Naturally Feel Your Best

Two years ago, my son and I were installing a television on Christmas day on the wall above our fireplace. He was standing next to me on the fireplace hearth, and I noticed him slowly falling backwards. My first impression was that he was joking, but then he continued to falling backwards, until he landed on the floor. I looked at him shaking as if having a seizure on our family room floor. He became conscious and asked, “what happened, why am I on the floor?” The previous night he was at an overnight and consumed a lot of junk food and orange crush soda. I called our naturopath who informed me, this was the second call she received with the same symptoms, the first ate a bunch of beef jerkey. She encouraged me to research the word “excitotoxin” and I did.

Our eyes were opened that day, to disappointment in the food industry. I immediately began reading labels, researching ingredients and removing toxic food from our kitchen cabinets. The foods were purchased at a health food store and considered healthy, but were they really?

When my daughter was diagnosed with diabetes mellitus or type 1 diabetes, we were in an adjustment period, learning to measure foods, so we knew how many units of insulin to give her. It was easier to purchase pre-packaged foods, with the nutrition facts already on the package. I discovered the prepackaged foods even though they include ingredients that sound healthy, like hydrolyzed vegetable protein are chemicals that enhance the flavor of our foods. They are MSG in disguise! Most health conscious people are aware of the dangers of MSG or monosodium glutamate, so what the food industry does is change the name. There is a large list of these ingredients included on this site.

We learned that our bodies produce glutamate naturally and it is very balanced amount. Our brains use glutamate as neurotransmitters and the concentrations are critical. When our bodies consume large amounts of glutamate (excitotoxins) it cannot handle the overload and excites the neurons. The excitotoxins travel directly to the hypothalamus within the brain, which is not protected by a blood brain barrier, so the excitotoxins go directly into the bloodstream. Large amounts of excitotoxins into the bloodstream can cause the brain to swell up, become very excited and fire repeatedly…then die off.

We have strived to eat excitotoxin free since that Christmas day. My son had no seizure events after changing the way we eat, except one day. He became ill with a stomach virus, so my husband purchased a bottle of 7 up, which WAS common in our home for upset stomach in the past. He drank about 6 ounces, went to the restroom and heard large bangs and again found him lying on the bathroom floor. This time, my husband called the paramedic, who checked him over and had no idea why he passed out. I know why, he was overloaded with excitotoxins from his soda. This episode again confirmed to us, that our brains cannot tolerate large amounts of glutamate or excitotoxins. We are profoundly affected by the food we consume.