What Are Excitotoxins and the Health Dangers
Today my friends, we are discussing “Excitotoxins” what are they? What do they do to your body and how can you protect yourself from them? So listen closely – you just might learn some very important facts that could help and your family stay healthy and free from disease.
What are Excitotoxins:
Excitotoxins are amino acids that are linked to neurotransmitters in the brain. Our nervous system needs those amino acids neurotransmitters to work properly, but when there is too much of those particular amino acids: these amino acids over-stimulate nerve cells and brain neurons. When they become exhausted those neurons and nerve cells can be severely damaged and die.
Some excitotoxins are naturally found in nature, and even produced by our brain.
If there are excessive amounts of them it is suspected to have adverse effects in many health condition including:
- migraines
- seizures
- endocrine disorders
- obesity
- neurodegenerative disorders as well as brain development disorders.
- cancer
- heart disease
There has been enormous amount of both clinical and experimental evidence that supports the many dangers of excitotoxins that are adding to food such as MSG, hydrolyzed vegetable proteins and aspartame.
MSG is a food additive used to enhance flavors and is used in many products, especially processed foods. Hydrolyzed vegetables proteins are at the base of several vegan meat substitutes, and aspartame is mainly used as a low-calorie sweetener, added to many diet products.
Those who defend the use of MSG, aspartame and other excitotoxins claim that because they are naturally occurring in nature, like in tomatoes or grapes, excitotoxins can’t be harmful. But naturally occurring glutamate has nothing to do with added MSG. Dr. Russell L. Blaylock, MD, Author of the excellent book: Excitotoxins: The Taste That Kills says:
“[Naturally occurring] glutamate are bound. They’re in oligosaccharides, polysaccharides. They are bound in amino acids groupings. They’re not free amino acids. If you have it as a complex protein, you absorb it in your GI tract. In the GI tract, there are almost no free amino acids if you eat foods such as tomatoes. The level of free amino acids is nil; it’s almost all absorbed as combined amino acids, and then it’s only broken down in the liver, where it’s released in very low concentrations that the body can deal with. It was never meant to have free amino acids in high concentrations.”
“Well, when you hydrolyze them — or you use yeast extract or enzymes to break down these various proteins into their free, released amino acids — they’re not natural. What you’ve done is artificially release the amino acids in an unnatural way, and when they enter your GI tract, they are absorbed as free amino acids, then your blood level of that glutamic acid goes up significantly. As I said, it can go up as high as 20-fold, in some cases 40-fold. Your blood brain barrier is not constructed to handle such high levels of glutamate, because it is not how it naturally occurs. So this argument, “Oh, it’s natural,” is just a lot of nonsense.“
Another harmful effect of excitotoxins is associated with accumulations of toxic free radicals and destructive lipid enzymes.This phenomenon could in fact multiply the cell’s over stimulation and interfere with the body’s natural ability to detoxify.
Avoiding excitotoxins can can be very difficult as MSG comes under over 25 different names. Many foods labeled as natural and healthy have hidden sources of MSG, so please carefully read the ingredient lists, this should always be mandatory.
This is a link to the interview that Natural News had with Dr Russsell Blaylock, MD www.truthinlabeling.org/Aspartame_Truth_NaturalNewsInterview.Blaylock.pdf
My suggestion is to try to eat as many “organic foods” as possible! After all don’t we want to make sure that we give our families the healthiest diet and to keep them safe from disease! We have one body and we need to take care of it for ourselves and our families.
We need to make the right choices and teach our children how to eat healthy and protect them from the dangers of excitotoxins. Always read labels very carefully! Don’t trust the manufacturers to let you know. I find it amazing and very disturbing how many excitotoxins are in foods that I thought was safe.
Quote of the Day: “The National Cancer Institute and the American Cancer Society focus most of their resources on research and treatment rather than on cancer prevention. By talking as if the cure is around the corner and their “war on cancer” is being won, when certain cancer rates—notably breast cancer and lung cancer among women and malignant melanoma—are on the rise, they divert attention from strict regulation of industry and minimizing people’s exposure to carcinogens!” — H. Patricia Hynes
