Thursday, April 14, 2011

Food Inc.

I finally watched Food Inc. this weekend. Wow! Enlightening, disturbing and overwhelming. It has taken me this long to really absorb it. If you haven't seen it, it's well worth it. It really gets back to change. The overwhelming part for me is where do you start?

I've decided the first thing we're doing is signing up for a food co-op. I thought about this last year, but didn't do it for various reasons. This movie was just the thing to get me fired up again. If anyone else is interested, this is the best site I've found to identify the best co-op for your particular needs: http://www.localharvest.org/csa/. It's really not that expensive, in fact I feel like we may save money and we'll end up with produce that I might not normally buy, which means ...wait. for. it... trying new things! The downside is that if the particular farm we buy into doesn't produce a crop this year (weather, etc.), we'll be out the money. After watching the movie, it's worth the risk. The farmer's market is another great option. Unfortunately the ones close to us are just far enough away that I can't seem to make it there on a regular basis. Life happens!

So, I am tackling the food co-op and I will keep you posted on how it goes. If anyone else is already doing it, I would love to hear your comments.

Monday, April 11, 2011

Out with the hot dogs

Some time ago my mother-in-law read some article and was concerned I was giving my toddler too many hot dogs. I considered hot dogs a staple. The little guy was still dealing with the milk allergy so it was one easy thing he liked & could eat. I had no interest in learning these were bad for him. Plus, I wasn't really feeding him hot dogs. They were turkey dogs, which are surely ok.

To appease her, I reluctantly googled it eyeing the positive articles. It seems they contain sodium nitrate which is the real concern. It's also in deli meat & I suspect, the reason they tell pregnant women not to eat deli meat. I wasn't convinced. After all, I'd been living on turkey sandwiches most of my life. Then I ran across a study that indicated children who ate 1 or more hot dogs a week were at a significantly increased risk of childhood leukemia. GASP! Out go the hot dogs!

I am very happy to report that a number of months after grilled cheese overtook our love of hot dogs, Oscar Meyer introduced nitrate-free hot dogs. The hubby won't eat the beef ones, but you really can't taste much difference with the turkey dogs.

I also just figured out you can cut the dogs about 3/4 of the length, twice to create an octopus. I add raisins for eyes. Now we eat "octopus" for lunch some days.

Friday, April 8, 2011

The Chemicals Most Dangerous to Children

My friend Elizabeth clued me into this other blog post on a list of chemicals most dangerous to children based on data from the EPA. They describe each chemical & why it is used. And yes, they are still widely used in things we all use everyday.  Click here to see the info. As it relates to the food dyes, I've long wondered why products aren't offered here without those contaminants. They've been outlawed in many other countries so manufacturers are already producing dye-free versions (think Kraft Mac & Cheese that's not orange & color-free M&Ms). Why not put them on the shelves here & let us choose?

There are a couple additional things I've started trying to avoid that I'm surprised didn't make the list. Those are sodium nitrate (hot dogs & lunch meat) and paraben (cosmetics, lotion, hair care & I've now started finding it in medicine & toothpaste). Again, I'm no scientist, but more on those later.

Off the subject, this weekend I'll be putting together our menu for the next month. I'll be sure to share once it's complete.

Wednesday, April 6, 2011

Do Corn Flakes come from corn?

The theme at preschool this week is "the farm". Today my oldest came home with a book he made. It started with corn growing on the farm & ended with corn flakes. It even features the 'corn flakes plant' just before the corn flakes conversion. This is particularly profound because I just finished reading "Food Rules" by Michael Pollan. Rule 14: Eat foods made from ingredients that you can picture in their raw state or growing in nature. I'm not sure corn flakes qualifies, but according to this homemade book, they do. We're teaching them early!

If you haven't read the book, it's good and a very easy read. He boils the food rules down to three overall themes: Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants. I'll share my favs:

Rule 2: Don't eat anything your great-grandmother wouldn't recognize as food. (My great-granny Duck is my only living grandparent. She lives on a mountain in TN & I wouldn't be surprised if she still only eats the food she grows. She likely still mows her own lawn too, while chewing snuff. I love her!)

Rule 9: Avoid food products with the wordoid "lite" or the terms "low-fat" or "non-fat" in their names. (We've gotten fat on non-fat foods).

Rule 11: Avoid foods you see advertised on television.

Rule 37: The whiter the bread, the sooner you'll be dead.

Rule 39: Eat all the junk you want as long as you cook it yourself. (Ever made french fries?)

Rule 41: Eat like the French. Or the Japanese. Or the Italians. Or the Greeks.

Rule 46: Stop eating before you're full. (New way of thinking: stop when you have no more hunger vs. when you're full.)

Rule 57: Don't get your fuel from the same place your car does.

It really is a good, simple read. A good reminder of some of the things we know, but forget or forget the importance of. I also learned a few new things, particularly related to how we eat. Maybe next I'll tackle one of his deeper books.

Along the theme of "mostly plants", I tried swiss chard for the first time last night and it was surprisingly good. My hubby (who is not a big veggie eater) even liked it. Here's the recipe I used. Enjoy!

Shots Do Not Come with a Side of Shrilling Screams

I've already told you how much screaming my child did the first few months of his life. On vaccination days, it was way worse! He would spend the rest of the day totally conked out or screaming like he was in terrible pain. I spent these days rocking him in the hammock next to the waterfall in our pool (I miss that back yard!) which was all I could do to sooth him. The second day after the shots wouldn't be a whole lot better, but he would be back to his normal screams by day 3. He was my first child & I assumed this was typical. If anyone is currently going through this: it's not normal!

I researched vaccines before I gave them to him. I skipped a few and I followed the manufacturer's schedule. I think it's interesting that vaccines are supposedly studied & determined safe at a certain age, but then it seems the CDC (or pediatricians) end up recommending them at an age earlier than what's been studied by the manufacturer. Last time I checked, MMR was approved at age 2. At 18 months it was on the list for us (though I waited). Later they started recommending it at 12 months and I'm not sure what the current recommendation is. I've also noticed this is done with medicine. Our pediatrician has recommended over-the-counter stuff for our little guy before the age it's approved on the box. Am I just anal (perhaps) or should we wait to give them stuff until it's tested to be safe in their little systems?

The latest book I read had me in tears. More & more they are linking long-term vaccine "issues" with under-developed immune systems. My little guy definitely had an immature immune system. I believe it was pure prayer & a little luck that he doesn't have an auto-immune disorder.

There is a new research study out indicating that there may be a link to vaccines and Autism. Not surprising, right? It does mention hypersensitivity and giving so many vaccines in such a short time as possible culprits. (I read somewhere else that what we give our babies is the equivalent to giving a grown man 70 vaccines at one time.) Here's an excerpt from the study:
Ratajczak also looks at a factor that hasn't been widely discussed: human DNA contained in vaccines. That's right, human DNA. Ratajczak reports that about the same time vaccine makers took most thimerosal out of most vaccines (with the exception of flu shots which still widely contain thimerosal), they began making some vaccines using human tissue. Ratajczak says human tissue is currently used in 23 vaccines. She discusses the increase in autism incidences corresponding with the introduction of human DNA to MMR vaccine, and suggests the two could be linked. Ratajczak also says an additional increased spike in autism occurred in 1995 when chicken pox vaccine was grown in human fetal tissue.


This gets me back to my original post: we want vaccines. Is it so impossible to make them safe?

I also wonder at what point this researcher will be determined to be a quack? That seems to be the growing trend for vaccine whistle-blowers.

Here's the link to the article: http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-31727_162-20049118-10391695.html

Monday, April 4, 2011

Processed food: how much is too much?

I grew up on processed food. I can't tell you how many times a week I ate at McDonalds. Staples at my house were Kraft Mac & Cheese, Spaghetti-Os and Campbell's soup. I also grew up with a single mom. Looking back, I don't think it was that she didn't necessarily have time to cook (though it was limited), it was more that she had a very stubborn daughter who would rather eat the junk. I imagine she plain didn't have the energy to fight me on what we were having for dinner at the end of the day. So by the time I was living on my own, I didn't know how to cook. Every once in a while I tried, but I really didn't know where to start.

Fortunately I married a man who can cook. And he has supersonic taste buds. He can taste something at a restaurant & re-create it. This totally came in handy when we discovered our child had so many allergies. I couldn't have done it without him. He cooked everything from scratch, substituting things that I couldn't eat & it was all unbelievably good. He taught me to cook. Except, he tastes & tweaks, I read recipes & follow directions. Here's what I figured out in all this: it's not that hard. It's really more a matter of doing it. The more you do it, the more comfortable you become. Most things really don't take that long. And it's typically so good.  

Planning is key in cooking things from scratch. The thing that helps me most is that we sit down once a month & decide on the menu for the entire next month. Then we go to the store & buy everything (except some of the perishables). This saves money & it keeps me from having to think of what we're going to eat each night. If I had to decide what we were eating one day at a time, I wouldn't. Dinner would arrive & I'd be running to a fast food joint or grabbing a box of something pretending to be food. I love waking up & simply checking the list.

Back to the "how much is too much" processed food...do what you can. I know some people who make a bunch of stuff on the weekends & eat it during the week. Also, don't be afraid to freeze things. I also previously had a fear of the freezer, but I've since learned that most things freeze fairly well. Make a bunch & freeze some of it for another time. A new trick I just figured out: freeze soups in single serving sizes. So easy to pull one out & stick it in the microwave! The point is, do what you can & make it work for you & your schedule. You won't be a good mom (or a fun person) if you make unreasonable demands on yourself & are stretched too thin.

Friday, April 1, 2011

Vitamin D or sun safety?

I was made more aware of the benefits & issues surrounding vitamin D when my child was an infant. Since I nursed, our initial pediatrician (yes, the one who asked if I had ever heard of colic) recommended I give him TriViSol supplements for vitamin D.

I researched it (that's what I do & I already was leery of this doc) and learned you mostly get vitamin D from sun exposure. Hello!?! I lived in Florida! And I took said child on a walk every morning so that he'd take a nap without the back breaking effort of rocking this 95%-for-his-weight infant. However, scientists hadn't figured out how much vit D a mother passes through breast milk so they were recommending it for every breast-fed child. I really don't care if "we've" figured it out or not. I can't imagine that God would somehow overlook this detail. I was still in awe of the details involved in the whole process of creating a child. I didn't give him the supplements.

Don't get me wrong--vitamin D is clearly very important. It naturally comes from the sun and your body builds up reserves. Get all you can in the summer I say. I used to have what I call my "March Mood" every year. It was the season when I would clear the bad out of my life (mostly bad boyfriends). Now I wonder if that was about the time I used up my vit D reserves & some sort of small depression would set in. It's noteworthy that my "March Mood" was virtually nonexistent when I lived in Florida.

This week I searched how to strike a balance between absorbing vit D and protecting yourself from harmful rays. The experts state that 5-30 minutes of prime sun twice a week should give you enough. First, so specific (not!). Second, it seems this is something they have totally pulled out of the air. And, if you get your vit D levels checked the results are skewed to the active levels at that moment. The test doesn't account for the reserves. Also it looks like they don't plan to conduct any studies on sun exposure for vit D because of the skin cancer risk. Humpf!

So, the result of my research is: we definitely need vit D. From there its ambiguous. I will likely still spend a few minutes in the sun most days during the summer without sunscreen and use SPF for longer exposure (as I've been doing for the past number of years). Perhaps I'll supplement in winter. If my March Mood returns, I will definitely supplement. (Did I mention that too much is toxic & you can't get vit D toxicity from the sun?)

As for the kids--they spend a lot of time outdoors & I don't slather them up really early morning or late afternoon or for really short periods. Peak times they definitely get slathered up! They also drink milk which is fortified with vit D so I think they are ok. They will absolutely not be laying out in their teens with the baby oil on. If I'm lucky they will also never choose to visit a tanning bed.

If you want to read more about vit D for yourself, I found this article a bit scientific, but thorough: http://ods.od.nih.gov/factsheets/vitamind/