I found a quote on what is likely a very controversial website (http://beyondveg.com) that spurred this post. I came across it while exploring naturopaths in Calgary. Which led me to "traditional" or "natural" diets. Which had me then groaning because everytime I look more deeply into some new health trend, I realize it is a dead end.
My issue is I have issues with naturopaths.I want to love them, I do. I took Charlie there and they performed a psychic reading on him. They didn't call it that. But they did say, stop medicine and just wait for him to get better. 6-8 weeks later he got better. Not scientific so I could never trust they did anything. And the weird voodoo didn't help their case, nor the cost.
Other than that, I have some points.
1. Their college here in Canada teaches a couple courses in homeopathy. I cannot say for sure that this "medicine" does not work. But I can say that there is no scientific evidence that homeopathy is no more effective than the placebo effect (taking sugar pills and believing they are true medicine). Let's not forget that the Placebo effect, even when someone knows they are taking a placebo, has a 20% success rate. However, the appointments and medicine are not free nor are they cheap. I do not want a part in this. Can I avoid homepathy while seeing a naturopath? Will they hate me for saying as such?
2. Many naturopaths practise dietary suggestions to patients including gluten-free, dairy-free, etc, diets. While professing that they steer away from hypothetical trendy diets and stick to traditional, whole-food diets, this in itself is actually a "trend" meaning in the last 100-200 years certain people have loosely studied native diets and modern followers have cited these diets as the new, best diet. However, most of these diets are just not proven scientifically and using the word "natural", they seem better, when in fact, those peoples had high infant mortality rates, horrid disease, and they didn't have the science to know what was actually in their food, meaning they had to consume some of it more than we do when we could just pop a pill with vitamin C (or have it injected by a, you guessed it, naturopath). You get success stories but none of the ex-diet people speaking up. Moreover, some are extremely time-consuming for real families. SO many breastfeeding advocates go along on this line of thinking. What was natural then must be good now, begetting any infant mortality, lack of dietary knowledge (ie. creating a viable substitute for breastmilk that wasn't a. poisonous or b. malnutritious). What really gets me is saying getting no sleep is natural for our cavewomen ancestors. That one really kills me as they only lived a few decades. Sleep is, to me, one of THE factors in good health.
3. One of the quotes I liked from above controversial website was "vegetarianism often is an enthusiasm of younger, more idealistic people that
doesn't last or doesn't "stick" as they get out into the world, and start
dealing with the everyday vicissitudes of life that make idealism of any sort
difficult."
4. If that previous idealism and currently waking up to reality doesn't perfectly describe my daily existence these days, nothing does. There is no more happiness found in not having cable tv, not driving my car, not eating meat. In fact, there is a certain large amount of misery found in no tv, walking and preparing vegetarian meals. The fact is that my child needs to be driven to daycare lately. We have a lot of illness lately and i just can't trust walking to get me/him home quickly in emergencies. It's called survival state. He hates vegetables and loves meat, which is a whole protein. Easier. I don't want meat, but veggie meals take longer for us to make. I am actually slightly afraid of meat and contamination, but the "everyday vicissitudes of life" are encroaching in what I used to believe in and would like to do with my life versus what I can actually do with my life right now.
5. With the lack of idealism in my life, I seem to be floating in space with no anchor. My sense of identity has become what I imagine is a wild cavewoman, hungry for meat, irritable and more likely to grunt than talk to someone saying with a fuzzy-bunny chime "how was your weekend!!!" I hate the weekends. I loathe trying to fit in quality family bonding, big meal preparations, having a nap, going for 20 minutes of exercise, and an endless list of Things That I Wanted To Accomplish This Weekend. I literally fall apart, grouch a lot and feel intense anxiety on the weekend.
6. Something has to change. For some reason I keep getting flare-ups of my ulcer. I have an ulcer! This is known as a chronic health condition, something this happiness-book-reader knows does NOT lead to happiness. It leads to chronic depression or in my case, more anxiety. Which led me to today.
7. Therefore, I am resigned to go visit a naturopath. Maybe it will be pointless. I know they cannot pry my latte out of stubborn hands as this is the only thing in life that makes me happy, but maybe something will arise from the venture into more health awareness that I have not thought of yet. Outside of not touching ANY doorknobs, light switches, kissing my husband, going out with friends, drinking weirdass health drinks constantly, thinking 'happy, grateful thoughts' when I can, etc, etc.
8. Wish me luck. It isn't easy being a skeptic. Truly, I cannot help skepticism. Some people have more than others. I have a lot. I tend to become interested in new ideas and look them up, usually with an open-mind, but the older I get, the more I look it up because I don't know how I had not come across this before. Turns out Shakespeare was right. There is nothing new under the sun. New ideas usually mean new fabricated ideas. Could I live a long life believing every evangelist that I came across? Who knows. Perhaps happier. But it just isn't me.
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