I accidentally ate some MSG last night. It was in some food in a particular restaurant. I won’t be eating there again; the food was good, but the ingredients aren’t for me. Bad night: sweats, headache, aches especially in the joints. If I didn’t know the symptoms of MSG in my own body, I might have assumed I was getting… um… something else that’s “going around” just now.
(And, by the way, all symptoms gone this morning, thank you!)
And further by the way: not everyone reacts to MSG, nor are reactions always the same. Some people react far worse than I do; many do not react at all. You might go years with no noticeable problem and then suddenly develop one (allergies / intolerances are like that). MSG problems was so common once upon a time, however, that it had a name: “Chinese restaurant syndrome,” waaay back in Ancient Times (the 60’s and such) when Chinese restaurants were the major source of that additive. Today, most Chinese restaurants no longer use MSG; its the package foods producers mostly who use it.
The American FDA has declared that MSG is completely safe. This is absolute nonsense; they have to know better. Study after study has demonstrated again and again that a percentage of people are badly affected by it. Every year a small number of people even die from MSG poisoning. Yet… it remains not only legal, but the processed food manufacturers are even allowed to hide its presence on the ingredients label!
(Note: some nations, apparently more considerate ones, have made MSG illegal. America, for some reason, lags behind on such matters.)
Some of the labels that might mean MSG: Hydrolyzed vegetable protein. Spices. Natural flavors. Artificial flavors. Etc… there are a dozen ways its presence can be announced that satisfy the Law without actually informing the consumer that it’s there. This means that when you see those items in the ingredients list, you DON’T KNOW what’s in the product. Many things can hide behind those terms. Might be MSG, might not.
For me, that means there’re a LOT of “food products” out there I will not risk eating since the manufacturer can’t just let me in on what’s in the package. Silly folks. Many of those are probably fine products, but how can I tell? I can’t. I could contact them and ask, but what if their ingredients list changes in the future? Do I contact them every time I want to buy some to see if one of those things now means MSG? If I can’t trust the label, can I trust a phone call to the manufacturer of that label?
Nasty, nasty, nasty. Are we each of us not in Charge of Our Own Bodies? (One Senator just the other day [as I write this] declared, in a different context, that he is “in charge of his own body” — I hope he remembers that feeling the next time any Women’s Rights issue comes up for a vote.)
MSG is a “flavor enhancer.” It was originally discovered in Seaweed, by some Japanese researchers (if memory serves here) and quickly synthesized and put on the market under various labels. Then it started getting added to processed foods, even to canned Tuna, fer gossakes! It allows the manufacturers to produce products with less actual taste (meaning less actual food / quality / nutrition) without losing their customers.
MSG does not actually increase flavor. It produces a response in the body that immediately says “give me more,” which we interpret as “Yumm!” It does not actually produce flavor out of nothing.
MSG is a neurally active drug. As I said, it even kills a certain number of people every year; so does Aspartame… and it remains on the market, and is also neurally active, and even more poisonous than MSG. Given the increased use of these two drugs [actually Aspartame breaks down into 3 neurally antagonistic drugs, one of which is poisonous to everyone (!), the other two are poisonous to a percentage of the population] and the coincidental increase in brain degeneration disorders (you know, the Senility / Alzheimer things) over the same period of time, one can’t help but wonder if there isn’t a connection.
That’s pure speculation on my part, though educated speculation. Please don’t run around to your doctor saying “This stuff is Rat Poison!” He might have data I don’t have.
My point here is many things, most of which I’ll leave for you to ferret out, but I want to say this: how many “chronic” symptoms do people experience which are not at all what they are diagnosed as? Toxic foods and food allergies (another topic altogether) I suspect are far more often what’s really happening when some one has “yet another cold.” I haven’t had a cold since 1994, myself — that was a bad one, and apparently my immune system took the lesson to heart (so to speak). But I have had food allergy reactions which are very nearly the same symptom list! I know they are food allergies because I have identified the particular foods that were causing the problems, also because the symptoms go away in just a few hours. On again eating those foods, the same symptoms appears: that is not a cold (but it is conclusive on the reaction caused by some food and it then goes on the “avoid this” list).
Your doctor, however, unless he is a very cautious, very well educated and experienced professional, with a suspicious mind and good awareness of the nature of our food supply, will not know the difference and will tell you you have a cold. That’s the easy way to get on to the next patient — which is a pressure most doctors are constantly under today: 15 minutes to a patient does not allow proper diagnosis of anything!
To me it makes very little sense how some people seem to get “a cold” several times a year when the last one I had was almost 30 years ago! I’m suggesting that these might be misdiagnoses and that it is probably a reaction to time pressure and too much assembly line medicine.
“The symptoms match, therefore it must be so.”
“Yeah, yeah, Doc, but those symptoms match a hundred things!”
“Shh! Don’t tell the patients that: my Boss doesn’t give me the time to test for all those!”
This which is not a disparagement on Doctors, but rather on the Medical System itself, and the external influences said Medical System is subject to — that is: non-doctors setting Medical Policy for reasons not related to medicine or health at all, at all… Doctors have their bosses and licensing boards and have to play by the rules too much of the time. Even when they know better, sometimes they’re not allowed to do what they know. All those years in medical school, and they aren’t allowed to actually do what they were trained — and usually well trained — to do.
You might look up what “a doctorate degree” actually is. It’s equivalent to a Master’s Status in Olden Times, not to be confused with what we call a “master’s degree” today — but actually recognition of Mastery, capable of original contribution to your field, and so forth — but that’s also another conversation! 🙂
Once again, these are just my musings. In this case, inspired by some toxic food.