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Soap Opera Digest presents
The Spirit Guide:

The Spiritual Diet

Food For the Body and Soul

BY MARK McGARRY

"God did not create a bread tree." - Dorothy Gault- McNemee, M.D., author of God's Diet

As the old story goes, God created Adam, Eve … and the apple tree in the Garden of Eden. While that fruit was considered forbidden back then, today an apple a day is said to keep the doctor away. That's what Dorothy Gault-McNemee, M.D., author of God's Diet (Harmony Books), firmly believes, along with the notion that eating well boosts not only the immune system, but the human spirit as well. "When you are eating healthier," she says, "it is a lot easier to be spiritual."

SPIRIT GUIDE: Why is the book called God's Diet?

DOROTHY GAULT-McNEMEE: I looked at all sorts of diets. One day on the news it said that something was bad for you, and in the newspaper, the front page, it said that very same thing was good. I said, "The heck with it. If God didn't make it, don't eat it."

SPIRIT GUIDE: How does eating God's foods help physically?

GAULT-McNEMEE: The cholesterol goes down in 93 percent of my patients at my clinic [Doctors of Santa Teresa in Santa Teresa, New Mexico]. The diabetes, sometimes I have been able to take people off medications, off of cholesterol medications. Migraines just go away. Allergies are so much better. People with fibromyalgia and arthritis … It just goes to show that we are causing so many of our own illnesses.

SPIRIT GUIDE: What are the top five "God foods"?

GAULT-McNEMEE: Oh, that's impossible to answer. Anything that God made. There is no way I could say. SPIRIT GUIDE: Okay, what are your favorite foods?

GAULT-McNEMEE: Strawberries, raspberries, apples, oranges - they are all God's fruit. Those of us who have a weight problem, we like the fruits better than the vegetables. So let's throw in some green beans.

SPIRIT GUIDE: Atkins says sugar is a no-no.

GAULT-McNEMEE:Atkins had a real good idea, but he went a little bit overboard. I even talk about him in my book. I want people to have the complex carbs, which is what you get in the fruits and vegetables. He never differentiated between the sugar that is naturally in an apple and the sugar that we take out, which would be fructose, and add to something else. Your net result is so much better if you eat the apple than the fructose from the apple.

SPIRIT GUIDE: And God did put them on the earth for you to eat.

GAULT-McNEMEE: He did! He did not create a bread tree; I guarantee you, there is no cake tree; I have looked, but there are no cake trees. He never made an ice cream bush. He and I are going to talk about that when the time comes: "You could have at least given us one." He is going to say something like, "I did. It is called an orange."

SPIRIT GUIDE: Why wouldn't ice cream be okay, since the ingredients are natural?

GAULT-McNEMEE: Because if you can do that then you can justify anything you put in your mouth. It's the same as having the cake. Once man starts processing the food - and I'm not even talking about adding chemicals - we take out all the nutrition and leave all the calories. Basically, if you can't pick it off a tree, dig it up or kill it, you probably shouldn't have it in your mouth.

FOOD FOR THOUGHT

Here's a sample menu from God's Diet. Note the Jell-O™, which God obviously didn't make. "Jell-O™ is on my 'swing list,'" explains Gault-McNemee. "Sometimes that's all the sweet that somebody needs to keep them going, and I don't want them to feel guilty. This is not only to lose weight but it's a lifestyle change. That's also why I have things on the 'swing list' - if you have a choice between a dessert that has diet Jell-O™ in it or pecan pie, it helps you make the decision. It's the lesser of the two evils."

BREAKFAST

• a bowl of fresh fruit
  - or -
• a small glass of orange juice
• a bowl of Nabisco Shredded Wheat - usually with fruit such as a banana, strawberries or raspberries on top - with milk
  - or -
• two or three scrambled eggs made with mushrooms and cheddar cheese and a little salsa on top to spice it up
• bacon
• a glass of tomato juice

LUNCH

• salad
  - or -
• soup
  - or -
• leftovers from last night's dinner

DINNER

• salad of apple chunks with pieces of chopped nuts and dates on a bed of spinach leaves
• steak
• baked potato with butter and sour cream
• green beans
• fruit and cheese for dessert (if you need dessert to feel complete)
  - or -
• salad of shredded lettuce with banana and fresh pineapple slices
• pork chops with sugar-free applesauce
• broccoli with cheese sauce
• brown rice
  - or -
• salad of diet Jell-O™ with raspberries
• baked chicken (yes, you can even eat the skin)
• mashed potatoes
• steamed carrots

The latest "The Spirit Guide" magazine available at:
• Wal-Mart     • Target    • Kroger     • Meijer's    • Safeway    • K-Mart
• Albertson's     • CVS    • Walgreens