Real Bread

            I have eaten bread my whole life, but I never really knew anything about it. Before I knew how important it was to know about the food I was eating, I just believed the marketing on food packages. To me, all wheat bread was healthier than all white bread, and anything “enriched” must be ok. I had no idea that I had so much to learn about bread – especially when it came to what was really good for me, and what wasn’t. One thing I never knew was the role that baker’s yeast or natural bread starters played in the production and health benefits of bread.

            What I’ve come to learn is that what I considered “bread” all these years is not actually real bread at all. Real bread is made of whole wheat freshly milled, yeast, salt, water and a possibly honey. Fake bread (the kind I had been eating) has dough enhancers, corn syrup, and/or white flour. Although there are gluten issues in all kinds of bread, certainly there are more problems with the fake bread. One of these is the use of baker’s yeast vs. the use of natural starters.

            A natural starter is a basic leavening consisting of water and flour that has been left exposed to the air for several hours. Yes – the air! The mixture actually catches wild yeast from the air. The dough rises because air bubbles are being released from the yeast growing. A pinch of that dough is set aside and considered the “starter.” This was the natural way to start bread – using wild yeasts.

            Unfortunately, baker’s yeast was made in a laboratory. It is one of the first adulterated foods, and it isn’t even one of the natural yeasts used for baking in the past. It takes more yeast cells for baker’s yeast to work. Baker’s yeast prevents the growth of lactobacilli, which utilizes maltose, so this symbiosis is not available in the fake bread. Baker’s yeast causes yeast overgrowth (weakening the immune system) and is not an actual real food.

            Unlike the fake bread that contains baker’s yeast, real bread has beneficial bacteria, and believe it or not, never gets moldy! Sure, it may get hard and stale, but mold is not present. (The hardened bread can then be used in soups.)  These real breads have more zinc, magnesium, iron, and B complex vitamins. Naturally leavened bread helps anemia and studies have shown that it is less harmful to those with gluten intolerance.

            Instead of buying bread – we should be making bread that contains things that are good for us.

STRESS

     

        We are really just beginning to know the extent of damage that mental stress can take on the body. One way that we are really beginning to understand the significance is through the mind body connection. In many ways, this is the study of psychoneuroimmunology.  Although the actual term was coined in 1975, the general concept of milieu interieur, introduced by Claude Bernard, really is a scientific understanding of what the “second brain” (and therefore, the whole body) endures because of stress and how the body needs to manage stress.

            A simple explanation of the mind body connection is that bad thoughts and stress can cause bad things in the body. In a very practical sense, we all know this is true. If you think bad things, you always end up feeling bad too. There’s a reason for this.  The Enteric Nervous System contains half of the body’s nerve’s cells. Putting junk in the small intestine means you get junk coming out emotionally and physically; and putting junk in our minds means that junk transfers to the gut. This happens because the vagus nerve connects our “second brain” (the gut) to our brain.

            Being vigilant about taking care of ourselves; and avoiding stress is very important to this connection. I have experienced this during a brief period of time that I suffered with panic attacks. At first I thought I was going crazy.  I was in no danger, and yet, I would feel like I had to get to a safe place –quickly! Many people have panic attacks that manifest in many different ways. (Mine led to a fear of embarrassing myself in public and leg tremors.) They were sometimes triggered by caffeine, loud noises, or flying. The fight or flight response kicks in because the body is dealing with stress that it can’t quite process. So, it handles it as if there is a real and immediate crisis.

            I learned techniques to handle the stress and avoid a panic attack – all without drugs. Relaxation and meditation really worked for me. I didn’t know I was stressed out that much until I tried to relax for the first time. Sometimes slow, deep breath is the best thing for us. Sometimes we just need to slow down in our day-to-day lives. I learned that the best gift I could give myself is enough sleep.  I still believe that – and I haven’t had a panic attack in years.

            Attitude really makes a difference too. It’s easier than you might think to get stuck in a pattern of negative thinking. I once knew a girl who complained that she got a free pack of cigarettes when she bought one pack at the store. (She complained so much it was hard to be around her.) When I consciously decided to try to be positive about everything, life really got better. My circumstance may not have changed, but my attitude and my health were totally different.  I love how Shakespeare showed this through Hamlet when he said, “for there is nothing either good or 
bad, but thinking makes it so.”  Hamlet is a perfect example of negative thought bringing negative outcomes.  Hopefully, as time goes by, we will all learn that stress is as dangerous as poison.