It won’t earn me a Nobel prize in science, but I can definitively state that an oatmeal raisin cookie and pierogi diet is not optimal for people with fibromyalgia.  You heard it here first. I’m miserable.  Everything is sore, the white-noise pain is way up, shoulders and back really sore, hands stiff, pretty bad tummy and digestive tract.  I suspect anyone else who did a cookie-pierogi crash diet would be having similar difficulties.  Still, in the name of science, I looked at the ingredients of both to see if anything pops out as a ringleader for distress.

Pierogi… These aren’t so bad ingredient-wise.  Water is the first on the list.  There is, however, an incredible amount of salt in them, which could account for the swelling in my eyes and joints this morning.  Not too bad for sugar at all, not too great on nutrition, but nummy.  There are mono and diglycerides, sodium acid pyrophosphate, disodium phosphate, and yeast extract in the potato flakes and dehydrated cheddar cheese.  Not the unprocessed, “pure” food I’m supposed to be aiming for.  Still, I suspect these aren’t the real problem with today (aside from the salt content).

Oatmeal raisin cookies.  Craisin, actually – dried cranberries rather than raisins.  A source of antioxidants, right?  Okay, no rationalization.  The first ingredient on the label is sugar.  No significant source of vitamins. “Invert sugar” is listed before butter – what’s “invert sugar” and does it cancel out regular sugar?  Leavenings is one of the ingredients listed as less than 2%, but the ingredients… sodium bicarbonate, sodium aluminum sulfate, acid phosphate of calcium.   Top that off with mono and diglycerides.

Mono and diglycerides are emulsifiers.  So when you want to mix oil and water, you need them to keep the oil and water from separating again.  It looks like there’s a bit of buzz on the internet about how bad these products are, one person even going so far as titling her blog “Stop Killing My Kids,” but the main issue is really about transfats, which these can contain.  Asking food manufacturers to stop using emulsifiers is pretty silly.  If people want food manufacturers to stop killing their kids, they need to start cooking for their kids instead of plunking processed food in front of them, probably while they play on their iPads during dinner.  Never mind.  I’m off subject.

The real culprit, plain and simple, is sugar.  I ate a HUGE amount of sugar yesterday.  I can go off topic all I want, but that’s it right there.  These were actually not horrible things to eat.  I ate too many and irresponsibly.  It was nummy and kind of fun in a rebellious sort of way, and I’m paying for it today.  That’s the way it is.  My fault – I accept the responsibility, the pain, the brain fog, grogginess, and general physical malaise.  I’m stocked up on good things to eat this weekend and will get better.