My enzymes ran away!

Picture from: doctorramani.com

Over this past year I have recently developed a slightly lactose intolerant digestive system. I have always wondered why in the world this happened so late in my life. After doing some quick research, I have found a possible answer. I noticed that I did not drink as much milk as my body had previously been used to. Growing up, my mother made me drink about 2 or so glasses of milk a day. Then as I got older, I began replacing milk with water or juice more often. Apparently, according the peer reviewed Journal of Young Investigators, this sudden lactose intolerance may have do with my lack of dairy for a certain period of time in my life. My body just assumed it did not need that lactose enzyme, and went through what is commonly called a natural enzyme deficiency. Now I am usually fine if I take a lactase pill every so often, and stay away from ice cream, milk, and limit myself to cheese. I still have some milk with cereal, and ice cream about once a month. I know this sounds ridiculous, but I have quite the touchy stomach. Along with that, milk has an unholy and unnecessary amount of fat in it that I could live without. There are many other ways of getting the proper amount of calcium in a diet. Referring back to the article mentioned earlier, they say that calcium can be obtained from grains and leafy vegetables. This is clearly a healthier alternative, but a glass of milk every once in a while will not kill you! Hopefully all that milk my mother made me drink when I was little will last me a life time and prevent me from getting Osteoperosis. Check out this article to see where I learned all of this from: http://www.jyi.org/volumes/volume6/issue3/features/lee_and_wei.html