Debra Shapiro, MD
Board Certified ObGyn, DipABLM and Health CoachHello, all you wonderful plant eaters and soon to be plant-eaters! Welcome to A New View of Food. Following is the story of my journey to a fully plant based lifestyle.
My Story
I was raised in New Jersey in the 1960s, and my mom did not like to cook. Not everyone can relate; some of you were probably lucky enough to have been given real food to eat, but I was eating processed, high fat, high sugar food throughout the day. Eggs, with American Cheese, Spam, Pop Tarts, tuna fish and other cold cut meat sandwiches, and meat or fish with canned vegetables for supper. As a child, a dinner out was fried chicken, or Chinese spareribs, or hamburgers and fries. In high school, my father would pick me up after a volunteered at our hospital and take me to Burger King for a Whopper with cheese. I don’t recall ever having a salad (which is so sad to consider). We had margarine, Cool Whip, Cheeze Whiz, Pringles … so much hyper processd food.
Not surprisingly, my mother had type 2 diabetes for my entire life. In fact, when I think of it, she also had fibroids and heavy bleeding that necessitated a hysterectomy when she was just 40 (a year after my birth), and she was diagnosed with type 2 diabetes a couple of years later. She was always miserable, physically and emotionally, because of that disease. One of my strongest childhood memories is of her boiling her insulin syringes and needles on the stove. That is the smell I remember coming most often from our kitchen; acrid and sad. She often needed three shots of insulin a day and she was never in good control of her blood glucose. Hypoglycemic attacks (very low blood sugar) happened often and left her frightened and afraid to go out. After about ten years of this disease, she was diagnosed with a glioblastoma, a deadly brain tumor, and died at the age of 54. I’m 62 years old now and it’s hard to believe how very young she was, and how sick.
SO IT WAS BECAUSE OF MY MOTHER THAT I BECAME A PHYSICIAN.
I am a Board Certified Obstetrician/Gynecologist. As a teen, out of compassion for animals, I was vegetarian, but I was clueless about the cruelty of the dairy industry, and about the health risks of dairy, and so I relied heavily on yogurt and cheese during those 9 years. My father also succumbed to diseases related to diet: he developed prostate cancer and after radiation treatment for that, multiple myeloma (a type of bone marrow lymphoma). He lived to be 86 perhaps, in part, because, unlike my mother, he always stayed fit, exercised daily, and ate better. When I really think about it, he definitely ate more fruit, more whole grains, and nuts on a regular basis.
I learned about veganism and plant-based nutrition initially from a patient. I credit her with first opening my eyes to a vast body of knowledge that changed my life and has enabled me to help others change their lives, as well. She told me about two websites: Farm Sanctuary and NutritionFacts.org. I remember watching Steve-O narrate a Farm Sanctuary video, I watched one of Dr. Michael Greger’s full length end of year videos, and it all just clicked for me. I only wish I had known sooner how to save my mother from so much suffering.
AS I AM ACADEMICALLY MINDED, I DIDN’T JUST WANT A LITTLE KNOWLEDGE; I WANTED A LOT!
So I started attending continuing education courses presented by Neal Barnard, MD and The Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, and the International Plant Based Nutrition Healthcare Conferences put on by The Plantrician Project. I took the online Plant Based Nutrition certificate course by T. Colin Campbell, PhD, offered through eCornell (and I highly recommend this course to anyone, medical professional or lay person). I needed to learn how to cook whole plant foods without salt, sugar, or oil, so I took the online Forks Over Knives 3-month cooking course.
I came to see what medicine often overlooks: real healing takes time.
Time to listen. Time to learn. Time to change.
In exam rooms bound by the 15-minute clock, I couldn’t give that. So I stepped out.
I became a Certified Vegan Lifestyle Coach and Educator through the Main Street Vegan Academy. Then a Certified Health Coach through the Health Coach Institute. And finally, I earned Board Certification in Lifestyle Medicine—a specialty rooted in using food, movement, and mindset as first-line tools for preventing and reversing disease.
Now, I combine the rigor of medicine with the heart of education.
I speak, I teach, I advocate—
all in service of one goal: to help people reclaim their health through the power of plants.
LAST LEG OF THE ACADEMIC JOURNEY: BOARD CERTIFICATION IN LIFESTYE MEDICINE
I’ve seen firsthand how transformative food can be.
In my private practice, even through phone sessions alone, clients experience life-changing results—because most people have no idea just how good their bodies are meant to feel.
When you shift to a whole food, plant-based diet, everything begins to align:
Weight stabilizes.
Blood pressure, blood sugar, and cholesterol return to ideal levels.
Energy rises. Aches fade. Moods lift.
Our gut microbes—those tiny allies—thrive on this way of eating. And they repay us daily in vitality and resilience.
I invite you to learn with me.
Learn which foods fuel you—and which drain you.
Learn how to nourish your body as an act of love and liberation.
Learn to forgive yourself for the missteps, because growth always begins with grace.
This is the only diet proven to reverse heart disease—our #1 killer.
It also reverses type 2 diabetes and reduces the risk of cancer, arthritis, Alzheimer’s, cataracts, and more.
We were made to enjoy the vibrant, colorful foods this Earth provides.
It is my joy—and my calling—to share that truth and inspire others toward lasting, radiant health.
With warmth and purpose,
Debra Shapiro, MD
“When the food is correct, medicine is of no need; when the food is incorrect, medicine is of no use.”
Ancient Ayurvedic Proverb
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Don't Wait Any Longer. Start Forging Your Own Path Today!
Please sign up to my mailing list to receive periodic updates from A New View of Food and receive my gift to you my ebook, "Why Eat Plants?" In the first chapter, I give three perfectly good reasons to eat mainly plants as opposed to animal products. Chapter two is a practical step by step guide to making the transition from an animal based diet to a plant based diet, including educational and culinary resources. In Chapter three, I expose some of the misleading nutritional research that has fueled and delighted the popular press and confused consumers in recent years. This ebook is a great introduction to A New View of Food.