Evil, Processed Food

Let’s talk about nutrition.

There’s this belief that the nutrition provided by some foods is superior to the nutrition we obtain from eating others. That “natural” foods are superior to processed. And maybe that belief is justified (no on really knows definitively), but there’s a catch. Let’s get right down to it:

If you have a history of disordered eating, fearing processed foods will, hands down, prevent you from reaching full remission. Why? Because avoiding any food is an attempt to mitigate anxiety. In other words: by avoiding some foods, and favoring other, “safer” foods, you’re not only holding onto your eating disorder, you’re strengthening it.

If this makes you think “What? So everyone else is allowed to eat healthy, but since I have a history of disordered eating, I’m automatically barred from participating??” My answer is a firm YES.

Here’s my reasoning: anyone without an eating disorder might avoid foods temporarily, but unless it’s an allergy, their strict avoidance never lasts in the long run. No matter how many people brag about their diets and clean eating, nobody’s actually adhering to their own rules as strongly as someone with an eating disorder would. What’s more: only those with eating disorders will be putting themselves at risk for serious mental and physical complications, including death, by participating in what we call “healthy eating.” Bottom line is: you can’t just “diet” like a normal person would, in the same way that an alcoholic can’t just grab a drink at happy hour like an unafflicted person would be able to.

Despite the perceived unfairness of it all, I’d argue these diets aren’t actually a healthy way to eat, anyway. Most would consider foregoing processed foods in favor of something natural to be the most fundamentally sound of diets, but I’d argue it’s more of a gateway drug than a healthy lifestyle. That’s because defining food as ✨“natural”✨ or not is a bunch of bologna. Think about it:

What is “natural,” anyway?

Natural foods are those existing in nature, without the interference of humankind. But human interference isn’t just processing food in a factory. Instead, our involvement in making food unnatural can be as simple as breeding and modifying those foods. For instance, a lot of the plants we eat didn’t come about by evolution, but rather by human interference.

Watermelons have been bred to increase the size of their placenta, and decrease their seeds. Bananas have been bred to be more easily peel-able and have smaller seeds. Carrots have been domesticated to have larger, sweeter roots. Broccoli’s been bred to have larger florets. Chickens have been bred to have larger breasts. Hens have been bred to have 250 eggs per year instead of the 15 a natural red jungle fowl would lay. And cows have been selectively bred to prioritize milk production.

My point is: regardless of the fact that we’ve bred foods to be more tasty, juicier, sweeter, less fibrous, easier to eat, and more resistant to disease, we don’t see anyone demonizing broccoli and carrots. Yet these foods by definition have been meddled with before they even come out of the ground.

Despite this interference, most would agree that “natural” 👼🏻 crosses over into “processed” 👹 when foods are changed either mechanically or chemically. When we think of processing, we think of big factories, machines, and money-greedy corporations. But something as simple as chopping vegetables processes them, and just cooking or freezing food changes its chemical structure. Yet the chorus remains: The enemy of natural is processed. Or so we’re told.

I go more in depth into why the science is out on processed foods in my ebook, so if you want, you can read more about that here. But for now, the main question is:

What is processed food?

Processed foods are: hot dogs, yogurt, Oreos, sourdough, butter, fresh juice, nut butter, cooked meat, etc. Processed foods aren’t inherently bad, or inherently good, they’re just not straight from the source.

Point being: as soon as we do anything to a food (peel it, dice it, cook it, bake it, juice it, ferment it), it’s processed. Regardless, popular opinion has decided to demonize processing as soon as it’s something that’s done on a large scale, or worse yet: when “unnatural” things are added to food, namely: chemicals. 🙅🏻‍♀️

Chemicals have a terrible reputation. If we were to believe all the hype, chemicals give our children ADHD, make us addicted to food, and send us all to a painful, early death bed.

But what are chemicals?

Chemicals are substances that are singled out and purified from a whole that they once came from. Chemicals are things like oxygen, nitrogen, and carbon. They’re also things like MSG, fructose, iron, antioxidants, calcium, ethanol, salt, baking soda, or FD&C Red 40.

Some chemicals are edible, meaning they can be digested and put to use in our bodies. In other words, these chemicals can’t be bad for us, because our bodies can use them to stay alive, it’s proven that they’re inherently good. Don’t get me wrong, obviously, some chemicals aren’t beneficial to us, like BPAs lining our tin cans, and pesticides sprayed on non-organic crops. But here’s the thing: chemicals (good and bad) are everywhere, in everything we eat, touch, drink, and breath. What it really boils down to is this:

Avoiding chemicals is not only impossible, but it will not help you recover, and it will not bring you any closer to living a better life.

All things considered, if your goal is to be healthier, the worst way to accomplish that is by attempting to avoid chemicals or processed foods. Just because something is processed, doesn’t mean it’s “bad,” just like if something is natural, that doesn’t necessarily make it “good.” Gangrene, herpes, alcohol, poisonous mushrooms, cyanide, and syphilis are all natural. That doesn’t make them inherently good.

When we’re not preoccupied with obsessing over making natural choices, we obsess with overanalyzing the wisdom of our bodies. Our biggest predicament, and the heart of it all is: we don’t trust our bodies to determine what’s best for them. We believe the lie that we need external advice in order to determine what we should feed ourselves. And where did this belief come from? I’ll give you one guess - external advice. Fear-inducing articles, best-selling books like “Eat This, Not That,” wildly fluctuating scientific interpretations waxing poetic over whether the antioxidants in chocolate are god’s gift to man, or if the lead and cadmium in chocolate shells is truly worth the risk. We vilify sugar, then demonize the sugar companies for trying to defend themselves with their own research. All this to say: we’re being led in a million directions, and none of them are benevolent.

So, the question remains: are unnatural/processed foods bad for us?

The correct answer is: nobody knows.

While magazines and journalists profit from stretching the truth about processed foods, the fact is: we really don’t have the proof that processing a food makes it bad for us. Like all things, there’s evidence for both sides. And if anything, I think the evidence in favor of processing food is stronger. After all, it wasn’t until we learned to process food through cooking that we were able to take a major step forward as a race: our brains literally grew from eating cooked (AKA processed) food. By allowing our bodies to allocate only a fraction of the energy it previously needed to digest our food, our bodies wasted no time in allocating the extra calories and nutrition on advancement and growth. Who’s to say we won’t benefit from further processing our food?

What it really boils down to is this:

Nobody knows what the perfect diet for humans is… nor if it even exists. But there is one diet that will kill you: your eating disorder.

When all’s said and done, if health and longevity is your goal, the best thing you can do is to stop feeding into the naturalistic fallacy. Instead of fixating on the things that will invariably prevent you from recovering (i.e. orthorexic ideals about food), set your sights on remission. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again:

Fearing food is unhelpful, and unnecessary.

There is nothing more important to your health and survival than healing from your eating disorder. Listen to me: worrying about McDonalds and candy bars is seriously misplacing your concern.

Processed food does not equal imminent danger: an eating disorder does.

So, how do you move forward? I don’t care how repetitive I sound at this point, but the answer is clear: like everything else in recovery…

You have to eat your way out of this.

Seek your fears out, and face them head on. Challenge them until they don’t scare you any more. Practice eating “junk food.” Push past the rules your eating disorder makes for you. Because in the end, eating what you fear is the only way through this. In the end…

Processed food will heal your eating disorder.

Believing in you, 💓

Maria