Ok can I vent for a second?
Is every single food you can buy in the grocery store dangerous? Organic is expensive, but apparently all other fruit is toxic or genetically modified. Apparently vegetable oil is bad for you because of how processed it is, but I know from personal experience that olive oil tastes terrible in cupcakes.
When I take Tyler outside, should I clothe him from head to toe? Because the sun causes cancer, but apparently so does sunscreen. Deoderant is being linked to breast cancer, but I don't have time or desire to slather my armpits with a paste of baking soda, and I really would prefer to not stink. Someone recently told me that all meat causes cancer and our bodies are not really meant to process meat anyway so we shouldn't put it into our systems. On and on it goes.
So seriously. How on earth do I feel good about feeding my family and caring for my children when every single decision I make seems to be proven detrimental somehow? I do not want to be a vegan. I'm sure it's the right decision for some people, but I neither desire to do it nor do I feel capable. Also, we enjoy meat. And cooked stuff.
I'm really not asking for arguments here. Don't tell me I'm a terrible mother because the milk I buy might have hormones in it or the chicken we eat didn't grow up free range. I just want to know how on earth we're supposed to survive when apparently every single thing in the grocery store is out to kill us. I believe in feeding my family fresh food as much as possible. I stay away from processed when I can because I would prefer to bake my own pizza dough or things like that. I buy into the marketing ploy that is "smart KD" because no preservatives or false colours sounds good to me and I like kraft dinner. But really. I sometimes feel like all this information is too much. There is no possible way to decide the "right" thing to do. You can't tell me that cutting out everything in your diet except fruit and veggies grown in your own garden is legitimately healthy. Or maybe you can...but don't. I won't believe you. Also, I live in a place where I would starve all winter unless we develop a greenhouse in our basement. ARGH.
So anyway. Don't soap box me. I just needed to vent.
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Amen...I hear you! It NEVER ends!!
ReplyDeleteMarni
I think that you feed you're family the best you know how on the budget you have and realize that EVERYTHING is going to kill at somepoint according to researches in charge of studying whatever it may be that day . One day wine is bad and the next you're suppose to drink it because it has helth benefits, so I say drink the wine and feed you're family a balanced diet of whatever is on the menu organic or not and then have another glass of wine because you know we need it because so many people have so many optinions on so many things :)
ReplyDeleteWhen I was pregnant, we started toying with the idea of becoming vegetarian - or at the very least eating only local, well-raised animals that were free of growth hormones etc - and eating primarily organic fruits and vegetables. We quickly found eating that a) we missed meat a lot and b) our poor low-income budget couldn't afford to eat that way. While we introduced solids in the first year, I was a hippie and made all my baby food with organic stuff but as they got older, I've totally slacked on that. The majority of the time they are getting home-made whole foods, but we also eat at Mcdonalds sometimes... Life is about balance and even if we eat a perfectly clean diet all the time, who knows how many toxins are we gonna breathe in the air when we're walking to the farmer's market?
ReplyDeleteI do think it is important to be informed about our food sources. And choosing what we buy in the grocery store is our only 'vote' on how we want things to be produced. But, once you start looking into those things, you quickly run into conspiracies, etc. And even if they're all true... I agree with you that it begins to seem impossible to feed our families!
ReplyDeleteI think God is more concerned with the matter of our hearts. So I think motives are more important than achieving perfection in our diets. I reached a point not that long ago, where I realized that I was trying to 'cheat death' by controlling every aspect of my diet. Essentially trying to 'beat God' rather than submit myself to His care and control over my life. And my diet/weight/health had become an unhealthy source of pride in my life. (Although now my weight is unhealthy in other ways. lol!!)
Personally, we try to eat as natural/homemade as we can, in an effort to maintain health and to be good stewards of the the gifts God has given us. Are we the most frugal shoppers? No. Do we buy all organic? No. But there is a lot of 'middle' ground between 'all organic' and McDonalds... so ask God to guide you in making the best choices you can for your family and that's all you can do!