I am medication free for my heart failure condition

Fast forward to last Thursday when I got very good news from my cardiologist. Apparently I've been able to reverse my diagnosis of heart failure! My left ventricle ejection fraction had been at 35% in Dec 2015. When a heart is functioning normally the LVEF is 55 - 70%. The most recent echo-cardiogram showed the LVEF at 56%! I am not taking any prescription drugs, but do take magnesium and vitamin D, which are both good for heart function. That's it, though. The cardiologist was stunned by the improvement made in this short time. She would still like for me to start taking a drug, but I'm going to hold off unless diet and exercise no longer work. Obviously, this needs to be a lifetime commitment to maintain these results, but I’m pretty pumped by the good news.

I cut out all animal products, started a walking regimen, and lost weight. I take magnesium oxide (500mg/daily) and vitamin D (5000 IU/Daily). My left ventricular ejection fraction was down to 35% and it’s now up to 56%. The cardiologist was recommending that I have a pacemaker and defibrillator implanted in October of last year, but I talked her into giving me 6 months. All of my doctors feel that this issue was caused mostly by the Lyme disease that I’ve had most all of my life (I’m 60). The Lyme disease didn’t get diagnosed until 2005, though, and by then it was too late to do much about it. The focus now is just on supporting my immune system as much as possible, which a plant based diet will do.

Checkups:

I had my 6 month checkup today with my primary care doc. She was so excited and pleased with my progress and improvement. She couldn't believe my test results and was amazed that I have reversed my heart failure diagnosis in 6 months without any prescription medication! She just kept saying "wow!" and commenting on what a difference the plant based diet (and exercise) has made. When we were saying good-bye, she said that if I ever wanted to give a talk to her patients about the changes I've made and what I've been doing to let her know!

What I eat now:

We eat as much whole food as possible, but we do occasionally eat vegan convenience foods. Our meals are simple - just raw or cooked veggies, fresh fruit, nuts (walnuts, almonds, pistachios, peanuts), flax meal, rice (brown, black, wild), quinoa, barley, beans and lentils for the most part. I use maple syrup and agave for sweeteners, and we use a lot of different vinegars, spices, and sauces like tamari, siricha, etc. for flavorings. I rarely use any oil, but if I do it's sesame oil. We get our fats from avocados, olives and nuts I get a lot of recipes from friends. If you haven't seen it yet, i would suggest the documentaries 'Forks over Knives' and 'Food Inc' for good motivation. Forks over Knives website has a lot of recipes on it, too. Hope this helps! 

My Breakfast: Barley cooked with 1/2 orange juice and 1/2 water and a cinnamon stick. I add blueberries and walnuts before eating. It’s good chilled, too!

None of my docs or cardiologists have ever recommended plant based eating.  My hubby’s cardiologist just recently started a plant based diet, and he asked my husband for pointers! He said that he’s at a loss for figuring out what to eat! That’s so sad that medical community doesn’t know more about this. We live in the Kansas City area where there are BBQ joints on every corner and there is an epidemic of obesity.