Pesticides and organic food

Do you eat organically grown foods?  Are you sure that the foods you eat don’t contain pesticides?  Here’s the truth about pesticides and organic food / eating.

Pesticides, what are they?

A pesticide is anything that is meant to kill or repel bugs (i.e. pests) or other organisms that are harmful to plants.  Such pesticides include herbicides that can get rid of weeds that we don’t want in our gardens or lawn.  There are also bactericides and fungicides which kill bacteria and fungi that could be harmful.  Unfortunately, pesticides and organic food don’t mix.

Eating organically

So many people are now on the ‘organic eating train’.  I know – I’m one of them.  I started my organic eating journey a few years ago because I knew I needed to start eating better.  I suffered from hormonal issues that were really problematic for me.  At that time, I started to read some books on healthful eating and realized that the cheaper fruits and vegetables, as well as lower quality meats, could be a problem for my body.  To me, in the long run, these seemingly cheaper fruits and vegetables would end up costing me more in health care in the long run.

Not only do we understand that eating raw food is healthy but we’ve also started to realize that not using chemicals on our crops helps our bodies and the environment.  Again, pesticides and organic foods don’t mix.

Pesticides and organic foods

As much as you may try to eat organic – it’s hard to do all the time.  You may get stuck somewhere without a grocery store that has any organic produce.  Would you choose a bag of potato chips over the nonorganic fruit?  Maybe.  Whatever you choose, it’s not organic.  Eating the produce is better than the potato chips in some regard, but now you have consumed pesticides.  So, eating organic 100% of the time is virtually impossible.

Other pesticides we ‘consume’

Let me ask you this:  Do you treat your lawn with a chemical fertilizer?  If so, you’re consuming chemicals because those pesticides are blown onto your garden.  Maybe you don’t use pesticides on your ‘organic’ garden, but your neighbor might.  The wind that contains those pesticides surely blows into your yard / garden.  Or, what about your local park?  Do you think they don’t use chemicals on the grassy areas?  Many cities spray to control mosquitoes.  The point here is that pesticides are a part of our lives and as much as we try to control our ‘consumption’, it is hard to do.

Disease

Chemicals aren’t good for us and the more we are exposed, the more likely we are to suffer.  Do you suffer from any of these:

• Migraines
• Cancer
• Neurological problems
• Brain fog
• Dizziness
• Aches

Many of these ailments are so common but hard to pinpoint.  The ache in your body could be attributed to any number of reasons but we generally don’t think about the pesticides.  Sadly, these chemicals are in our tissues and can stay there for a long time.

What can you do about pesticides and organic food?

Obviously, we can’t control everything.  We can’t go around to every city that we’ll be in and ask them to stop using chemicals before we get there, during our time there, or when we leave.  It is up to us to watch what we do and to control what we can control.  Eating organically is one huge step.  Walking the talk by not spending money on chemicals also helps – this includes not buying the chemical lawn fertilizers and buying organic as much as we can.  Note:  this includes our habits of eating out.

If you constantly eat out, are you eating at an organic restaurant?  The answer is likely ‘no’ so by eating at those establishments, you are contributing to the chemicals.  This is just an awareness – it’s not meant to make you feel bad because it is impossible to always eat 100% organic.  However, knowing this may make you think twice about eating that fast food next time.  Like I always say…being aware is half the battle.  Once we know better, we do better (as Maya Angelou so eloquently put it).

Live better and feel better

At the end of the day, we want to make sure we are doing the best for our health and our earth.  The better we take care of ourselves, the better we will look and feel.  And, that goes for our planet.  The more quality ingredients you put into your body, the less problems you will have – that includes any skin or hormonal issues.  Save the planet and yourself!