No Goitrogens Please

This could be a blog beyond all blogs today as I have so much to say or I should say I have learned so much this week. This will take tremendous discipline not to bore the reader into a comatose state but bear with me I promise to be succinct. I will edit and rewrite and publish my “brief” this afternoon come, as they say, hell or high water.

This week I got the great news, not, that my TSH (thyroid stimulating hormone) was at an all time high of 13.2. Even the most conservative endocrinologist would acknowledge that this is unacceptably high and my FMD flew in to a panic as a good TSH runs in the range of 1.0-2.0 although some Neanderthals will say up to 5 is okay. My last TSH was 4.7, so even that was high and was recorded 4-5 months ago. Looking back I would say it was creeping up since last summer and I know most of the reasons why but then I added Iodoral (Iodine and Potassium Iodide) to the mix about a month ago after my iodine loading test indicated I needed it. It has its own side effect of raising the TSH for up to 6 months (one has to go by the FT3, FT4 and body temperature at this point and not the TSH which reflects your pituitary output).

After my rather impromptu phone consultation with my FMD I took a dip in to a dumpster of moods, albeit only briefly, but I could not believe his news, I was flabbergasted. After all I was doing everything right. Looking back after my week of research I wonder how in the world I could have been so arrogant and so wrong? It prompts me to blog yet again on thyroid disease and its many bumps in the road.

Last summer I started to drink a green drink once or twice a day that made me feel really good, my inflammation went away, several cysts around finger joints disappeared, aches and pains went away, all was right with my world. I still, by the way, think this green drink is fabulous it just isn’t for me, a person who must face that she really does have hypothyroidism and what I eat affects my little butterfly shaped gland that sits in the front of my throat just under the Adam’s apple. In addition to the green drink (which shall remain nameless because I have no reason to condemn it for the general population) I was taking rather hefty doses of alpha lipoic acid, resveratrol and DIM.

So what, you ask? What is significant about these items, I discovered this week, is the goitrogenic effect of all of them and that blew my mind. Something as good as alpha lipoic acid could be bad? Resveratrol, the king of antioxidants, having an adverse effect? DIM, Green Drinks, what next? Broccoli, broccoli which is so good for you that everyone hates it with the exception of me. My green drink was full of dehydrated raw cruciferous vegetable and root juices including broccoli, kale, cabbage, maca and spinach (and many acceptable things which is why I was drinking it). These are all goitrogens and goitrogens interfere with the conversion of T4 to T3 and thus interfere with the function of your thyroid gland. I was slowly killing my thyroid. Well I hope I was only slowly killing it and that I haven’t done any permanent damage.

Here’s the real crux of the matter for me, I knew about goitrogens and I was ignoring my intuitive sense that the green drink wasn’ t right because it made so many things seem better (it was simply masking the symptoms of hypothyroidism). I was innocent of forethought and malice with the intake of alpha lipoic acid and resveratrol. I really  didn’t have an inkling that they were bad especially since I was taking very high quality forms of these supplements and my doctor approved (sometimes I really must remind myself that they, too, are only human).

So dear reader, I am going to supply you with a list of possible goitrogens, to save you the mind blowing experience I have dealt with for about 5 days now. I will also tell you that there are some really good discussion groups out there and the “iodine group” and the “thyroid group” on Yahoo! groups have been amazingly helpful in my search for answers. Breast cancer choices is a great source of information regarding the “iodine protocol” even for those of us who don’t have cancer. Mary Shomon has some of the information I am going to share, also Janie at Stop the Thyroid Madness and I just found some good information at this site . Several bloggers supplied the rest but it is all out there to be researched in depth and if you want more information just Google “hypothyroidism”, “sluggish thyroid”, “goitrogenic foods” you will literally entertain yourself for days I know I have.

Foods that people with hypothyroidism should limit in their raw state:

Peaches, pears, strawberries, canola oil, rapeseed oil, flax seed, hemp seed, pumpkin seed, peanuts, pine nuts, walnuts, almonds, millet, soybeans, turnips, spinach, kale, kohlrabi, mustard greens, cassava root, rutabaga, sweet potato, cabbage, broccoli, cauliflower (actually all brassica family veggies), lima beans, brussel sprouts, radishes.

It is best to avoid dairy, nitrate rich foods like lunch meats,wheat, caffeine, alcohol, fluoride, chlorine, processed foods,antihistamines, sulfa drugs, lithium, alpha lipoic acid, DIM, and resveratrol.

I have asked about but never had answered before how fermentation affects vegetables like cabbage, turnips, rutabaga, cauliflower (I ferment all of those in a kim chi mixture). I finally got an answer from a  C. Masterjohn in Cholesterol-And-Health.com Special Reports Volume 1 Issue 1, 2008 where it is stated that “fermentation makes crucifers more goitrogenic”. Darn! Is that why I almost always get irregular heartbeats after enjoying a bowl of my “special” kim chi? My best guess is I have yet again suppressed my thyroid function and that sends a signal that releases adrenalin and BAM! my heart reacts to the adrenalin rush.

I close with the words of an undisclosed blogger who kindly posted a lot of this information on a raw food discussion site (I cleaned up some of the typos but otherwise it is a quote) “People who have resilient health while eating these foods should continue to eat them with impunity. However, people who have thyroid problems or other problems associated with iodine deficiency or cyanide exposure should consider experimenting with the following dietary restrictions: 1) eliminate millet; 2) moderate soy and only consume it with additional sources of iodine; 3) limit crucifer intake to five servings per week, only eat more than this if it is boiled, and match one’s crucifer intake with extra iodine; 4)avoid foods with cyanogenic glycosides unless they are extensively boiled or crushed and leached in running water for several days, and match one’s cyanogen intake with extra iodine and vitamin B₁₂-containing foods or supplements (but not cyanocobalamin). These foods are not inherently unhealthy but simply contain chemicals that have the capacity to harm the health of some people under some circumstances; this is true of all foods. Experience always trumps theory, so the individual should use this information as but one tool with which she or he can experiment to find the most appropriate diet for herself or himself.”

Namaste. If this helps just one person my day will be complete.

Proline Activities

In the course of my investigation regarding Proline and the Celiac patient I found very little to help me determine whether it was acceptable or not. I believe that what I can be certain of is proline is an amino acid connected with protein and not necessarily wheat protein, so for instance whey protein contains proline.
Upon further investigation this morning I found this patent application for an invention that would create a proline that has no amylolytic side activities that would prevent, for instance, a haze that forms on beer as the liquid ferments, or on the surface as wine ferments. This “invention” might even be applicable to celiac patients and other gluten intolerant individuals, if they eat a product with this particular proline together with wheat it would minimize the effects of the “toxic gluten epitopes”.
I, therefore, conclude that proline is not a problem for people diagnosed with celiac’s or people who just have gluten intolerance (which includes me). Proline is an amino acid contained in protein and as such could be associated with wheat but is not directly associated with the gluten in wheat.
If you want to look at the patent application I have provided the URL below:

http://www.freepatentsonline.com/y2009/0325268.html

Holy Bromide Poisoning

Almost three years ago I started to take FIR saunas and almost three years ago I started having heart palpitations. I could never figure out if they were related or just sheer coincidence. I am now thinking they are related and the whole thing kind of disgusts me. At the time I told my SU (spousal unit) that it felt like I was having a detox reaction but how could that be and what was I detoxing? I did toy with the idea that it could be lead or mercury after all I have been in the dental industry for 30 some years. I also considered fluoride but never once did I think of bromide mostly because I had never heard anyone talk about bromide and I thought I had very little exposure to it whatever it is. (Interestingly, if I sit in a hot tub where bromide is used my skin itches and I cough with every inhalation of the poisoned air which admittedly should have been a clue.)

Three weeks ago I started on 25 mg of Iodoral per day upon my FMD’s instructions and three weeks ago I joined some discussion groups. One group discusses thyroid problems and one discusses the therapeutic use of iodine (mostly at 50 mg). I have learned so much (and one thing is, don’t believe everything you read online) from these discussions but at the moment the one I value most is the subject of  “Bromism”. It is not an oft discussed subject but at www.breastcancerchoices.org they have coined the term for the many people who have been poisoned by the addition of bromide to our food, to our bedding, in our hot tubs, in plastics (like the ones that make up the case that is your computer), cosmetics, hair dyes, etc.

We in the USA are some of the few citizens still exposed at the rate we are because “the UK banned bromate in bread in 1990. Canada banned bromate in bread in 1994. Proposal P230 in Australia: Food Regulation Ministerial Council (FSANZ) still has not finalized its July 2007 proposal to mandate iodized salt in breads, breakfast cereals and biscuits.”

Worse than the fact that we still have it in our food supply and in so many things we use in our homes and business places is that as far “back as 1999, the Center for Science in the Public Interest petitioned the FDA to prohibit the use of potassium bromate, charging that the FDA has known for years that bromate causes cancer in lab animals, but has failed to ban it. (24) As of September 2007, the US FDA responded to Breast Cancer Choices inquiry with the statement, Potassium Bromate is still listed as a safe additive.”

I was still trying to pinpoint where I would be exposed to bromate when I got to the part that said “Potassium bromate is even in your toothpaste and mouth wash and is known to cause bleeding and inflammation of the gums. Sodium bromate is in permanent waves, hair dyes, and textile dyes and Benzalkonium is used as a preservative in some cosmetics.”  Confessions of the wise old dental hygienist, I used to brush my teeth running around the house swallowing toothpaste as I went. I have played with hair color since I was in my twenties and I used to eat bread baked in large bakeries where they undoubtedly used bromates, so I know how it got in my body and it needs to get out now before I, like so many lab animals develop cancer.

You might ask why I have come to this conclusion, so I can tell you this much when a person starts taking in iodine it causes you to detox bromide and fluoride if you have an excess in your body, that is a fact. My symptoms since starting Iodoral almost to the letter match the symptoms described under “Iodine Related Bromide Detox” and sadly it is said this could take months. In the meantime, I can expect such things as bad dreams, foggy head, heart palpitations, heavy legs (hadn’t had that one until this morning) all things that are scary and unexpected but I am now informed and prepared to deal with the detox. Next week I will discuss in more detail the process of detoxing the bromide (and undoubtedly fluoride). Until then if you would like more information on the Bromide Dominance Theory here is the URL: http://www.breastcancerchoices.org/bromidedominancetheory.html

Good Supplement or Bad?

I found this quote in an excellent article (http://ow.ly/VzDz) I was reading this morning “Celiac disease is an immune-mediated disorder that is characterized by small intestinal mucosal injury and nutrient malabsorption. Celiac disease occurs in genetically susceptible individuals following the dietary ingestion of gluten, a group of glutamine and proline rich storage proteins in wheat, rye, and barley.” I was struck by the specific words “glutamine” and  “proline” because I take each of these in supplement form. Glutamine can assist in digestion and proline is an amino acid that is good for your heart health, so now my question is if your intestinal lining has been damaged by celiac’s disease should you avoid taking these supplements?

Having researched several sites on the subject of celiac (or in Britain coeliac) disease there is no reason to avoid glutamine so long as the manufacturer insures the rest of the ingredients in the supplement are gluten free. It is indeed an amino acid but it actually can help heal the lining damage done by celiac’s. On the other hand further research is necessary to determine the relationship between celiac’s disease and proline. If any readers have knowledge of the deleterious affects of proline on someone who suffers from celiac’s disease please leave a comment and I will share the very welcome information.

Iodoral It

Months ago I did an iodine loading test which was, to put it lightly, not the highlight of that particular 24 hours but once it is over and done with it all seems pretty easy. The company I used made mailing it in a breeze as all you had to do was put a tiny amount of the 24 hour collection in a tube, place that in an envelope, call FedEx and leave it at your front door. So off it went and last week I finally had a doctor appointment and got to hear the results.

A normal person who needs no supplemental iodine would excrete about 90% (+) of the ingested Iodoral which is all very precisely measured at the lab (I don’t know how and don’t care). My test results showed an excretion of 74%, which simply put means I am not a total disaster but I do need supplemental iodine. As I have hypothyroidism any lack of iodine makes my thyroid work at less than full capacity, so I feel like finding out was well worthwhile.

Lack of iodine in your system can contribute to dis-ease and many experts in the field of breast cancer feel low levels of iodine make women particularly vulnerable to breast cancer. When Iodine isn’t present we cannot detox such things as Bromide and Fluoride and they get stored in our bodies where they can feed wild little cells.

My functional medicine man and I have agreed that I will take 2 12.5 mg tablets of Iodoral per day for three months and then I will repeat (I so want to write re-pee, so there you go it is out there) the test and see how my levels are at that time. In addition to Iodoral I use one or two scoops of Boku Superfood every day in my morning smoothie. Boku Superfood has kelp in addition to all kinds of greens, cocoa powder, etc. My FMD felt that the kelp I was ingesting was indeed adding much needed iodine just not enough to get my excretion level to 90% or better. A person can add iodine to their diet by eating scrumptious things like sushi and shrimp in addition to Boku Superfood.

I am hopeful that getting more optimal levels of iodine in my body will assist my thyroid and I will share an update in two months. In the meantime I am also working at balancing all my hormones with bio-identical hormones and taking supplements that strengthen my thyroid because I feel that if I feed my body what it needs it will function at a higher level and dis-ease will be but a distant memory.

This just in….

I promised the results of last week’s experiment and the news is just in…..freezing freshly made coconut milk is a partial success.
It has been thawing all morning and I have occasionally given it a seismic shake. I think the product has been rendered usable for the morning protein shake (which was my intent, so it is perfect) but I would add that if you like to drink naked coconut milk it is not very palatable as some bits of coconut oil are not dissolving totally and make for a curious mouthful at times.
I think in the end that I would do it again as there are times when I have the moment to make fresh coconut milk and times when it would simply be a nuisance. I wanted to have it around to blend with my Mercola Whey Protein powder and for that purpose it will work perfectly. However, if I wanted it for tea or coffee I think it would be totally unsatisfactory and thus I could not recommend once frozen coconut milk for coffee or tea or even as a refreshing glass of “milk” as it would be too clumpy. That said, it may just pass the test for using in hot cocoa and I will try that later today with my Enerhealth Coco Mojo.
So go ahead and make your fresh coconut milk as previously discussed in last week’s blog but you might want to make it and use it and skip the freezer.

P.S. It works great for hot chocolate as all the coconut oil just melts away and the taste is fabulous.

Crazy for Coconut

I just tried the “recipe” for making coconut milk that was featured on Tropical Tradition’s blog last week and it really works. The milk tastes great and it lacks the additives found in canned coconut milk not to mention the BPA from the lining of the cans.

I thought I would share the instructions with my readers and the procedure I followed. However, should you want to watch the video go to Tropical Traditions and search coconut or their blog. It is there, you will find it.

Ingredients:
7/8 cup shredded coconut
1 cup hot water
Equipment:
Cotton cloth for draining liquid through (could be cheesecloth or thin dishtowel)
Colander
Blender
Large bowl
Measuring cup with 7/8 measurement (I found a glass one that had the appropriate measure)

Instructions:
Place shredded coconut in the blender. Bring water to a boil and once boiling place one cup in the blender,mix lightly with spatula to incorporate the water. Turn blender on for 2-3 minutes, turning off once to clean sides of blender if necessary. Then dump everything in your cloth that has been laid over a colander which is resting on your bowl. Pull the edges of your cloth together and “milk” the bag completely letting all liquid fall through the colander in to the bowl.
Place the drained coconut shreds back in to the blender and add 1/2 cup (I added more like 3/4 cup) hot water to the coconut and blend for 1-2 more minutes repeating the draining procedure. Dump the spent coconut in your compost pail, pour your coconut milk in to a container and place in refrigerator for storage.

I currently have one jar in the refrigerator and another jar I am going to freeze to see if that will work for those days when you don’t want to blend up coconut milk. I will let you know if the frozen milk works out okay.

If the idea of making coconut milk is appealing to you buying shredded coconut in bulk is not hard. Tropical Traditions and Wilderness Family Naturals both have it. I ordered mine from Wilderness Family Naturals because they are a Minnesota company and Speedee delivery is indeed speedy (basically next day delivery in Minnesota) and only costs $5.95.
Have a great day and Bon Coconut!

I’m Sorry I Can’t Hear You

This has been a fascinating week in my crazy thyroid world and I just have to share it now that things seem to be on the upswing. I will try to be brief for those who are bored by mundane subjects regarding the butterfly shaped organ called thyroid, so you will have to refer to previous blogs to get all the facts.

On Wednesday I had my now regular three month phone appointment with my functional medicine man, Dr. Rob Bruley. As always he asked how I was feeling to which I replied “great”. Then we discussed my present opinion of my thyroid which included the question “how are the heart palpitations?” I responded “Knock on wood (and I did just that) they are really good at the moment. I haven’t had any for a week and ever since I started on the dessicated thyroid from Women’s Health America they have been much better.” I also foolishly told him I was sleeping like a rock with my newly updated amount of bio-identical progesterone. Next time just put duct tape on my mouth.

Why oh why do I say these things? Within an hour of my conversation with Dr. Bruley the palps started up with a vengeance and persisted for most of the rest of this past week. When the irregularity is bad during the daytime hours I feel the need to cough especially if the palpitation or irregularity is more than every 20 beats or so. If the irregularity occurs every 4th or 5th beat then I cough this dry cough that seems to nip it in the bud for the time being but it will return soon after that. Usually by the time I go to bed or shortly after supper the daytime palps are gone or not noticeable. Normally I then sleep perfectly with no palpitations or irregularity during the night.

However, when I have them at night it is different and this week I was rudely awakened three nights in a row with palpitations stimulated by really bad dreams that I am calling my night terrors. I have the night terror, wake up with a start and my heart is pounding. Within moments I can feel a small blip, twenty beats later another blip and so on. It lasts about an hour and then finally I can sleep again with a calm heart and no more night terrors. Being the health investigator that I fancy myself to be this causes quite a stir  because I simply have no answer, well no answer at first.  I have a theory now and that is what prompts me to share my experience in this week’s blog entry.

Yesterday,  frustrated by several nights of interrupted sleep I changed my regimen. First I reviewed whatever information I could glean from Stop The Thyroid Madness. In that information one point stuck with me because I have been suspicious that this was the case. Sometimes what you think are hyperthyroid symptoms are really symptoms of  a hypothyroid state and you need to increase your dose of dessicated thyroid. This is a scary thing for me to do because I HATE the racing pulse that comes with the increased dosage but a rapid heartbeat beats an irregular heartbeat every time. The other thing that a lot of thyroid advocates state over and over is divide your dosage throughout the day, something my doctor poo-poos (But then again I told him about the Armour shortage and the bad reaction people were having to the reformulated Armour and he said he had no knowledge of either. He does now.).

Being armed with the information I needed once again (amazing how one forgets what you read) I took half of my 90 mg tablet in the morning, the other half at noon and around supper with some trepidation I took less than a quarter of my 180 mg Armour tablet (I have about three months worth of what I now assume is the newly reformulated Armour that doesn’t work very well). That should be very roughly 135 mg of dessicated thyroid and nothing bad happened, all my fears were for nothing. The good news is I slept much better. I did have a night terror episode but it was accompanied by the startle and the racing heart but only one or two minor blips and I was soon sleeping soundly again. It is sad when a night like last night somehow seems fabulously restful but it is the truth I feel like a new person or perhaps better said, I feel like me again.

Here is the summary (for those who are now yawning) I am going to continue to take the 135 mg of dessicated thyroid until I start having the palpitations again at which time I will increase the dose to slightly more. I suspect that my normal dose will eventually be 180 mg but by then I will be using the dessicated thyroid from Women’s Health America and I will not return to Armour as Forest Labs has proven to be unreliable and uncaring about the people who take their products. My adrenals for all intents and purposes are fine. I pass all the tests with flying colors (blood pressure, pupil dilation), so I see no need to take cortisol despite STTM’s recommendation to do so. If my pulse starts to regularly be greater than 80 bpm I will cut back my dessicated thyroid as my normal resting pulse is close to 70 and my blood pressure is a comfortable 110/73.

Wish me luck because I suspect I need a smidgeon of that as well. I am keeping a diary of events, so that when I next talk to Dr. Bruley I can with certainty tell him all about what has happened in the last three months. I suspect when asked how I have been feeling I will cautiously say “fine” and as for the heart palpitations question I may just feign cell phone static or some cosmic interruption, tell the good doc I can’t hear him and carry on from there.

Sugar May Be Bad, But This Sweetener Is Far More Deadly

Sugar May Be Bad, But This Sweetener Is Far More Deadly.

Tune in to this fascinating video presentation by an endocrinologist on the subject of what is making the world obese. If you read Mercola you will already know the sugar that is far more deadly (fructose, of course) but for me the details revealed regarding Coke, the soft drink company, are eye opening and the manipulation of our diet by just this one company makes me stagger with the implications. Please take the time to watch the top video and then read Mercola’s commentary. I am still digesting what I just heard (burp!) and thanking God for my aversion to soda for the last many years.

In the New Year Bone up and Build Up your Osteoblasts

2010 has arrived in a wintry rush and with temperatures somewhere in the minus 20 F I am housebound like never before. I have dogs and even they are avoiding the outside world but that could have something to do with the booties I insist they both wear when we venture out. They are so embarrassed by their appearance that the mere mention of the word “outside” sends them running and scrambling in a mad dog world kind of way. Oh well, this too shall pass and when it does I want my bones dense and ready to run.

My mind went to healthy bones this morning when I opened Al Sear’s Sunday Review and one of the articles he featured referred to the “glue” that keeps your bones together, Vitamin K2. He states, and I quote “calcium supplements have little to do with the strength of your bones. The U.S. has the highest intake of calcium, yet our rate of osteoporosis is the highest in the world.” I haven’t checked his data but I can say that the people I know who religiously took their calcium supplements and have always drunk their milk (pasteurized of course) now have diagnosed osteoporosis and take Fosamax. Are there things we can do to help build strong bones? Yes and I will list some good things to do for your bones but I will start with some of the worst things for your bones.

Fluoride is not good for your bones. It is, in the dental world, touted as being a “tooth vitamin”, but that simply isn’t true. I have a grown daughter who has had little to no fluoride ever and she has perfect teeth, she has never had a carious lesion in her mouth.  In my years of dentistry I have seen the effects of too much fluoride and it isn’t pretty, teeth become powdery and white or brown (it depends on the level of fluoride) and if it affects teeth that way it is affecting your bones in the same manner and will make them powdery, chalky and ultimately brittle. There are areas in the US where there are naturally high levels of fluoride in the well water but most people get it after it has been artificially added to their municipal water supply or innocently added to baby formula or dropped in a wee ones unsuspecting mouth. I believe we need to question things we are told and never again drop fluoride in the mouth of babes without looking up all the information published on the subject of fluoridation and what other countries are doing. Then if you agree it is harmful and unnecessary filter fluoride out of household water including water that is used for showers and bathing (fluoride entering through your skin is like just shooting up with the stuff). Several other sources of fluoride are tea (depends on the ground the leaves were grown in), toothpaste and mouthwash all of which are easily avoided.

In my opinion another untruth perpetuated by our much touted Food Pyramid is that milk sold in stores in most states is good for you. A dentist in our office tells every parent to just make sure their children drink lots of milk. It will help them grow tall and have good bones and teeth according to her. I have to turn the other way as I firmly believe pasteurized milk has nothing good left in it except for what they artificially add like Vitamin D3. In fact, pasteurization cooks everything out, so all you are left with if you are lucky is some fat. However, most people shun full fat milk and drink only the unappetizing blue skim milk which has nothing left but lactose, a.k.a. sugar; sugar the nemesis of  good teeth and bones. If you want a healthy drink of milk look at www.realmilk.com and drive miles to the nearest farmer who sells real milk full of enzymes, vitamins, calcium all naturally placed their by Mother Nature and the dear cow who produced it. If you are in the Twin Cities contact Jay Kalisch and find out where his closest delivery point is to your home.

Now for more good things you can do to feed your bones. Firstly, we come to Dr. Sears suggestion of Vitamin K2, the glue that keeps your bones together. Vitamin K2 is even available at a store near you in the produce section. Dark leafy green vegetables are full of Vitamin K but be sure and eat them raw or fermented or just steamed lightly so you don’t destroy the vitamin content. Also you can take a supplement of Vitamin K2 also known as menaquinone-7 (MK-7) or eat Natto (a fermented soybean product available at Asian food stores). Personally I like Boku Superfood, 2 scoops of which have as much Vitamin K2 as a capsule of Mercola’s K2, it tastes good and provides a multitude of vitamins and enzymes, basically everything you need in a whole food supplement.

Magnesium is an essential element missing in most American diets. We are told to take Calcium but seldom is it mentioned that you need to balance it with magnesium.  Most medical experts recommend 400-600 mg of magnesium a day in a 2:1 ratio calcium:magnesium. Magnesium needs to be taken to bowel tolerance which is to say if it gives you diarrhea you are taking too much, cut back and then add what you can tolerate. Several sources of magnesium are Calm (magnesium citrate), Thorne Research Magnesium Aspartate, Boku Superfood, epsom salt baths, Ionic Fizz Magnesium, Magnesium oil (Ancient Minerals being a top rated brand) applied transdermally, Ecological Formulas Tri-Salts (also has calcium and potassium), and the nasty tasting Magnesium Chloride (definitely my least favorite way of getting magnesium). If you add magnesium to your daily diet not only will it assist your body in using the calcium it takes in it may very well alleviate or diminish aches and pains, muscles cramps, constipation, restless leg, lower blood pressure and even help you sleep.

Vitamin D3 is another essential ingredient and it is one of the easiest and cheapest supplements to take. At my latitude of 45 degrees it is recommended that an average adult should take 4000 IUs a day in the winter months. You can produce your own Vitamin D in the summer by exposing your clean body (no sunscreen) to the midday sun for 20 minutes at least three times a week, cheap and easy. This winter I am using my Sunsplash Renew from Mercola.com three times a week, 10 minutes a side (front and back). I will have my D levels checked in February and will know if I have kept my D levels optimal. If they are optimal I will strongly endorse the Sunsplash Renew.

Lastly, but by far not the least, is exercise. Weight lifting will cause the muscles to pull on your bones and naturally help them rebuild themselves or keep them strong. Weight bearing exercise like running, jumping rope, and walking will jar the bone and cause it to produce osteoblasts and thus strengthen the bone. Once you have the foundation you too can build a fabulously strong body that will never need pharmaceutical poisons that claim to build strong bone. Run, walk, jump in to the new year and help your bones be strong at the same time.