The big C – it’s a word no one wants to hear and everyone is trying to avoid. People seem to fall into two categories; those who believe there is nothing they can do about it and those who think that everything causes cancer and if they try hard, they will avoid it.
The truth is somewhere in the middle. No matter how healthy a diet you eat, no matter how much exercise you get, sometimes your genes determine whether or not you will get cancer. This doesn’t mean that you should throw up your hands and say “To hell with it”, however. There are plenty of things you can do to try to prevent cancer.
Today, we are going to take a look at the top things that either increase your risk of developing cancer or decrease that risk.
While you can’t do anything about your genes, there are other things that are completely within your control.
Want to Increase Your Risk? Keep Eating or Doing the Following:
- Drinking alcohol daily (more than 1 drink) or binge drinking on weekends
- Adding salt to everything or eating lots of salty foods such as pickles
- Eating red meat more than twice a week
- Continue to smoke
- Being a couch potato
- Drinking tap water (fluoride is not the problem, it’s the other chemicals in your tap water which are the problem)
- Grilling meat until it’s black
- Avoiding the salad bar
- Getting all your clothing dry cleaned
- Ditching the sunscreen for coconut oil or wearing none at all
- Avoiding those checkups or ignoring warning signs such as pain
- Gaining weight every year
While some of the above are no brainers that you’ve heard a million times before, some might be a little more shocking. We have provided scientific links to each one of these for more information.
By the way, let’s not forget that it’s the dose that makes the poison. Even water can kill you if you drink too much. So if you decide to skip the gym on the weekend of your birthday to be a couch potato, that’s fine. However, if you decided to continue smoking because it’s just too hard to quit, you should prepare yourself for some serious hurt later on in life.
Want to Lower Your Cancer Risk? Keep Doing or Start Doing the Following:
- Eat more fruits and veggies. Lots more. Especially dark, lefty greens (like spinach) and colorful produce like red cabbage and yellow bell peppers.
- Limit alcohol to no more than 1 drink per day or less.
- Limit red meat to no more 500 grams a week. Chicken and fish are fine.
- Filter your tap water and take a bottle with you.
- Stop topping off your gas tank. When it clicks off, leave it!
- Drink several cups (3 to 5) of Joe every day unless your doctor has told you not to.
- Drink plenty of liquids to flush out cancer causing agents in the body
- Enjoy one or two Brazil nuts each day (but no more than 2)
- Get 30 minutes of exercise most days of the week.
- Wear sunscreen. Don’t forget a hat.
- Get 1200 mgs of calcium each day, but not more than that.
- Maintain a stable weight.
- Avoid trans fats, such as margarine, shortening, and snack foods. Use more plant based oils such as coconut oil, olive oil, and butter.
Keep in mind that there are really no benefits in eating organic. Both use pesticides that need to be washed off before consumption. GMO’s have still not been shown to cause cancer or any other health problems.
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