Haven't you dreamed about eating what you want? Haven't you fantasized about enjoying the foods you love and not gaining weight?
Eating Applied shows you how to make your dreams come true. Without restrictions. Without hunger or stress.
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When I started formulating the EatApp method, losing weight was the last thing on my mind. At the time, my digestive health was in shambles, and I was guzzling indigestion medicines like there was no tomorrow.
I was waking up every morning with an acidic taste in my mouth. My larynx was sore, and it felt like a golf ball was constantly stuck in my throat. It seemed I was coughing and forcefully clearing my throat every five minutes.
And that was just for starters. The real torture was when I ate. Even the smallest amount of food lead to heartburn, bloating, and regurgitation. My chest pain was the most versatile tormentor, however, ranging from dull to sharp, steady to throbbing, bad to simply intolerable.
Sounds familiar? Of course it does. Millions of Americans experience these symptoms almost every day. The disease is commonly called acid reflux because its official medical term, when not abbreviated, is hard to pronounce - Gastroesophageal Reflux Disease (GERD).
Like many people, I didn't treat GERD with the respect it deserved. I simply drowned my symptoms in antacid medications just like we drown our sorrows in alcohol. It is very common to ignore the alarming signs of a disease, especially for men. We realize that we have a serious problem only after symptoms completely get out of control and stop responding to drugs.
There's nobody else to blame for this situation but ourselves - it is a life-style disease rooted in our bad eating habits. On second thought, I stand corrected - there is one particular person to blame. I am talking about the fictitious doctor in TV ads that keeps telling us that GERD is no biggie. He assures us that the nasty symptoms will go away after a sip or two of whatever he is selling, and we will be ready for the next slice of pizza, or a bag of potato chips, or Hot Tamales.
The deceitful, corrupt bastard insinuates that we can keep going like this forever without consequences. The fictitious doctor had bewitched even me, a physician. I knew very well that GERD, if not treated properly and in a timely manner, could deteriorate into something more serious, namely, esophageal stricture, but I didn't care. Esophageal stricture is what happens when the esophagus becomes so narrow that you can barely swallow a gulp of water.
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But that's not the worse thing that might happen. GERD may cause esophageal cancer. This deadly disease affects thousands of people every year. In 2015, close to 17 thousand people were diagnosed with esophageal cancer in the US, and about 90% of them died.
Just so you know, esophageal cancer is an exceptionally vengeful malignancy. Even when the esophagus is removed and you are cancer-free, your life will have serious limitations. Modern medicine doesn't have the ability to effectively reconstruct esophagus with all its complex functionality.
Esophagus looks like a plain, boring tube, but it is an intricately and elegantly designed organ. When esophagus is replaced with a part of stomach or large intestine, it makes swallowing very difficult and kills the pleasure of eating for good.
Mitigating the symptoms of GERD is futile, the disease will eventually progress to the point of no return. I am still dismayed by my insouciant attitude. My only consolation is that my misjudgment wasn't a total waste after all. There is a light at the end of the tunnel, dear reader. Onward to how we can get there ...
