When I had bronchitis following my bout with the flu in November, I had to take antibiotics. I was only too glad to take advantage of this medical wonder of the twentieth century. But even wonders have their side effects, and one of the side effects of antibiotics is that they cause stomach upsets, because they kill not only the bad bacteria infecting my respiratory system, but the friendly bacteria which help my digestion. Vegetarians and other types who abhor the wilful death of living beings might also be aware that millions of tiny living beings die horrible deaths in their bodies every day, victims of a healthy immune system. And humanists will probably be aware that we intelligent beings are hosts to uncounted millions more of these little lives we never know about until they are missing: friendly bacteria.

I struggled along with a continually upset stomach for weeks, wondering whether I would ever be able to eat well again. Then I remembered that I had taken antibiotics. I looked up the side effects on the all-knowing Web, on one of the more reliable health information sites. What was the remedy for this holocaust of intestinal fauna? I must eat… yogurt. Not just any yogurt, but yogurt with "live cultures."

I have made it well known to anyone who will listen that I detest yogurt. This dislike runs in the family, as I have an aunt who also hates yogurt as much as I do. That is a mild word for how I feel about it. Yogurt reminds me of snot. It looks, to me, like mucus and baby spit-up. It tastes like sour, curdled milk, which is basically what it is. I don't even like to say the word yogurt. I call it "the Y-stuff." It is Lovecraftian in its slimy, flowing, viscous puddle, a quivering mass of primal white jelly, reminiscent of the earliest life on the planet, long before anything resembling complex life evolved. I purchased some little cups of this primordial ooze and put them in my refrigerator.

I contemplated the container as I read the ingredients list:

"Cultured pasteurized organic low fat milk, naturally milled organic sugar, inulin (chicory root), natural flavor, pectin (apples and citrus peels). Made with Lactobacillus acidophilus, Lactobacillus bulgaricus, S. thermophilus, and bifidus live active cultures."

Live active cultures. I was going to eat this stuff alive. I was going to consume something filled with untold hordes of little wriggling organisms. I opened the cup, stirred it up, and snarfed it down, helped by sips of coffee. Despite all the natural sweetening and flavors, there was nothing anyone could do to disguise its taste. Sweeten it, put fruit in it, put chocolate in it, freeze it, dye it pink, whatever: it's still yogurt.

I made sure to eat at least some of the primal white jelly for three days, including some Persian yogurt with chopped cucumber and green onion in it, a delicacy known as mast-o-khiar. And believe it, within three days, my stomach had settled down, and my appetite returned. The most natural remedy worked, and the helpful bacteria were back at work where they belonged, inside the tubes of my organic refinery. It's good to have friends in low places! I will never love the stuff, but for now, there will be a spot in my refrigerator for yogurt, so that I can continue to have some culture in my life.

Posted at 3:38 am | link