Why you should never eat processed foods again!!!
Resisting the urge to drink that soda pop or eat those chips can be
tough, especially if you have grown accustomed to eating these highly
addictive foods as part of your normal diet. But once
you understand a little bit more about how these and other processed
foods affect your mind, body, and even your soul, it becomes easier to
make healthier food choices that enrich your being rather than sap it.
Here are nine motivating reasons why you should cut processed foods from
your diet for good:
1) Processed foods are highly addictive.
Your body processes whole foods much differently than it does refined,
processed, and heavily-modified "junk" foods. Processed foods tend to
overstimulate the production of dopamine, also known as the "pleasure"
neurotransmitter, which makes you crave them constantly. Your body ends
up not being able to resist the temptation to continue eating junk foods
in excess, which can lead to obesity and other health problems.
2) Processed foods often contain phosphates that destroy your organs,
bones. Many processed foods contain phosphate additives that augment
taste, texture, and shelf-life. But these additives are known to cause
health problems like rapid aging, kidney deterioration and weak bones,
according to the Rodale Institute, which makes foods that contain them
far less attractive to those in the know.
3) Fresh foods are
actually cheaper than processed foods. People with junk food addictions
often claim that fresh, healthy foods are too expensive. But according
to numerous studies and assessments, whole foods made from scratch end
up costing less per serving than their unhealthy, processed equivalents.
According to Rodale, a single serving of 100 percent organic chili made
with fresh ingredients and grass-fed beef, for instance, is about 50
cents cheaper to make than buying a can of chemical-laden, microwaveable
chili from the grocery store.
4) Processed foods cause chronic
inflammation. One of the leading causes of chronic illness today is
inflammation. And studies continue to show that refined sugars,
processed flours, vegetable oils, and many other nasty ingredients
commonly found in processed foods are largely responsible for this
inflammation epidemic. So the next time your body craves a candy bar or a
box of cheese crackers, consider the fact that heart disease, dementia,
neurological problems, respiratory failure, and cancer have all been
linked to the chronic inflammation caused by processed food consumption.
5) Processed foods ruin digestion. Because they have been stripped of
their natural fibers, enzymes, vitamins, and other nutrients, processed
foods tend to wreak havoc on the digestive tract. Chronic consumption of
such foods can throw your internal ecosystem off balance, harming
beneficial bacteria and exposing your system to infection. So you can
basically think of those gummy bears and that piece of cake as literal
poison for your system, which may help deter you from eating them.
6) Processed foods destroy your mind. If you suffer from chronic bouts
of brain "fog," or have difficulty concentrating and thinking normally,
chances are your diet has something to do with it. And a recent study
out of Oxford University lends credence to this possibility, having
found that junk food consumption can cause people to become angry and
irritable. Nutrient-dense whole foods, on the other hand, can help level
out your mood, sustain your energy levels, and leave you feeling calmer
and more collected.
7) Processed foods are loaded with GMOs.
The basic buildings blocks of most processed foods on the market today
are derived from laboratories, not nature. Genetically-modified
organisms (GMOs), which have been linked to infertility, organ damage,
gastrointestinal disorders, and cancer, are prolific in processed foods.
Excess consumption of these poisons promotes weight gain, acidifies
your blood, and can even permanently alter the composition and function
of your intestinal flora.
8) Processed foods are loaded with
pesticides. In order to effectively grow the GMOs used in processed
foods, conventional farmers have to apply Roundup (glyphosate) and other
pesticides and herbicides, many of which end up in the final product.
According to data compiled by Rodale, breakfast cereals alone have been
found to contain up to 70 different types of pesticides, including
warehouse fumigation chemicals and other residues.
9) Processed
foods are not actually food. One of the ways you can assess the
nutritional value of food is to see how animals, insects, bacteria, and
fungi respond to it. Real foods will actually rot or grow mold, for
instance, while fake, processed foods remain largely the same in
appearance and shape no matter what their age. As we reported recently,
processed food is essentially synthetic, and the industry that produces
it admits that heavy tampering and crafty modifications are necessary to
make it taste real, even though it is not.
I know it's so easy
just to pop food into a Microwave or drive though a fast food line at
McDonald's many of us use the excuse that we don't have time to cook.
Well let me ask you this,"Do you have time to deal with cancer,
diabetes, high blood pressure or a host of other diseases caused by
eating these toxic foods?"
In the long run these foods are VERY
EXPENSIVE, they ruin your health, and you spend a fortune trying to fix
the damage caused by eating the toxic foods.
Carbohydrate Addiction is Epidemic........Part 1
And the Food Industry Promotes it right along with the FDA & the AMA!
A staggering two-thirds of Americans are now overweight, and one in four are either diabetic or pre-diabetic.
Obesity rates in children in several states are now above 30%!!!!!!
Carb-rich processed foods are a primary driver of these statistics,
and while many blame Americans’ overindulgence of processed junk foods
on lack of self-control, scientists are now starting to reveal the truly
addictive nature of such foods.
Most recently, researchers
at the Boston Children's Hospital concluded that highly processed
carbohydrates stimulate brain regions involved in reward and cravings,
promoting excess hunger.
As reported by Science Daily:
“These findings suggest that limiting these 'high-glycemic index' foods could help obese individuals avoid overeating.”
While I don’t agree with the concept of high glycemic foods, it is
important that they are at least thinking in the right direction. Also,
the timing is ironic, considering the fact that the American Medical
Association (AMA) recently declared obesity a disease, treatable with a
variety of conventional methods, from drugs to novel anti-obesity
vaccines...
The featured research is on the mark, and shows
just how foolhardy the AMA’s financially-driven decision really is.
Drugs and vaccines are clearly not going to do anything to address the
underlying problem of addictive junk food.
Brain Imaging Shows Food Addiction Is Real
The study, published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition
examined the effects of high-glycemic foods on brain activity, using
functional magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). One dozen overweight or
obese men between the ages of 18 and 35 each consumed one high-glycemic
and one low-glycemic meal. The MRI was done four hours after each test
meal. According to the researchers:
“Compared with an
isocaloric low-GI meal, a high-glycemic index meal decreased plasma
glucose, increased hunger, and selectively stimulated brain regions
associated with reward and craving in the late postprandial period,
which is a time with special significance to eating behavior at the next
meal.”
The study demonstrates what many people experience:
After eating a high-glycemic meal, i.e. rapidly digesting
carbohydrates, their blood sugar initially spiked, followed by a sharp
crash a few hours later. The MRI confirmed that this crash in blood
glucose intensely activated a brain region involved in addictive
behaviors, known as the nucleus accumbens.
Dr. Robert
Lustig, Professor of Pediatrics in the Division of Endocrinology at the
University of California, a pioneer in decoding sugar metabolism,
weighed in on the featured research in an article by NPR:
“As Dr. Robert Lustig... points out, this research can’t tell us if
there’s a cause and effect relationship between eating certain foods and
triggering brain responses, or if those responses lead to overeating
and obesity.
'[The study] doesn’t tell you if this is
the reason they got obese,' says Lustig, 'or if this is what happens
once you’re already obese.' Nonetheless... he thinks this study offers
another bit of evidence that 'this phenomenon is real.'”
Previously, Dr. Lustig has explained the addictive nature of sugar as follows:
"The brain's pleasure center, called the nucleus accumbens, is
essential for our survival as a species... Turn off pleasure, and you
turn off the will to live... But long-term stimulation of the pleasure
center drives the process of addiction... When you consume any substance
of abuse, including sugar, the nucleus accumbens receives a dopamine
signal, from which you experience pleasure. And so you consume more.
The problem is that with prolonged exposure, the signal
attenuates, gets weaker. So you have to consume more to get the same
effect -- tolerance. And if you pull back on the substance, you go into
withdrawal. Tolerance and withdrawal constitute addiction. And make no
mistake, sugar is addictive."
Carbohydrate Addiction is Epidemic........
And the Food Industry Promotes it right along with the FDA & the AMA!
A staggering two-thirds of Americans are now overweight, and one in four are either diabetic or pre-diabetic.
Obesity rates in children in several states are now above 30%!!!!!!
Carb-rich processed foods are a primary driver of these statistics,
and while many blame Americans’ overindulgence of processed junk foods
on lack of self-control, scientists are now starting to reveal the truly
addictive nature of such foods.
Most recently, researchers
at the Boston Children's Hospital concluded that highly processed
carbohydrates stimulate brain regions involved in reward and cravings,
promoting excess hunger.
As reported by Science Daily:
“These findings suggest that limiting these 'high-glycemic index' foods could help obese individuals avoid overeating.”
While I don’t agree with the concept of high glycemic foods, it is
important that they are at least thinking in the right direction. Also,
the timing is ironic, considering the fact that the American Medical
Association (AMA) recently declared obesity a disease, treatable with a
variety of conventional methods, from drugs to novel anti-obesity
vaccines...
The featured research is on the mark, and shows
just how foolhardy the AMA’s financially-driven decision really is.
Drugs and vaccines are clearly not going to do anything to address the
underlying problem of addictive junk food.
Brain Imaging Shows Food Addiction Is Real
The study, published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition
examined the effects of high-glycemic foods on brain activity, using
functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). One dozen overweight or
obese men between the ages of 18 and 35 each consumed one high-glycemic
and one low-glycemic meal. The fMRI was done four hours after each test
meal. According to the researchers:
“Compared with an
isocaloric low-GI meal, a high-glycemic index meal decreased plasma
glucose, increased hunger, and selectively stimulated brain regions
associated with reward and craving in the late postprandial period,
which is a time with special significance to eating behavior at the next
meal.”
The study demonstrates what many people experience:
After eating a high-glycemic meal, i.e. rapidly digesting
carbohydrates, their blood sugar initially spiked, followed by a sharp
crash a few hours later. The fMRI confirmed that this crash in blood
glucose intensely activated a brain region involved in addictive
behaviors, known as the nucleus accumbens.
Dr. Robert
Lustig, Professor of Pediatrics in the Division of Endocrinology at the
University of California, a pioneer in decoding sugar metabolism,
weighed in on the featured research in an article by NPR:
“As Dr. Robert Lustig... points out, this research can’t tell us if
there’s a cause and effect relationship between eating certain foods and
triggering brain responses, or if those responses lead to overeating
and obesity.
'[The study] doesn’t tell you if this is
the reason they got obese,' says Lustig, 'or if this is what happens
once you’re already obese.' Nonetheless... he thinks this study offers
another bit of evidence that 'this phenomenon is real.'”
Previously, Dr. Lustig has explained the addictive nature of sugar as follows:
"The brain's pleasure center, called the nucleus accumbens, is
essential for our survival as a species... Turn off pleasure, and you
turn off the will to live... But long-term stimulation of the pleasure
center drives the process of addiction... When you consume any substance
of abuse, including sugar, the nucleus accumbens receives a dopamine
signal, from which you experience pleasure. And so you consume more.
The problem is that with prolonged exposure, the signal
attenuates, gets weaker. So you have to consume more to get the same
effect -- tolerance. And if you pull back on the substance, you go into
withdrawal. Tolerance and withdrawal constitute addiction. And make no
mistake, sugar is addictive."
The Extraordinary Science of Addictive Junk Food
Previous research has demonstrated that refined sugar is
more addictive than cocaine, giving you pleasure by triggering an innate
process in your brain via dopamine and opioid signals. Your brain
essentially becomes addicted to stimulating the release of its own
opioids.
Researchers have speculated that the sweet
receptors located on your tongue, which evolved in ancestral times when
the diet was very low in sugar, have not adapted to the seemingly
unlimited access to a cheap and omnipresent sugar supply in the modern
diet.
Therefore, the abnormally high stimulation of
these receptors by our sugar-rich diets generates excessive reward
signals in your brain, which have the potential to override normal
self-control mechanisms, thus leading to addiction.
But it doesn’t end there. Food manufacturers have gotten savvy to the
addictive nature of certain foods and tastes, including saltiness and
sweetness, and have turned addictive taste into a science in and of
itself.
In a recent New York Times article, Michael
Moss, author of Salt Sugar Fat, dished the dirt on the processed food
industry, revealing that there’s a conscious effort on behalf of food
manufacturers to get you hooked on foods that are convenient and
inexpensive to make.
I recommend reading his
article in its entirety, as it offers a series of case studies that shed
light on the extraordinary science and marketing tactics that make junk
food so hard to resist.
Sugar, salt and fat are
the top three substances making processed foods so addictive. In a Time
Magazine interview discussing his book, Moss says:
“One of the things that really surprised me was how concerted and
targeted the effort is by food companies to hit the magical formulation.
Take sugar for example. The optimum amount of sugar in a product became
known as the 'bliss point.' Food inventors and scientists spend a huge
amount of time formulating the perfect amount of sugar that will send us
over the moon, and send products flying off the shelves. It is the
process they've engineered that struck me as really stunning.”
It’s important to realize that added sugar (typically in the
form of high fructose corn syrup) is not confined to junky snack foods.
For example, most of Prego’s spaghetti sauces have one common feature,
and that is sugar—it’s the second largest ingredient, right after
tomatoes. A half-cup of Prego Traditional contains the equivalent of
more than two teaspoons of sugar.
Novel Flavor-Enhancers May Also Contribute to Food Addiction
Another guiding principle for the processed food industry
is known as “sensory-specific satiety.” Moss describes this as “the
tendency for big, distinct flavors to overwhelm your brain, which
responds by depressing your desire to have more.” The greatest
successes, whether beverages or foods, owe their “craveability” to
complex formulas that pique your taste buds just enough, without
overwhelming them, thereby overriding your brain’s inclination to say
“enough.”
Novel biotech flavor companies like Senomyx also play an important role.
Senomyx specializes in helping companies find new flavors
that allow them to use less salt and sugar in their foods. But does that
really make the food healthier? This is a questionable assertion at
best, seeing how these “flavor enhancers” are created using secret,
patented processes. They also do not need to be listed on the food
label, which leaves you completely in the dark. As of now, they simply
fall under the generic category of artificial and/or natural flavors,
and they don’t even need to be tested for safety, as they’re used in
minute amounts.
How to Combat Food Addiction and Regain Your Health
To protect your health, I advise spending 90 percent of your food
budget on whole foods, and only 10 percent on processed foods. It’s
important to realize that refined carbohydrates like breakfast cereals,
bagels, waffles, pretzels, and most other processed foods quickly break
down to sugar, increase your insulin levels, and cause insulin
resistance, which is the number one underlying factor of nearly every
chronic disease and condition known to man, including weight gain.
By taking the advice offered in the featured study and cutting out
these high-glycemic foods you can retrain your body to burn fat instead
of sugar. However, it’s important to replace these foods with healthy
fats, not protein—a fact not addressed in this research. I believe most
people may need between 50-70 percent of their daily calories in the
form of healthful fats, which include:
1. Olives & Olive oil
2. Coconut and Coconut Oils
3. Natural whole fat butter
4. Organic raw nuts, especially macadamia nuts, which are low in protein and omega-6 fat.
5. Organic pastured eggs and pastured meats
6. Avocados
A growing body of evidence also suggests that intermittent fasting
is particularly effective if you’re struggling with excess weight as it
provokes the natural secretion of human growth hormone (HGH), a
fat-burning hormone. It also increases resting energy expenditure while
decreasing insulin levels, which allows stored fat to be burned for
fuel. Together, these and other factors will turn you into an effective
fat-burning machine.
Best of all, once you transition to
fat burning mode your cravings for sugar and carbohydrates will
virtually disappear, as if by magic... While you’re making the
adjustment, you could supplement L-Glutamine (1,000MG) before each meal
and 3,000-6,000 MG at bed time. This will help reduce cravings.
Other tricks to help you overcome your sugar cravings include:
Exercise: Anyone who exercises intensely on a regular basis
will know that a significant amount of resistance exercise is one of
the best "cures" for food cravings. It always amazes me how my appetite,
especially for sweets, dramatically decreases after a good workout. I
believe the mechanism is related to the dramatic reduction in insulin
levels that occurs after exercise.
Organic black
coffee: Coffee is a potent opioid receptor antagonist, and contains
compounds such as cafestrol -- found plentifully in both caffeinated and
decaffeinated coffee -- which can bind to your opioid receptors, occupy
them and essentially block your addiction to other opioid-releasing
foods. This may profoundly reduce the addictive power of other
substances, such as sugar.
