Your Life, Now!

Toxic Waste Remix

Thought I'd send out an update on my toxic waste cleanup!  I don't know about you, but if money grew on trees in my yard, I'd buy all organic foods regardless of the cost.  But I have a budget and have to find healthy stuff at the regular stores for the bulk of what we eat.  I do shop the health food stores, but I can't buy everything from there - at least not yet!  So here's my updated strategy on staying as toxic free as possible!

Reading labels carefully again.  If it has too many 'chemical' words, I tend to put it down.  But I am finding more foods that are msg/glutamic acid and HFCS free.  Very happy about that!  I'm not totally throwing out seaweed, wheat free soy sauces, or yeasts.  Just making sure it's natural and not too much.

Buying clean, healthy meats locally when possible.  Also, organic dairy and eggs.

Buying locally grown veggies at our farmer's market, but I also grow veggies in my own garden.  There are great prices on some organic produce at my local Walmart store.

Reducing sugar by using Stevia, TruVia, and Xylitol.  I'm also trying getting my chocolate fix with a small square of dark chocolate a day.  I'm looking at some recipes to combine chocolate with fiber, nuts, or dried coconut for a sweet lo-cal treat.  As for ice cream - which is one of my favorites - we're going to buy an ice cream maker and make our own healthy versions with the healthy sweetners!  I'm excited about that!  I don't totally throw out cane sugar, I do use the organic brands and sometimes do a combo of sugar/sweetner depending on what I'm making.

Grains are harder since I'm gluten free, however, flax seed and gluccomannon and other fibers help greatly when I make my own breads.  There are great choices to buy as well.  For my hubby who is not GF, I buy the organic higher fiber breads for him. 

Some great finds recently: Kettle Brand chips has some great flavored chips with no or natural glutamic acids (msg's).  My hubby & son still want flavored chips and they will eat these!  I'm know there are others that I haven't found yet.  LiteHouse brand dressings, dips/sauces.  Still looking for more, though.

Unfortunately, we live about 1 to 1 1/2 hours away from large Health Food stores that would carry lots more great choices.  But our stores are getting more in all the time. 

Gotta figure out restaurants at some point . . . . do you know good info? 

More updates later! 

My veggie garden last year.

Lab Results for MSG

Well, I'm going to try and wrap up the MSG info on this post.  Maybe we can revisit it in the future for additional, helpful info, but for now let's finish it off.

First, I thought some of you might want to see some actual lab studies done on MSG rats - quite interesting if you can understand all of it.  I didn't need to read/understand it all to get the gist of what MSG does to the rat!

http://www.scielo.br/pdf/bjmbr/v30n5/2647C.pdf
http://endo.endojournals.org/cgi/content/abstract/en.2005-0640v1
http://ep.physoc.org/content/93/2/213.abstract

As for me, I'm a bit frustrated in my food choices.  I'm already living gluten free, and having to add another list of ingredients to avoid is frustrating - especially when it is hard to know 100% about the MSG.  I've written a few companies about particular products I liked and found out another interesting yet frustrating problem. 

You have to ask if it contains free glutamic acids - not just monosodium glutamate - since there are so many variations of this stuff!  And they don't have to answer about all of them if you don't specifically ask!

Now the really frustrating part of all this is, glutamic acid is a naturally occurring thing on it's own in fermented products such as soy sauce.  I don't think a naturally occurring glutamate would be the same as the manufactured flavor enhancers as far as reacting negatively in the body.  I don't think being key here!  There's so much information out there on this subject that is hard to sift through it all, and I can't say for sure.

I've looked over the lists of all the glutamic acid names and here's a few that really get me! 

• hydrolyzed proteins - soy or whey

• autolyzed yeast or yeast extracts

• whey proteins

• sodium & calcium caseinates

Look at your "healthy" protein shake ingredients - see any of the above?  All of mine had hydrolyzed or whey proteins except for a not so nice tasting rice protein!  Read some labels on the all natural, organic, healthy foods out there.  See one of these on there?  Yep, you will!  These are also found in a number of health food store, all-natural products I thought would be a great alternative.  I was BUMMED! 

Yes, I love to eat fresh veggies and fruit, and whole grain rice, and other fresh from the ground foods, but I want to be able to enjoy more that just that.  I want some healthy snack foods that I don't have to make from scratch all the time.  I love a healthy chip & dip, a protein smoothie, a frozen dairy treat being on my menu!  It's tough to avoid ready made foods the rest of your life!  That's TOUGH!

And I don't want to, either!  So, I'm going to be writing food companies, asking about the glutamates they serve, asking them to stop using them, finding truly safe choices to eat, and generally making my voice heard and voting with my dollars for safe food choices. 

Check out these sites:  Truth in Labeling and get great info on the MSG battle.  Also http://tasteofbluesky.blogspot.com/2008/09/pantry-suggestions.html  for a great list of MSG free foods.

Two things I've changed so far:  No more Chick fil A chicken!  The grilled chicken has 3 forms of glutamic acid.  I'm sticking with the plain salad, cole slaw and bringing my own dressings again.  One salad dressing/sauce company I will be using:  LiteHouse Brand.  Check out their products and policy on MSG.

I won't be eating out much, and I will be making more from scratch at home.  And when I find some great foods that are glutamate free - I'll let you know!

Until then, keep reading those food labels and keep up the good work on your health and well-being!

The Lab Rat Syndrome

Lab rats.  Ever thought about how they get the rats into the disease state they want to then fix or experiment on? 

Hmmmm . . . . I never thought about it until I started dealing with my own health and weight issues.  Then, I found all the information on the food issues that contributed to my ill health.  I was shocked, and then I was mad!

Are you a lab rat as well? 

Seems that we all are.  I know you're thinking, "You're just a paranoid person.  Our food supply is safe and no one would knowingly harm people."  You really think so?  Let's find out. . . .

MSG is injected under the skin of day old mice and rats to produce obese animals with a predisposition to diabetes!  This has been one of the standard lab procedures for 30 some-odd years!

MSG not only causes fat-gain and obsesity, it damages the brain and causes a host of serious health problems in the body.  John Erb, author of the book The Slow Poisoning of America believes that MSG is the food industry's equivalent to Nicotine. "Studies have shown that people who eat food laced with MSG eat more of it, and faster than food that does not have this additive. If it makes the elderly eat more, what is it doing to our nations' health?
 
Glutamate is an amino acid that can excite almost every major organ in the body, especially the brain. It occurs naturally in milligram amounts in some harvested foods. Now, however, a person can get as much as a teaspoonful a day. John Erb finds this especially disparaging considering in some countries of the world one tablespoon of MSG is given to dogs to make them go into epileptic convulsions until they die!"

Because MSG affects the brain, it is CRUCIAL that all pregnant and nursing women avoid MSG at all costs.  It can definitely cross from you to your baby and affect their brains as well!
 
"When ingested by human test subjects MSG directly affects the Pancreas stimulating it to triple its standard output of insulin output.  This unnatural amount of insulin finds the sugar in the blood and converts it to fat. A few hours after you eat MSG the excess insulin the MSG triggers reduces your blood sugar level so much that you become tired and even hungry again. In animal test subjects this excess insulin leads to hyperinsulinemia: the chronic overproduction of insulin. The pancreas becomes so out of control that the body starts producing killer T cells to shut it down. Is it any wonder why diabetes, obesity and lethargy in our youths are at an all time high? Junk foods, processed foods, even cafeteria foods are now laced with large amounts of exitotoxic glutamates." John Erb reports.
 
Now, causing obesity and other metabolic issues is bad enough, but MSG does much more damage to the body than just your weight.  Because it damages the brain itself, it can cause or contribute to diseases such as ADD/ADHD, autism, pituitary tumors, epilepsy, migraines, sleep disorders, panic/rage disorders, and more.

So you want to stop eating MSG?  Great!  Me too!  The sickening part - excuse the pun - is that it is hidden in our foods and goes by other names than just MSG!  Flavour enhancers can appear in foods under the following description:

Glutamic acid (620)

Monosodium glutamate (621)

Monopotassium glutamate (622)

Calcium glutamate (623)

Monammonium glutamate (624)

Magnesium glutamate (625)

 Hydrolysed vegetable protein (HVP), other forms of hydrolysed or autolysed protein

Hydrolysed plant protein (HPP)

Natural flavourings

Flavours

Kombu extract

Yeast extract

Accent

Ajinomoto

Zest

Gourmet powder

Chinese seasoning

Ve-tsin powder

 The new MSG: Flavour enhancers 627, 631, 635

Disodium guanylate 627

Disodium inosinate 631

Disodium 5’ribonucleotides 635, also called ribonucleotides or nucleotides

Nucleotides are possibly added to unbaked products such as chicken nuggets in ‘bakers yeast’

How frustrating is that?!  Unfortunately, many foods we eat every day contain MSG in its various forms such as: 

Flavoured chips and snacks • flavoured noodles and snacks with flavour packs or sachets• savoury biscuits and crackers with flavours such as pizza or chicken and even ‘plain’ rice crackers • soups or sauces (canned, packet, restaurant) • stock cubes, stocks • gravy mix • crumbing mixes • seasoned salt • prepared meals • slimmers, lite or ‘healthy’ products and meals • frozen foods and meals • pies, party pies and sausage rolls • fresh sausages, marinated meats and stuffed or seasoned chicken • bottled soy or oriental sauces (note that naturally brewed soy sauce is a form of natural MSG) • deli, manufactured meats or mechanically reclaimed meat such as devon, some hams, luncheon chicken and turkey, chicken nuggets • flavoured tuna • vegetarian burgers and sausages

And most importantly - MOST fast foods and restaurant foods!  Junk & fast foods really do make you fat and sick!

Let's sum up so far!   The two worst things you can eat are High Fructose Corn Syrup and MSG additives.  It causes obesity, diabetes, and other serious health issues.  BOTH of these things are found in most of the every day foods that you eat!   You must make the conscious effort to buy truly all natural, non-enhanced, or organic foods available.   Sticking with your basic clean meats, veggies & fruits, and some of the better whole grains is your best choice to stay healthy and disease free!

For more information and to check out the sources of information I used go to:

Fed Up With Food Additives
MSG Truth
MSG Causes Obesity
The Shocking Dangers of MSG

To stopping the Lab Rat Syndrome,
Majetta