Recently, we watched a very interesting and revealing documentary on Netflix, called The Magic Pill. What an eye opener!
In the past few years, medical doctors have dedicated their life’s work to understanding the reasons behind the obesity epidemic we are currently facing. They have come forth with information that has shaken the powerful economic forces behind the publicity and policies being pushed onto us regarding what we should be eating to have a healthy life.
For years we have been told the food pyramid, as it still stands, is the correct way to fuel our bodies so that we can lead an energetic and healthy life. This is the same food pyramid we were told for years we had to follow, we did without questioning it and it let us to where we are today.
We were told to stay away from fats, because ” fats make you fat “, and now we come to hear from studies that have come to light that eating this way has provoked an illness pandemic that seems to never end.
Diabetes, high blood pressure, heart disease, alzheimer, depression, ADD, ADHD, cancer, autism just to name a few, have taken over our lives. With the illnesses come the never-ending medications to control them.
These very brave doctors have gone against the standard western diet and it has not been an easy task. Society has already been conditioned to eat in a certain way and to break away from this is very difficult. What I have seen and learned by observing friends and family is that we would rather not know the truth about our eating habits than know and take the necessary steps to change them.
It has been proven that the food industry took its marketing model from the tobacco industries. We have been conditioned to eat because its time to eat, not because we are hungry. We no longer know how to detect hunger in our body because the foods have created an addiction to them with all the additives and sugars added, that our hunger switch is on all the time.
Like any addiction, we first must recognize it exists and we are experiencing it, before we can make any significant changes. This is not an easy task.
Sometimes we must hit bottom before we decide we are willing to go thru the sacrifice and first detox our brains of ancient and harmful ideas, instilled in us by powerful corporations, for their own economical benefit and second detox our coverts, fridges, cars, offices and anyplace we have used as our eating places.
We no longer eat to live, we live to eat.
Our social gatherings revolve around food. Birthdays, weddings, class reunions, christmas, mothers day, fathers day, christenings, graduations, and even funerals have become occasions to get together to eat…
So, my question is, how can we do the right thing if we are bombarded by tv, magazine, radio ads pushing us to eat what we know now is what is making us fat and sick?
I don’t have an answer to that, but I am definitely trying to search for it everyday. I have learned that anything that comes in a box, has been processed someway and it may not be healthy, so if I read the ingredients and it contains something I cant pronounce, I don’t buy it. It has taken time for me to change my shopping habits.
In order for me to detox my brain, I only read information from reliable sources, listen to videos of all kinds of experts, try out their findings and see how I feel, physically and mentally and then I find the courage to suggest it to others as I see their needs for health.
I have been blessed with a wonderful, trusting husband, who has applied these changes to his life and has seen results, too. This has helped me keep on, keeping on. Because I am going through menopause and take blood thinners to avoid brain strokes, I cant seem to loose weight.
But I push myself everyday to make the right choices on what to eat and listen to my body as to when to eat it. Its a daily struggle. My kids, not children anymore, 24 and 20 years old respectively can testify to the changes in my mood and energy levels.
We have talked about my eating modifications, they have tried it themselves, have also made changes in eating habits and have experienced changes in their own health struggles. This has led them both to establish goals in the health medical fields, because of what they have seen and have experienced themselves.
It all goes back to Socrates, the father of medicine, when he said, “let food be your medicine”.
But, what is food? Food should be anything that is whole, comes from a tree, the earth, or the sea. It has not been processed. It is true to its natural form. It contains, vitamins and minerals and it is not toxic.
So now I shop the outside isles of the supermarket. Buy vegetables, fruits, seeds, nuts, organic meats, eggs and poultry, coconut oil and avocados, drink lots of water and feel great.
When to eat? I eat when I’m hungry. I listened to videos on intermitting fasting and retrained my brain to listen to hunger signs.
I am a Christian, and for many years practiced fasting as a way of resting my body and communicating with God through prayer, so it made a lot of sense to me to limit my food intake if I wanted my body to rest and heal itself. By doing so, I was able to turn off that sense of hunger that was programed into me and developed my own program.
Don’t get me wrong, this has been a long road and a very difficult one. I still get urges when I see a big mac commercial and the pizza ones, well lets not go there! That was my favorite comfort food. If I was happy, I craved pizza, if sad, I craved pizza, if I was celebrating that was my go to food!
Now, I consciously take a deep breath, and sometimes laugh, tell my husband how I feel and move on. Im glad I don’t have these addictive foods in the house. Another conscious decision. This is the new pyramid I follow:
I have vowed to keep learning and help others, who like me are hurt and upset on what these companies have brained washed us to do with our bodies. I choose the hard road and pray others will see the difference in me and it be a inspiration to them to change too.
We are the architects of our lives! Welcome to my journey!