5 Toxic Foods Killing Your Brain

 

When it comes to diet and nutrition, I think most people associate that with losing weight, getting fit, staying young, and trying to avoid the big “C” cancer. But what you are feeding your body, is not just about dropping some unwanted pounds or getting in shape.  What we eat on a daily basis doesn’t just affect the scale, it affects our entire bodies and our brains. Our food intake impacts how we think, how we feel, how we sleep, and poop–yes poop! It affects our energy levels, our memory and mental capacity and so much more. Not only is there an epidemic of chronic illnesses in this country but, neurodegenerative disorders, mental illness, and autism spectrum disorders are also on the rise, with shockingly scary statistics. It has become more important than ever to read labels and know exactly what you and your loved ones are putting in your body every day.  Science has now proven that there is much truth in the old saying, “You Are What You Eat.”  Knowledge is the real power here…..if you know the toxins that are in your food, then you can avoid them at all costs, greatly improving your health, and preventing many diseases.

Benjamin Franklin once said….”An Ounce of Prevention is Worth a Pound of Cure.”

6 out of 10 adults in America are suffering from a chronic disease, 4 in 10 adults have two or more chronic illnesses. 

Nearly 10 million Americans are suffering from a serious mental disorder.

One in fifty-four children is diagnosed on the Autism Spectrum.

More than 6 million Americans are living with Alzheimer’s.

Almost two-thirds of Americans living with Alzheimer’s disease are women.

Gosh! If that doesn’t scare you into reading labels, then nothing will. Oh, and if you are under 50, you might think, “Alzheimer’s, I have decades to go before I have to worry about that,” however, according to many experts, including the Mayo Clinic, the preclinical stage of Alzheimer’s starts years to decades before symptoms appear based on MRI studies. Many diseases do not discriminate, making it critical to get familiar with your fare.

70% of deaths in America are caused by chronic diseases that are preventable conditions linked to diet and lifestyle.

The keyword here is “PREVENTABLE.”  We actually have way more power and control over our health than we think. You are your very own best food detective! Avoiding the five toxic ingredients below is a great place to start “taking your health back.”

5 Toxic Foods That Are Killing Your Brain….And Your Body Too.

Toxic Food #1 – MSG

What Is It?

MSG or Monosodium Glutamate is a common food additive that makes food taste delicious and it’s so addictive that it keeps you coming back for more. The majority of food items that line our grocery stores are laden with this toxic substance.  The amount of MSG put in processed foods has doubled every decade since the 1940s. According to Russell Blaylock, a nationally recognized neurosurgeon, and author, MSG is an excitotoxin that can be toxic to the brain. According to Dr. Blaylock, very few people are aware of excitotoxins even though they play a significant role in many modern diseases.

An Excitotoxin is a chemical substance that stimulates the brain, all of the nervous system, and many other organs, to such a degree that such cells become damaged or die. Dr. Blaylock, Prescriptions for Natural Health

Why Is It Toxic To Your Brain and Body?

The term “Excitotoxicity” was first coined by Dr. John Olney, Professor of psychiatry, pathology, and immunology at Washington University School of Medicine.  Dr. Olney, renowned for his work on brain damage, used this term to describe what happens when nerve cells suffer damage when levels of seemingly normal and necessary neurotransmitters like Glutamate become too high resulting in excessive stimulation of receptors leading to neuron cell death. Dr. Olney discovered through his research that humans are 20 times more sensitive to MSG than animals and repeated exposure to MSG can compromise the Blood-Brain Barrier designed to protect the brain from toxic compounds.

MSG’s Many Disguises

Food manufacturers have found many ways to disguise this toxic compound in your food so it is important to read labels and recognize its many hiding places.

Autolyzed Yeast Extract                Bouillon

Broth                                             Carrageenan

Caseinate                                      Natural Flavoring

Gelatin                                          Malt Extract                       

Hydrolyzed Protein                       Soy Products

Whey Protein                                Glutamate                                            

Hydrolyzed Flour

“MSG is the most dangerous food additive around today and a known carcinogen and killer of brain cells.”

Dr. Frank Lipman, a leader in Functional Medicine and best-selling New York Times Author

Toxic Food #2 – Microwave Popcorn

What Is It?

According to Wikipedia, microwave popcorn is a convenience food consisting of unpopped popcorn in an enhanced sealed paper bag intended to be heated in a microwave oven.

According to Kathleen(Me), it is a bag of toxic trash that is killing your brain and body……throw it out…like right now! I know that sounds kind of bitchy, but trust me, you will thank me when you are 65 and you can still remember where you put the popcorn and how to cook it…..on the stove ofcourse.

Who doesn’t look forward to a warm bowl of delicious buttery popcorn? For most of us, just the amazing aroma of popcorn takes us back to childhood movie nights.  Growing up as the youngest of twelve children, by the time the weekend rolled around, my mother was exhausted, so sometimes we had popcorn for dinner, and that was pretty fun!!!  However, nowadays most people are not eating the kind of popcorn they enjoyed as children. We use to pop it fresh on the stove with pesticide-free popcorn and top it off with “real” melted butter and sea salt…I can taste it now……yum!

Why Is It Toxic To Your Brain and Body?

So you might think, “Popcorn, what’s wrong with that?”….I’ve always been told it’s a healthy snack?” And guess what, you are right, as long as, you pop it the old-fashioned way like mom or grandma used to make it. Let’s compare the ingredients:

Old Fashioned Popcorn Ingredients:

Popcorn seeds

Non-GMO vegetable oil or air-popped

Real Butter

Sea Salt

Microwave PopCorn Ingredients:

Popcorn Seeds (ironically most popcorn seeds are not GMO, but the vegetable oil included in microwave popcorn usually is genetically modified which is laced with the toxic herbicide glyphosate.

Microwave Popcorn Bag lined with PFOA’s – key ingredient in Scotchguard and Teflon cookware. This man-made chemical, also known as C8 has been linked to many tragic health issues including cancer and tumors and it leaches into the microwave popcorn during the heating process.

Natural and Artificial Flavor(Diacetyl–this ingredient is EVILLLLLLL) – According to Dr. Sam Walter’s, acclaimed Naturopathic Doctor and NASA Scientist, Diacetyl (one of the main compounds used in butter flavoring in microwave popcorn), has the ability to cross the Blood-Brain Barrier, which is like a gatekeeper for the brain to keep out toxins, and Diacetyl also causes beta-amyloid clumping which is a significant indicator in Alzheimer’s Disease. See the excerpt Taken Directly From NCBI Research Study “Effects of Diacetyl Flavoring in Mice Metabolism.”

Result: Diacetyl Disrupts Homeostasis in Mice.

When an organism’s homeostasis is disrupted, this may lead to some dysfunction that impacts metabolism or promotes disease. The organism can also develop a stress response to help to maintain homeostasis [39, 40]. Diacetyl and other α-dicarbonyl compounds promote chemical disorders including mutagenesis, cancer, aging, diabetes, neurodegenerative processes, several metabolism errors, and inflammatory diseases [13].

Color (usually artificial) – artificial dyes have been linked to many health disorders, which explains why most artificial food coloring has been banned in Europe and if a product contains them, the company is required to put a surgeon general warning label on them, much like cigarettes labels in the United States.

Hydrogenated Soybean Oil(also usually GMO) – laced with the toxic herbicide glyphosate.

Propyl Gallate – linked to a litany of health problems.

Citric Acid

Salt

“Researchers conducting test-tube studies revealed that diacetyl has several concerning properties for brain health. Not only can it pass through the blood-brain barrier, but it can also cause brain proteins to misfold into the Alzheimer’s-linked forms known as beta-amyloid.” 

Dr. Mercola

Toxic Food #3 – sugar

The Average American Consumes 24 Teaspoons of Sugar or 88 Grams Every Day!

What is it?

Simply put, cane sugar mainly from GMO sugar beets is a simple carbohydrate made of two molecules, glucose, and fructose. Glucose, in the natural form, can be a great source of energy and acts as fuel for the entire body, including the brain. In fact, the brain utilizes this energy from glucose to fuel many critical brain functions.

Why Is It Toxic To Your Brain and Body? 

The problem with sugar is not the small or moderate amounts of glucose that your brain actually needs or even small amounts of natural sources of fructose like fruit that provide the body with many vitamins, minerals, and much-needed nutrients. The problem with sugar is that there’s nothing “small” about it anymore. Our ancestors, 200 years ago, consumed about 2 pounds of sugar a year…..yeah in one entire year.  Today, the Food Industry has literally and completely “cashed in” on our modern-day “stressed out to the max and overstimulated” society. Thanks to King Kong’s of the addiction-enabling industry like General Mills and Nabisco and the 600,000 processed foods containing “added” sugars that line our grocery store shelves, Americans are now consuming 150 pounds of sugar each year or 3 pounds a week……whaaaat?  The toxic effects of sugar have been well-researched and well-documented and below is just a small list of what too much sugar does to your brain and your body.

• It has been well-documented that too much sugar consumption often leads to chronic high blood sugar which we now know causes inflammation in the body which is linked to heart disease, diabetes, cancer, and Alzheimer’s disease.
• Even slight elevations in blood sugar have been shown to increase the risk of Alzheimer’s Disease-Dr. David Perlmutter, world-renown neurologist, and best-selling author.
• Overconsumption of sugar is scientifically linked to obesity, heart disease, Type 2 diabetes, and cancer.
• Sugar can provide a significant rise in triglycerides leading to high Cholesterol.
• Sugar feeds cancer.
• Sugar can exacerbate learning disorders in schools.
• Sugar interferes with the body’s absorption of calcium and magnesium.

Excerpt from, “This Is Your Brain On Food,” Dr. Uma Naidoo, Nutritional Psychiatrist, Harvard Med School

Consuming unhealthy processed foods like baked goods and soda, which are loaded with refined and added sugars, often in the form of HFCS, floods the brain with too much glucose. The “sugar flood” can lead to inflammation in the brain and may ultimately result in depression. 

“The Impact of Sugar on Body, Brain, and Behavior”

Excessive sugar consumption, however, may trigger neuroadaptations in the reward system that decouple eating behavior from caloric needs and leads to compulsive overeating. Excessive sugar intake is in turn associated with adverse health conditions, including obesity, metabolic syndrome, and inflammatory diseases.  NCBI Research Study

Sugar is a highly palatable food that triggers our reward systems due to both caloric input and taste. Taken in excess, sugar can trigger these reward systems too strongly, inducing compulsive eating. NCBI Research Study

Data from the Framingham Heart Study (FHS) has shown that people who more frequently consume sugary beverages such as sodas and fruit juices are more likely to have poorer memory, smaller overall brain volumes, and smaller hippocampal volumes–an area of the brain important for memory. 

Excerpt from Harvard Article-“Sugar and the Brain”

“Type 2 diabetes accelerates brain aging,” says Novak, “which, in turn, accelerates the progression of functional decline.”

The Many Sugar Disguises

• Evaporated Cane Juice
• Glucose
• Honey/Maple Syrup
• Fructose, Lactose, Maltose, Sucrose, Dextrose
• Corn Sweetener
• Brown Sugar
• Sorbitol
• Molasses

Toxic Food #4 – aspartame

The good news is that many people are waking up to the negative impacts of sugar on their bodies and are making a considerable effort to cut back on the sweet stuff.  Unfortunately, however, many of them are replacing their sugar intake with artificial sweeteners, which possibly poses a much higher health risk to their brain and bodies than the real deal. Multiple large-scale studies in the last couple of decades have outlined that artificial sweetener users gain more weight and have higher BMI’s. Let’s dive in here.

What Is It?

This is the definition taken straight from Dr. Mercola’s article on Aspartame’s Hidden Dangers

Aspartame is made up of aspartic acid and phenylalanine. The latter has been synthetically altered to carry a methyl group, which is responsible for aspartame’s sweet taste. The phenylalanine methyl bond, called methyl ester, allows the methyl group on the phenylalanine to easily break off and form methanol.In fruits and vegetables, methanol is bonded to a fiber called pectin that allows it to be safely passed through your digestive tract. However, in aspartame, methanol is not bonded into anything that can help eliminate it from your body.

Once inside your body, the methanol is converted by alcohol dehydrogenase (ADH) enzyme into formaldehyde, which can wreak havoc on your DNA and sensitive proteins. All animals, except humans, possess the ability to break down methanol into formic acid.

Why Is It Toxic To Your Brain and Body?

• Much like MSG, Aspartame is an excitotoxin – a carcinogen that produces neurotoxic effects that can stimulate your brain cells to death.
• Aspartame is implicated in many mood disorders like depression and anxiety.
• Aspartame has been linked to weight gain, increased appetite, and obesity.
• Research has proven aspartame’s link to headaches, migraines, and even seizures.
• Aspartame has been linked to many types of cancer including breast, prostate, and brain tumors.
• Aspartame is responsible for over 75% of adverse food reactions reported to the FDA.
• Research shows that artificial sweeteners kill off “good” gut bacteria needed for a healthy microbiome.

Where Is It?

In over 6,000 products lining our grocery stores, mostly in “diet”  anything, especially diet sodas, and “sugar-free” food items.  Listed below are the many artificial sweeteners to look out for when reading labels.

• Aspartame(Equal)
• Sucralose(Splenda) – Sucralose made international headlines a while back when an Italian study found that it causes leukemia (blood cancer) in rats.
• Acesulfame(Equal)
• Neotame
• Saccharin(Sweet’n Low)
• Stevia
• Advantame

According to an article in the National Library of Medicine, consuming Diet Soda every day puts you at a 67% greater risk for developing Type 2 diabetes.

Aspartame (α-aspartyl-l-phenylalanine-o-methyl ester), an artificial sweetener, has been linked to behavioral and cognitive problems. Possible neurophysiological symptoms include learning problems, headache, seizure, migraines, irritable moods, anxiety, depression, and insomnia. PubMed NIH Article“

Science implicates many artificial sweeteners in depression: one study showed that people who consume artificial sweeteners, mostly via diet drinks, are more depressed than those who don’t consume such beverages. Even Worse, several studies have demonstrated that artificial sweeteners can be toxic to the brain, altering brain concentrations of mood-regulating neurotransmitters. Dr. Uma Naidoo, Nutritional Psychiatrist, Harvard Medical School

My advice to you is to give up aspartame, sucralose, stevia, sugar alcohols, xylitol and maltitol, and all other heavily used and marketed artificial sweeteners unless you want to slow down your metabolism, gain weight, and become an addict.”  Dr. Mark Hyman, Director Functional Medicine, Cleveland Clinic

Toxic Food #5 – GMO(Glyphosate)

What Is It?

GMO stands for Genetically Modified Organism. There has been a ton of controversy over the last couple of decades over the safety of GMO foods.  There are many articles that will tell you that GMOs are perfectly safe, but if you dig deeper into the article, they are usually funded by Monsanto in some way, shape or form so no surprise there.  However, if you look at independent research studies done by “real” Ph.D.’s and scientists, the outcome is usually very different. Having a son that used to be on the autism spectrum,  I can tell you that I have done more research on GMOs and glyphosate than most of the people writing the “GMO’s are Perfectly Safe” articles. And no, I am not a doctor, I am not a scientist, but  I am a “Mom Warrior”, and at the time, Mama Bear was willing to do just about anything to “heal” her cub. If you are a mom, I know you can relate.  The most important thing is to do your own research and decide what’s best for you and your family.

Why Is It Toxic To Your Brain and Body?

GMO crops are different than organic or conventional crops, they specifically engineered to withstand huge amounts of the herbicide glyphosate(the main ingredient in the weedkiller RoundUp) in order to kill the weeds without ruining the crop. So what does this mean? Basically, the GMO crops are drinking the roundup and depositing it into the food we eat.  According to Dr. Stephanie Seneff, Senior Scientist at the Massachusetts Institute for Technology(MIT), there is a strong correlation between the rise in glyphosate use since the mid 70’s and the rise in many chronic illnesses such as cancer, allergies, asthma, digestive issues, autism, ADHD, Alzheimer’s and many more. This is no coincidence, and there is a reason that chronic disease affects 133 million Americans and growing. That is why it is absolutely critical that we stay educated, spread awareness, and make constant demands of our Government to protect the safety and integrity of our food supply.

Glyphosate is the most widely used herbicide in the United States on crops. An estimated 300 million pounds of this toxic compound is dumped on our food supply annually.

In 2015, the WHO (World Health Organization) declared glyphosate as a “probable Carcinogen”.

Glyphosate, the main ingredient in the weedkiller RoundUp has been directly linked to Non-Hodgkins Lymphomas and Bayer(who purchased Monsanto 2 years) has agreed to pay out $10 billion dollars to settle tens of thousands of lawsuits. New York Times Article

Glyphosate has been linked to the following illnesses:

• Cancer
• Alzheimer’s
• Food Allergies
• Reproductive Disorders
• Autism
• Digestive Problems
• Chronic Illness
• Infertility

Most Common Foods That Are Genetically Modified

According to the Center for Food Safety, it is estimated that 75% of processed foods like soda, cereals, snack bars, chips, soups, and condiments contain GMO ingredients.

• Corn
• Soy
• Potato
• Papaya
• Sugar Beets
• Canola
• Alfalfa
• Summer Squash

Glyphosate timeline done by Stephanie Seneff, MIT Researcher and Lead Scientist

• Rate of Autism in 1970 Pre-RoundUp = 1 in 1000.
• Monsanto introduces to the market in 1974(roundup).
• EPA Potential Carcinogen 1985.
• Roundup-ready soybean hit the market in 1996, RR Corn in 1998.
• Rates glyphosate observed in humans increases 500% between 1993-2016.
• 93% of Americans found to have glyphosate in urine.
• 99% of Food Samples contain some level of pesticide residue.
• Rate of Autism in 2021 = 1 in 54, 1 in 34 boys.

Good Reads:

Excitotoxins: The Taste That Kills, Russell Blaylock M.D.

This Is Your Brain On Food, Dr. Uma Naidoo

Brain Wash, Dr. David Perlmutter

The Brain Warrior’s Way, Dr. Daniel Amen

Disclaimer

The information contained in this blog and any content within therootcausewellness.com website is intended to educate, empower, and inspire readers to make positive choices for their own overall health and wellbeing. I am not a doctor, psychiatrist, or therapist and the information contained on this website is my personal opinion based on my education, real-life experience, and research unless otherwise stated. Therefore, it is in no way intended to substitute for professional medical advice from a doctor or licensed health professional. This information is not intended to diagnose, treat, prevent, or cure any disease or medical condition. It is always recommended that you consult with a doctor or licensed medical professional before making any dietary, lifestyle, exercise, medication, or supplement changes. Kathleen Freydl, Certified Health Coach and Owner of the Root Cause Wellness, accepts no responsibility or liability whatsoever for the use or misuse of the information contained in therootcausewellness.com website including any affiliate links.