10 Biggest Health Myths

I find what you mentioned about iron very interesting....
Ever since my kidney issue appeared, the doctors have been telling me my system is low in iron (common for a lot of women) and the kidney specialist actually advised me to take an iron supplement. However, when I tried taking an iron supplement every day, I started getting headaches, so I stopped taking it, and the headaches disappeared! I told the doc that I feel worse WITH the iron supplement than without!! I only take the blackstrap molasses when I feel like my system needs a boost - so maybe it is actually the magnesium in the molasses that is giving the benefit, and not the iron....just realized that - the iron supplement gave me headaches, but the molasses took a headache away.....hhhmmmm....

I've become such a HUGE label reader in the grocery store :) It amazes me to look at the label of something like juice, or a so-called "healthy" cereal....yet the nutrient label is almost all zeroes!!!

An excellent story to demonstrate that point:

Where I work, one of the old owners (before they sold the business) was also a huge label reader. He told me a story one day that he was doing his grocery shopping, investigating labels, and a woman was going through the store at the same time. She eventually went up to him, chuckled, and told him "You know, watching you is making my shopping easier- I know what not to buy now, just from watching you put things back on the shelf!"
He got a very good laugh from that....and I find myself doing the same thing in stores; I pick up something, read the label....and put it back on the shelf!!

Originally Posted by sesheta

I told the doc that I feel worse WITH the iron supplement than without!!

And for good reason! Here's a page that highlights the risks that accompany an over exposure to iron. It seems that there's a delicate balance at play... this drifting between too much iron and too little...

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http://www.healthy.net/scr/column.aspx?Id=68

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Originally Posted by sesheta

I've become such a HUGE label reader in the grocery store :) It amazes me to look at the label of something like juice, or a so-called "healthy" cereal....yet the nutrient label is almost all zeroes!!!

Wonderful! We all need to be reading labels with an intense eye for both the listed ingredients... as well as what each ingredient implies... some ingredients seem innocuous enough until we realize that words like "yeast extract" actually mean "MSG", but by a different name!
There is also the hidden stuff that they don't have to list on the labels.. The history of the raw ingredients, before combined with the others, doesn't have to be detailed... there's no telling what those were exposed to along the way...

This is largely why my wife and I have gravitated almost souly to single ingredient buying. And those being organic where possible... At least this way the "hidden" is better mitigated. There are so many chemicals and hormones that are being used on the stuff that are going into commercial products that a single-ingredient focus is about the only way of stepping around much of this..... Thusly, our processed foods are down to a very small portion of our kitchen, and those being as "clean" as we possibly can find.

In the beginning this focus felt a bit heavy-handed, but as we grew accustomed to the process it now feels quite normal and cozy. We now trust the foods we eat implicitly! Knowing that what little that makes its way past our radar will be easily handled by the integrity of a body well nourished. :^)