Designing An Anti‑Cancer Diet You Can Actually Follow

Are you tired for sifting through all the conflicting & confusing information online around diet & cancer prevention?

With recommendation and arguments on every side of this debate...from Raw Vegan to Keto or Carnivore it can feel impossible to know which diet is best for you.

In today's episode we strip nutrition down to what actually supports healing: a nutrient‑dense plate, smart macro balance, and habits that strengthen the body’s core systems. 

I walk you through five clear principles that make food choices easier and more effective, without forcing you into an extreme plan or a second career in meal prep.

Here's some of what we're covering:

• our Ground & Root 3‑pillar approach
• five core principles for real‑world meals
• macro balance with higher protein and lower carbs
• meal timing, overnight fasting and seasonal ketosis
• blood sugar and insulin control strategies
• anti‑inflammatory foods and what to limit
• immune support and microbiome nourishment
• personalization with labs, lifestyle and preferences

If you’re ready for more nutrition guidance, we have 3 ways to support you:

1- Receive a personalized plan inside our coaching program. Schedule a FREE strategy session to learn more

2- Join the self‑paced Enhance Your Plate course

3- Grab the Cancer Diet Cookbook for 100 recipes that put these ideas on your plate (or get it FREE when you join either the course or our coaching program)

As always, if you're enjoying our content, please help us spread the word by sharing, subscribing, & leaving a review. 🙏

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Transcript

Welcome And Food Month Theme

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Hello and welcome back to the Ground and Root Podcast, where we explore the world of holistic and functional strategies to enhance healing and help you stay cancer free. I am your host and holistic cancer dietitian Dion Detraz. We are welcoming in a brand new month at the time of this recording, it's March, and our theme for the next four episodes will be focused around food. We're going to talk about all things diet-related, specifically around an ideal anti-cancer diet and what that looks like. And although diet and food is not the only piece to the healing puzzle, certainly following a nutrient-dense anti-cancer diet is a very important piece to the healing puzzle and a subject we do spend a lot of time coaching our clients on. Of course, it's a subject that also probably has the most questions related to it because it happens to be a pretty confusing topic out there. You know, a quick search online and you will find diet recommendations and arguments on every side of this debate, right? Everything from you should be raw vegan with like lots of fresh juices to keto or even carnivore, and then everything in between. And it often unfortunately leaves people feeling really confused and overwhelmed and honestly pretty afraid to eat the wrong thing, right? So I want to help get rid of that for you. That is a big part of my mission is to make eating healthy, eating in a way to help you stay cancer free as easy and delicious as possible. So in today's episode, we are going to start with the basics, or at least as I see the basics. Okay, you will learn our unique approach to diet and the principles that I believe are most important as you begin to craft a pattern that's going to work best for you. Because the truth is, across everything we talk about here, there is no one size fits all, right? And that goes for diet as well. So let's dive in and let's start with the basics. So first I want to give you a sense of what our approach is at ground and root, and then I'll get into a little bit more details with you. So here's the overview of what I'm calling our ground and root dietary approach. There's three parts. Okay. All three of these parts must be met for it to be an ideal diet for our population. Number one is nutrient density. Okay. And I'm going to give you some examples of like what falls under each of these in a little bit, in a little bit. I'll give you more info. But first, it needs to be a nutrient dense, right? So we're bringing in a lot of nutrients into our body because our cells, our tissues, our organs, our systems of cancer prevention need a lot of nutrients, macronutrients and micronutrients. Number two is we want it to be macro balanced. And obviously, that is a little bit tricky because it's not necessarily going to be exactly the same ratios for everyone. It really depends on what's uniquely going on for each person. So I'm going to get to into that in a little bit more detail too. And then principle number three is it needs to be system supporting. Okay. And when I say system supporting, there are really four systems that we are targeting to help optimize our health and healing. One is the immune system, first and foremost. Then we're also targeting our detox systems. We're also targeting anti-inflammatory pathways. And we're targeting blood sugar and insulin balance. Okay. So when we put together a dietary approach, we want to make sure we check off that we're supporting each of those four systems. So within that overview, okay, those three primary pillars, if you will, we have five main principles. And then I'll talk a little bit more about the system supporting pieces. Okay. Again, I'm trying to keep this as simple as possible. And for you to also understand it doesn't have to be perfect all the time for it to be working. Okay. So principle number one is really just to eat real food. Real whole food. When we think about nutrient density, we are getting nutrient density from real food, not processed man-made foods, right? So we want it as close as possible to its real whole form, organic when that's possible for you. And ideally a mix of animal and plant-based. Okay. I don't prescribe to like it only has to be plants or it should only be meat or animal food. I really think our bodies, we're designed to be omnivorous. We're designed to digest and utilize both forms, and that actually both provide a lot of really important nutrients. So eat real food organic when possible. Number two is plant focus. That doesn't mean vegan. It doesn't even mean vegetarian. Like I said, I do believe animal foods should be in the diet, especially animal proteins when you're actively healing. You need a lot of the nutrients that are found in animal food. And it doesn't mean you can't do it without it, but it is harder. And I've, you know, this is what I've seen over a decade of working with people. So we do want to bring a lot of plants in. We want it to be plant focused, but not 100% plants for most people. Now there's also going to be a special emphasis on certain plants, certain foods that have the most anti-cancer potential. And I'm going to actually share what those foods are later in the month. So the second solo episode of the month is going to be just on that topic. Okay. So more to come for that. Number three, again, within this, within this goal of nutrient density, is that we want to eat a rainbow of colors as colorful as possible. And that's because those colors are connected to phytonutrients. And phytonutrients go beyond vitamins. They go beyond minerals. They include a lot of our antioxidants, but the phytonutrients is what has been shown in research to have the most disease preventing and disease fighting potential across all types of diseases, but specifically when it comes to cancer too. So we want a lot of plants in the diet, but not solely plants. And we want it to be as colorful as possible. Okay. Now, the second thing I had mentioned earlier was macro balanced. And so what does that mean? Typically, for us, for our population of people, it will mean higher protein. It's also going to mean lower carb, but not necessarily low carb. It's rare that I have somebody do like a real authentic ketogenic diet. Sometimes we do, depending on what the cancer is that they're dealing with. But more often than not, it's not keto. It's almost more paleo as far as carb content goes. Lots of healthy fats and lots of fiber. Okay. And then the exact ratios, the exact percentages of all those things are going to vary for each person, depending on what their needs are, right? Depending on where they are in the healing journey, what nutrients are they deficient in, or which nutrients do they need more of right now? How is their blood sugar and insulin responding? Like what does their lab chemistry look like? Right. So there is a level of personalization here. But in general, and if you're, you know, if you're hell otherwise healthy and you just want to stay that way and you want to stay cancer free, then the goal is a higher protein, like an optimal protein amount and a lower carb. Now, the fifth principle, and this also kind of corresponds with macro balanced, is optimal meal timing. And when I say optimal meal timing, it doesn't mean everybody's eating at exactly the same like hour, you know, over the course of the day. I don't mean it quite like that, but I mean within the cadence or the rhythm of your day, when you're getting up, when you're going to bed, we do help you design an ideal rhythm, right? So that we're eating within 30 to 60 minutes of waking up, helping to wake up our metabolism, right? Like eating in a way that supports our circadian rhythms. We're finishing eating earlier in the evening. So we have a longer window to digest before we go to bed. We're optimizing the overnight fast. I've, if you remember in the fall, I recorded a couple of fasting-related episodes. I would go back and listen to those if you've missed that, because fasting is a really important principle of what we follow and what we teach at Ground and Root. And so when we think about optimal meal timing, that of course includes the fasting window, right? It's going to look a little bit different for each person, but in general, we have an overnight window of maybe like 13 to 15 hours, depending on the cadence of your day. And then I would also add in here, because this is going to kind of move into point number three, which was about system supporting, is in addition to that optimal overnight fasting window, we're also bringing in cycles of ketosis, not necessarily with the keto diet, but with doing extended fasts in a regular interval. And that's going to vary again based on each person, like how often should they be going longer. But in general and within our collective, within our group, at least once every season, we are moving through a three to five day fast together, which is like a week of ketosis, right? So we are putting our bodies into ketosis here and there, maybe just not all the time. All right. So five principles eat real foods, organic when possible, plant focused, doesn't mean vegan, rainbow of colors, macro balance with higher protein, lower carb, lots of fiber and healthy fats, and then that optimal meal timing window with periods of fasting. Those are the five primary principles of the diets we teach at ground and root. Now, point number three was about system specific, right? System supportings, especially the systems that help us stay cancer free. So I wanted to break that down for you a little bit more today into three of those systems. Okay. The detox supporting foods, we are actually, I'm gonna devote all of April. That is gonna be our theme for April. So we're gonna really dive in to detoxification support soon. So we're gonna, we're gonna table that for now. But we'll what we'll talk about next is blood sugar and insulin balancing, anti-inflammatory, and immune nourishing. Okay. These three are really important when we're trying to help our bodies recover and stay cancer free. So blood sugar and insulin balancing. And again, each of these I know I could spend like a whole episode talking on, and I will. Okay. I just first want to, since we're still kind of new this podcast, I first want to just bring out the overarching goals and recommendations for you so you can start working on these things. And then as we go along, I will do deeper dives into each of these topics. Okay. So bear with me. But for now, blood sugar and insulin balancing. This is really important because both glucose and insulin can fuel and stimulate cancer cells. Okay. Most cancer cells have a lot of receptor sites on their membranes for glucose and for insulin. So this doesn't mean that we want to have, you know, that we can't have any glucose or insulin in our bodies because obviously our healthy cells need those as well. But we definitely don't want to have excess. And these are certainly two lab markers that we are monitoring closely to make sure that we, that we hit the right portions for you, right? The right ratios of how much carbohydrate is okay. How much fasting should you do? Like, how can we keep these numbers in a tight, optimal window? But in general, that's going to mean removing or at least greatly limiting sugar, refined carbohydrates, right? Like sweetened beverages, things that we know are just basically a blood glucose hit on the body. It also means replacing that with higher fiber, low glycemic carbohydrates, and starchy foods so that it keeps our blood sugar steady. It also means balancing any carb or starch in our meal with protein, with healthy fat. So again, we're not spiking our system, spiking our blood supply with a bunch of glucose at one time, which would, you know, cause a bunch of insulin to get pumped out and then begin this cascade that we're trying to avoid. And in portions that are appropriate for your chemistry. So based on what your labs are telling us, right? Based on how you're feeling, that will determine exactly how much carb or starch is okay for you or how to balance them with protein and fat. But in general, that would be the guideline to help keep blood sugar and insulin down, right? Balanced and down. Now, the next one would be anti-inflammatory. So part of this, of course, is like what are we getting rid of? And then what are we bringing in? Thankfully, there's more things we can bring in to help support these systems than like get rid of. But there are some inflammatory foods for sure. Certainly anything that you're actually not tolerating well or digesting well should be removed, at least until you create new equilibrium in the body because it is creating irritation or inflammation in your system. Um, bad, you know, I would say like bad fats or processed meats or even just really ultra-processed foods are going to be very inflammatory in the body. So we're definitely removing or greatly limiting sort of that category, those categories of foods. And then we're bringing in a lot of the foods that are going to in our anti-inflammatory pathways that are going to help keep inflammation in check, right? Inflammation balance. And it might require supplementation as well, too. This is another area that we monitor closely with lab values so that we can make, you know, more targeted recommendations if this is an area of concern for you. But in general, we just bring in a lot of anti-inflammatory foods. So what are those? Those are foods that are high in antioxidants, right? All those colorful plants we were talking about before, all your healthy fats, especially your omega-3 rich fats, but not just those, your nuts and seeds and olive oil, those are all good, healthy anti-inflammatory fats as well. Plus certain foods that have been shown to lower inflammation in the body, especially things like green tea or turmeric or berries, right? We'll talk about more of those specific foods in the next solo episode that we do. But in general, we're trying to follow a diet that's going to keep inflammation regulated and prevent this sort of inflammatory terrain, which many people are living with nowadays. Like our modern day lifestyle is definitely leaning more towards inflammation than not, right? So that is number two in our kind of system supporting section. And then the last one would be the immune nourishing, right? Remember, the immune system is our primary defense against cancer, right? And against infection, too, of course. So we want to make sure we're bringing in the nutrients that are going to help our bone marrow make plenty of white blood cells, our soldiers that are constantly surveilling and on the lookout for things that don't belong there, like precancerous cells, mutated cells, infection, et cetera. And we also want to include foods that are going to feed the microbial diversity and really support our micro, our gut microbiome and the health of our gut. Because 70 to 80 percent of our immune cells actually live in the gut. So your digestive health is gonna have a direct impact on the health of your immune system. So we can't like we can't support one without the other, right? So when we think about nourishing the immune system, it's not only bringing in foods that feed white blood cell production, things like protein, like vitamin C or zinc, or vitamin A rich foods, or mushrooms, or garlic and so many others. But we also have to bring in foods that are going to feed the microbiome, the gut microbiome. So fermented foods, right? Foods rich in fiber and rich in prebiotics, foods that nourish the lining of the gut. And this is incredibly important when you're moving through a cancer journey and getting treatment, specifically chemotherapy, but also if you're getting certain immunotherapies or radiation that's targeted to the abdominal area, there is going to be a consequence to the gut, right? So we need to do everything we can to really help protect that environment and then support its repair and its rebalancing once treatment is over. Because the quicker we get your gut health back, your gut microbiome back to an optimal state, the quicker that's also gonna help your immune system recover. And remember, that is your surveillance going forward, right? If we have a strong immune system, our bodies are on surveillance mode, and that is definitely gonna help us stay cancer free. So there's a lot of pieces that we're thinking about, right? It's certainly that I'm thinking about when I piece together a diet for someone. But even in just like the way I eat and what I talk about on social media or on my website or in the recipes that we put together in the cookbook, all of this is based on these principles that we're focusing on real whole foods, right? Like nutrient-dense foods, foods that are gonna nourish the cells of our body, that are gonna nourish our organs, nourish our tissues, help help make energy, right? All of those things, feed the mitochondria. Like we need nutrients to do that from real food, a mix of animal and plant, ideally, and then a special emphasis on certain foods that have like a stronger anti-cancer potential. We're gonna learn more about that soon. Then there's the microbalancing, right? So that we want typically most of us need a higher protein, especially if we're still in active repair, active healing. We need more amino acids available in the body. So higher protein, lower carb, lots of healthy fats, lots of fiber, fermented foods, right? All those things we talked about, foods that are gonna help balance the blood sugar and insulin, foods that are gonna feed the microbiome, foods that are gonna feed the white blood cell production, right? The immune system. And that includes optimal meal timing. So kind of optimizing the fasting windows, which is also gonna make a big difference in lowering inflammation and lowering blood sugar and insulin. So even so, thinking about even when we don't eat is gonna have almost as much of an impact as what we are eating. And then, of course, finally the system supporting. So anti-inflammatory foods, blood sugar balancing foods, detox supporting foods, which we will get to more next month, and immune-enhancing foods. And the good part here is a lot of these do multiple things, right? I think about something like cruciferous vegetables, for example. They check off anti-cancer actions, they check off anti-inflammatory actions, they check off detox-supporting actions, and they actually check off antimicrobial, which can also be immune-enhancing actions, right? So it doesn't necessarily mean that we have a list of like a hundred foods we have to eat every day to check off all these systems. Thankfully, that's not true. We've narrowed it down to the ones that are going to cover all of our bases. Okay. And that is what I will talk about two weeks from now. When I do my next solo episode, we will get into those specific foods, like cruciferous vegetables. What are the ones that really have the biggest impact on all of these different systems? I hope that was helpful to give you kind of the overarching umbrella of when we think about putting together an ideal, long-term, right, sustainable anti-cancer diet, there are quite a few elements that we're thinking about in helping you put that together. Now, in our coaching programs, and I've mentioned this previously, but if you'd like to learn more about it, there's a there will be a link in the show notes where you can learn more about our three-step recovery system, like sort of our approach to helping people move through and beyond cancer. But step two in this three-step system is focused around nourishment. And it's focused around changing the terrain, changing the internal environment of the body to make it harder for cancer to grow. And our food is a big piece to this puzzle. It's not the only thing, like I said before, but but it is a big part. So inside of our coaching program, not only are we teaching you about what I just covered, our dietary approach, but we're also helping you personalize a nutrition plan and really setting priorities based on your needs. So, what is the cancer you're dealing with? What is your treatment plan? Where are you in the healing journey, right? Like which of these nutrients might you might have a higher need for right now? What about your genetics? Your DNA also plays a role into what foods you're going to tolerate better and also what foods you might be more at risk for deficiency in, not foods, but nutrients. Your lab values. Remember, I said we we want to customize ratios or like portion goals based on your chemistry. So if we're not looking at your labs, we don't really know how much carb you should be aiming for, right? We can give you a general guideline, but your labs are what's going to tell us if we need to be stricter or not. And then, of course, your lifestyle, your food preferences, your family's preferences. I certainly don't want You're making different food for everybody in your family. I don't do that for my family, and I would never ask somebody else to do that. So it needs to be foods that are going to fit right in your lifestyle. Now, of course, if this is something you've really been looking for, feel free to click the links below in the show notes. You can learn more about working with us and what that looks like. We can hop on a free call just to chat about it more. No obligation. And if you're not ready for a full coaching program, but you do want more information around diet, more than I can provide to you just in one or two podcast episodes, then I will encourage you, and I will link to this below as well, to check out our self-paced course, Enhance Your Plate. It's a six-module course that's going to walk you through each of our main principles and how to actually put this together into a personalized plan. So basically it's going to guide you into creating your own plan. Lots of resources, lots of recipes and meal ideas. We also have our cookbook, the Cancer Diet Cookbook. It has a hundred recipes inside of it that fit these principles that we're talking about, right? That can help enhance recovery, help you stay cancer-free. So there are definitely resources available for you to take action on this if you're wanting more support. Now, next week, we are going to be joined by my friend Lauren Papanos. Again, I had her back in the fall. We talked about thyroid health and breast health. And if you haven't listened to that, I would recommend going back and listening to it. It was an incredible episode. We're having her back to talk about more general thyroid health and cancer prevention. And even though the conversation is broader than just food alone, I felt like it would be very interesting for you to hear some of the food connections when it comes to lowering inflammation, supporting thyroid health, which is also going to lower our risk for cancer. So again, there's a lot of overlap here, right? It doesn't require 20 different diets, thank God, for us to get like overall good health. So that is coming out next week. I hope you will join me for that. And as always, if you are enjoying the content that we're covering here, thank you so much for being here, by the way, and for listening and going on this journey with me. Feel free to comment. Feel free to reach out with a message. I'd love to hear from you. Particularly if there's other topics or things you'd like me to cover, if you have questions, please, please feel free to reach out. But if you're enjoying it, of course, please help us spread the word. We are still a new podcast. I would love to have you share, subscribe, leave a review. All of those things help us get into the ears of more people, which is really the goal is to spread this message. And I would be, again, just so appreciative. All right. That is it for today. I wish you a beautiful day. And I look forward to connecting with you again on next week's episode. Bye for now.