The Beginning of the Corn High Fructose Corn Syup

It was May of 2006 and my sister and I were heading up to the camper for the first campout of the season. I was trying to figure out how to tell her this was going to be the last year. My joints were locking up more and more and it was getting harder and harder to get around. I could not hike, my asthma was making it hard to breathe, my sinus allergies were bothering me a lot and even though I wasn't eating enough to explain my weight, I was hungry all the time.

The doctors had said my joint problems were genetic, my asthma was due to an accident with an exploding vacuum cleaner bag and sinus allergies are normal. The hunger was scaring me. I had a very bad history with a mother who was a beauty queen and sometimes for no reason would decide not to let me eat. Put me on diet pills at 11 when she decided I was 5 lbs overweight. I would eat something before going to bed because I was so scared of being hungry and more and more I was still waking up hungry at 4 am.

I had heard a rumor a couple of days before that High Fructose Corn Syrup wasn't fructose at all. That is was bad for you. I wasn't a label reader beyond looking for soy as my husband and sister are both allergic. For some stupid reason I thought the FDA wouldn't let bad stuff into the food, even though I had ample evidence from other stuff that it was probably naive of me to think something like that! I knew soy is a bad food, suppresses thyroid function and causes immune problems.

I went to the deli at the store we stop at halfway up the mountain and got my usual sandwich and a piece of "fresh in the store baked carrot cake" I read the label. It went on and on and on and there wasn't even any carrots in it! A long while later my sister called on my cell to ask where I was. I told her I am still reading labels. I spent on hour reading labels on everything! I did not buy the cake!

When I got home I started research. I stopped anything with High Fructose Corn Syrup. A couple of weeks later my husband was at the top of the stairs and told me he needed new pants. I said you just got some. He let go of his waistband and his pants fell down.

Within 4 weeks, our next camp out, my clothes were loose, my asthma was gone, my joints were working normally, and I had not touched my allergy medication.

Also within 4 weeks, my father in law, who had out of control diabetes and general very bad temper was much better. His blood sugar went rock steady, his bad temper went away and he stopped accusing us of not feeding him! He would tell any nurse or doctor we didn't feed him. Since there would be empty dishes sitting right in front of him and he is not skinny, it was just attributed to senility. He was being hungry all the time too.

The big problem we found it that is in so many things. It was in our juice, in our bread, in my cereal I ate late so I wouldn't wake up hungry. It was in just about everything. Thank goodness I wasn't a soda drinker or I might have had more problems than I did.

HFCS is not sugar. It is corn starch that has been run through several chemical processes. It goes through the liver and goes straight to the body as fat. And as the body doesn't recognize it as food the person is still hungry. And as it is a chemical, it is addictive. It is responsible for the rise in obesity, diabetes and a host of other problems. What confuses me is that someone will know all this and still eat it!

The rise in obesity goes along with a perfect graph of when they started putting the HFCS into food. The explosion goes along with them putting more and more into to food supply. It is a preservative, it is cheap. When I called Hansen's All Natural Soda and asked why they put it in there and called it natural, I was told the FDA lets them and there is not enough sugar to go around.

I called Tiger's Milk company, my favorite "energy and vitamin" bar, which is probably what started my downward cycle 20 years ago, I asked why are you calling these healthy and what are they doing in the health food section of the grocery stores. I was told they had no control over where a store put their product and "Ma'am, we never said they were healthy".

I now recognize what I call the HFCS look in people, especially children. They look overweight and their faces are bloated and round. Even before I knew about HFCS and thought it was just sugar, it did always bother me when parents bought their children soda from the machine at the store I do readings at. Don't they care about their children's health at all?

I talked to my doctor who rants about sugar and weight. If he starts it is like putting a quarter into him and he won't shut up until the quarter runs out. I asked him if he knew about HFCS and he said yes. I asked why he didn't tell people and he said he knew real sugar was better, but all forms of sugar should be quit, so he never mentioned it because he wants his patients to quit all sugar.

I stared reading labels and as I was throwing out my favorite soups, my favorite oat nut bread, my cereal, my granola bars. I was so mad as I always thought I was eating healthy! I was calling every 800 number and informing them that I would not buy their product again until the HFCS was gone.

The responses were interesting. Some said it was a lie. Some said I was misled as the FDA would never allow something bad into the food. Kellogg's was the best. I was told they knew and were working on it. A few told me I was not the only one calling about it.