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Posted: February 8, 2017 at 8:42 am
Atrial fibrillation (also called AFib or AF) is the most common supraventricular arrhythmia in Western countries -- affecting at least 2.7 million people in the U.S., according to the American Heart Association. AFib is a serious condition, and one that I treat regularly in my practices at the Montefiore Einstein Center for Heart & Vascular Care in Bronx, New York.
During February's American Heart Month, here's some important information about AFib:
Typical Patient
AFib predominantly affects, but is not limited to, older people. This element is increasingly important because as our life expectancy continues to improve and the average age of the population increases, AFib is expected to grow and affect an estimated 50 million patients by 2060 across the U.S. and Europe. It's important to learn the facts of this condition as early as possible.
[See: The Facts on Heart Disease.]
Common Signs and Symptoms
The most common symptom of AFib is a quivering or irregular heartbeat (also known as an arrhythmia), though patients may experience palpitations, which are sensations of a racing, uncomfortable, irregular heartbeat, or a flip-flopping in your chest; lightheadedness and/or dizziness; confusion; shortness of breath and anxiety; weakness; fatigue; reduced ability to exercise; and/or chest pain or pressure. Please note, if you're experiencing chest pain or pressure, call 911 immediately.
Now that we've outlined the most commons signs and symptoms of AFib, there's one very important fact to note: Nearly one-third of AFib patients are asymptomatic. In other words, some people with AFib have no symptoms and are unaware of their condition until it's discovered during a physical examination. Because of this fact, it's crucial to schedule an annual physical exam with your doctor and understand your risks.
How to Treat It
There are a growing number of ways we can treat AFib and achieve great results. However, if left untreated, AFib can evolve from a momentary episode into a chronic, longstanding and potentially even permanent issue, causing subsequent concerns such as blood clots, stroke, heart failure and other heart conditions. In fact, patients with AFib are nearly five times more likely to experience a stroke those without AFib, are at an increased risk of developing dementia and have a nearly doubled risk of experiencing a heart-related death. Studies also show that individuals with AFib have an increased risk of renal disease.
It's important to discuss your risk of heart failure with your doctor, as AFib and heart failure frequently coexist and are often associated with several common predisposing risk factors. These include hypertension, coronary artery disease, structural heart disease, diabetes, obesity and obstructive sleep apnea.
[See: The 12 Best Heart-Healthy Diets.]
The Good News
There are a number of ways you can reduce your risk of developing AFib:
1. Increase your physical activity. Obesity is a significant risk factor for AFib. Consult your doctor to learn more about ways to safely increase your levels of physical activity.
2. Improve your diet. Undergo a weight-loss program and incorporate more fruits, vegetables and lean meats into your daily diet. Limit caffeine, alcohol, fats and excess salt. If necessary, consult your doctor about bariatric surgery.
3. Treat your blood pressure. Have a diet with low salt, and take your medications routinely, as hypertension increases your risk of developing AFib.
4. Treat your sleep apnea. If prescribed, remember to use your continuous positive airway pressure, or CPAP, mask every night. Doing so will improve your AFib.
5. Control your diabetes. If diet and exercise alone don't control your diabetes, please consult your doctor for more support and/or resources, as gaining control of your diabetes will reduce your risk of developing AFib.
6. Remember your medications. If your doctor prescribed blood thinners to you, it's important you never forget to take your medication to reduce your risk for stroke.
If you're diagnosed with AFib, there are many treatment options you can explore with your doctor, ranging from medications to minimally invasive procedures and, at times, surgery. One such procedure is a catheter ablation -- an established treatment to achieve freedom from AFib. Several randomized clinical trials have shown that catheter ablation improves symptoms and quality of life.
[See: 17 Ways Heart Health Varies in Women and Men.]
Although ablation is effective, the best outcome is achieved with a multidisciplinary approach that addresses multiple health conditions and cardiac risk factors. And remember, if you have AFib, the best outcomes are achieved if you actively care for yourself by keeping your weight down and controlling your blood pressure, diabetes and sleep apnea.
Consult your doctor for more information if you think you've been experiencing AFib.
Luigi Di Biase, M.D., Ph.D., F.A.A.C., F.H.R.S.,cardiologist, is the section head of electrophysiology and the director of arrhythmia services at the Montefiore Einstein Center for Heart & Vascular Care. Dr. Di Biase is also an associate professor of medicine within the Department of Medicine (Cardiology) at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine. Dr. Di Biase received his medical degree and completed his cardiology residency at the University of Bari in Bari, Italy. He completed a second-level master degree in Electrophysiology and Pacing at the University of Insubria in Varese, Italy, and his Ph.D. program in cardiovascular physiopathology at the University of Foggia, Italy. Dr. Di Biase's research focuses on cardiology and electrophysiology with specific emphasis on catheter ablation of atrial fibrillation and ventricular arrhythmias performed either manually or with robotic catheter navigation. Additionally, his research focuses on heart failure, particularly cases treated with cardiac resynchronization therapy devices. Dr. Di Biase is the author of nearly 300 publications in indexed journals, 300 abstracts and 18 electrophysiology book chapters.
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Atrial Fibrillation: Understanding Symptoms, Risks and Treatment - Yahoo News
Posted: February 8, 2017 at 8:42 am
Not long ago, the Canucks went on a bit of a tear, picking up points in 12 of 14 games with a 9-2-3 record. That run brought the team to the lofty heights of the second wildcard spot, which they clung onto by the tips of their fingers like a rock climber with no rope. (Sidenote: The picture in that link makes my hands sweat involuntarily.)
Unfortunately, the Canucks werent able to cling to the edge and and have started plummeting down the standings like Lady Gaga from the top of NRG Stadium: slowly and safely.
The Canucks are now 5 points out of the last wild card spot and, with a tough schedule ahead of them, will find it tough to make up ground. Unless Ryan Miller plays out of his mind, the Canucks dreams of making the playoffs could be over in a hurry.
Like, say, by the trade deadline.
March 1st is just three weeks away and as the Canucks fall further and further out of the playoff picture, theres less and less chance that Jim Benning will gamble the future on making the postseason. But will they make any trades at all or will this just be a repeat of last year, when Benning failed to make the most of pending free agents Radim Vrbata and Dan Hamhuis?
The Canucks have a few players that could fetch value in a trade. Alex Burrows and Jannik Hansen top that list, but theyre not alone: Ryan Miller is a pending UFA and the Canucks have defencemen that could be moved as well, from Luca Sbisa and Erik Gudbranson to Chris Tanev and Alex Edler.
The biggest problem is that Burrows, Hansen, Miller, and Edler all have no-trade clauses in their contracts. For Hansen and Miller, theyre modified clauses that allow them to list teams they would be willing to go to. Earlier this season, Jim Benning made it clear that he wouldnt ask veteran players to waive those NTCs, a switch from his stance when he first came in as General Manager.
There are a couple reasons why I wanted to put that out there about not trading the guys with no trade contracts, he said on TSN 1040. The first reason, I think, is I wanted to be honest with our players and our fans...the other reason is I want to try to eliminate the unnecessary distractions so our players can focus on getting better and winning games.
Whether you agree with this call or not, at least it was clear. It left an opening for players without no-trade clauses to be moved, like Tanev, Sbisa, or Gudbranson, but at least guys like Burrows and Hansen could play out the season without worry.
Except
Heres what Benning had to say this week on the subject of asking Burrows and Hansen to waive their no-trade clauses or, in Hansens case, of providing a list of teams.
Were going to see where were at, said Canucks general manager Jim Benning, whos on a European scouting trip. Ill have individual conversations with those players and their agents, but were hoping we can stay in the (playoff) fight. But its a tough trip.
Wait, what?
Benning went from clear and distinct he wont trade players with NTCs to more waffley than Elevens diet. Instead of a blanket statement that covers everyone with a NTC, its now about individual conversations. And so much for being honest with our players and eliminating distractions.
So, will Benning aim to add more draft picks and prospects by doing what he said he definitely wouldnt do? Honestly, going back on his word is probably the best move for the franchise as a whole. I love Burrows and Hansen, but if you can get a high draft pick and/or a great prospect back in a trade, you have to do whats best for the future.
Still, it adds a dose of uncertainty to the next few weeks for several Canucks.
Posted: February 8, 2017 at 8:42 am
Eat half a croissant and a pack of baby food, and you too can lose weight likeLena Dunham.
For those of you begging me for answers, the actress captioned an Instagram of a spoof meal plan dubbed Lenas Trump Diet, which comes a day after saying shes beenso upset since Donald Trumps presidential victory that she hadnt been able to eat.
On paper, she lists her daily diet ofgreen tea, 1/2 croissant before finding out Devos has been confirmedand baby food so I dont faint during press, complete with time stamps and funny illustrations.
On Monday, the Girls star told Howard Stern that her recent weight loss was sparked by Trumps presidency.
Donald Trump became president and I stopped being able to eat food, she said, blaming her weight loss specifically on soul-crushing pain and devastation and hopelessness.
But she warns that the diet plan isnt to be taken seriously.
FYI still rocking a BMI above doctors recommendation despite months of this. Do not recommend this diet, she explains.
It is unclear if the diet has had the same effect on Lenas pooches, as they were supposedly in on her 2:30 p.m. meal of veggie dog buns.
Posted: February 8, 2017 at 8:42 am
I know Democrats and progressives are going nuts over President Donald Trumps first few weeks in office I know the Middle East is a mess and that we have no small number of incredible challenges at home but I have my own worries.
Like millions of other Americans, Im on my annual February diet.
You see, its not easy to be trim and fit in America. Our culture is saturated with an abundance of high-calorie, processed foods that turn into instant fat.
We work long and hard in sedentary office jobs, then eat our stress away, two or three fast-food treats at a time.
Weve become so fat, to quote Rodney Dangerfield, that our bathtubs have stretch marks.
We know our increasing tubbiness isnt healthy. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, obesity-associated diseases such as diabetes have soared in recent years. Gallbladder diseases, sleep apnea, high blood pressure and heart disease are all caused by carrying too much weight.
And so we are on a continuous mission to lose weight. Our challenge is that the fad diets that promise to get us there go in and out of fashion faster than the white patent leather shoes and belts my father used to wear to church.
According to the website The Daily Meal, the Mediterranean diet featuring natural, plant-based foods, such as fruits and vegetables, whole grains, legumes and nuts is in.
So, too, is the Paleo diet, which apparently is similar to the Mediterranean diet, except legumes are forbidden.
Which is a shame, too, because I just learned that legumes include alfalfa, clover, peas, beans, lentils, lupin beans, mesquite, carob, soybeans, peanuts and tamarind which go well with the bourbon I am driven to drink as I try to figure out which diet to go on.
Volumetrics is another in diet. It encourages the consumption of low-energy-density foods, which make you feel full with fewer calories than high-energy-density foods. It also sounds like too much math is involved.
The gluten diet is on the outs, though, according to The Daily Meal. Apparently, it puts people at risk for different deficiencies such as B vitamin deficiencies, calcium, fiber, vitamin D and iron.
The Daily Meal no longer favors the Atkins Diet, either, which makes me sore.
Dr. Atkins said we could eat delicious steaks, pork, chicken and fish. He said we could eat as much eggs and cheese and other tasty no-sugar treats as we could stuff into our bellies. His diet was all the rage for years.
But now The Daily Meal says his diet is a no-go? That it is not heart-healthy and that most users are not compliant over the long term?
Not so fast! Several prominent studies have concluded that old Doc Atkins was onto something. Low-carbohydrate diets may actually take off more weight than low-fat diets and may be surprisingly better for cholesterol, too.
One of my greatest dieting disappointments of the last 20 years, though, was the failure of the exercise pill, which had shown promise at Duke University around 2002.
Researchers had located the chemical pathways that muscle cells use to build strength and endurance. With that knowledge in hand, there was hope that a pill could be created that would pump up muscle cells without the need for actual exercise.
Dieting Americans could have sat on the couch, chomping potato chips and dip, while their biceps got as round as cantaloupes and their abs got as hard as stone but this uniquely American dieting innovation wasnt to be.
I think Ill try a new, restrictive diet this February: the Democrats in Congress diet.
Ill deny myself everything.
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Purcell: Still searching for a diet panacea - Casper Star-Tribune Online
Posted: February 8, 2017 at 8:42 am
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MEMPHIS, Tenn. -- There are countless things we can learn about ourselves from our DNA, but what about using it to find the perfect diet?
It's the latest tool in the battle of the bulge analyzing your genetic makeup to find out your 'Diet DNA.'
"Like a fingerprint, they're all individual," said Maria Stevenson, clinical laboratory scientist and CEO of Arc Point Labs of Memphis.
Scientists can now pinpoint not only what you should and shouldn't eat, but also how your body responds to certain exercises.
"I think everybody would like a clear-cut road map on how their body works specifically, instead of some cookie-cutter diet that may not work for them," Stevenson said.
Arc Point Labs uses this new genetic testing to help clients find the right diet and exercise plan.
"We think macronutrients and micronutrients and how we process those differently, so I might be able to process protein more efficiently than you would," Stevenson said. "So that might be able to curb how your diet can be tailored specifically for you."
Stevenson took the test herself last year, unhappy with what she saw in the mirror.
"I just kind of ate whatever I wanted and it showed," she said. "It was not cute."
All it takes is a cheek swab, and in about two weeks, your results are in.
"What we found out is that I had specific genes that were pre-dispositioned toward obesity," Stevenson said, "so I'm struggling against my own DNA."
Stevenson's personal trainer and nutritionist says her DNA results saved him about a months-worth of work when creating her plan, instead of having to figure out what her body needed the old fashioned way.
"We were able to go ahead and develop her diet based around that," said Ronald Poe.
Since getting her results, Stevenson and Poe have worked together to transform her body, while she trains to compete in her first bodybuilding competition this summer.
"Every week when she sends me pictures, we're noticing a tighter, leaner physique," Poe said.
Stevenson even dead-lifted a car at a competition on Beale Street recently.
Arc Point Labs doesn't create a diet plan for you. You can either take your results to a nutritionist or use the tips in your DNA report to make healthy changes.
Arc Point Labs charges about $400 for a DNA test, but Stevenson says those results are good for the rest of your life because ones DNA never changes.
35.149534 -90.048980
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Diet DNA: Can your genetic makeup help you find the best diet? - wreg.com
Posted: February 8, 2017 at 8:42 am
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If youre part of the 10 percent of men who suffer from depression, theres more options than getting a prescription to Zoloft, Paxil, or Oleptro, drugs that all contain a laundry list of side effects. Among the well-studied all-natural things that may decrease depressive symptoms is Vitamin D, meditation, and old-fashioned therapy. But an even easier step? Change your diet.
While a junk-food diet has been previously indicated as a contributor to clinical depression, for the first time a healthy diet has been shown to actually improve mood. A newly published study shows that patients weaned off sweets, fried food, and refined meats and cereals in favor of fish, lean meats, nuts, whole grains, and veggies showed marked improvement more than a third of patients showed signs of pulling out of major clinical depression during a 12-week period.
"Empty calories in a lot of our foods means you aren't getting the vitamins and minerals needed to burn for fuel and deal with the waste; it taxes your body, says Columbia University psychiatrist and author of Eat Complete, Drew Ramsey. "And what you also get with a healthier diet are substances that help promote brain growth and resilience, he explains. For example, fish has omega 3 fats and magnesium, beans and nuts have zinc and phytonutrients.
While this research involved only 67 subjects, it gives us more reason to believe that diet plays a role in treatment for depression, and one that isn't tied to a prescription. We all know the common-sense answer: eat right, feel right, Ramsey says. But weve never had a randomized controlled clinical trial to show that diet can treat existing depression.
Even as evidence mounts that a nutrient-dense, Mediterranean-style diet shows success in preventing depression, these kind of lifestyle changes are never as easy as they may sound.
While the whole foodie movement has gotten men thinking and talking about what they eat, its still a challenge to get men to intake more seafood and to feel satiated eating plants, Ramsey says. A better diet doesnt require total deprivation, he adds. You can still have steak and potatoes it just has to be organic grass-fed and a purple potato from a farmers market.
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How Diet Affects Depression - Men's Journal
Posted: February 8, 2017 at 8:42 am
The first sign that something was wrong was that the female hamsters were really active in their cages. These were European hamsters, a species that is endangered in France and thought to be on the decline in the rest of their Eurasian range. But in a lab at the University of Strasbourg in France, the hamsters were oddly aggressive, and they didnt give birth in their nests.
Mathilde Tissier, a conservation biologist at the University of Strasbourg, remembers seeing the newly born pups alone, spread around in the cages, while their mothers ran about. Then, the mother hamsters would take their pups and put them in the piles of corn they had stored in the cage, Tissier says, and eat their babies alive.
I had some really bad moments, she says. I thought I had done something wrong.
Tissier and her colleagues had been looking into the effect of wheat- and corn-based diets in European hamsters because the rodents population in France was quickly disappearing. It now numbers only about 1,000 animals, most of which live in farm fields. The hamsters, being burrowers, are important for the local ecosystem and can promote soil health. But more than that, theyre an umbrella species, Tissier notes. Protect them, and their habitat, and there will be benefits for the many other farmland species that are declining.
A typical corn field is some seven times larger than the home range for a female hamster, so the animals that live in these agricultural areas eat mostly corn or whatever other crop is growing in that field. But not all crops provide the same level of nutrition, and Tissier and her colleagues were curious about how that might affect the hamsters. Perhaps there would be differences in litter size or pup growth, they surmised. So they began an experiment, feeding hamsters wheat or corn in the lab, with either clover or earthworms to better reflect the animals normal, omnivorous diets.
We thought [the diets] would create some [nutritional] deficiencies, Tissier says. But instead, Tissier and her colleagues saw something very different. All the female hamsters were able to successfully reproduce, but those fed corn showed abnormal behaviors before giving birth. They then gave birth outside their nests and most ate their young on the first day after birth. Only one female weaned her pups, though that didnt have a happy ending either the two brothers ate their female siblings, Tissier and her colleagues report January 18 in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B.
Tissier spent a year trying to figure out what was going on. Hamsters and other rodents will eat their young, but it is usually when a baby has died and the mother hamster wants to keep her nest clean. They dont normally eat healthy babies alive. The researchers reared more hamsters in the lab, this time supplementing their maize and earthworm diet with a solution of niacin. This time, the hamsters raised their young normally, and not as a snack.
Unlike wheat, corn lacks a number of micronutrients, including niacin. In people who subsist on a diet of mostly corn, that niacin deficiency can result in a disease called pellagra. The disease emerged in the 1700s in Europe after corn became a dietary staple. People with pellagra experienced horrible rashes, diarrhea and dementia. Until the diseases cause was identified in the mid-20th century, millions of people suffered and thousands died. (The meso-Americans who domesticated corn largely did not have this problem because they processed corn with a technique called nixtamalization, which frees bound niacin in corn and makes it available as a nutrient. The Europeans who brought corn back to their home countries didnt bring back this process.)
The European hamsters fed corn-based diets exhibited symptoms similar to pellagra, and this is probably happening in the wild, Tissier says. She notes that officials with the French National Office for Hunting and Wildlife have seen hamsters in the wild subsisting on mostly corn and eating their pups.
Tissier and her colleagues are now working to find ways to improve diversity in agricultural systems, so that hamsters and other creatures can eat a more well-balanced diet. The idea is not only to protect the hamster, she says, but to protect the entire biodiversity and to restore good ecosystems, even in farmland.
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A diet of corn turns wild hamsters into cannibals | Science News - Science News (blog)
Posted: February 8, 2017 at 8:42 am
Less than a month into Donald Trumps term in office, there are already countless distinctions between the Trump administration and the Obama administration. Americans are passionately debating the implications of the policy distinctions Trump is drawing on a daily basis.
However, Axios recently focused on a slightly less critical, although certainly potentially important, difference between Trump and Obama.
President Obama and his wife Michelle made fitness, diet and health priorities while in office, but Trumps diet seems more appropriate for a college dorm room than the White House. His eating habits even provided some excellent free product placement for top brands from time to time.
Aides report that Trump was constantly guzzling The Coca-Cola Co (NYSE: KO)'s Diet Coke on the campaign trail.
One aide referred to Dominos Pizza, Inc. (NYSE: DPZ), McDonalds Corporation (NYSE: MCD) and Yum! Brands, Inc. (NYSE: YUM)'s KFC as the three staples of the Trump campaign trail diet. Trump apparently has a special place in his heart (and his stomach) for the Big Mac.
While some Trump critics rolled their eyes at pictures of Trump eating Big Macs and fries on his private jet, aides say these occasions weren't simply photo ops to make Trump seem more relatable to voters; He frequently had Big Macs served to him on a silver platter, according to the Axios report.
In addition to fast food, Trump frequently snacks on PepsiCo, Inc. (NYSE: PEP)'s Lays potato chips and Kellogg Company (NYSE: K)'s Keebler Vienna Fingers.
Why should this unhealthy lifestyle concern Americans? At age 70, Trump is the oldest president ever elected. In addition to his poor eating habits, aides also report that Trump doesnt exercise, other than playing an occasional round of golf.
Trump hasnt had any major health issues up to this point, and aides report his diet has improved somewhat since the campaign ended. Trump also enjoys steaks (well done), potatoes, fish, seafood and vegetables. He doesnt smoke and doesnt drink alcohol at all.
For better or worse, Trump is certainly following through with his campaign promises when it comes to policy. As noted by Axios, aides report he's also a man of his word when it comes to Oreo cookies as well. Trump apparently used to love snacking on Oreos, but he gave them up entirely after Mondelez International Inc (NASDAQ: MDLZ) moved an Oreo plant from the U.S. to Mexico.
Posted-In: Axios Big Mac Diet Coke Donald TrumpPolitics Restaurants Media General Best of Benzinga
2017 Benzinga.com. Benzinga does not provide investment advice. All rights reserved.
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The Trump Diet: Fried Chicken, Diet Coke And Big Macs Served On A Silver Platter - Benzinga
Posted: February 8, 2017 at 8:42 am
Children who consume a Mediterranean diet are less likely to be diagnosed with attention-deficit/ hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), according to a new study led by researchers at the University of Barcelona.
The Mediterranean diet includes large amounts of fruits, vegetables, olive oil, beans, and cereal grains such as wheat and rice, moderate amounts of fish, dairy, and wine, and limited red meat and poultry.
The team also found a higher prevalence of ADHD among children who consumed high levels of candy and sugary drinks and low levels of fatty fish.
The study, published in the journal Pediatrics, is the first to investigate the link between the Mediterranean diet and ADHD in children and adolescents. The findings suggest that unhealthy eating habits could play a role in the development of the disorder.
However, the authors say that more research is necessary to firmly establish causality between nutrient-poor eating habits and ADHD.
The study involved 120 children and adolescents (60 diagnosed with ADHD and 60 controls) between the ages of six and 16. The childrens dietary patterns were assessed using food frequency questionnaires. The findings show that children with low adherence to the Mediterranean diet were more likely to be diagnosed with ADHD compared to those with high adherence.
Furthermore, the team identified a higher prevalence of ADHD among children who consumed high amounts of candy and sugary drinks, but low amounts of fatty fish.
The exact mechanisms linking a low-quality diet and ADHD are still unknown. Previous scientific studies have associated some dietary patterns (diets with processed food and low in fruit and vegetables) with ADHD. It is also known that an unbalanced dietary pattern can lead to deficiencies in essential nutrients (iron, zinc, magnesium, omega-3 fatty acids, etc.) that appear to play an essential role in the etiology of ADHD.
While the new research doesnt establish a direct cause-effect relationship between dietary patterns and ADHD, it can help determine specific dietary strategies to help improve the quality of life for both the affected patients and their families, say the researchers.
Furthermore, the link between an unhealthy diet and ADHD could be an example of reverse causation. For example, said Dr. Jos ngel Alda, a psychiatrist at Sant Joan de Du University Hospital, its unclear whether kids develop ADHD because of an unhealthy diet or perhaps the disorder itself causes them to eat an excess of fat and sugar to balance their impulsiveness or emotional distress.
We believe this is a vicious circle, said Alda, meaning that the impulsiveness of children with ADHD could make them eat unhealthily, and therefore they dont eat the nutrients they need and it all worsens their symptoms.
Source: University of Barcelona
APA Reference Pedersen, T. (2017). Mediterranean Diet Tied to Fewer ADHD Diagnoses. Psych Central. Retrieved on February 8, 2017, from https://psychcentral.com/news/2017/02/07/mediterranean-diet-tied-to-fewer-adhd-diagnoses/116142.html
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Mediterranean Diet Tied to Fewer ADHD Diagnoses - PsychCentral.com
Posted: February 8, 2017 at 8:42 am
Knowing a thing means you dont need to believe in it. Whatever can be known, or proven by logic or evidence, doesnt need to be taken on faith. Certain details of nutrition and the physiology of eating are known and knowable: the fact that humans require certain nutrients; the fact that our bodies convert food into energy and then into new flesh (and back to energy again when needed). But there are bigger questions that dont have definitive answers, like what is the best diet for all people? For me?
Nutrition is a young science that lies at the intersection of several complex disciplineschemistry, biochemistry, physiology, microbiology, psychologyand though we are far from having figured it all out, we still have to eat to survive. When there are no guarantees or easy answers, every act of eating is something like a leap of faith.
Eating is the first magic ritual, an act that transmits life energy from one object to another, according to cultural anthropologist Ernest Becker in his posthumously published book Escape From Evil. All animals must feed on other life to sustain themselves, whether in the form of breastmilk, plants, or the corpses of other animals. The act of incorporation, of taking a once-living thing into your own body, is necessary for all animals existence. It is also disturbing and unsavory to think about, since it draws a direct connection between eating and death.
Human self-awareness means that, from a relatively early age, we are also aware of death. In his Pulitzer prize-winning book, The Denial of Death, Becker hypothesized that the fear of deathand the need to suppress that fearis what drives much of human behavior. This idea went on, in social psychology, to the form the basis of Terror Management Theory.
Ancient humans must have decided, once their bellies were full, that there was more to life than mere survival and staring mortality in the face. They went on to build things in which they could find distraction, comfort, recreation, and meaning. They built cultures in which death became another rite of passage, not the end of everything. They made structures to live in, wrote songs to sing to each other, and added spices to their food, which they cooked in different styles. Humans are supported by a self-created system of meanings, symbols, rituals, and etiquette. Food and eating are part of this.
The act of ingestion is embroidered with so much cultural meaning that, for most people, its roots in spare, brutal survival are entirely hidden. Even for people in extreme poverty, for whom survival is a more immediate concern, the cultural meanings of food remain critical. Wealthy or poor, we eat to celebrate, we eat to mourn, we eat because its mealtime, we eat as a way to bond with others, we eat for entertainment and pleasure. It is not a coincidence that the survival function of food is buried beneath all of thiswho wants to think about staving off death each time they tuck into a bowl of cereal? Forgetting about death is the entire point of food culture.
When it comes to food, Becker said that humans quickly saw beyond mere physical nourishment, and that the desire for more lifenot just delaying death today, but clearing the bar of mortality entirelygrew into an obsession with transforming the self into a perfected object that might achieve a sort of immorality. Diet culture and its variations, such as clean eating, are cultural structures we have built to attempt to transcend our animality.
By creating and following diets, humans not only eat to stay alive, but they fit themselves into a cultural edifice that is larger, and more permanent, than their bodies. It is a sort of immortality ritual, and rituals must be performed socially. Clean eating rarely, if ever, occurs in secret. If you havent evangelized about it, joined a movement around it, or been praised publicly for it, have you truly cleansed?
As humans, we are possibly the most promiscuous omnivores ever to wander the earth. We dine on animals, insects, plants, marine life, and occasionally non-food: dirt, clay, chalk, even once, famously, bicycles and airplanes.
We are not pandas, chastely satisfied with munching through a square mile of bamboo. We seek variety and novelty, and at the same time, we carry an innate fear of food. This is described by the famous omnivores paradox, which (Michael Pollan notwithstanding) is not mere confusion about choosing what to eat in a cluttered food marketplace. The omnivores paradox was originally defined by psychological researcher Paul Rozin as the anxiety that arises from our desire to try new foods (neophilia) paired with our inherited fear of unknown foods (neophobia) that could turn out to be toxic. All omnivores feel these twin pressures, but none more acutely than humans. If it werent for the small chance of death lurking behind every food choice and every dietary ideology, choosing what to eat from a crowded marketplace wouldnt be considered a dilemma. Instead, we would call it the omnivores fun time at the supermarket, and people wouldnt repost so many Facebook memes about the necessity of drinking a gallon of water daily, or the magical properties of apple cider vinegar and coconut oil. Everyone would be just a little bit calmer about food.
Humans do not have a single, definitive rulebook to direct our eating, despite the many attempts nutrition scientists, dietitians, chefs, and celebrities have made to write one. Each of us has to negotiate the desire for food and fear of the unknown when we are still too young to read, calculate calories, or understand abstract ideas about nutrition. Almost all children go through a phase of pickiness with eating. It seems to be an evolved survival mechanism that prevents usonce we are mobile enough to put things in our mouths, but not experienced enough to know the difference between safe and dangerous foodsfrom eating something toxic. We have all been children trying to shove the world in our mouths, even while we spit out our strained peas.
Our omnivorousness gives us an exhilarating and terrifying amount of freedom. As social creatures, we seek safety from that freedom in our culture, and in a certain amount of conformity. We prefer to follow leaders weve invested with authority to blaze a path to safety.
The heroes of contemporary diet culture are wellness gurus who claim to have cured themselves of fatness, disease, and meaninglessness through the unimpeachable purity of cold-pressed vegetable juice. Many traditional heroes earn their status by confronting and defeating death, like Hercules, who was granted immortality after a lifetime of capturing or killing a menagerie of dangerous beasts, including the three-headed dog of Hades himself. Wellness gurus are the glamorously clean eaters whose triumph over sad, dirty animality is evidenced by fresh, thoughtfully-lit photographs of green smoothies in wholesome Mason jars, and by their own bodies, beautifully rendered.
There are no such heroes to be found in a peer-reviewed paper with a large, anonymous sample, and small effect sizes, written in impenetrable statistician-ese, and hedged with disclosures about limitations. But the image of a person you can relate to on a human level, smiling out at you from the screen, standing in a before-and-after, shoulder-to-shoulder with their former, lesser, processed-food-eating self, is something else altogether. Their creation myth and redemptionhow they were lost but now are foundis undeniably compelling.
There are twin motives underlying human behavior, according to Beckerthe urge for heroism and the desire for atonement. At a fundamental level, people may feel a twinge of guilty for having a body, taking up space, and having appetites that devour the living things around us. They may crave expiation of this guilt, and culture provides not only the means to achieve plentiful material comfort, but also ways to sacrifice part of that comfort to achieve redemption. It is not enough for wellness gurus to simply amass the riches of health, beauty, and statusthey must also deny themselves sugar, grains, and flesh. They must pay.
Only those with status and resources to spare can afford the most impressive gestures of renunciation. Look at all they have! The steel-and-granite kitchen! The Le Creuset collection! The Vitamix! The otherworldly glow! They could afford to eat cake, should the bread run out, but they quit sugar. Theyre only eating twigs and moss now. What more glamorous way to triumph over dirt and animality and death? And you can, too. That is, if you have the time and money to spend juicing all that moss and boiling the twigs until theyre soft enough to eat.
This is how the omnivores paradox breeds diet culture: Overwhelmed by choice, by the dim threat of mortality that lurks beneath any wrong choice, people crave rules from outside themselves, and successful heroes to guide them to safety. People willingly, happily, hand over their freedom in exchange for the bondage of a diet that forbids their most cherished foods, that forces them to rely on the unfamiliar, unpalatable, or inaccessible, all for the promise of relief from choice and the attendant responsibility. If you are free to choose, you can be blamed for anything that happens to you: weight gain, illness, agingin short, your share in the human condition, including the random whims of luck and your own inescapable mortality.
Humans are the only animals aware of our mortality, and we all want to be the person whose death comes as a surprise rather than a pathetic inevitability. We want to be the one of whom people say, But she did everything right. If we cannot escape death, maybe we can find a way to be declared innocent and undeserving of it.
But diet culture is constantly shifting. Todays token foods of health may seem tainted or pass tomorrow, and within diet culture, there are contradictory ideologies: what is safe and clean to one is filth and decadence to another. Legumes and grains are wholesome, life-giving staples to many vegan eaters, while they represent the corrupting influences of agriculture on the state of nature to those who prefer a meat-heavy, grain-free Paleo diet.
Nutrition science itself is a self-correcting series of refutations. There is no certain path to purity and blamelessness through food. The only common thread between competing dietary ideologies is the belief that by adhering to them, one can escape the human condition, and become a purer, less animal, kind of being.
This is why arguments about diet get so vicious, so quickly. You are not merely disputing facts, you are pitting your wild gamble to avoid death against someone elses. You are poking at their life raft. But if their diet proves to be the One True Diet, yours must not be. If they are right, you are wrong. This is why diet culture seems so religious. People adhere to a dietary faith in the hope they will be saved. That if theyre good enough, pure enough in their eating, they can keep illness and mortality at bay. And the pursuit of life everlasting always requires a leap of faith.
To eat without restriction, on the other hand, is to risk being unclean, and to beat your own uncertain path. It is admitting your mortality, your limitations and messiness as a biological creature, while accepting the freedoms and pleasures of eating, and taking responsibility for choosing them.
Unclean, agnostic eating means taking your best stab in the dark, accepting that there is much we dont know. But we do know that there is no One True Diet. There may be as many right ways to eat as there are peoplenone of whom can live forever, all of whom must make of eating and their lives some personal, temporary meaning.
Link:
Diet Culture Exists to Fight Off the Fear of Death - The Atlantic - The Atlantic
