hugo-soccerI have to say, I’m absolutely gutted today. I am overwhelmed almost to the point of despair about how I am supposed to raise healthy children in a world where millions of people do not care about the ways we are polluting our soil, groundwater, food supply, electromagnetic environment, etc. etc.

I really just have one primary driver: I don’t want any of my family to develop a serious illness. The cancer rate is now 1 in 2. That’s right, out of every single person you know, half of them will have cancer at some point in their lives.

Why doesn’t that stat live with people and permeate their lives? When you go to buy your groceries, “1 in 2” should be playing in your head, when you spray your lawn, when you reach for your cell phone, “1 in 2” should be repeating over and over. When you buy your kid – with their still-developing, thinner skull, a cell phone (for pete’s sake!) and a wireless computer, “1 in 2” should be positively booming in your head.

What exactly is going on? Does every mother at my kids’ school think that her child is going to be the disease-free half of the population, so she doesn’t have to change anything? Uh….hmmm, let’s just do the math for one millisecond and we realize how ludicrous that is. Or do they just not care?

Or are they like the school board, who bases all of it’s decisions upon information put out by industry-influenced sources? Are people really that naive? Has no one learned anything from the cigarette/smoking issue? Or the swine flu fiasco?

Do I sound a tad irate? Do I sound like I just can’t take it anymore? Because you know what, I’ve already healed myself of serious, chronic illness (largely inflicted upon me by the well-meaning ignorance of my parents). And I am NOT going through that again.

People who have never had a serious illness, don’t realize that you will spend almost every minute in misery for YEARS. They don’t understand that nothing is worth that. But I do.

And that’s why I’m so beside myself at having to live in a community where everyone around me is continually making disease-producing choices and I’m the only one pushing in another direction.

And yes, I’m “pushing.” I spend every day pushing against the choices made by other parents when they give my children chemical and sugar-laden foods at playdates and birthday parties. When the school installs wireless computers and allows children to bring cell phones to school and the teachers provide sugary, chemical-laden “treats” at every holiday. When other parents send sugar/chemical “treats” to school for everyone when it’s their child’s birthday, valentine’s day, halloween, etc. And what about all the after-soccer, birthday party, post-performance celebrations at McDonald’s and Dairy Queen?

Oh yes, thank you, that’s so nice of you! Cause you know, I was having a hard time getting my kids to eat enough sugar and artificial crap without your help.

And what does that turn me into? The big, bad, nagging meanie. When I’m really a fun-loving, adventurous, dynamic person who has always lived life in the “flow”. Now every single day, I’m “pushing”. I hate it. I hate living this way.

But I hate illness even more.

When I think, I should just give up, let the kids be like everyone around them, and remove a huge stressor from my life, then I also think: Yeah, and for how long? Because one thing you learn when you have to heal yourself from a serious, supposedly “incurable” illness, is what produces disease and what produces health.

So I don’t have the benefit of ignorance. I KNOW that if I let my kids do what everyone else is doing and we live the way everyone else is living…”1 in 2″. And that’s just cancer. That doesn’t even include MS, Lupus, diabetes, Crohn’s, colitis (which is approaching epidemic levels), CFS, etc etc.

What’s the solution? Do we have to go completely “off the grid” and buy 150 acres somewhere and grow our own food, have our own water supply, homeschool our children, etc. Oy vey, and how would I have the time/energy to do all that and still run my business? And where exactly would we do that?

Or are there places where there are communities of people who are already aware of the toxicity of “normal” lifestyles and a bunch of people doing something different? I’ve heard about a development in Vilcabamba, Ecuador – but you may have to be a vegetarian, raw foodist to live there and personally the crime and the bugs don’t appeal to me.

And then if you join any kind of “community” aren’t you going to get all the whacky people and bureaucrats who just want to control everyone – kind of like a strata council (or condo owner’s association) that never stops?

You see what I mean? Now you know why I’m feeling totally gutted, trapped, exhausted, etc. I don’t actually want to move anywhere, or become a farmer.

But I don’t want my kids to develop a serious, chronic illness, even more.

A friend of mine is convinced the solution is to move to New Zealand. Who knows??