Dear Farmers To You Families,
Long before I started Farmers To You and moved my family to Vermont, I was in horticulture. We used lots of chemicals to grow our crops because no one thought it was worth the extra money for Organic flowers, trees and shrubs. I finally sold the business in 2006 because I got very sick.
I was taught at an early age that the chemicals we used were safe and necessary to grow a “healthy” crop. That was what the salesmen and universities told us. As a young boy I clearly remember the smell of Diazinon, Sevin, 2-4-D and would often climb up on the pallets of bags in our warehouse just because kids like to climb. And I never remember anyone telling me that that was not good for me.
Our bodies have an amazingly high capacity to move these poisons out over time, and I was otherwise a very healthy kid who enjoyed lots of outdoor time, good food, and tons of unstructured play. But eventually the load of toxins in my body reached a breaking point. I developed Type 1 Diabetes at age 31, and Crohn’s shortly after that. I was in my early 40s when I had a severe reaction while driving through one of our farm fields in New Hampshire that had just been treated with a powerful fungicide. That day I connected the dots and knew I had to make a change.
Interestingly most of the Organic farmers I know come from families who have never farmed. But the few I know who grew up in Conventional farming families, came to convert to Organic because of a health crisis like mine. Our instinct told us that these chemicals were poisons; if they could kill insects, fungus and weeds then they could kill us, too. And even a little bit would hurt us over time. Presently these chemicals are everywhere — in our food, our water and our air. And I am very careful about minimizing my exposure to even tiny trace amounts.
Toxic loading is a term now being used more often to describe what happened to me. We go through life taking in toxins from our food and environment, and our body does the best it can to flush them out until we reach a load that is beyond our body’s capacity to get rid of. Then they begin to cause genetic and physical damage. These effects can be inherited because these chemicals affect us at a genetic level. Celiac, Diabetes, Autism, ADHD, and hyper food sensitivities are the results. They are signs that our immune system is compromised, and these chronic diseases and others are on an exponential rise.
I started Farmers To You because after moving to Vermont, I discovered that the food we have readily available to us here is so much cleaner and more nutrient dense than what is available at the supermarkets in Boston. I knew that what helped me clean up my diet and intake of toxins was eating very clean, nutrient dense food. It took me about four years for the metallic taste, the rashes, and the allergic reactions to go away. The Diabetes and Crohns are lifelong diseases that I have learned to manage.
I’m normally a very private person, but I wanted to share this story because I see our children suffering due to the declining quality of our food and our diet. And because I want to make sure all our children do not have to go through what I did. Given how much of these toxins are taken in from the environment around us, it is even more important now to control what we can and make sure the food that enters our kitchens and our mouths is as clean as possible. If we do this our bodies are resilient and can handle much of the toxic load from the environment. But our bodies, especially our children’s, need the nutrient density to maintain our health.
At Farmers To You we work very hard to select extremely fresh, clean and nutrient dense foods that are grown and created by people like us who care for you, the environment, and nurturing healthy families – theirs and yours. We work diligently to make it easy for you to know who is growing and preparing your food – so you can feel confident you are doing your best. We are grateful for your support, and we know you are grateful for our help in feeding your family.
I speak for our entire team at Farmers To You when I say it is an honor to do this work and to feed your family quality food each week.
Yours,
Greg
