Has it always been like this?

[Deleted]

May 23, 2012 13:41:50 GMT -5 Sum Dum Gai said:

And of course it must all be fresh, wholesome, and 100% "Organnnnic" ...

Well, I do get pesticide free organic spinach. The amount of pesticides and crap they spray on lettuce here is kind of obscene otherwise, and there's no way you're going to convince me that a quick rinse under the sink is getting all that stuff off. If the pesticides washed off that easy they'd be worthless since they'd rinse off every time the crop was watered.

Do you get the manure and human excrement free spinach as well?

[Sum Dum Gai]

Do you get the manure and human excrement free spinach as well?

Actually it's probably got more manure on it. They use "natural" fertilizers instead of chemical fertilizers. I've never been out to the farm to ask in person, but I'm pretty sure natural fertilizer equals shit of some kind.

[Deleted]

May 23, 2012 13:45:36 GMT -5 Sum Dum Gai said:

Do you get the manure and human excrement free spinach as well?

Actually it's probably got more manure on it. They use "natural" fertilizers instead of chemical fertilizers. I've never been out to the farm to ask in person, but I'm pretty sure natural fertilizer equals shit of some kind.

Sounds delicious.

[saveinla]

May 23, 2012 13:21:33 GMT -5 movingforward said:

I know this tread is about food allergies but the only thing I can think about is the episode of Everybody Loves Raymond where it is Debra's turn to bring a snack for the kids basketball or soccer game (some sport) and it is not on the "approved" snack list.

And how Raymond goes behind her back and gets stuff from the approved list. I loved that episode ;D

[skubikky]

May 23, 2012 13:45:36 GMT -5 Sum Dum Gai said:

Do you get the manure and human excrement free spinach as well?

Actually it's probably got more manure on it. They use "natural" fertilizers instead of chemical fertilizers. I've never been out to the farm to ask in person, but I'm pretty sure natural fertilizer equals shit of some kind.

And horses and cows or whatever is providing the fertilizer are given wormers, antibiotics and sometimes....and my personal favorite...growth hormones. Not to mention the bots and other wormy creatures that live in their intestines....mmmmmm

[midjd]

Sku, you're in my brain! I was just going to ask if the manure used in organic products had to come from organic cows, or if it was just any old cow chowing down on some Round-Up grass

[midjd]

This song seems appropriate... "All The Food is Poison," one of my favorites


ETA argh, can't figure out how to embed.

[nogooddeed]

I prefer zoo-manu to regular compost. Then I can brag about how my home grown veggies have a secret, exotic ingredient. Nothing like elephant, zebra, lion, etc poop to help things grow!

[Deleted]

I was able to eat anything and everything until a couple years ago (mid 30s). I don't know if it is aging or what but now I have to severely limit my dairy/gluten/eggs. As in, I can eat a bite or two once a week. I haven't had a beer in two years. The longer I avoid these items, the less sick I feel when I do cheat so I try to "save up" my cheating. I don't give a shit that being GF is trendy - actually I like it because it means there are more GF products out there.

Food allergies can develop over time due to exposure and other changes. Doctor tested me for gluten sensitivity and I came up positive. I feel a lot better now that I've given it up. I'm reminded that I need to stay away from it when I eat a little and feel horrible. I wasn't eating processed foods before either.

Lena - maybe a different moms group? I've never had any of the problems you describe. We all bring our own snacks and sometimes the host will provide something.

[mandyms]

LOL, Dark, here's an interesting article for you

www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2012/05/does-organic-food-make-you-a-judgmental-jerk-maybe/257465/

Does Organic Food Make You a Judgmental Jerk? Maybe


Even among those who don't buy their groceries there, Whole Foods Market has something of an unfortunate nickname: Whole Paycheck. The company's reputation for selling up-market, healthful goods is both its saving grace as well as its curse, and Whole Foods CEO John Mackey has struggled to walk the line between defending his brand and accidentally sparking a class war.

"There's a significant portion of the population that doesn't want to keep eating crummy food, and they're willing to pay for it," said Mackey at a conference last year. Left unsaid is the implication that the rest of us sheep will continue to eat slop either because we don't know any better or we can't afford it -- and them's the breaks.

Mackey's apparent self-righteousness may not be a figment of your imagination. According to a study published this month in Social Psychological and Personality Science, people who are exposed to organic foods tend to judge others more harshly.

Kendall Eskine, an associate professor of psychology at Loyola University, says those who are primed to think about healthy organic foods like spinach, apples, and tomatoes are more likely to criticize morally questionable activities. He took 62 Loyola undergrads and divided them up into three groups. One group was given images of fruits and vegetables bearing organic labels; another saw comfort foods like cookies and ice cream; and the third group looked at "neutral" foods such as grains and beans.

All the participants were then polled on the acceptability of certain scenarios, including incest and eating a dead pet. The survey took the form of a seven-point ranking system where 1 meant "perfectly acceptable" and 7 meant "totally unacceptable." Finally, they were asked whether they could spare some additional time to help another professor with a different study.

Those who'd seen images of healthy foods were more likely to rank the morally questionable activities as not okay, and were least likely to say they could give their time to the other professor's study:

"On a scale of 1 to 7, the organic people were, like, 5.5, while the controls were about a 5 and the comfort food people were, like, a 4.89." The organic people also only offered to volunteer for a mere 13 minutes, as compared with the control group's 19-minute offer and the happy comfort-food group's 24-minute commitment.
Eskine suggests the images of organic food reinforced feelings of moral certitude, making those participants more judgmental than those in the processed-food and control groups. There's been some pushback to this explanation, such as the fact that sugar can make people more altruistic, and that many of the non-organic products Eskine showed were sweet foods. Another possibility is that feelings of guilt associated with eating junk food could be making people more empathetic. Then there's the fact that only a handful of people participated in the study, and all of them were undergraduate students -- not exactly a wide-ranging sample.

Still, Eskine's research raises other interesting questions about the limits of morality regardless. We already know that willpower is a finite resource -- making decisions we don't like actually reduces our ability to make similar decisions later. It'd be fascinating to know if our capacity for morality and sympathy are under the same constraints.

[InsertCoolName]

Take Pixie Sticks the huge ones. And Mountain Dew made with REAL sugar.

[skubikky]

May 23, 2012 14:00:19 GMT -5 midjd said:

Sku, you're in my brain! I was just going to ask if the manure used in organic products had to come from organic cows, or if it was just any old cow chowing down on some Round-Up grass

In all honesty, I really don't know exactly how they do or do not track that back through the food chain or if it really matters. But it just seemed funny to me.

[GRG a/k/a goldenrulegirl]

I am qualified to speak here because I have 2 of those kids with the PITA life-threatening, anaphylactic, food allergies. Trust me, I'd trade places with any of you in a heartbeat.

First, just to be clear, peanut allergies are deadly because they cause anaphylactic shock.

But, peanuts are NOT the only food that can cause anaphylactic shock. Any food can, but the 8 most common (in no particular order) are peanuts, tree nuts, eggs, dairy, wheat, soy, fish and shellfish. (I have met people who have life-threatening allergies to green beans and celery so any food can be highly allergenic.)

Second, when your child is diagnosed with a life-threatening food allergy, the learning curve is almost vertical in a heartbeat. It takes time -- months, years even -- for a parent to develop a strategy for dealing with the food allergy at home, never mind at social gatherings. So, for parents in a play group for young children, it is possible that the parents of the kids with food allergies are still trying to figure it all out and find out what works for them and their child. Yeah, they might be militant/needy right now, but I'm certain most of you would be too if you were in their shoes. Cut them a little slack. If they have any common sense at all, they'll eventually figure out how to teach their child how to move in the larger world. But, it doesn't happen overnight.

Third, I NEVER expect other people to feed my kids. If they offer to do so, and can do so safely, great. I always have/send food or have taught my kids that "when in doubt, go without". But, my kids are teens so are somewhat more reliable when it comes to food choices. Lena's kids are 4 and under and I assume that is the age group she has playdates with. Yes, in an ideal world, the parents of the kids with food allergies will assume primary responsibility for their kids and keep a close eye on them. But, at their age, cross-contamination (even a microscopic amount of an allergen can cause death in moments without (and sadly, sometimes even with) an Epi Pen) and food sharing happens.

So, my requests are/were always simple. One kid has an anaphylactic allergy to eggs and tree nuts: please don't leave out platters of deviled eggs or a bowl of nuts. The other kid is allergic to soy: please don't serve edamame or tofuttis. Those are not the only foods that contain their allergens, but they are the most accessible forms of their allergens and therefore highly dangerous. Other than that, I made sure to feed my kids safe food I brought from home.

Finally, I have ALWAYS given other parents an out. If I sensed, or if they expressed, anxiety/discomfor/frustration over having my child in their home because of the food allergies, then we offered to host or made plans to meet elsewhere. I never saw a reason to push the food allergy agenda on someone who, at any particular moment, couldn't hear it.

So, Lena (and others), should decide between 1)food-free activities (if for no other reason than simply because of our national obesity problems) or 2)giving the families with food allergies a chance to figure out what works for them or 3)meeting in a neutral, food-free place.

JME. YMMV.

[mandyms]

Well spoken, Goldenrule. Food allergies is one thing I HATE educating patients on; it's so overwhelming for them.

[thyme4change]

On our baseball team this year with had a peanut allergy, a diabetic and a kid who was kosher. The final pizza party went like this "Hey parents, we are buying Domino pizza, juice boxes and Safeway cupcakes. If you would like to eat, please pitch in. If you don't want to eat what we are bringing, you are welcome to come anyway."

One family brought a cooler with food, including a sugar free cupcake. One family brought a kosher pizza. One kid didn't eat, and only stayed for a bit, and then left (presumably to go home and eat.)

[midjd]

I think the headline of this post is a fair question. Are there more allergies today, or are they just more frequently diagnosed?

I didn't grow up THAT long ago (late 80s-early 90s) and I don't remember a single classmate with a peanut, gluten, soy, or egg allergy. I had a cousin who was lactose intolerant, and a set of twin juvenile diabetics in my class, but that was it. So are allergies more prevalent these days? I find it hard to believe that the prevalence is the same and everyone back then was just keeping it under wraps or hadn't been diagnosed (although that is a feasible answer to the recent increase in some other disorders - autism, for instance).

[thyme4change]

I didn't grow up THAT long ago (late 80s-early 90s) and I don't remember a single classmate with a peanut, gluten, soy, or egg allergy. I had a cousin who was lactose intolerant, and a set of twin juvenile diabetics in my class, but that was it. So are allergies more prevalent these days? I find it hard to believe that the prevalence is the same and everyone back then was just keeping it under wraps or hadn't been diagnosed (although that is a feasible answer to the recent increase in some other disorders - autism, for instance).

I agree with this. Food allergies never came up when I was a kid. And, yes, we didn't have the word "autism" but we had another more generic word that we applied to many people who clearly had a more specific problem. We also had kids that were "weird" not "Aspergers." But, food allergies seemed to have actually increased. I guess there were people who didn't eat things - maybe every time they had ice cream they got diarrhea, so they just said "I don't like ice cream." Meanwhile, they had a dairy allergy, or lactose intolerant - but didn't name it. I was a pretty clueless kid - maybe I just never noticed.

[Sum Dum Gai]

Are there more allergies today, or are they just more frequently diagnosed?

Probably both. Pretty much everything these days is more frequently diagnosed because we require well baby and child check ups, and we undergo more medical screening than we used too. It's a lot more likely for medical issues to be caught since we're actually looking for them now.

It does seem like there are more people developing allergies now though. Like serious allergies not just stuff they don't like to eat.

[Chocolate Lover]

I think that the kids that had allergies when I was in school (80's and early 90s) had parents that handled it and didn't have high expectations that the school would and if you weren't friends with some of these kids you wouldn't have known. I had a friend that was allergic to wheat and milk and IDK what all, she brought her food from home and didn't take any from you. She might let you try hers but would NOT try yours. This was in elementary school.

I have shellfish allergies but that's rarely a problem outside of home when you're a kid, the school isn't going to put shrimp on the menu anytime soon and most people aren't putting that stuff out for kids either.

[resolution]

I read that food allergies had more than doubled in the last 20 years and 1 out of 12 kids has them now. I'm not a parent but it seems like the celery and carrots are cheap, healthy and easy. I would probably bring them every time it was my turn and not worry about what is or is not on the list.

[thyme4change]

most people aren't putting that stuff out for kids either.

What??? Kids don't like shrimp cocktail?

(Although, I did serve shrimp to some of our kids' friends a couple of weeks ago. That was what we were having for dinner. They wanted to stay. So...)

[Deleted]

May 23, 2012 14:28:01 GMT -5 GRG a/k/a goldenrulegirl said:

I am qualified to speak here because I have 2 of those kids with the PITA life-threatening, anaphylactic, food allergies. Trust me, I'd trade places with any of you in a heartbeat.

Thanks for your perspective. I just about choked at the (I hope) joking suggestion on Page 1 that you feed the kid a little of the supposed allergen to see if the parents are lying. In our area one teenager ended up in a coma after some classmates opened up Reese's Peanut Butter cups near her.

As for why these allergies are more common now: I think that one factor is that kids with these extreme sensitivities used to die early but no one knew why. There are also some theories that maybe we try to protect our babies from everything and they never develop strong immune systems. In the 1950s it was OK if your kid crawled on the floor, drank from the garden hose, ate the occasional mouthful of dirt, or kissed the dog. I have a brother who ate my butterfly collection as a baby and a niece who was caught eating food out of the dog's bowl as a toddler. All of us are extremely healthy adults. I'm strictly an amateur but that makes sense to me. It means that the overprotective mommies (as opposed to the ones whose kids have been diagnosed with severe allergies) are just making the situation worse.

[midjd]

In the 1950s it was OK if your kid crawled on the floor, drank form the garden hose, ate the occasional mouthful of dirt, or kissed the dog. I have a brother who ate my butterfly collection as a baby and a niece who was caught eating food out of the dog's bowl as a toddler. All of us are extremely healthy adults. I'm strictly an amateur but that makes sense to me. It means that the overprotective mommies (as opposed to the ones whose kids have been diagnosed with severe allergies) are just making the situation worse.

I tend to agree (although I tread lightly because I know there are always exceptions and I'd never want to tell any parent "well, your kid wouldn't have allergies if you'd just let him roll around in the dirt a little!" )

DH's cousin recently had a baby - his first, his wife's fourth - and their new rule is that no one can touch/hold the baby without dousing their hands and forearms in Purell. (I ran afoul of this at Christmas as I was out of the room during the Purell announcement, and had my ass handed to me when I was so bold as to try to hold the baby without sanitizing. ) Their other 3 kids are the raised-in-dirt type (hell, they apparently lived in a meth lab briefly when she was married to her ex) and are fine. It'll be interesting to see how this baby turns out, health-wise - that much triclosan can't be good for you.

[thyme4change]

In the 1950s it was OK if your kid crawled on the floor, drank from the garden hose, ate the occasional mouthful of dirt, or kissed the dog.

Was I suppose to stop my kids from doing any of that?

joking suggestion on Page 1 that you feed the kid a little of the supposed allergen to see if the parents are lying.

My nephew has a peanut allergy, and although he is lucky enough that he has never gone into anaphylactic shock - he does throw up if he eats something with peanuts in it. That alone makes me just go ahead and believe anyone who says they have a peanut allergy. Even if it won't kill them - I really don't want to get barfed on.

[Miss Tequila]

Mid, I am seriously laughing because that is the type of mother I was...my oldest was born during flu season so I rarely left the house with her and if anyone came to the house, they had to practically don scrubs to hold her...I boiled, bleached and steam cleaned everything on a daily basis.

Seh was NEVER sick.

Fast forward to when she was 18 months old and I was put on bed rest with my second pregnancy and we were forced to put her in daycare...holy f'n shit, she was sick from day one. When I talked to her pediatrician he basically blamed me for sterilizing her environment and told me that she basically had no immunities built up because she was never exposed. Oops...lol

[Chocolate Lover]

May 23, 2012 15:09:15 GMT -5 thyme4change said:

most people aren't putting that stuff out for kids either.

What??? Kids don't like shrimp cocktail?

(Although, I did serve shrimp to some of our kids' friends a couple of weeks ago. That was what we were having for dinner. They wanted to stay. So...)

Well sure they do, but I'm not serving it at a play date. Are you??

[Miss Tequila]

"Well sure they do, but I'm not serving it at a play date. Are you?? "

If that's what we are having for dinner then yep.

[thyme4change]

Playdates? No, I just mix sugar and salt in a bowl and put 12 spoons in it.

[Chocolate Lover]

That's your fault for having a play date at dinner time Tina They should be from 2-4 when they should've had lunch already and it's too early for dinner.

Thyme, I'll have to try that on the neighbor kids ;D

[Sum Dum Gai]

It's all your fault for not letting them pick their noses. I probably still have the study in my favorites somewhere, but a German group studied nose picking and found it very beneficial to immune development. Our hands are one of the germiest parts of our bodies, and are constantly interracting with environmental contaminants, so when we pick our noses we're constantly introducing small quantities of stuff into our nasal passage where our immune systems are like optimized to receive germs and develop antibodies and stuff. It was a cool study, but the take away was, let your kids pick their noses and they'll be healthier later.

Unfortunately they didn't study letting them eat it after, so I have no scientific backing to give that the green light as well. The salty taste is kind of nice though, and I don't imagine it'll hurt.