Too Poor To Be Healthy

I am an Earth sign. I am a tree-hugging hippie, and proud of it. I prefer to eat food that is as close to its natural state as possible, and to feed my children things free of preservatives, artificial flavors, artificial colors, and refined sugar. Yeah, I'm that person. One of my fondest dreams is to own a share in a local farming co-op, so that once a month my kids and I can pick up a huge harvest of organically, locally grown produce so fresh it still has dirt on it. But here's the problem with all of this...I'm broke as a joke.

Living healthy is ridiculously, prohibitively expensive. Don't get me wrong - I understand the whole supply and demand thing, and how much it costs to maintain organic farms and whatnot. I am not blaming the farmers at all - they have to live, too. But over the last few months as I have moved further and further from the typical Western lifestyle, and utilizing alternative medicine more than conventional medicine, I have been trying my damndest to keep chemicals out of my and my family's food as well. I even bought organic makeup, for pete's sake! And it's EXPENSIVE.

Did I mention it's expensive?

I'm beginning to think there's a conspiracy here, and I'm not one of those people who think that very often. But if you look at it, things are all kinds of bassackwards regarding the health industry, the food industry, and pricing...

The media and the medical community preach and supposedly support individuals getting healthy. They tell us what foods to eat to lose weight and improve our heart health, and what foods to avoid to minimize cancer risk, etc. And yet the very foods we are supposed to eat to be healthy are dangling above the heads of the middle class and below, just out of reach. But a double cheeseburger is $0.99, and spam and ramen can feed a family of four for just under $2.

If we keep the natural foods and products unavailable to the majority of the population, it keeps them just sick enough - with just the right amount and combination of maladies - to support Big Medicine and Big Insurance, not to mention the back-end business people that benefit as well. If we were all eating as we should, and natural, organic foods were all there were, our bodies would be functioning as they are meant to. If we were able to afford the supplements and alternative treatments that view the body as a holistic, fantastical symphony that must be balanced if it is to be on key, there would be no reason for the preventative and maintenance sides of medicine at all.

There is definitely a place for Western medicine. There are times when it is an absolute necessity and a blessing to rely on traditional medical procedures, and my spinal surgery is a great example. If there had not been the developments and sterile, invasive procedures that were used, I would be fully paralyzed by now, and dead inside 4 years (according to my neurosurgeon). So I'm not knocking the industry entirely. My point is that there would not be nearly as high an incidence of obesity, allergies, cancer, diabetes, thyroid issues, asthma, mental issues...the list goes on and on. And that would break the medical and insurance industries into teensy little superfluous pieces.

So is this why it's so much easier to afford artificially flavored, pesticide riddled, chemical laden, bright blue dyed foods for my children? So they can be groomed to be the next generation of devastating illness to keep the greedy heart of business beating? I don't know. I just know that there is a disturbingly symbiotic relationship between the food industry and the medical/insurance communities, and it unnerves me.

Until I can find a job that will hire me (and that I can actually do), and the government does finally admit that I am disabled and helps to supplement that income, I am going to remain broke beyond belief. But I will also continue to sacrifice in just about every other category of my life (I refuse to use bargain toilet paper - it's my one non-negotiable item. Even hippies have standards.) in order to feed and surround my family with as many natural and naturally derived products as possible.

Because I may be too poor to be healthy, but I'll be damned if I feed my children crap in order to feed the machine of big business.

So eat that.