Then & Now

    One of the benefits of aging is the perspective that comes from experience. Perspective is why I no longer jump on diet or health fad bandwagons, (perspective, and the fact that I am too old and fat to jump). I now realize the wagons are just passing through and only a moronic kangaroo would try to jump on all of them. Here are some of the "science" swaps of my adulthood. In the 70's the miracle vitamin was C, followed later by E, then B12. Now the cure for all ills is D3. Then the undiagnosed illness everyone was afraid they had was low blood sugar, which was a real issue--for about seven people. Now the illness you must have even though you don't realize it, is gluten intolerance. The reason gluten intolerance has become epidemic is because the list of symptoms consists of things experienced by every human on the planet, such as occasional sneezing.
     The impending weather disaster of the 70's was the coming ice age. Now, based on the same scientific expertise, it is global warming. The first sign of warming being the "cooking" of the statistics. The political ideology we feared back then was communism, which would usher in nuclear war. Now we fear terrorism, but not as much as being politically incorrect, even regarding terrorism. The enemy nations which inspired "James Bond" movies were Russia and China. Now our enemies are North Korea, who at least has the courtesy to admit it, and most Muslim countries, especially Iran. Unfortunately, our president is too busy being politically correct to attend briefings on our enemies. The bomb shelters of the 50's are back in vogue for the doomsday preppers of the 2010's, only now they contain more guns which will be needed to protect your hoard of trail mix from looters, not to mention protecting your brains from marauding zombies.
     In the 80's whether you went to the doctor for blood pressure or nail fungus, the culprit was coffee. Now three cups a day are the minimum requirement for health. When I had my first child, we were taught laying a baby on its back might cause it to aspirate and die, and the preferred thing to lay them on was faux sheepskin. Now laying a baby in any position except back would practically be considered a death wish, as would the sheepskin. Unfortunately, when this science shifts, it will be too late for the flat-headed babies. The immunization scare of the 80's was the supposed link between autism and the pertussis vaccine. In order to appease paranoid parents, a DT (diphtheria, tetanus) option was available. Now par(anoid)ents are omitting the MMR immunization because of (see above).
     Speaking of immunities, after years of being told to douse everything that might touch children with disinfectant, science now concludes that their bored immune systems are creating allergies just to have something to do. Along the same line, after school lunchrooms have made possession of a peanut butter sandwich as threatening as bringing a handgun to school (or pointing a cracker shaped like a handgun), doctors now say the upswing in peanut allergies is caused by introducing them too late. In a further food fad, coconut oil, which dieticians believed would clog arteries on contact, is now the current miracle cure. We know it works because it is endorsed by Dr. Oz, who is correct almost as often as the weatherman. There have been too many diets to count since the 70's, but one of the most popular now is the paleo, the diet that kept our hunter/gatherer forebearers slim for life--which was about 40 years.
     There are better ways to lose weight than jumping on and off of bandwagons and frankly, it makes us look a little gullible. Remember: Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. Fool me over and over--we call that Obamacare.