Tend your giants. They grow like weeds...

Ever heard the expression "growing like a weed"? It's what the old folks in my family said when I would get taller before they saw me again. "Growing boys need food", "gotta eat your greens if you want to grow big and strong", and stuff like that. I never really understood the significance of that kind of thing until I was older, and understood a little more about some of the basics of biology.

As it turns out, weeds, and plants in general, need certain nutrients to grow, and the right amount of the right stuff can result in better growth. And if you think about it, every living thing kinda has that sort of thing going on. Yeah, animals need different stuff than plants do, like fats and proteins and vitamins and stuff, but my point is we grow, much like weeds, and much like weeds, we can only do so if we get enough of the right stuff.

Now, I'm not going to give a whole list of stuff that our bodies need. This blog is more about the idea that eating healthy is a WAY bigger deal than just keeping a healthy figure. In terms of 'growth', there is only a certain window (of several years) in which we get taller, everything fills out, and our brains grow. In that window, though, what kids put in their bodies is the source of everything their body uses to build the person they will become. Once we're grown, it still matters more than people sometimes recognize. It's more a matter of maintenance, but your cells die and reform all the time, they need energy to do what they do, and it's pretty complicated and I won't get into it too deep, but nothing is for nothing. You are what you eat.

Another thing to keep in mind is that what you put in can hinder the body just as it can help. That goes for whatever the body does, whether it's growth or maintenance. There are tons of things in our modern world of garbage food that throw huge wrenches in the human-body 'machine'. This is especially a problem during those years of growth and development. Studies show that everything from future height to future IQ are affected by both what is and what isn't in the childhood/teenage diet. During pregnancy, the fetus is extremely sensitive to nutrition and toxicity. Vitamin D deficiencies can result in autism, aspartame can lead to a number of birth defects, as many things can. What is there and what is not there for the body to utilize makes all the difference. Do your own digging to get the bigger picture of what's good and what's bad for the body. I'm no expert, just an enthusiast, and I don't have the time here, but it's important.

One last note, maybe a topic for another time, we evolved on the foods that occur in nature, and all of their naturally occurring chemical components. All this synthetic crap we got these days has no place in our bodies. I've been saying it for years, and I see it getting a little more publicity these days, so maybe something good will come of it. Take it seriously. Thanks for reading.