[jimbo2012]

U could not have read or understood the books and dvd if you say that, It's not one doctor.

Maybe U don't know how cook creatively?

[senior citizen]

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[senior citizen]

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[jimbo2012]

Who said it's good for everybody, U will not find that statement by me.

So your mother never took any meds?

Stop complaining about my posts, don't read them, you turn all my posts off so U never see them, there's an option for that.

There have been many people here that have switched, most like the differences they feel along with the automatic weight loss.

Some don't have the will power, but that why we have all the choices.

All the naysayers R really funny, the hate the plant based diet but they read and reply to all the related posts.......why? they know it's not wrong just a little harder at first.

Well all I can say to the naysayers continue what you're doing perhaps being over weight and pooping pills works for U, good but stop bitching about the diet.

Oh and you're very lucky there R building more old age nursing homes for U too!

[senior citizen]

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[senior citizen]

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[senior citizen]

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[senior citizen]

Originally Posted by AutoBike

My grandfather immigrated here from Italy as a young teenager. I'm betting that just about every meal he ate in his 97 year lifespan had something containing olive oil in it. I, also remember him loving locally-made Italian sausage and eggs for breakfast.
He was in the hospital once in his life before he died. It was for a hernia that he got at age 84 for lifting something too heavy.
He died at 97 from complications after breaking his hip while pulling weeds on the side of the hill in back of his house. He was active up until his death. I'm hoping I have his genes.

God Bless him. Sounds like my elders.....they worked harder than we ever had to, that's for sure.......never had the modern conveniences we all enjoy, ate their ethnic diet of choice and lived to ripe old ages.........obviously, the old bones age eventually.........as we all have to go from something.........I'll bet he lived a joyful life as he kept active till the end.

My Italian grandmother had all of her "marbles" until the end......but at age 95 (widowed for 50 years) she told her daughters "not to disturb her",
as a week before Easter in 1965, she took to her bed.........told her daughters she only wanted water on her night table......... we were told mid day on Good Friday that she had passed away........guess she knew it was "time".

Died in her own bed on her own terms.

She had climbed five flights of stairs, up and down, to attend mass at the corner church every day of her life in New York City........until age 90....so that was five years before she died.

She also danced the tarantella at weddings up to age 90 (after that she couldn't got to weddings due to the steps I guess)........

The aunts would find her sitting on the window sill washing the outside of the windows, five flights up.......she never would leave the tenements, although each of her children, and her brothers, begged her to come and live with them in their homes outside the city. One aunt stayed behind to care for her.........

She had come from Italy at a young age in the early 1890's. Died in 1965.

Anyway, my elderly grandmother never needed the gym !!! Five flights is a lot of exercise every day. All of her children lived to ripe old ages, with no cancer, ditto for her brothers...... My dad did pass before 70, but he was born one of a set of twin boys (the other twin died at birth, stillborn, while my dad was born with a heart defect). She had sixteen pregnancies , many sets of twins, with seven surviving children and also raised her two little brothers from Italy.........they were all totally devoted to my grandmother.

Again, a lady who managed to survive to age 95 with no surgeries and no pharmaceuticals.

As I recall, she had a wonderful sense of humor. When my husband and I got engaged at age 19, my dad and mom took us to visit her so that she could meet my fiance as she could not attend the engagement party.........she had just turned 95...........could no longer do the five flights of stairs........

Grandma took one look at this tall blondish Polish fellow and said , "Look at those beautiful GREEN eyes.....he is so handsome......too bad he's not Italian".............she always had a twinkle in her eyes and a sense of humor and could admire a young man.

My grandmother had blue eyes, which is unusual for an Italian from southern Italy.......only one of her daughters, my Godmother , also had the blue eyes.........all the rest had the dark brown eyes of their father.

Six months later she took to her bed and passed away......one month before our wedding in May 1965 when we were 20. She died in her own bed, on her own terms. Guess she just knew it was "time" ; she had mourned her deceased husband for 50 years. How many would do that nowadays?
Her daughters would try to get her to wear something other than black.
Once they convinced her to wear some white and black dresses but then her brother Stefano in Italy died......and she reverted back to the black.

I could write a book..........wonderful memories of a vibrant elder who ate all the old ethnic foods of Italy.........and some of Greece as one of her daughters married a Sicilian and much of their Italian couisine is blended with that of Greece........again, the Mediterranean diet.

There were no processed foods at all in my grandmother's lifetime............plus there wasn't a little pill for every ailment under the sun.........I'd say the last two facts also contributed to her old age....plus she had the joy of being surrounded daily by a huge family of relatives who would visit her..........they were all jolly as I recall.......and the men did smoke Italian cigars but still didn't get lung cancer. Go figure. They also drank the Italian "home made" wine, made by the uncles.

[senior citizen]

Originally Posted by AutoBike

Wonderful stories. Our Italian relatives sound like they could have been cousins.
My Italian grandmother went into the hospital at age 92 and while there for congestive heart failure, was told that she had cancer. Her doctor wanted to start treatment for the cancer and my grandmother said "No! Take all of these tubes out of me and let me go home to die in my own bed in peace."
They made arrangements for her to go home the next day and less than 24 hours later, she passed peacefully in her sleep in her own bed on her own terms.

On her own terms indeed. Those old Italian grandmas were the heart of the home.

What town and province were your ancestors from? When I began my genealogy search about a dozen years ago, I had no idea I would end up with a family tree of 11,837 souls. Mine were from Laurenzana Potenza Basilicata Province in southern Italy. They all sailed out of the Port of Naples. From New York City they eventually ended up all over the United States and Canada.....and also Argentina, Cuba, Australia, etc. wherever there were openings for immigrants......when the quotas in N.Y.C. were filled.

Due to the huge families of children and the Italian naming tradition with each subsequent son naming their children after the grandparents and backward.......many eventually contacted ME and then when we shared whatever records we had, microfilms, birth, marriage and death records from Italy, etc........plus family stories, we made hundreds upon hundreds of cousin connections..........it is a small world after all. No pun intended.

[senior citizen]

Originally Posted by AutoBike

They were from, and many still live in Perugia. Like your family, mine is also filled with blue-eyed Italians.

I know where Perugia is. I forgot to mention that besides my grandmother and my Godmother (her youngest daughter), her son Leonard also had the blue eyes.......which are rare. My dad always said her family came "from the north" but when I checked........in the 1800's they were in Laurenzana; earlier than that they were in the town of Potenza north of Laurenzana.
But in 1599 they were in Graz Austria........so that is indeed the NORTH.
When I checked our same surnames in the Trent Fondo area which is in northern Italy near the Austrian border......they didn't have the lineage going back as far as we all had found..........but they did have blue eyes and red hair.

My grandmother's husband's family had been in Laurenzana forever as were the families they married into........going back to the 12th century with the Greeks. Anyway, the little southern village......from whence all of mine came, all intermarried with their cousins.........they were all related in one way or another..........easy to check as Napoleon was a stickler for keeping good records.

[Villages PL]

Originally Posted by senior citizen

I know where Perugia is. I forgot to mention that besides my grandmother and my Godmother (her youngest daughter), her son Leonard also had the blue eyes.......which are rare. My dad always said her family came "from the north" but when I checked........in the 1800's they were in Laurenzana; earlier than that they were in the town of Potenza north of Laurenzana.
But in 1599 they were in Graz Austria........so that is indeed the NORTH.
When I checked our same surnames in the Trent Fondo area which is in northern Italy near the Austrian border......they didn't have the lineage going back as far as we all had found..........but they did have blue eyes and red hair.

My grandmother's husband's family had been in Laurenzana forever as were the families they married into........going back to the 12th century with the Greeks. Anyway, the little southern village......from whence all of mine came, all intermarried with their cousins.........they were all related in one way or another..........easy to check as Napoleon was a stickler for keeping good records.

As long as we're on this subject, my maternal grandmother, who was born in Sicily, had blond hair and blue eyes. My mother was born with chestnut-brown hair and it gradually turned black. I was born with blondish hair that gradually turned black (but my under-arm hair is brown, ha!). The blond hair and blue eyes skipped a generation so I had some Italian cousins with blond hair and blue eyes.

[Shimpy]

Boy, has this post been hijacked. We went from plus or minus of consuming olive to whose grandmothers had blue eyes.

[kittygilchrist]

Mediterranean diet lowers risk of heart attack, stroke - CNN.com
Jimbo, I am not giving up my olive oil! :-D

[jimbo2012]

ok, don't, no one is twisting your arm, I'm only the messenger.

[SpicyCajunPugs]

Originally Posted by kittygilchrist

Mediterranean diet lowers risk of heart attack, stroke - CNN.com
Jimbo, I am not giving up my olive oil! :-D

I agree with Kitty...I am not giving up my olive oil, eggs, or shrimp because it has good cholesterol and other great benefits....it has been scientifically proven, and it tastes so good. My up and down weight problems are from eating too much of everything, and not from olive oil which I consume even when I am on a drastic diet...it actually helps me lose weight when used in moderation.