It's 4:55 AM

...seems like a good time to write and eat noodles.

geez, what to write about, tho?

What even is my life?
-Fuzz

Comments

[PresentPerfect]

...You're writing noodles? O.o

[Fuzzyfurvert]

4314441
I'm about 1000 noodles in. Not sure what that is in MSG, but it's probably not that healthy.

[Carapace]

It takes skill to write noodles.

[Trick Question]

omg that picture

[Trick Question]

4314523
MSG is just salt and glutamate, more or less. If it's causing a reaction, it would have to be because you're eating too much salt in general. Glutamate is in everything, and it's an amino acid you need to survive.

[Trick Question]

4315628
I'm not trying to discount the validity of your experiences and suffering: what you experience is no doubt real and compelling. However, what you're proposing doesn't hold water either physiologically or empirically.

There isn't a physical reason MSG could affect you other than salt. It's an ancient urban legend that MSG causes various maladies, but this never shows up in clinical trials. People who take placebo vs. those who take MSG report the same scattershot of maladies at the exact same rate. You can find information defending MSG reactions online from lots of bullcrap sources, but here's an official fact from an authoritative medical source designed for patients to read (Mayo Clinic):

Researchers have found no definitive evidence of a link between MSG and health symptoms.

This is an understatement. Go ahead and check out research from the Journal of the American Medical Association if you don't believe me (for a detailed summary, look for a literature review; where the sheer quantity of studies being compared eliminates the need for a p-value). The statement above from Mayo might sound a bit guarded, but that's intentional because people who think they're allergic to MSG will generally shut you out if you give them hard facts. But even phrased this way, this statement is true in spite of decades of direct research into MSG's effects. This chemical has been studied over and over again because the public widely believes MSG is dangerous or causes allergic reactions. The only reason the FDA labels it GRaS (generally recognized as safe) and not 100% guaranteed safe is because most consumers still demand that MSG be listed on ingredients. The GRaS designation is what forces that labeling to happen.

There have been dozens of properly-controlled studies attempting to determine the side effects of MSG, including studies to see if any side effects exist only for certain, specific people (like a rare allergy). Even if you study only people who report side effects from MSG, that subgroup reports the same side effects, with equal strength and frequency, when you give them a placebo. Nopony does these studies anymore. In the scientific community, this issue was firmly settled a long time ago. There's already a mountain of extant data shooting it down, so it would at this point be irresponsible to throw more money at a problem we've proven doesn't exist. It's also irresponsible to study it because these reactions are physiologically impossible.

It's really hard to convince people stuff like this, because one's health experiences include biofeedback (where how you feel psychologically can affect your health), and unscientific measurements with confirmation bias (people tend to notice effects when they're looking for them), so placebo triggers are rampant when it comes to food (which we all eat lots of every day, so there's tons of data you can cherry-pick without realizing it). The vast majority of people who think they have food allergies don't have food allergies (the gluten craze began partly due to a huge chunk of Americans mistakenly believing they have an extremely rare allergy to gluten). My mom is like this, and since she raised me, I used to believe I was allergic to a dozen different things. Fortunately, I figured it out eventually, so now I can eat citrus and chocolate whenever I want, with zero side effects. I didn't believe I had allergies because I was stupid, either. It's super-easy to convince yourself of it because your mind automatically filters data to look for patterns (this takes place below the conscious level entirely, so you can't stop it or mitigate it).

I'm not saying it's 100% impossible, but there is just no physiological reason MSG could cause edema if it isn't the sodium. Additionally, your side effect of edema is a unique one: it hasn't been reported as a side effect from MSG from any sizeable subgroup, including people who think they're allergic to MSG. That said, MSG is absolutely loaded with sodium, and yes, sodium can cause edema.

If it somehow isn't the sodium, but is some kind of allergy, the only other culprit would another ingredient more commonly found in whatever food you eat that you know has MSG in it. But that's still super-unlikely. I'd bet 100:1 odds in a heartbeat that the edema you experience isn't an allergic reaction to the ingredients in your food. It could be psychological, or it could be the sodium. It's probably a mixture of both.

Think logically about this for a moment: MSG dissociates immediately into sodium and glutamic acid in an aqueous solution, so your body is never even exposed to MSG when you eat it. Your tongue can't absorb it and/or detect it if your saliva hasn't dissolved it already. It can't get into your body in any way without being torn apart into sodium and glutamic acid first.

As for the glutamic acid, it's an essential amino acid. Your body is brimming with glutamic acid. Its conjugate base is glutamine, which is found in every living thing (including viruses) on earth: it's the G in CATG found both in DNA and RNA. It's also found in most kinds of meat, in legumes like soy, in tomatoes, and in well-aged cheeses (which is why Italian and Asian foods always have that strong 'savory' taste to them). Glutamic acid is so important for your body to consume large quantities of that you have taste buds designed to detect only glutamic acid (as you have taste buds for sugar, sodium, sour acids, 'bitter' flavors, and (it's strongly believed but not proven yet) fatty acids), and its 'savory' flavor is officially called 'umami'. The reason Chinese food adds MSG and soy to everything is that glutamate 'umami' flavor is the most important flavor in Asian cuisine, excepting desserts.

[Trick Question]

4315628
Also, I apologize to you and Fuzzy for unloading like that on Fuzzy's blog. I'm super-tired right now from taking diphenhydramine (I don't have food allergies, but I am allergic to cats—and my parents' house has thirteen of them). Being tired is not an excuse for behaving like a douche, but it's a partial reason I guess.

Feel free to ignore all that crap.