Sunday, February 26, 2012

Eat For Health

Yesterday I ran 8.4 hilly miles in the wind, and I thought about food the whole time.

Not in the way you would think like, "I'm eating a burger after this!" Or, "I deserve to make cookies when I get home." Quite the opposite.

This week Keebler cookies AND Oreos went on sale at Smith's, which is where I do most of my grocery shopping since it's a block away from my house. The first time I saw the huge display of the delicious E.L. Fudge cookies, I had to stop and look at the ingredients list to remind myself why I was NOT going to buy them, even if they were half off. Here's the list:

ENRICHED FLOUR (WHEAT FLOUR, NIACIN, REDUCED IRON, THIAMIN MONONITRATE [VITAMIN B1], RIBOFLAVIN [VITAMIN B2], FOLIC ACID),
SUGAR,
VEGETABLE OIL (SOYBEAN, PALM, AND PALM KERNEL OIL WITH TBHQ FOR FRESHNESS),
DEXTROSE,
CONTAINS TWO PERCENT OR LESS OF HIGH FRUCTOSE CORN SYRUP,
COCOA (PROCESSED WITH ALKALI),
EGGS,
COCOA,
SALT,
WHEY,
CORNSTARCH,
BAKING SODA,
BUTTER (CREAM, SALT),
NATURAL AND ARTIFICIAL FLAVOR, SOY LECITHIN.

Now why do you need all that junk in your cookies?!

They are not food.

I got home that day and told Pete that I think I need to stop shopping at Smiths because I'm sick of being bombarded by these things. I really do love E.L. Fudge cookies. They are one of my favorites, but I just can't feel good about eating that anymore.

Then he showed me this video:



I could go so far as to say this video is life-changing.

At least to me.

This lady basically cured her MS with food!

It is unbelievable to me that she had all the best care and medicine available, and yet she was still getting worse. She could hardly walk and was unable to sit up in a chair. She went from that to riding her bike 18 miles and riding horses in the Rockies in a year!

Seriously, how much money do we spend on research to find cures for things like MS or cancer or whatever in this country, when the answer is right here. Maybe we should spend more time and effort on educating people about this, instead of trying to treat the symptoms.

Maybe I'm over-simplifying it, but I don't think so. We need these nutrients to live and be healthy. One thing she said that really stood out to me is that we are literally starving ourselves. Here we live in this land of plenty and we are starving ourselves and getting fat and sick at the same time, while we're surrounded by all this good food.

And we are doing this to our children.

She also mentioned that these foods could help with behavioral problems. How many of us would LOVE for our children to behave better? I remember the day after Halloween, several people posted on facebook about how terrible their children were acting that day. Coincidence? On the other side of that, my kids have been so good these past 2 days! Coincidence again? Maybe. But they have been getting along so well, and obeying us so much better. Maybe they're just feeling better.

On my run yesterday, while I was thinking about all of this, I also thought about how grateful I am for my healthy body and that I'm able to just go out and run eight miles.

I want to keep it that way.

We are going to try to start building our meals around the vegetables instead of grains or starches. We don't need those things, and like she said, if you get all the vegetables in and you're still hungry, then you can have the grain. We are really excited about this.

Now, I'm not saying I won't ever have sugar again. I mean, cookies are my favorite thing, but they need to be a much more rare treat.

When I told my sister about this, she said, "You always do such weird diets." But first of all, it's not a "diet" and secondly, how is it weird to eat fresh, real food? I sent her the video, and I hope it helps change her way of thinking too.

Please try this with us! If you do, post on here and let me know how it's going or what you think of it.

PS - Building Mitochondria also helps with running!

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