DANGERS OF SOYA -VERY IMPORTANT FOR LADIES

The soya bean is the seed of the leguminous soya bean plant. Soya foods have been a staple part of the Chinese diet for over 4000 years but have only been widely consumed in Western countries since the 1960's. Soya foods include tofu, tempeh, textured vegetable protein (chunks, mince etc), miso, soya sauces, soya oil and margarine, and soya dairy alternatives.

THIS ARTICLE IS THRU THE KIND COURTESY OF MS SUREKHA RAMCHANDANI, ONE WOMAN'S STORY ON SOYA...

All Males - PLEASE pass this info to all your female friends... It may save their lives!Something to take note of. This is my true story, nothing altered.  These are facts, as they relate to my experience, my opinions based on what I have read and felt. I am relating them to warn other young health-conscious women who are unwittingly harming themselves.

In 1989, I graduated from high school in Texas and couldn't wait to hit the big college city. One of the changes I wanted to make was to eat healthier.  Once I moved to health-conscious Austin, Texas, I began to fortify my body  with the best and healthiest foods I could find.

Tofu was the main ingredient in every healthy dish and I bought soya milk  almost every day and used it for everything from cereal to smoothies or  just to drink for a quick snack. I bought soya muffins, miso soup with  tofu, soybeans, soybean sprouts, etc.

All the literature in all the health and fitness magazines said that soya  protected you against everything from heart disease to breast cancer. It was the magical isoflavones, the estrogen-like hormones that all worked to  help you stay young and healthy. I looked great, I was working out all the  time, but my menstrual cycle was off. At 20, I started taking birth control pills to regulate my menstrual cycle.

In addition to this I began to suffer from painful periods. I began to get  puffy, it was as though I was losing my muscle tone. I began to suffer  from depression and getting hot flushes. I mistook all this for PMS since  my periods were irregular. By the time I was 25, my periods were so bad, I  couldn't walk.

The birth control pills never made them regular or less painful so I dec! ided to stop taking them. I went on like this for another two years until I realized my pain wasn't normal. At 27, my gynecologist found two cysts in my uterus. Both were the size of tennis balls. I went through surgery to have them removed and thank God they were benign. The gynecologist told me to go back on birth control pills.  I didn't. In 1998, he discovered a lump in my breast. Again, I went through surgery and again it was benign.

In November 2000 my glands swelled up and my gums became inflamed. Thinking I had a tooth infection I went to the dentist who told me that teeth were not the problem. After a dose of antibiotics the swelling still  did not go down. At this point I could feel a tiny nodule on the right  side of my neck. I told my mother I had thyroid trouble. She thought I was  being silly. No one in the family suffered from thyroid trouble. Going on  a hunch I saw a specialist who diagnosed me with Papillary Thyroid  Carcinoma.

After a series of tests he told me it was cancer. My fiance and I sat stunned. We were not prepared and I was so scared. We scheduled surgery right away. The specialist told us that it would only be after the operation that a pathologist would be able to tell us for sure if it was cancer. They found a tumor in my right lobe composed of irregular cells and another smaller tumor growing on the left, so the entire thyroid was removed.

They told me that after undergoing radioactive iodine I would be safe and  assured me that I could live a long life. After treatment I began to  search for the cause of all these problems. I never once thought it could  be all the soya I had consumed for nearly ten years.

After all, soya is healthy. I came upon a web page that linked thyroid problems to soya intake and the conspiracy of soya marketed as a health food when in fact it is only a toxic by-product of the vegetable oil industry. This was insane, after all, the health and fitness magazines had  ! said&nbs p; nothing about soya being harmful.

I visited a herbalist who was diagnosed with thyroid cancer in 1985. She  informed me that soya was the culprit. She had a hysterectomy due to cysts  and other uterine problems. A few months later another acquaintance who  had consumed soya came down with thyroid cancer. A girl in England I met  through the Internet in a thyroid cancer forum had just undergone surgery  and she was only 19.

What was going on???? Breast cancer is linked to estrogen. What mimics estrogen in the female body, SOYA!

But I never suspected soya because until now I never once found a single article that stated soya could be dangerous. Women who took soya prior to  thyroid problems will continue to take it after if they are not aware of  what soya actually does, what it contains and how it reacts in the female  body. I think this is the reason that women with thyroid cancer often develop breast cancer later.

My co-worker is big into soya and I see her losing hair and gaining weight  despite a walking workout during her break and after work, and apples and  oranges for lunch. She just had cysts removed from her uterus too.

I warned her to stay off soya. I referred her to websites but until it is  on the evening news on all four networks, women will suffer. Since the  thyroidectomy, I do not touch soya, haven't for two years.

Dear readers, please use my story in any way you can.  There are so many young girls who are consuming soya because they think they are taking care  of themselves, and women taking soya because they want to be healthy.

It is so unfair that the information about the dangers of soya isn't more  widely circulated. It is sad. There are many out there who feel this way  and it is a terrible blow when you realize you are not as healthy as you  thought and that the information that you depended on was wrong.