were able to stay and avoid disease . So that's pretty dramatic and it's dramatic today .

So a plant-based diet is one that sort of connotes whole foods , whole grains , fruits , vegetables , legumes , beans , pulses and nuts and seeds , and did I say fruits in there Fruits and vegetables . And did I say fruits in there ? Fruits and vegetables .

One of the things that I really loved about your book was your four eating does it rules , which I thought were really easy and simple to try . Can you walk us through ?

And I know that a lot of my research has just been influenced by well being married to a climatologist for 37 years now and the conversations that we've had , and that there's a lot of intersection and overlap between our own personal habits and what control that we have over really big , challenging issues , in fact , the issues of our time chronic disease and

climate change . So that's what got me to the book and to writing the book , and we could certainly start with the four food rules in my book because it simplifies things . It's a travesty that just figuring out what good food is and how to keep ourselves healthy is complicated , and it's really not .

So that's why I wrote down these four food rules and let's start with them here . It is plain and simple . We've defined what whole foods , whole plant foods , are . The more whole plant foods in your diet , the better , the more you will avoid risk of disease and allow your body to heal .

So that's a very general statement that doesn't say , okay , vegan tomorrow , or else we're going to die , no Right . The more you can add these fiber-filled whole fruits and vegetables , nuts and legumes , whole grains into your regular dietary pattern , the better . So that's number one the more the better .

And the second is going along with that Don't sweat the small stuff . You're going to go to a party . You're going to celebrate grandma's birthday with a cupcake .

You're going to have a glass of wine , you know , every once in a while , whatever , whatever it is that you know is not supporting your health in terms of nutrition , it's okay until it becomes a pattern . If you're going to have a cupcake once every couple weeks , that's a little thing .

If you go to birthday parties and office parties and celebrations like this time of year and it becomes a regular thing , it's going to add up . So that's the difference Don't sweat the small stuff , don't make it into a pattern . The third one is my fave . It's eat the rainbow .

And what I refer to in terms of the rainbow , or the variety of the colorful whole plant foods that you find as close to picking it from the soil as you can , because those colors of all of the different vegetables and plant foods and white is a color I include those are the same chemical compounds as antioxidants that help clear our blood , keep our parasites

at bay and build up good bacteria both in our gut and keep our bloodstream and our colon healthy . So that's what the rainbow of colors in our food or variety of plant foods represent , and that's number three . Number four is my favorite , and that , as well as three , okay , I like this one .

I think your audience will like this one , but you'll have to let me define it .

That regularly how quickly those macronutrients get into your system the sugar , the glucose , the protein , the fat and so that fiber not only regulates those nutrients and allows our body to control those nutrients to be absorbed as needed , it fills us up and it also cleans our gut and allows and gives our microbiome the right food it wants to create a healthy

bacterial colony in our gut which supports our immune system and regulates our inflammation level and really leads our health . So eat as much as you want , as long as that food has intact fiber , as much as you can . And of course , all of this is not medical advice . If you have a chronic condition , you've got to work with your health care practitioner .

This is just a great guideline . It's eat as much whole plant food as you can , don't sweat the small stuff . Look at your big dietary pattern . Eat the rainbow of valuable colors from the plant world every day and eat as much as you want , as long as you have that whole food that has fiber along with it .

You're going to break up the fiber , so it's not whole anymore , it's not intact , it's turned into a liquid , say . It still has the fiber in it and that's good for you . Quite often we take fiber in a powdered form because it's been broken up like that .

Then it's dry and put in the powder and put it in the jar and then we take a teaspoon of it and that's fiber . It does a good job in an isolated form . But the less you touch that fiber , like if you were to eat the apple whole the more intact that fiber is and the more effect it has to protect your health .

So , um , processed foods have wiped out all the fiber like white rice , or right , that's White flour less fiber . There's a little fiber in white rice , as you say . There's very little fiber in white flour , but there's more in whole grain flour , whole wheat flour . It's still broken up .

If you were to eat the whole wheat buds itself , the grains itself , like whole brown rice as opposed to white rice , then you're getting more of that fiber .

But I want to make sure to have the intact fiber as much as I can . So steamed spinach would have intact fiber . You know a vegetable medley , a stir fry , would have intact fiber . You know nuts and seeds . You know sunflower seeds intact fiber . That sort of thing Does that help . Very helpful , thank you .

We are so used to getting concentrated heaps of isolated ingredients like sugar and fat and high hunks of protein that our bodies are just not used to . That's not how our bodies are designed . They have addictive qualities . These foods , these isolated ingredients put together , have addictive qualities to them because they're in such concentrated form and our body isn't .

You know , not only are they not used to that from an evolutionary perspective , but our taste buds get used to it and then they want that and that can be the beginning of food addiction . I mean , it's not our fault . It's just that you know food manufacturers know how to hit us with food , so we keep wanting to come back to it , and so that's a problem .

We need to sort of get our taste buds used to the foods that they're designed to eat , with the portions of sugar and fat and salt in the amounts that they're used to .

I don't feel deprived , and that's one of the things that I like about your book is that there are recipes in there for some foods that sound really delicious , because it's one thing to tell people that they should eat better , but it's another thing to show them some simple , easy ways how to incorporate that into their life .

And you're right . I mean , the cuisines of the world are just so tasty on their own . It just takes our taste buds a bit of time to get used to it , or just a bit of detachment away from what the ultra-processed foods and the manufacturers who make them want us to taste .

So , yeah , the food is flavored by natural herbs and spices and fats coming from whole beans and whole nuts , and even coconut , and if you have these foods along with fiber , you can be able to mitigate that fat and you'll get that mouthfeel that you're looking for . And there are a couple of tips , and that would be .

You know , look at these recipes that I've presented in the book or other whole plant food recipes , and don't add the salt as you're cooking .

Don't add the fat as you're cooking , salt after you've cooked , because that way you'll use a lot less and no matter what you're making food at home , you're going to have less sodium in your diet than if you buy products already made for it Fast food or right exactly .

adding more whole food plant-based foods into my diet . I don't know how typical that is For the person who is eating the standard American diet . How long can they typically expect that change to provide some noticeable results ?

Standard American diet and you take them off . If it was immediate , people would quite often I hear this all the time feel pretty immediate effects . In a few days and in a couple of weeks you can really feel less tired , feel your energy coming back , you might see your skin get better , you might start losing weight .

So you know you can get pretty amazing results in a couple of weeks . And then you keep going and you know it's just it's . You know it's sort of uphill , but easy from there as long as you don't expect perfection . It's sort of uphill , but easy from there as long as you don't expect perfection , because we're not perfect . We're humans .

I would say that that's the idea is to make it simple . That's why I wrote the four food rules . The more whole plant foods , the better . You don't have to stress over how many calories do I ? You know . You don't have to stress over the numbers . You know how much protein , how much fat , how many calories am I taking ? And Do I have to add ? You know ?

Do I have to combine grains and beans together to be healthy ?

No , the more whole plant foods the better , and these foods include leafy greens , other vegetables , whole grains , nuts and seeds and legumes , and I'd like to just highlight beans and pulses and legumes like lentils and chickpeas and beans , because these high-protein food that has been the cornerstone of so many diets around the world .

Those are the populations where they haven't had diseases .

Grocery prices have been going up . It's really easy to see the real life effect of inflation when you go to the grocery store , but it's not even just the grocery store . I think that we are we . We eat out a lot and so much money gets funneled that way .

And as a financial advisor working with people that need to find ways to reduce their budget , this is a great way , even if they just were able to replace a few meals , even a week , with something that they put together at home .

And it can be as easy as a sheet pan dish with , like you said , chickpeas and spices and some vegetables and you throw it in and you don't have to think about it . Those little ways that we can tweak our budget . Also , the big ticket items on most people's budgets for the groceries are meat , dairy and processed foods .

There's nothing wrong with that with canned beans at all , and you're right . So we just need to learn that . Oh , we can open a can of beans , we can get a jar of salsa that doesn't have any additives in it and preservatives , and we can make some brown rice . Can even find frozen whole organic brown rice in the freezer .

And the more whole the plant , the whole the food is the beans that you haven't cooked yet , the more fiber you're going to get and the healthier you're going to get as a food product .

If you're a growing bovine but we're not we don't grow into 1,500 to 2,500

pounds . We're different species . We're not designed to drink milk as adults , let alone the milk of another species .

So , if you think about it , it's a little odd that we are taking the milk , the breast milk , that we are taking the milk , the breast milk , in a way from another species , and that stuff has a lot of fat and sugar , lactose , and when you make it into cheese , for instance , it's really concentrated . It's got salt and sugar , lactose and fat .

It takes 10 pounds of milk to make a pound of cheese , for instance . It also contains casein , a certain protein , casein morphine . It's a compound similar to morphine that during digestion it gives us a hit of pleasure .

It may stimulate the brain the same way to make us crave more and more , and it could play into such a food addiction of this very high fat food and lead into . You know , obesity and it's like it's it's . I really want your audience to know it's like not a fault . It's not our fault that we can't give up these high fat foods .

They're designed so that you keep wanting more . There's a lot of growth hormones in there and dairy , particularly IGF-1 , which can simulate the growth of cancer . Milk and we're already grown the protein is going to want to grow stuff and if you might have some exposure to cancer cells or something , it's going to grow the wrong cells .

So there is an association of dairy with a lot of issues , including diabetes , autoimmune disorders , of course , lactose intolerance . People often complain of constipation , ear infections with children , sinus congestion , you know , skin problems , asthma , digestion issues , arthritis . All these things mean we're all so different .

We could be associated with the amount of dairy that we take in . So a lot of us , like 75% to 90% of us , particularly those with Asian or African and East Asian descent , are lactose intolerant . Many people don't even know it , including Hispanics and Native Americans .

Hispanics and Native Americans because these cultures have had less time to evolve the genetic tolerance to milk as white Europeans have . They've been drinking milk the longest . Dairy , bovine milk Also , particularly cheese .

There's a higher acid load , from meat , from animal foods and cheese in particular just because it's so concentrated and that could demand more calcium to buffer the acid in our blood , and so it's really hard to figure out where that calcium is coming from .

But our storage of calcium are our bones , calcium and minerals magnesium and phosphorus so we might be leaching calcium from our bones in order to , you know , buffer the acid .

And if your audience isn't familiar with tofu , it's soy , it's made from soybeans , it's processed soybeans into soy milk , so there's not much fiber left in it , but it's lightly processed , so it's almost a whole food , not quite so tofu bok choy .

So , there are a lot of good replacements that are really yummy and they're high fat , but you can't really get a higher fat than cheese made out of cow's milk . It's pretty high fat . So , even going down to cashew cheese , I suggest , if you are lucky enough to have a grocery store that carry , ask do you have cheese alternatives ?

I know that there's so much that we could talk about alternatives and I know that there's so much that we could talk about .

Okay , well , you know , I would say I just I can't just imagine some of your listeners going through very stressful times and I want to emphasize what you said , that a lot of these plant foods they're anti-inflammatory , they're calming foods .

They're foods that will allow your body to take a breath and heal and allow our body's stress reaction , which is inflammation , to calm down that I mentioned . There's so many of them , there's so many different kinds and I go through some of them , just a few of them in the book . But here's some good news Cocoa is rich in flavonoids .

That's a color like dark brown . It's like chocolate yeah , chocolate or cocoa powder . I have a smoothie recipe in the book and if you want to just add some tablespoon of cocoa powder to that , then that will help the release of endorphins that you know are like the relaxing hormones that help you feel better and improve your mood

. You know , it's just amazing how just these plant foods , compared to ultra-processed foods , they affect our stress hormones , our cortisol levels and those foods that are associated with lower stress . You may know like chamomile and chamomile tea , but dark chocolate has those flavonoids and green tea is very soothing .

The antioxidants in almonds and blueberries and alternative to dairy yogurts like coconut yogurt or cashew yogurt , those can be very calming and they sort of affect your level of stress hormones . So that might be a bit of a tip of um of stress hormones , so that that might be a bit of a tip .

So , again , I'm going to have all your contact information , your tips and access to purchase your new book on our show notes . So thank you again for joining us .