Nutritional Supplements in De Pere

Everyone has heard of Vitamin D. Everyone needs Vitamin D. Especially those of us who live above 37 degrees north latitude (Green Bay, De Pere, and the rest of Packerland) or below 37 degrees south latitude. Most of us know it’s good for our bones because Aunt Eunice’s doctor told her to take it now that she has osteoporosis. But bone health is just the tip of the metaphorical iceberg when it comes to the wonder that is Vitamin D. In fact, clinical research supports Vitamin D supplementation for all of the following:

• Type 2 diabetes
• Arthritis
• High blood pressure
• Cardiovascular disease
• Multiple sclerosis
• Polycystic ovarian syndrome
• Depression
• Epilepsy
• Cancer prevention
• Osteoporosis
• Muscular Pain

[1] “Vitamin” D is a misnomer because it functions more like a hormone than a vitamin. If you’re looking for a vocabulary lesson, researchers have characterized vitamin D as pluripotent pleiotropic seco-steroid which is a fancy way of saying it does a whole lot of different actions in the body. For that reason, coupled with the fact that the majority of the human race is deficient, we all need to be supplementing with Vitamin D. How much? That’s different for everybody. But it is very well documented that the previous guideline of 400 IU per day is far too low to positively affect serum Vitamin D3 levels. This is important too; Vitamin D is a fat-soluble vitamin. That means the only way to absorb Vitamin D is to consume it with 5-10 grams of fat. If you don’t take Vitamin D with a meal, you won’t absorb any of it and you will simply be flushing it down the toilet in a couple hours.

Tundra Chiropractic explains how we don’t eat enough plants. As a population, we are severely deficient in all of the good things found in fruits and vegetables. Unfortunately for us, plants are our greatest source of dietary magnesium. Also, unfortunately for those of us in close proximity to Lambeau Field (and the whole state of Wisconsin for that matter), there is only a negligible amount found in cheese. Magnesium is so important and so deficient that some researchers of human physiology are pushing for it to be fortified in the public water supply. Until the funding and legislation for that gets pushed through, tap water isn’t a good source of magnesium either. So it’s best to supplement with magnesium...in addition to increasing vegetation intake.

[2] Magnesium is a cofactor in more than 500 metabolic reactions which basically means that the cells in your body could not function without it. It also helps to quench free radicals which are those nasty little molecules that damage DNA. By protecting your DNA, you’re taking the right steps to prevent cancer.

[3] That’s just the beginning, here is a vastly condensed list of problems that magnesium supplementation helps:

• Headaches
• Cardiovascular disease
• Atherosclerosis
• Hypertension
• Stroke
• Renal disorders
• Osteoporosis
• Diabetes mellitus
• Asthma
• Preeclampsia
• Neurologic & Psychiatric conditions

[4] Another interesting piece of information is the fact that magnesium levels in the body are depleted by emotional stress. Conversely, supplementing with magnesium has been shown to focus the mind and combat emotional stress! Not that anyone in 2018 is stressed, but it’s something to consider. [4]

You don’t need to be an expert in math or the Greek alphabet. You just need to understand how ratios work. Omega 3 fatty acids are ANTI-inflammatory and Omega 6 fatty acids are PRO-inflammatory. In De Pere, we need both. We need both in a ⍵-3:⍵-6 ratio of 1:1. The problem is that the currently, the average American’s diet is 1:20. This drives the inflammatory state which drives basically every disease process known to man.

[5] It’s no wonder our ratios are so skewed. Check out this list of foods that are full of ⍵-6:

• Grains
• Oatmeal
• White bread
• Wheat bread
• Grain fed meat
• Corn Chips
• Potato Chips
• Vegetable Oil

And here’s a list of foods rich in ⍵-3:

• Broccoli
• Kale
• Grass-fed meat
• Wild caught fish

[5] How can we possibly improve the ratio? This goes back to discussion about Magnesium and how we don’t eat enough plants. The first step is to eat more fruits and vegetables. Then cut grains and refined oils. Then get on a good fish oil supplement. A good fish oil is one that is potent. Check the label. You want EPA and DHA to add up to 1000 mg or more. A word about mercury. There is always concern about mercury levels when consuming fish.
This is especially true when it comes to fish higher on the food chain. Shark, swordfish and king
mackerel are suppose to be delicacies. Treat them as such. They tend to be high in mercury.
Here’s the great news! The processes that manufacture fish oil supplements removes the
mercury found in fish. Regardless of the brand, you can rest assured that supplementing with
fish oil is not slowly turning you into the Mad Hatter.
[6]

There is a long-standing joke that taking a daily multivitamin does nothing more than give you expensive, colorful urine. Yes, the B2 in most multivitamins changes the color of your urine, but there is a great deal of evidence that shows multivitamins do much more than that. To understand it, here a history lesson regarding the evolution of diet.

Wild plants and animals that were eaten by hunter-gatherers contained a potent, concentrated dose of micronutrients (vitamins and minerals). Then dairy foods and cereal grains got thrown into the mix and micronutrient density in the diet declined. When cereal milling techniques were perfected in the Industrial Era, the already declining micronutrient density plummeted into a free fall.

[7] This is where things really turn bleak. Micronutrient deficiencies damage DNA the same way that radiation and harsh chemicals do. [8] Such DNA damage is the driver of many disease processes plaguing our country including heart attack and cancer. The good news is that multivitamins, when taken daily, have been shown to be an effective primary prevention for heart attack [9] and cancer [10].