Ignorance is Bliss! Knowledge can be quite annoying when you can't help but act on it. I'm a health nut. I have OCD tendencies. When I learn something new, I am compelled to act on it. If I don't, I will literally lose sleep until I do. So where does this lead ... this always leads to making my life more difficult and inconvenient. But hey, at least I sleep peacefully, right?
So this obsession started my senior year in college. There was this nutritionist in my church and one day we were talking nutrition and she mentioned the idea of only eating food, real food. I was confused. She elaborated by saying one should only eat food that comes from the perimeter of the grocery store. You go down the first aisle and get your produce, across the back wall and get your meats, and down the last aisle to get your dairy. Everything else is bad for you. I questioned her. What do you mean everything else is bad? Well, she said, you should never eat anything with an ingredient that you don't know what it is. If it comes in a box, chances are it is full of preservatives, artificial flavors, and other random things that aren't really food. My next trip to the grocery store lasted three hours. I was astonished. Everything I picked up had ingredients that I couldn't pronounce.
I started slowly. But one by one, I started eliminating things from my grocery list. Pop tarts and toaster strudels were the first to go. I switched from Velveta to cheddar cheese. I bought real butter. The first thing I noticed is that all the foods I thought were healthy (i.e. 'low fat' or 'diet') were the worst. They were full of fake foods to make up for the real food that was taken out to reduce the calories. I thought, I am going to gain weight doing this because real food has more calories. But I didn't. In fact, I lost the 15 pounds that I had gained my freshman year in a matter of months. And I wasn't even trying. It just happened. I was hooked. Real food was the way to go.
Over the years I have learned more and more about healthy eating. Each time I learn something, I am compelled to act on it. Here are some of the things I have done:
-Cut out deli meat (it's processed). If I want a turkey sandwich, I have to cook a real turkey.
-Switch to whole grain (flourless) bread. Wheat four is not much better than white flour.
-Buy organic produce, especially on the things we eat the most and the '
dirty dozen'.
-Cut out nitrites, preservatives, artificial flavorings and high fructose corn syrup.
-Use honey over sugar when possible.
-Switch from cooking in non-stick pans to cast iron.
-Reduce hormone exposure by buying organic eggs, almond milk, and replacing beef with deer meat (thanks to my awesome BIL who hunts).
I'll stop there.
In addition to changing the way we eat/ prepare food, I have switched to phosphate-free cleaning products, eliminated as much plastic as possible from our home, switched to fluoride-free toothpaste, and a host of other things.
OK, I'm stopping. The point is, when I hear about something being bad for you, I feel compelled to research it. Sometimes it turns out to be a bogus claim with no real scientific data to support it. But if I do find it to be legitimate ... well, I just can't sleep until I act on my new knowledge.
And thanks to a fellow blogger who posted
this article, my latest research has been on microwaves. It's driving me crazy. Now every time I use my microwave, I think about all the nutrients being zapped out of my food, (among other things). So I have decided to see if I can go the month of June without my microwave. I'm not throwing it out or anything (it's great for disinfecting sponges) and I will probably still use it to reheat coffee since there is nothing nutritious in coffee anyway. But no more cooking food or reheating leftovers in my microwave.
Ahhhh, more work for me! That's what always happens when I learn something new.
I'll let you know how it goes.
