I was born in 1971, and my mom was kind of a granola muncher. By 1978, she was feeding us carob chip cookies and whole grain bread. She joined a food co-op (which she now runs from her garage) and fed us all sorts of wierd stuff. As a pre-teen, I was quite envious of my peers at the lunch table, with their brightly colored store-bought junk food. By age 10, I was riding my bike to the convenience store to get the good stuff. I began to rebel, and in high school, I ate star-crunches and nutty bars every day for lunch. In college, I started drinking lots of pop, my favorite being Dr. Pepper. I never thought twice about anything my mom would warn me about, since I perceived it all as pseudoscientific nonsense. But it turns out she was right about the sugar. When I was diagnosed with Type 2 Diabetes, I was drinking 6+ cans of non-diet pop each day. I actually sought out flavors that had extra sugar, the worst being Grape and Strawberry Crush. I didn't know anything about the pancreas or endocrine system. I must have slept through that health class.
I now cringe at the damage I must have been doing to my body. I have no family history of Diabetes, and I have never been overweight. I personally think the Fructose caused my diabetes. I still can't stand whole grain bread or carob, but my mom sure was right about sugar. Unfortunately, her eccentricity pushed me as a kid to the opposite extreme. So my advise to health-nut parents out there: don't force it too much. Let your kids have lunchables or whatever junk they like on occasion. Be prudent. Don't make your kids eat gross stuff just because it has some special ingredient of questionable value. My 7 year old daughter likes corn dogs and lunchables, but also salad and steamed broccoli (chemically treated, non organic) and grilled salmon. Good food doesn't have to be a punishment. Alot of the granola muncher stuff is Ludditism. Man made chemicals are not inherently bad. Food science is not a conspiracy to poison us. It's a miracle I can eat broccoli today, since the organic broccoli I was fed 20 years ago had dead caterpillars in it! I would have done better to eat a little more pesticide with my broccoli, if it meant I drank less fructose in my rebellious years.
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