You Say Tomato, I say Tomahto.

The Doodle's favorite food lately is tomatoes. He loves them and better yet, he loves to feed himself tomatoes. I love it because I can cut them up really small and it keeps him busy for a few minutes; unless he stuffs them all into his mouth at one time and chokes and then I feel like a bad mom. But, that's another blog.

To you, tomatoes might seem like such a small thing but for a Doodle Bug it's big because he doesn't eat a lot of fruits and vegetables. Usually only applesauce if I'm lucky. Lately he's been gagging on peaches. So, as a mom I worry that he's going to get scurvy from an all carb diet with no fresh produce.

Then the crazy, paranoid side of me kicks in and only wants him to eat organic tomatoes. Jim was reading this book by Kevin Touhey and has me scared of pesticides, hormones and pretty much anything you might buy at the grocery store.

I guess I could make myself crazy trying to eliminate anything that might be potentially harmful. We wouldn't be sleeping on a chemical filled mattress emitting toxic gasses while we sleep...or use an antiperspirant or perfume or air freshener.
We'd be living in a toxin-free padded room built out of bamboo with a high functioning HEPA filter running on solar power eating organic soy beans and drinking water only from glass bottles. Except, I just heard that it was revealed that chemicals in soy could increase the risk of breast cancer in women, brain damage in both men and women, and abnormalities in infants. Guess what the only form of liquid the Doodle will drink? Right. Silk Milk "Very Vanilla" Soy.

And then there's the reports that toxins in carpet and glue kill rats, cause brain damage and seizures.

Let's not forget the toxic BPA and PVC in plastic bottles, including baby bottles and sippy cups and the drinking water bottles I buy in huge quantities that cause cancer and kill brain cells. Yes, I did just throw away all of my Tupperware.

And there's the theory that Teflon and aluminum causes Alzheimer's.

My personal favorite, the debate over the vaccinations in children.The U.S. vaccine schedule has grown from 10 vaccines given to our children in the 1980s to 36 today, perfectly matching the dramatic rise in autism. Is this all just pure coincidence? Maybe. Maybe not. Who the hell really knows.

Then there is the thought that food allergies, red dye reactions and yeast are also contributing factors to autism, ADHD and bad behavior.

There's the argument about cell phones and Wifi and emissions of electromagnetic radiation from electronic equipment in the home and workplace...

And an assumption that jet fuel from planes flying high above us are leaking JP-4 and JP-8 fuel chemical compounds into our atmosphere and environment making us ill.

I could go on and on.

There's so much information out there to decipher with no known facts, depending on which article you read or which channel you watch which is usually driven by a large pharmaceutical or mass-market conglomerates and media funding totally equal to a he-said-she-said politically driven crap shoot. Who can you really trust?

The only true information I can count on is from talking with other parent's who live with a child with autism. People who have lived, breathed and cried over it because it is their LIFE and their reality every single day...people like me.

Hmph.