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Eating Carrots and Crusts: Haunting Old Wives’ Tales

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An apple a day keeps the doctor away; frogs give you warts … 

    No matter how practical you are, old wives’ tales are a part of our culture and often influence our behavior. These tidbits of wisdom seemingly have no basis in fact, but have been passed down since the Middle Ages. They’ve gained widespread acceptance, despite scientific evidence to discredit them. Review the following old wives’ tales to see how you rank on the superstition scale. 

    Perhaps the first old wives’ tales to address are those surrounding determining the sex of a pregnant mother’s baby! The ring and string method is among the most popular methods. The tale says:

Tie a ring to a string.

Wave the string over a pregnant woman’s stomach.

If it swings in a circle, it’s a boy.

If it swings in a line, it’s a girl. 

    Sure, it’s fun to do these “at home” tests, but there is no evidence that this predictor is anymore than 50 percent accurate. Doctors still say that the shape of the mother’s stomach only reveals the baby’s position and the mother’s uterine and muscle tone. Thus, the carrying high vs. low predictors aren’t any more accurate than the ring/string method, nor are the heartbeat counters (high = girl, low = boy) or mom’s food cravings.     However, one study at Harvard University did link food and the baby’s sex, finding that mothers of boys ate more than mothers of girls, possibly accounting for higher birth weights among boys.

Veggie Tales

     All right, perhaps we’ll accept that predicting the gender of our offspring is rather a futile effort. We can find solace in the fact that a handful of the food myths we heard during childhood are somewhat true. Not all, but some. So, pass along some of these old wives’ tales to your children: 

    Eat your carrots for good eyesight. Although carrots do contain vitamin A and other ingredients that support eye health, they will not ward off wearing glasses nor improve already poor eyesight. Don’t despair, however. Eating carrots can reduce by 40 percent your chances of developing macular degeneration (a loss of central field of vision) and supports your overall health. Optometrist Stuart Anderson of Kansas City North, states: “Vegetables and fish are wonderful foods for your eyes. Whatever you are doing to the rest of your body affects your eyes; eating more fruits and vegetables is better, as you are eating fewer chemicals and fatty foods.” 

    Eat the crust of your bread and you will have curly hair. Bread crusts have been found to contain as much as eight times more antioxidants than the rest of the loaf, but consuming crusts will not provide curly hair. The antioxidants will lower your cancer risk, which may allow you to keep enjoying your hair—even if it isn’t curly. 

    Eat spinach for strong “Popeye-sized” muscles. As for spinach, we probably all know that it contains high levels of iron that should strengthen our muscles, but have you heard of oxalic acid? Spinach also contains this chemical that can block iron absorption. So what’s a healthy eater to do? When in doubt, eat a wide variety of colorful fruits and vegetables everyday and you will be as healthy as you are meant to be. Especially if you include an apple a day in your diet! Or, is that another myth?

To Your Health

    Feed a cold, starve a fever is another time-honored tale with little or no truth behind it. Most doctors advise patients to drink plenty of fluids when they are sick and to eat if they feel hungry. Pick foods with lots of vitamin C to help you fight off infection or the cold virus. Although the heat from hot liquids, like chicken soup and tea, is comforting and opens up clogged sinuses, it’s not a cure. Doctors don’t recommend you starve anything, especially when you are sick. 

    Wear hats to prevent heat loss in cold weather. Here’s another debunked myth. Scientists have found that we do not lose more heat from our uncovered heads than from the rest of our bodies, except when we are babies. So, moms are right to cover their babies’ heads; they just don’t have to worry as much once their child’s body is proportional to his head size. 

    Touching frogs or toads causes warts. This superstition is best used as a preventive measure to keep children from handling these creatures that do carry a toxic substance, bufotenine. This chemical can cause hallucinations and kills snakes, but it doesn’t cause warts! Like colds, warts are caused by a virus and are spread through human contact: shaking hands, sharing towels, etc. Statistics show that about 75 percent of people will have a wart(s) during their lifetime and it will usually go away within one year. Liquid nitrogen is the most effective treatment for persistent warts. 

    The Five-Second Rule: Eating dropped food within five seconds is safe. There are still conflicting reports on this issue. According to the TV watchers in my household, MythBusters supposedly validated the rule, demonstrating that the amount of accumulated bacteria on dropped food after two and six seconds were nearly the same and not enough to cause concern. However, several university-led studies have shown otherwise. Best advice: be aware that bacteria lurk everywhere, including “clean” countertops, and that small amounts (10 salmonellas or 100 E.coli.) of bacteria can cause illness. 

    Feeling confused? Don’t let learning the truth behind some of your favorite traditions bother you too much. Most of the population continues to believe in them. We’ll still dangle rings over pregnant women at baby showers and eat chicken soup when we’re sick, but it might not be a good idea to eat dropped food after five seconds!

More Unusual Tales Busted

Kathy Stump writes from Parkville, where she still tries to keep her kids from eating off of the floor.

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