Glassman,

I'm already getting additional C and E in a multivitamin. Cardiologist
indicated the B6, B12 and folic acid combo was proving more effective for
post heart attack cardiovascular health than the additional vitamin C and E
(over the multivitamin amount). I have coronary artery disease; heart attack
in 2001. I try to keep the number of daily pills in the single-digit range,
if possible :-)

Yours sounds more like a modified version of Atkins, given the GOOD carbs
you ingest. Those veggies and berries sure help. I'm just still surprised
that whole grains aren't accepted as healthy by the Atkins gurus, given
their emphasis by the world's medical community. It's Atkins' sat fats,
especially the animal fats, and its lack of whole grains, that the medical
and health communities blast up one side and down the other. Foregoing
simple sugars and refined foods, especially refined carbs, is a big plus in
any diet (except when trying to recover energy from prolonged, hard physical
work or play). I haven't eaten white bread (90% of the stuff in
supermarkets) or ordinary pasta in decades, but I'll go through a loaf of
walnut cranberry raisin whole wheat bread smothered in seasoned olive oil in
a day or two with the medical community's blessing, as long as I burn up its
calories, and I my heaps of whole wheat pasta are very healthy.

I've had no personal experience with Atkins. What I HAVE done is spent
hundreds of hours researching it intensely in the medical and health
literature. Most people can't stick to it for long (I'm not sure why; a diet
of meat and cheese and ice cream and all the rest of the Atkins stuff sounds
great -- I plan to spend my last few months on that plus the dessert diet,
the pizza diet, the pastry diet, and the buffet diet in general.), and over
a year most Atkins dieters lose less weight than control groups on the food
pyramid/Mediterranean diet recommended by the medical and health worlds.
Just as I want my last check to bounce (and be made out to my undertaker), I
also see no reason to die slim and with low cholesterol; that's a waste of
good junk food IMO. I WOULD have to sweat calories or portion size on a
high-fat diet, as I've been kicked out of buffets twice for eating too much.

I wouldn't expect a  colonoscopy to be influenced by Atkins. Red meat is
only strongly SUSPECTED of promoting colon cancer, and probably takes
decades to bring it on, if it does. I cut my sat fat intake by probably 95%
two decades ago, and my colonoscopy was clear just three years ago; my
large, very life-threatening, colon cancer grew in just three years from
being invisible by colonoscopy to becoming now my most probable cause of
death , even with surgery. Fortunately for all the high-fat/protein dieters,
my case is just anecdotal, just a fourth decimal place contributor to the
statistics.

I.P.