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Another thread, that touched on the topic of nightshades (generally considered by many to be unhealthy), and how they contain health benefits that are not found in other foods that are regarded as more "healthy", inspired me to devote some thought to the convoluted way in which the food industry is evolving (or is devolving a more accurate term?). One of the things that really bugs me about medical researchers, doctors, the medical community in general, and especially food "experts", is their almost universal tunnel vision. To them every issue is either black or white, and in order to keep things simple, no gray area is allowed. Perhaps they're all lazy, and they don't want to have to explain all the caveats involved if a full spectrum of benefits and disadvantages are considered, or maybe their brain isn't capable of processing complex thoughts. Or maybe they have an agenda.
Whatever the case, nearly all foods are classified as either good or bad (healthy or unhealthy), and no allowance is made for the possibility that they might have good aspects and bad aspects, and consequently they might be good for some people, and bad for others, and a wide range of possibilities might exist in between those extremes. Researchers have established a pattern of determining that certain foods contain one or more natural ingredients that can be detrimental to the health of certain individuals or groups of individuals, and so they condemn those foods in general, despite the fact that other natural ingredients in those foods may have overriding beneficial attributes.
And conversely, they promote certain foods as healthy, based on certain ingredients that have earned a perception of being "healthy", despite the fact that those foods may not have been thoroughly investigated for the same or similar ingredients that caused other foods to be labeled as "unhealthy". The whole system of food evaluation seems to be a rather disorganized process, sort of a free-for-all, in many ways.
The fact of the matter is that all foods have beneficial attributes, and all foods have detrimental attributes. Every food contains lectins, for example, but obviously some lectins are much more harmful to human health than others. It's our job to weigh the benefits against the disadvantages, and to select foods that suit our purposes.
And in many cases where a food has been labeled as "unhealthy", after a few decades have passed, other researcher have shown that the original research that caused a food to be labeled that way was flawed, and the conclusions reached were just plain wrong, in the first place. So it behooves us to make our own decisions about which foods are healthy, and which ones are not, based on our own, and others' real life experiences, because obviously, researchers have not earned a reputation for accuracy and reliability, as far as the overall effects of food on our health are concerned. And that's mostly because they aren't concerned about the effects of food on our health — they're concerned about publishing another research article, and hopefully inspiring some company to provide additional funding so that they can continue to do research. IOW, they're primarily concerned about job security.
And most of us are well aware that there's a more important aspect to food than just fuel for the body, and that's the concept of food as medicine. Science tries to do it by identifying certain natural ingredients in food and promoting them as self-contained additives or supplements for providing health benefits. But experience has shown time and again that such an approach seldom works, because when ingredients are used in isolation (without the synergistic benefits provided by other ingredients in the food from which they were taken) their effectiveness is greatly reduced, and in some cases the hyped benefits are almost completely absent.
So why should we accept the promotion of "designer foods" that are enriched by adding "healthy ingredients" (that have been removed from foods that actually were healthy, but these ingredients may no longer be effective after isolation)? Are any of the super supplements (such as protein supplements for example) that contain dozens of ingredients with long and complex names, really healthy? Essentially, such products are a poor man's version of GMO, because they do not exist as a food in nature, nor could they ever exist naturally. Am I wrong?
Instead, why not eat the foods from which those healthy additives were extracted in the first place, in order to get the full benefit, rather than getting some lab rat's opinion of what constitutes healthy food? If lab rats are so good at recognizing healthy food when they see it, why do so many of them appear to be unhealthy?
The bottom line is: Experimenting with designer foods in the diet is best postponed until after we are in remission. During the healing process, we should eat whole foods (that are known to be safe for us), and if we eat any processed foods at all, those foods should have no more than 5 (safe) ingredients, because the longer the ingredient list, the greater the chances of cross-contamination. In fact, limiting processed foods to those with ingredient lists that contain no more than 3 ingredients is much safer, because as the number of ingredients increases, the risk does not increase linearly, it increases exponentially. Therefore, if the number of ingredients in a product is increased until it reaches a sufficiently high level, at some point the risk of cross-contamination begins to approach 100 %.
Even after we are in remission, we still run the same risk of cross-contamination, if we are willing to take unnecessary chances on using processed foods with long ingredient lists. If you are reading this, and you feel that you are generally in remission, but you still do not have "normans", or you have other nagging symptoms, then the odds are extremely high that you are the victim of cross-contamination. If you have wheat flour in your house, you need look no further for the source of your problem. Ditto if you are using processed foods or food supplements that have a long ingredient list. Trust me, I've been there, done that. Cross-contamination is ubiquitous and long ingredient lists in designer foods are a prime source of trouble for anyone who has MC. Why take chances when you can eat safe, whole foods and avoid the risk?
The fastest, surest route to remission (and the best way to maintain remission, once acquired) is one that avoids processed foods with long ingredient lists, and designer foods of all types. Humans evolved eating safe, simple, whole foods. Why on earth would we presume to think that we are capable of improving on a diet that worked for millions of years, before we began tinkering with it (in the neolithic period)?
Sure, technology continues to evolve at an ever-increasing rate, to make life easier for us. But the human body is not a machine. And trying to force it to evolve as rapidly as everything else around us is not only futile, and an exercise in frustration, but it's the primary source of most of our health problems.
At least that's my 2 cents worth. YMMV.
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