How many times have you heard “You are what you eat?” But what does this really mean? You may be telling yourself, I eat a vegetable now and then and an apple once in a while. Doesn’t all food feed me the same? Many people know that some foods are better than others, but they don’t typically look at some foods as actual poison to the body, or that food will actually affect the way they think and act.
Last year scientists were shocked to learn just how incredibly poor the American diet really is. Researchers at the University of California at Berkeley gathered dietary information from more than 4,700 adults and found that soft drinks proved more than 7 percent of the average American diet – the largest single source. Then they added in alcohol and sweets and the number jumped up to 25 percent. Then it got even worse when adding in fruit drinks and salty snacks brought that number up to 30 percent. This means that the average person gets one-third of their diet from junk food. The result, Gladys Block, epidemiologist and the study’s author, said “it is an unappetizing paradox: a nation simultaneously overfed and undernourished.”
An analogy I often use to explain basic nutrition to people is the bucket concept, like building a house. When building a house, there is a bucket of nails, a bucket of wood (albeit a large bucket), a bucket of glue, a bucket of paint, and so on. Our bodies have buckets in them for each nutrient that is needed to build and repair cells in our bodies. A bucket for vitamin C, a bucket for zinc, a bucket for fiber and so on. Just like when building a house, each bucket is important. You can’t complete the house without all the necessary buckets. Some buckets you need more of, and others you need less of, depending on the house, and the body, respectively.
We have a sheet of paper in our store that lists all the nutrients in an apple. There are over 400 nutrients in an apple. That is correct, over 400. And each fruit and vegetable has its own unique list of nutrients that only it contains. No matter how many isolated vitamins and minerals you take, you will not get the same powerhouse of nutrients you get from the actual apple (or other fruit or vegetable) itself. Each plant comes with its own unique list of nutrients. When you eat an apple, you help fill up the appropriate buckets in your body with those 400 nutrients. When your body is building new cells or repairing old cells, there needs to be nutrients in the buckets so the body has something to pull from, so it can complete its job effectively. When we get stressed – we pull nutrients from our buckets even more. If the buckets are empty, or your bucket account is overdrawn, the work cannot be done correctly, and this is where illness and/or negative moods often set in. Unfortunately, it is very, very easy to empty our buckets, and much more challenging to fill them back up.
If you are eating organic fruits, vegetables, whole grains and meats, your body will get the much-needed nutrients to “fill your buckets.” If you are eating food that has antibiotics, hormones, steroids, pesticides or food that has hydrogenated oils, saturated fats, artificial colors, artificial flavorings, preservatives and the like, you are just putting toxins in your body that overfill your toxin bucket, pulls nutrients from other buckets to help compensate, and does not put any nutrients in the buckets that are depleted. How do you expect your body and your brain to work optimally when you aren’t giving it what it needs to function properly?
Dr. Dean Ornish said “Most common diseases may be prevented or even reversed by making diet changes.” And behavior issues are no different.
Food has the ability to alter the production and release of neurotransmitters. Neurotransmitters are the chemical messengers that carry information from one nerve cell to another. Neurotransmitters tell us when we are hungry, when we are full, when we are tired, etc. When we eat food that feed these neurotransmitters, they work optimally for us. When we don’t feed them correctly, our brains get “foggy” or we have memory loss, or we can feel anger, fear or anxiety.
In addition, our brain is the most important organ in our body and the most vulnerable as well. The brain can’t store energy, can survive only a few minutes without oxygen, and dies very fast under difficult conditions. Basically, when something is wrong with the body, our brains suffer. Most mothers are very familiar with this – when a child is coming down with an illness, they typically have a tantrum or other outburst first.
An excellent book that spells out what a major impact food has on our mental health is
Food, Teens & Behavior by Barbara Reed, Ph.D. Barbara states, “Every protein in the body, every bit of fuel in the blood, every enzyme necessary for the thousands of reactions that take place every second, come directly from or are derived from what we eat. ... If our diets do not provide the cells with the substances they need, our bodies will malfunction in one way or another.” Barbara Reed was a probation officer who worked with and helped thousands of people to healthier lives by teaching them how to feed their bodies properly.
Barbara taught people that:
This does not by any means discount therapy or other spiritual growth. Even though these things seem to many to be mutually exclusive – they all in fact work together. It’s as if the body is smart enough to believe the good things about it if it is supported nutritionally as well. And if the body is filled with garbage – only the negative seems to resonate. In other words, good food feeds good actions and bad food feeds bad actions.
Another important factor in moods is to keep hydrated – dehydration affects your ability to think clearly and concentrate – toxins in your brain make your brain get foggy. Many people, especially children, do not drink enough water to properly help clear toxins out of their bodies. Instead they drink sodas, juice and other beverages that are typically loaded with sugar, artificial sweeteners, artificial colors, etc. It has been estimated that more than 70% of pre-school children drink no water at all. Drinking good water each day is an inexpensive and effective way to help hydrate your body better.
Breakfast really is the most important meal of the day. Many people do not eat a proper breakfast, which affects not only your brains actions, but also your blood sugar levels, adrenals, and thyroid glands. Hypoglycemia and other blood sugar disorders are only made worse when people not only eat the wrong foods, but also don’t eat at proper times when their bodies need to be fed to work properly. Eating better later will not make up for skipping breakfast. Studies have proven that many behavioral issues stem from children not eating a proper breakfast. People make sure they have gas in their car before they drive off, but show less respect to their bodies by not feeding them properly in the morning – but demanding they perform optimally.
Is has been know since the 1920’s that milk is not a proper food for people. It is the proper food only for baby cows. In 1978 the Schauss-Simonsen study compared the diets of juvenile offenders to another group of kids who had behavior problems, but had no criminal background. Children who got in trouble with the law drank a lot more milk than those who did not. Dairy has also been linked to many allergies; skin issues, asthma and more health issues are added to the list each year.
Eat only meats that are preferably grass-fed and organic (these are higher in the good fats, and lower in the bad fats), whole grains (oats, brown rice, millet, quinoa, spelt, etc.). Eat organic vegetables either raw or slightly cooked and fruits that are organic as well. Even the US Food Pyramid, which is horribly out of date, recommends that we as human beings need to eat 5-7 servings of fruits and vegetables each and every day at a minimum to maintain health. If you are not optimally healthy, eating more of these can help turn your health around. When choosing oils, make sure they are cold-pressed olive oil, grapeseed oil, flax seed oil, lecithin, or fish oils that provide the “essential” fatty acids to feed our brains properly.
Avoid all refined foods and all foods containing sugar, wheat flour, caffeine and alcohol. Avoid foods with artificial flavors, colorings, preservatives, or sweeteners.
The US spends more per child than any other nation in the world marketing poor food choices to kids - $15 billion per year, which is more than what it would cost to provide health insurance for all uninsured children. Many other countries including Ireland, Sweden, Norway, Austria, Belgium, France, and more ban advertising to children, knowing that these foods are bad for kids’ health and minds. It is so sad to see commercials selling “food” that doesn’t really feed us at all. It is our job as parents to change this for the future. You don’t have to buy into what you are being sold. You don’t have to eat what everyone else eats. We can make healthy choices for our families, setting better examples for our children, sending powerful messages to the companies that make these foods, that we won’t purchase them anymore, and in the process getting our families healthier.