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Archived News of the WeekExcitotoxins: Death to Your BrainIf you read this and still plan on ingesting anything with Nutrasweet (almost every sugar-free thing on the shelf.. . ) or MSG and all it's sneaky variations then I can only deduce that your brain has already been affected by excitotoxins and is not thinking clearly. Or if you prefer to go "La La La La La" and cover your ears like a three year old - not even intereseted in hearing this important but possibly habit-changing bit of dietary truth - please don't bother to read any further. Russell Blalock, M.D., a neurosurgeon, watched his father die - inch by inch - of Parkinsons Disease. For the years and years his father suffered and despite Dr. Blalock's medical specialty, he felt helpless that he could do nothing but offer palliative care. He vowed to research not only Parkinson's but all other neurodegenerative afflictions like ALS, MS and Alzheimers. He discovered a profound connection between these diseases and what he calls excitotoxins, the most prevalent of which are Nutrasweet and MSG and all of MSG's disguises. Neurodegenerative diseases, esp. Alzheimers, have increased exponentially since the advent of Monsanto's chemical spawn of satan, aspartame. I really don't think that this could be just one of those amazing coincidences, do you?Dr. Blalock wrote a very provocative book called, Excitotoxins: The Taste that Kills (1997). He has also written another newer book called Health and Nutrition Secrets (2002). Since I am a sucker for any book title with the word "secrets" in it, I purchased both books from Amazon in a two-fer special. Not sorry. His research is impeccable (pages of references in the back of both books) and for my money, offers very sound nutritional advice for the prevention of all kinds of dis-ease states including neurodegenerative disorders, atherosclerosis, heart disease, Alzheimers, diabetes and more. Back to excitotoxins and please bear with me for a moment: Most excitotoxins are amino acids. When you ingest Nutrasweet, it breaks down into three amino acids - glutamate, aspartate and phenalalaline (plus methanol and formaldehyde the latter of which is used to embalm dead bodies and can't be very good for you.) Glutamate and aspartate are excitatory amino acids. They act very much like cocaine in the brain, stimulating all of your bored neurons into feeling high. They bully all the good less-excitable guys out of the lock and key receptors of the neurons and start messing with your head activating systems involving sensory perception, memory, orientation in time and space, cognition and motor skills. For some reason, you learn to like the feeling (addiction) and eventually you become a cocaine/glutamate junkie and may find yourself stealing old ladies' purses to support your ever escalating Diet Coke habit. (I once treated a patient who admitted to drinking up to 10 Diet Cokes per day. By the time I saw her, her feel-good addiction had turned around and bit her on the butt, she was feeling quite horrible and probably on an inexorable course to some awful neurodegenerative disease. Her detox from aspartame was very uncomfortable with headaches, sweating, shaking and nausea, not unlike a cocaine detox.) The same thing happens with MSG - another infamous excitotoxin - which also contains large amounts of glutamate and aspartate. Witness the phenomena known as Chinese Restaurant Syndrome: The symptoms are exactly that of a cocaine/glutamate detox. I can hear you now: "But what about the blood/brain barrier? Isn't that supposed to protect me from bad stuff like excitotoxins?" Good question: Ordinarily yes, but here are the situtations and events which will either weaken the blood brain barrier or create actual holes in it: 1) Being a baby, esp. newborn to age 4 2) being an elderly person over age 65 3) having sustained a brain injury of some sort or even hit your head really bad once or twice, 4) having spells of hypoglycemia 5) hypertension 6) viral and bacterial infections of the brain 7) exposure to some metals including lead and tin 8) having an elevated core body temperature and 9) stroke. Since one or more of these risk factors include most of us, then we are ALL at risk for blood/brain barrier incompetence and being "excited to death" by an excitotoxin. YOU WILL HAVE TO READ LABELS TO AVOID EXCITOTOXINS! Avoiding nutrasweet is fairly simple. Just look for either nutrasweet or aspartame or artificial sweetener on the label and avoid. MSG is a bit more difficult. You can BE SURE that the product contains MSG if the label says: monosodium glutamate, hydrolyzed vegetable protein, hydrolyzed protein, hydrolyzed plant protein, plant protein extract, sodium caseinate, calcium caseinate, yeast extract, textured protein, autolyzed yeast, hydrolyzed oat flour The additives that FREQUENTLY contain MSG are: Malt extract, malt flavoring, bouillion, broth, stock, flavoring natural flavoring, natural beef or chicken flavoring, seasoning, spices. Additives that MAY contain MSG are: Enzymes, soy protein concentrate,soy protein isolate, whey protein concentrate and carageenan. (A note on carageenan found in most prepared salad dressings: Carageenan is typically utilized as a TUMOR PROMOTER in rat reasearch.) The very best action for you to take: First of all, go through your cupboards with this list in your hand and throw away everything with Nutrasweet and MSG and all of it's evil incarnations. Secondly, learn to prepare everything from scratch using whole, organic foods. An easy way to do this is to avoid buying foods that come in a bag, box, can, jar or wrapper.
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