Anyone Moving from Healthy Eating to More Healthy Non-GMO and Organic??

Lovethesea · ‎03-15-2010

I have been consuming more and more fresh fruits and vegetables in recent years but am now moving into more Non-GMO and Organic. Anyone else travelling this path??

Midnight11 · ‎03-18-2010

I am, it's a process, more aware and buying organic and no GMOs. We eat a lot of fruit and vegs, and nuts, coconut oil, honey etc.

soonersis · ‎08-12-2010

I would say it's been a 37 year journey I've been on that I still continue as it was in 1978 (when I was 26) that I started reading about health and nutrition and changing the way I eat. I still continue to learn and put that knowledge into my food choices. Of course as more non-GMO food and organic food has become available, I get that as much as possible. I now live close to a wonderful farmer's market which provides great organic choices. After reading Wheat Belly and Brain Grain, and following the advice of Doug Kaufmann, my food choices have evolved even further.

It's a continuing process that I will be on for the rest of my life.

haddon9 · ‎03-09-2010

Yes DH and I have been eating all organic, GMO free, pastured chicken, wild caught fish & grass fed beef for the last couple of years. Ever since DH came down with a serious autoimmunie illness he's been devoted to eating this way. Even when we go out to eat and it hasn't been easy.

I will eat more conventional food when I go out with my girlfriends for lunch or a book club dinner. Hopefully there will be more options to eat this way when going out as time goes on.

Lovethesea · ‎03-15-2010

@soonersis wrote:
I would say it's been a 37 year journey I've been on that I still continue as it was in 1978 (when I was 26) that I started reading about health and nutrition and changing the way I eat. I still continue to learn and put that knowledge into my food choices. Of course as more non-GMO food and organic food has become available, I get that as much as possible. I now live close to a wonderful farmer's market which provides great organic choices. After reading Wheat Belly and Brain Grain, and following the advice of Doug Kaufmann, my food choices have evolved even further.

It's a continuing process that I will be on for the rest of my life.

You are way ahead of me, Soonersis.

Speaking of Brain Grain, I watched Dr. David Perlmutter on PBS earlier on Saturday discussing his new book, Brain Maker, and the new research on the correlation between the brain and the gut. Fascinating!

Doug Kaufmann is wonderful... I watch "Know the Cause" at every opportunity!

ETA: Today, I noted that several foods/teas that I have on hand list "natural flavors" in their ingredients, so I emailed them to inquire as to exactly what are those "natural flavors." Emails included Luna Bars, Lemon Zest flavor; Lifeway Kefir, Raspberry flavor; Progresso Traditional Chicken & Wild Rice soup; Celestial Seasonings Red Zinger and Lemon Zinger teas; and Tyson Grilled Chicken Breast Strips. After reading online that "natural flavors" can be anything, and that raspberry flavor (my favorite) can be from the anus' of beavers (how shocking!), I am interested in the responses I'll receive, if any.

soonersis · ‎08-12-2010

Sounds like you're doing great, Seaside Shopper. It can be a struggle for all of us, so we just have to do the best we can, one day at a time.

Lovethesea · ‎03-15-2010

@soonersis wrote:
Sounds like you're doing great, Seaside Shopper. It can be a struggle for all of us, so we just have to do the best we can, one day at a time.

Thank you, Soonersis. I agree with you that it can be a struggle for us. I have been seeking non-gmo foods for a couple of years and have found the Non-GMO Project info to be helpful.

Also, I shop at Publix which have several sections in their stores that provide organic items although most of their non-gmo and organic items are mixed in with everything else. I must say that I am enjoying this process, though.

ETA: I have just discovered that Monsanto is one of the sponsors of Webmd.com! Surprising but true.

sidsmom · ‎11-25-2011

@Lovethesea wrote:
@soonersis wrote:
I would say it's been a 37 year journey I've been on that I still continue as it was in 1978 (when I was 26) that I started reading about health and nutrition and changing the way I eat. I still continue to learn and put that knowledge into my food choices. Of course as more non-GMO food and organic food has become available, I get that as much as possible. I now live close to a wonderful farmer's market which provides great organic choices. After reading Wheat Belly and Brain Grain, and following the advice of Doug Kaufmann, my food choices have evolved even further.

It's a continuing process that I will be on for the rest of my life.
You are way ahead of me, Soonersis.

Speaking of Brain Grain, I watched Dr. David Perlmutter on PBS earlier on Saturday discussing his new book, Brain Maker, and the new research on the correlation between the brain and the gut. Fascinating!

Doug Kaufmann is wonderful... I watch "Know the Cause" at every opportunity!

ETA: Today, I noted that several foods/teas that I have on hand list "natural flavors" in their ingredients, so I emailed them to inquire as to exactly what are those "natural flavors." Emails included Luna Bars, Lemon Zest flavor; Lifeway Kefir, Raspberry flavor; Progresso Traditional Chicken & Wild Rice soup; Celestial Seasonings Red Zinger and Lemon Zinger teas; and Tyson Grilled Chicken Breast Strips. After reading online that "natural flavors" can be anything, and that raspberry flavor (my favorite) can be from the anus' of beavers (how shocking!), I am interested in the responses I'll receive, if any.

@Lovethesea

I'm glad you mentioned natural flavorings...'spices' is another term that is used....Heaven-knows-what is in it! Lots of times, it's MSG or a chemcial derivative to zoom up the tastebuds to keep us addicted to the product.

Ever so often a thread about 'Flavored Waters' is posted here...and everyone is blissfully ignorant about all the chemicals they are ingesting, even though it clearly says 'all natural, no additives'. The orange flavored water tastes nothing like a Sunkist Orange you but at the grocery store. Manufacturers are coding & calling these additives different things to slip in under the wire.

Here's a good piece 'Sixty Minutes' did a while back...very straight up with the chemicals added to our 'natural' foods.

http://youtu.be/a7Wh3uq1yTc

bebe777 · ‎12-10-2012

@Lovethesea wrote:
@soonersis wrote:
I would say it's been a 37 year journey I've been on that I still continue as it was in 1978 (when I was 26) that I started reading about health and nutrition and changing the way I eat. I still continue to learn and put that knowledge into my food choices. Of course as more non-GMO food and organic food has become available, I get that as much as possible. I now live close to a wonderful farmer's market which provides great organic choices. After reading Wheat Belly and Brain Grain, and following the advice of Doug Kaufmann, my food choices have evolved even further.

It's a continuing process that I will be on for the rest of my life.
You are way ahead of me, Soonersis.

Speaking of Brain Grain, I watched Dr. David Perlmutter on PBS earlier on Saturday discussing his new book, Brain Maker, and the new research on the correlation between the brain and the gut. Fascinating!

Doug Kaufmann is wonderful... I watch "Know the Cause" at every opportunity!

ETA: Today, I noted that several foods/teas that I have on hand list "natural flavors" in their ingredients, so I emailed them to inquire as to exactly what are those "natural flavors." Emails included Luna Bars, Lemon Zest flavor; Lifeway Kefir, Raspberry flavor; Progresso Traditional Chicken & Wild Rice soup; Celestial Seasonings Red Zinger and Lemon Zinger teas; and Tyson Grilled Chicken Breast Strips. After reading online that "natural flavors" can be anything, and that raspberry flavor (my favorite) can be from the anus' of beavers (how shocking!), I am interested in the responses I'll receive, if any.

Seaside Shopper, thanks so much for starting this thread. I'm really enjoying reading the responses to your question. They're really interesting!

lol, this is soooo exciting between soonersis, you and I, we have our own little Doug Kaufmann fan club!!! I just adore Doug. I haven't had the chance to watch his shows for a while but the great thing about his show is that you can pick it up again at any time. There's always interesting new info, but he makes sure to cover the fungal invasion core info on a regular basis. lol, when I first started watching him in the early 2000s I thought: nice guy, but maybe just a wee bit on the fanatical side... just maybe.

So as Doug suggested I started googling the information and was I dumbstruck. What he says is backed up by hard science. Just type in "aflatoxin" and either "corn" or "soy" and there are serious articles about how these micotoxins (mico = tiny & toxins = poisons) have invaded these two crops. Peanuts (a legume) have micotoxins. Wheat crops grow moldy (i.e. fungus) when they are stored in silos. And mushrooms... well, they are the fungus.

Seaside Shopper, you mentioned Dr.Perlmutter's latest book on the brain/gut connection. I know that 70% of the neurochemical seratonin is actually in the gut, but I'd appreciate it if you would share some of the key information in his book. I know that, in the brain, seratonin levels are responsible for regulating sleep, satiety, and mood. -- Several weeks ago when Andrew Lessman (Procaps Labs) was on TV, he mentioned that he was going to talk about exciting new research in this field. I was really disappointed because all he said was that we could google it on Pub Med.

Seaside Shopper, thanks you for that info about "natural flavors" which was surprising and informative. Good for you for emailing those companies. I'd really appreciate it if you would share your findings with us.

-- bebe

bebe777 · ‎12-10-2012

I posted most of this in the Mark Sisson - Paleo diet - was on Dr. Oz Show today thread, but I thought I'd post it here as well. -- bebe

____

My nutritional journey was rather haphazard and relatively unstructured.

I became interested in nutrition in my teens but fourty years ago the only information I could find was in the health section of fashion magazines. Desserts at health food stores tasted like cardboard so I tended to avoid. I stopped eating meat/chicken for a few years and tried my best to get a complete amino acid protein profile by eating complimentary carbs as per the best selling book, Diet For A Small Planet. Eventually, I realized that my body needed meat protein and I reverted back to a meat based diet. And that was where I stayed until about 10-12 year ago.

I always watched the Oprah Show. I think she started having Dr. Oz on her show maybe 10-12 year ago. He was talking about anti-aging and I just didn't have a clue as to what he was talking about. About a year later I started noticing a few signs of aging, and then it all clicked. I was a captive audience.

PBS had been showing nutritional shows for a few years and I started listening to all of them. Doug Kaufmann came into the picture, as did Gary Null, Dr. Mark Hyman, Dr. Andrew Weill, Dr. Deepak Chorpra, Dr. Neil Barnard and Brenda Watson (I read her leaky gut book and was taking her friendly flora). There were other influences as well, but these are the ones I remember off the top of my head.

I started out by trying to eat organic. I was pretty clueless but it sounded like a good place to start.

I slowly figured out the grass fed animal rationale (good Omega-3 vs. problematic Omega-6 profile)

For whatever reason, when they talked about eating a rainbow of veggies I just totally missed the boat on what they were talking about. It wasn't until Andrew Lessman and his supplements (around 2007) that I understood that the different colored pigments on fruits/veggies had different antioxidant benefits.

I stumbled across Andrew while I was channel surfing. It was October and so he was having his annual COQ10 special offer. I had never bought anything from a shopping channel before -- lol thought they just sold overpriced plastic cows -- but he had all these charts and stuff so I decided to listen in. I had been asking every nutrition store I knew to explain what this COQ10 was. The best answer I got was that Kevin Bacon and Alex Baldwin bought it all the time. Sounded interesting but I was looking for actual info... and Andrew had tons of charts. I learned a whole lot that day. So I bought the COQ10, full well expecting to return it in 30 days. Of course that never happened. for the previous 8 month I had been exhausted, falling asleep by 8pm. I took a COQ10 capsule at 4pm (with a bit of fat, it's fat soluble) and I stayed awake until 11pm. The next day I was able to stay awake until 1am (I tried to say up to test it out). I was sold on Andrew and his supplements. -- FYI, COQ10 is not stimulant, it cts like the gas you need to run your car.

Since Andrew's COQ10 had worked so well, I slowly started taking additional supplements. Even though I really liked Andrew's line I wanted to experiment. I've probably tried around 3 dozen different brands, and Andrew's is always the best. These days I don't need to do much experimenting.

Around this time I started wondering why whole wheat carbs, which turned into inflammatory sugar, were much better than white carbs. It just didn't make much sense to me. And, for that matter, really all carbs turned into inflammatory sugars in the bloodstream. -- But no one was addressing that issue, until I turned on Doug Kaufmann's Know The Cause.

I listened to Doug for several years before I finally bought one of his anti-fungal Kaufmann diet books. One of the things I like about Doug is that, much like Andrew, he an educator. He honestly doesn't care if you purchase any of his books or not, he just wants you to try his anti-fungal diet. He explains the diet on his show and then tells you that you can get more free info on it at his website.

Since Doug's diet was a Paleo variant diet before Paleo, it was a very hard sell for me. It basically sounded as though I'd be eating grass fed meat/chicken/eggs/dairy and green leafy veggies. I couldn't even wrap my brain around the fact that some veggies were other colors. Oh yeah, and he threw in some nuts and good oil. I couldn't even have any legumes (bye, bye hummus... and I thought legumes were a healthy source of protein). I couldn't figure out how anyone could possible follow this diet. And most fermented foods were out. I didn't care about the wine and beer, but it meant that I would have to say goodbye to my beloved cheese. -- FYI, some fermented foods like yogurt and sauerkraut seem to be ok on Doug's plan (I still get a bit confused by this).

Doug was basically taking all sugars (including the ones in fruit) and fungal producing foods (mixotoxins in wine/beer/cheese and fungus from legumes that are grown in the ground) out of my diet.

What amazed me was that when I finally did do on Doug's diet (around 2008), my body had never felt better.

After being on Doug's diet for a few years, I started to notice that the PBS nutrition specials started focusing more on limiting all carbs because all carbs do turn into sugars in the body. -- Veggies are fine because they have a low sugar content to begin with and their fibrous content means that these sugars are digested slowly.

Around 2011, one of my best friends introduced me to a Vitamix and I added yummy green veggie smoothies to my daily diet. The first time I had a green smoothie I could actually feel my body crave the nutrients in it. It literally was an addiction response. The Vitamix cuts through the very dense veggie cell walls making all these wonderful micro-nutrients available for absorption by the body. For the next week (seriously) my body was in an addiction response until it had gotten enough of the micro-nutrients that it had been missing for decades. -- From then on, my Vitamix green smoothie became an integral part of my diet.

I try to eat organic whenever possible. I try my best to eat only grass fed (and not "grain-finished") meat/chicken and only buy eggs/milk/yogert from animals fed on that diet.

I've been Non-GMO from the time I understood what agrabusiness was doing. I speak passible french and frequently watch the french news station (or BBC). It gives me a chance to brush up on my french and they do a better job of covering the international news. From day one, the French were up in arms about GMOs. Early on there were about a dozen GMO test fields scattered throughout France in hush hush locations. Well, some of those secret locations were discovered and activist groups (and probably sometimes local farmers) just burnt these fields down. That kind of action got GMOs on my radar very early. -- The problem was that, for a very long time, there was legislation in the USA prohibiting manufacturers from lableing their products Non-GMO, so you really had to know where your food was coming from (much like the antibiotics (bstd?) in milk situation).

There have been times when I've gone off my Kaufmann/Paleo diet. I this past fall/winter I was commuting back and forth to see family and friends and I basically junked my diet. I didn't have a Vitamix there and it was too complicated. I'm thinking of purchasing a portable Vitamix to rectify this situation in the future.

But these days I'm back on my diet.

-- bebe Smiley Happy