一位美食家心脏科医生的忠言（1/4）

By William Castelli

威廉·卡斯特利 

    本文标题中的定语从句who loves to eat颇能激发起读者的好奇心，因为它与其修饰对象a heart doctor构成了隐晦的paradox (悖论)。众所周知，心脏病患者的饮食受极大限制，而绝无可能是一个美食家。

    不仅标题引人，而且作者的亲身故事也含传奇色彩，作者不无自豪地称：

    Eight years ago, I passed a medical milestone. I became the first man in my family to turn 50 without having a heart attack.

    但是，作者的成功又并非像常人所想象的那样谨小慎微地吃，谨小慎微地生活。他称：

    Over the years, I’ve hit upon a number of solutions. I still snack on sweets. I don’t turn up my nose at red meat. And I’m always interested in finding ways to exercise less. But my cholesterol is now below 5.5.

    作者虽具有心脏病的家族史，他仍不回避甜食，仍大谈牛羊肉(red meat)，更有甚者，他想方设法exercise less! 然而, 他的健康指标却理想如初。   

    作者确以其成功的实例向读者表明：高血压／冠心病患者可以不必throw out all the family’s favorite meals. 作者坦言：   

    My powers of resolve would never survive such an upheaval, let alone my first taste of wheat—gluten roast or tofu hamburgers.

    作者的经验最令人信服之处在于其辩证的目光，透过表象看实质的目光。如：

Some fast—food restaurants fry foods in highly saturated oils or beef tallow. The result is that chicken and fish get drenched in more fat than the choicest cuts of beef contain.

    Most cholesterol in your body is produced by your cells. …Trim the saturated fat in your diet and you automatically cut the cholesterol in your blood.

    据笔者观察，我们在细读此文，欲得其“秘诀”的同时，千万不能忽视洋溢在字里行间的那种积极主动、热情乐观的生活态度。比如：

    作者会同妻子兴致勃勃地商讨改进每天的食谱：

    So my wife and I combed through our oral cookbook and replaced ingredients high in saturated fat with low—fat equivalents.

    作者入餐馆用膳，也会主动要求“特制”他的那一份：

    Also on the menu was a Reuben sandwich, suggesting the kitchen stocked sauerkraut,   which I got as a side dish. Finally, I asked for some plain spaghetti with tomato sauce.

    作者精心“设计”，增加自己的运动量：

    So I park on the far end of the car park, climb stairs instead of waiting for a lift and walk to the store to buy my newspaper.

    祛病健身的根本也许就在于热爱生活、积极地生活、认真地生活。作者的另一句话也同样向我们传递了这样的信息：

    Of course there’s difference between knowing something and acting on it.

    EIGHT YEARS AGO, I passed a medical milestone. I became the first man in my family to turn 50 without having a heart attack. I’m living proof that you can beat the odds of heart disease—even if it runs in your family. And you can do it without subsisting on bean sprouts and mineral water and running eight kilometres a day.

   八年以前，我越过了一个医疗里程碑，成为我们家族中年满50岁而没有发心脏病的第一人。我是一个活的证明：即使你有心脏病的家族史，你也能够战胜患心脏病的厄运，而且你不必靠吃豆芽，喝矿泉水过日子，也不必每日跑上八公里。

    When my father was only 48, he had a heart attack. He was a doctor, and he knew that plaques of fat had clogged the spaghetti size arteries that carried oxygen to his heart. In those days, though, no—one knew why this happened. Most doctors thought heart disease was just nature’s way of ploughing under the old crop. It was only after I joined the Framingham Heart Study, the longest—running investigation of heart disease ever conducted, did I begin to understand.