July 16, 2006 - Day 5 - Week 15 - Restorative Health Care

Today was a day filled with great diversity.  Granddaughter Belle, Brad’s 6 year old has been visiting from Florida and she spent the weekend with us.  Today we visited the Pacific Palisades Farmer’s Market because Belle, with no prompting from me I might add, informed us that broccoli was one of her favorite foods.  She has never heard of the super foods, or that I have extolled the virtues of broccoli on this website, but she wanted some for lunch so we bought organic broccoli from Givens Farm.  She also asked for pizza for dinner, yes she is 6, so we will go to Jacopo’s tonight.

Food choices for children should be orchestrated by the conductors of the household, but they will certainly inform you if they like the choices.  Trial and error with children is the order of the day, but each child should be given the opportunity to eat a healthy diet.  Eventually they will make the decisions on their own but exposure to broccoli etc. is a wise decision on the part of parents.  We asked if she liked clams and she said emphatically ‘children don’t like clams.”  The bottom line is finding things that our children will eat all within the framework of the food for health screen which should be the primary reason we eat what we eat.

Our focus as a family with a history of cancer must be on working with each generation to make healthier choices to maximize our potential for cancer avoidance.  We can only do a little when it comes to the pollution in the atmosphere, but we can do a lot when it comes to polluting our own bodies.

Yet, this simple home story must be balanced by the story of us running into an old friend who has lived with cancer for 40 years. Cliff and Gretchen and their daughter Mishi and her three year old and I exchanged hugs all around.  Cliff’s sense of humor is infectious and he helped me laugh at my challenge as he said emphatically ‘you will beat this as I have beaten leukemia for 40 years.’

I also napped today as did Belle.  I have been going hard because of feeling so good but hit the wall this afternoon.  I inquired of Belle if I was snoring and she assured me that I was quiet.  Out every evening for four days running followed by having to keep up with the energy of Megan, Theo and Belle on Saturday and then Belle alone on Sunday was enough for old Popeye (my grandfather name.)  The learning is simple.  Maintaining one’s immune system so as to avoid disease and illness is necessary when interacting with the younger generations. By the way, Katy had to nap as well for she was center stage for hours in the pool with all three kids.

Life is good when celebrating with family, but prevention of disease becomes all the more important when looking into years of interaction with the grandkids.  So now it is all about restoration.  Restorative health care is a term I have not run across, but that is what gave 40 years to Cliff and I hope it will give 40 years to me.

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