An All Too Typical Case of Lost Dietary Culture

I had my biannual dental cleaning today and when I arrived my very sweet Vietnamese hygienist greeted me with “Hi…oh you so skinny!” I smiled and thanked her as she started talking about how difficult it is to stay thin. She said she used to consistently be a size 2/4 but is now more than filling out a size 6. I casually mentioned that it wasn’t hard to stay thin if you eat right but that most of us don’t actually know what that means because of the misinformation we’re given. Usually when I make these comments they’re met with the all-too-familiar “oh you’re a crazy low carb person” look or glazed-over eyes as people tune out. But today was different. Hannah perked up and said “tell me how to eat to be healthy and thin!”

My first thought was that it is so sad that people are so starved for the right information about health and nutrition that she was willing to get advice from someone despite knowing my educational background or my profession. But, she wasn’t looking for a miracle cure or a quick fix so my second thought was that I finally get to share the knowledge I’ve gained with a willing student!

Hannah and her husband are in their 40s and have a toddler that they need to keep up with.  Hannah also lost her mother when she was young so she is dedicated to health and longevity for the sake of their daughter. She truly cares about her health and wants to eat “right” and she knows that the medical community and government have been feeding our country incorrect information for decades. Hannah shops at farmers markets for produce and buys organic and sustainably farmed items when she can. She is doing the best she can with the knowledge has and is far ahead of most people I meet when it comes to knowledge of how nutrition affects your health.

I gave Hannah my typical speech about sugar and refined carbohydrates after which she confessed that she had a sweet tooth and it was hard to overcome. She said that after each meal she needs something sweet so she will usually have a piece of fruit or a traditional vietnamese bean curd dessert.  You could see the guilt on her face when she talked about her sweet cravings and it really made me feel for her. We spoke some more about her dietary habits and she started telling me about her childhood in Vietnam. She said they regularly ate pho with “every part of the animal” in them.  She also said that if she started to get a cold or if she had a bad cut her mother would make a dish from turmeric, intestines and chives. She said after eating that her wound would heal very quickly or her cold would be gone by the next day. So now she just takes a turmeric supplement.

After living in the US for the better part of her adult life, Hannah has abandoned the traditional meals she ate as a child and has begun using supplements to try to get the benefit she inherently knows she got from the food she ate as a child. She also told me that she ate a lot of organ meats in Vietnam and that brains were a delicacy that they could only afford on special occasions. After moving to the US she heard that organs, especially liver which she really enjoys, could be toxic because they filter the toxins from the animals’ bodies so you shouldn’t eat them. So she completely stopped eating some of her favorite dishes that were considered dietary staples and even delicacies in her culture.

In the years that Hannah has been in the US she has virtually abandoned her dietary culture and is not passing along the time-honored recipes of her family to her daughter. She is now taking supplements instead of simply eating what she knows is good for her. She is eating fast food – although she only had half of her Jack in the Box meal yesterday because she’s “watching her weight”. And she has developed a sugar craving that she appeases after every meal, luckily not with sodas and candy bars. But she’s still getting a sugar infusion at least 3 times a day. It is no surprise that she’s now experiencing weight gain.

Hannah sent me home with a WaterPik and directions to floss more. I sent her home with a list of books to read to help her on her quest for health and weight maintenance and advice to return to her traditional cuisine and by all means eat that liver. I have an appointment with her in 6 months and we both promised we’d do better, me with my teeth and her with her diet. I’ve got high hopes for Hannah and I bet when I see her in 6 months she’ll be well on the road to good nutritional health.