Sick of It

It was pretty late last night when we got out of our Kung Fu classes, and we had just missed going to Trader Joe’s by a few minutes. We LOVE Trader Joe’s, and decided a while ago that it was to be our regular go-to spot for nearly all of our food shopping. We still head out to Whole Foods from time to time, to pick up some of their bulk grains and legumes, and the occasional bottle of kombucha, but aside from those few items, we still prefer Trader Joe’s for everything else. It’s much more reasonable, especially compared to Whole Foods. It does my heart good to read their labels and not see a laundry list of ingredients we can’t pronounce—primarily icky dyes, additives, and preservatives.

But TJ’s was closed last night, and I needed to go food shopping. I had only a few ingredients on-hand, but not everything necessary to prepare a complete meal. “Not a problem,” I thought, “we’ll just go to the regular supermarket.” Oh, but what a nightmare experience that turned out to be! Not only was there no organic produce, the regular produce was exorbitantly priced. The two aisles devoted to healthy alternatives were just awful, too. I mean, their products were just fine, but they were marked up so much, it was ridiculous. One gluten free cereal we usually purchase at TJ’s was a whole $2 more expensive there. I figured we’d try our luck elsewhere in the store. By then I had already given up on purchasing anything aside from what I had been craving all day—potato salad. Generally, I would prefer to make it myself, but with the lack of organic options available at the store, I was dangerously close to just caving and buying a little container of the premade stuff, just to tide me over. Frankly, I don’t know what I was thinking. I don’t tend to think clearly when I’m craving something as intensely as I was then. So yeah, I was dangerously close to succumbing, but only until I took one look at the ingredient label, listing items such as high fructose corn syrup and sodium benzoate. And those were only the couple I recognized and remember at this writing.

And frankly, those ingredients were bad enough, with HFCS increasing risks of obesity, diabetes, and liver damage, and the Sodium Benzoate being a potential carcinogen, causing an increase in free radicals all on its own, and a proven carcinogen when combined with ascorbic acid (Vitamin C). Considering this, it’s ridiculous that Sodium Benzoate is added as a preservative to many fruit juices, jams, and jellies—foods more apt to contain ascorbic acid, and products often marketed to children. Also on its own, Sodium Benzoate has been shown to contribute to mitochondrial damage, causing neuro-degenerative diseases—Parkinson’s is one. It’s also been implicated in ADHD.

This kind of stuff pisses me off so much. Actually, I’m holding back here. It more than pisses me off. This is the stuff that keeps me up at night. I keep thinking of children developing ADHD or any other condition, and then having some doctor diagnose them, and insist on their taking medications that can lead to other health problems. It’s such a HUGE freaking domino effect of awfulness. And we’re doing this to them. And the FDA allows it. It’s absolutely disgusting, and a social justice issue that needs addressing BIG time.