What next?

Was just reading a post on another website where a pregnant woman was asking if it is OK for her to eat bleu cheese. She's been told to stay away from any of the different varieties of blue cheese, soft cheese, deli meats, eggs, on and on and on and on.

Food poisoning, listeria, bacteria, sickness, plague, pestilence and general stupidity.

Now, honest, I am not saying this lady (who I know slightly) is dumb. Really, I'm not. I know her to be a funny and smart woman.

What I am wondering about is what the hell the purpose of all this "DON'T EAT THAT THERE IS A HORRIBLE RISK OF CONTAMINATION! YOUR BABY WILL BE BORN WITH 4 ARMS AND THREE EYES!"

The Powers That Be seem to have lost all sense of perspective. I can't imagine how the human race survived all these aeons by being so foolish as to eat whatever they could find.

Since when did we give the guvmunt license to freak us out on a whim? They don't even seem to be able to find the source of the latest salmonella outbreak, how could they possibly figure that some poor schmuck is going to get listeria from bleu cheese?*

Current medical advice is, regardless of a short-lasting craving, don't follow it. Never, ever, ever, under any circumstance, listen to what your body is telling you. Listen to the guvmunt talking heads. After all, they're Official.

That's stupid. That is just damnably, incredibly, shortsightedly STUPID. Has anyone heard of someone craving rat poison? Or 2-4D? Poison of any kind? Toilet bowl cleaner? Antifreeze? Arsenic? If there is a documented instance of this, I want to know. Other than people who shouldn't be pregnant in the first place, people's body's are not going to send them off on some hell-bent quest for something that will kill the baby or make both of them sick. If the body is even in moderate balance and moderate health, it simply is contrary to any evolutionary biology to imagine such a suicidal action.

This particular poster has a history of miscarriage, which certainly is a concern. In darned near every case where that happens, other than mischance or accident, there is a real reason for the miscarriage. I would be willing to be it isn't because the woman ate bleu cheese.

My experience isn't scientifically valid, true, but I ate anything and everything, including farm eggs and raw milk, sardines, soft cheese. My kids were, and are, happy and healthy.**

My final observation is this: medicine is not a science. It is more of an art. Doctors change their minds on a regular basis. What is bad this week will be good next week. Medicine has careened wildly between opposing opinions: vitamins vs. no vitamins, no solid food before 1 year vs if they're hungry feed them, 10 vaccinations vs 3, on and on and on and on. This will continue. It's good to be informed but it isn't good to slavishly follow vacillating opinion. Listen to your body. Just listen.



*Anyone who has the slightest acquaintance with me knows this whole thing just sets me off. In my mind, it's an official equivalent to those damned disinfection commercials. What person in their right mind is listening to commercials that tell us to disinfect every last surface in out homes? And worse, then DOING it? I don't even bleach my cutting boards, or countertops. I put the boards in the dishwasher and then put them away. Get thee back, sodium hypochlorite, get thee from my sight. Hence, vile concoction!
** There were complications in all the deliveries but that is an endocrine problem on my part. My single miscarraige came very early and I doubt that had anything to do with anything I ingested.