Magnesium....does your body have enough?

Magnesium....does your body have enough?

Symptoms of Low Magnesium

Yesterday we covered Iodine deficiency and how it effects the metabolism and our overall health. Today is all about Magnesium and how it plays such an important role in our body and it's hormone production. Many of the symptoms of low Iodine are similar to the effects of low magnesium levels and both of these minerals are equally important in our health both physically and mentally. 

Many of the symptoms of low magnesium are not unique to magnesium deficiency, making it difficult to diagnose with 100% accuracy. Thus quite often low magnesium levels go completely unrecognized… and untreated. Many medical doctors never test for magnesium levels yet it can be the leading cause for many of our problems.

Signs of Magnesium Deficiency

Neurological:                                                 

Behavioral disturbances
Irritability and anxiety
Lethargy
Impaired memory and cognitive function
Anorexia or loss of appetite
Nausea and vomiting
Seizures

Muscular:

Weakness
Muscle spasms (tetany)
Tics
Muscle cramps
Hyperactive reflexes
Impaired muscle coordination (ataxia)
Tremors
Involuntary eye movements and vertigo
Difficulty swallowing

Cardiovascular:

Irregular or rapid heartbeat
Coronary spasms

Metabolic:

Increased intracellular calcium
Hyperglycemia
Calcium deficiency
Potassium deficiency

Conditions Related to Magnesium Deficiency

The following conditions represent possible indicators of chronic latent magnesium deficiency:

• Depression
• Chronic fatigue syndrome
• ADHD
• Epilepsy
• Parkinson’s disease
• Sleep problems
• Migraine
• Cluster headaches
• Osteoporosis
• Premenstrual syndrome
• Chest pain (angina)
• Cardiac arrhythmia's
• Coronary artery disease and atherosclerosis
• Hypertension
• Type II diabetes
• Asthma

As you can see there are many problems caused by magnesium deficiency and now it's time to look at what causes us to be magnesium deficient.

1.  Poor Eating Habits:
 Eating fast foods too often, these are basically dead calories providing you with little to no nutritional value.

 2. Drinking Carbonated Sodas:
Most dark colored sodas contain phosphates. These substances actually bind with magnesium inside the digestive tract, rendering it unavailable to the body. So even if you are eating a balanced diet, by drinking soda with your meals you are flushing magnesium out of your system.

3. Eating Sweets, Donuts, Cakes, Pastries and other foods heavy in refined sugar. 
Refined sugar is not only a zero magnesium product but it also causes the body to excrete magnesium through the kidneys. The process of producing refined sugar from sugar cane removes molasses, stripping the magnesium content entirely.
And sugar does not simply serve to reduce magnesium levels. Sweet foods are known by nutritionists as “anti-nutrients”. Anti-nutrients like sweets are foods that replace whole nutritious foods in the diet, yet actually consume nutrients when digested, resulting in a net loss. Because all foods require vitamins and minerals to be consumed in order to power the process of digestion, it’s important to choose foods that “put back” vital nutrients, and then some.

4. Stress:
  Stress can be a cause of magnesium deficiency, and a lack of magnesium tends to magnify the stress reaction, worsening the problem. In studies, adrenaline and cortisol, byproducts of the “fight or flight” reaction associated with stress and anxiety, were associated with decreased magnesium. Because stressful conditions require more magnesium use by the body, all such conditions may lead to deficiency, including both psychological and physical forms of stress such as surgery, burns, and chronic disease.

5. Drinking caffeinated beverages daily:

Magnesium levels are controlled in the body in large part by the kidneys, which filter and excrete excess magnesium and other minerals. But caffeine causes the kidneys to release extra magnesium regardless of body status. If you drink caffeinated beverages such as coffee, tea and soda regularly, your risk for magnesium deficiency is increased.

6. Pharmaceutical drugs:
Heart medication, asthma medication, birth control pills or estrogen replacement therapy.
The effects of certain drugs have been shown to reduce magnesium levels in the body by increasing magnesium loss through excretion by the kidneys.

7. Alcohol:
 The effect of alcohol on magnesium levels is similar to the effect of diuretics: it lowers magnesium available to the cells by increasing the excretion of magnesium by the kidneys.

8. Calcium Supplements:
Many of us have been told how important calcium is to our bodies, yet no one talks about how important it is to supplement magnesium with your calcium. Taking calcium without magnesium actually reduces your bodies ability to utilize magnesium. Yet when taken together magnesium actually aids in absorption of calcium. So make sure you take both when you are supplementing calcium.

How do you know if you are Magnesium Deficient?

You may go to your health care provider and have them order blood work and they can have results to you within just a day or two. Texas Metabolics can also order lab work for you and actually help you with a balanced nutrition program and finding the right Magnesium supplement for you. Dosage will vary based on age and size of the individual along with several other factors that may deplete you of magnesium.

If you have any question contact us and we will help you with a healthy solution! 

  

 

Why Sugar is Toxic to the Body and in particular the BRAIN Part 3 of 5. SUCROSE: "PURE" ENERGY AT A PRICE

Why Sugar is Toxic to the Body and in particular the BRAIN

Part 3 of 5.

SUCROSE: "PURE" ENERGY AT A PRICE



When calories became the big thing in the 1920s, and everybody was learning to count them, the sugar pushers turned up with a new pitch. They boasted there were 2,500 calories in a pound of sugar. A little over a quarter-pound of sugar would produce 20 per cent of the total daily quota. "If you could buy all your food energy as cheaply as you buy calories in sugar," they told us, "your board bill for the year would be very low. If sugar were seven cents a pound, it would cost less than $35 for a whole year." A very inexpensive way to kill yourself. "Of course, we don't live on any such unbalanced diet," they admitted later. "But that figure serves to point out how inexpensive sugar is as an energy-building food. What was once a luxury only a privileged few could enjoy is now a food for the poorest of people."

Later, the sugar pushers advertised that sugar was chemically pure, topping Ivory soap in that department, being 99.9 per cent pure against Ivory's vaunted 99.44 per cent. "No food of our everyday diet is purer," we were assured. What was meant by purity, besides the unarguable fact that all vitamins, minerals, salts, fibers and proteins had been removed in the refining process? Well, the sugar pushers came up with a new slant on purity. "You don't have to sort it like beans, wash it like rice. Every grain is like every other. No waste attends its use. No useless bones like in meat, no grounds like coffee." "Pure" is a favorite adjective of the sugar pushers because it means one thing to the chemists and another thing to the ordinary mortals. When honey is labeled pure, this means that it is in its natural state (stolen directly from the bees who made it), with no adulteration with sucrose to stretch it and no harmful chemical residues which may have been sprayed on the flowers. It does not mean that the honey is free from minerals like iodine, iron, calcium, phosphorus or multiple vitamins. So effective is the purification process which sugar cane and beets undergo in the refineries that sugar ends up as chemically pure as the morphine or the heroin a chemist has on the laboratory shelves.

What nutritional virtue this abstract chemical purity represents, the sugar pushers never tell us. Beginning with World War I, the sugar pushers coated their propaganda with a preparedness pitch. "Dietitians have known the high food value of sugar for a long time," said an industry tract of the 1920s. "But it took World War I to bring this home. The energy-building power of sugar reaches the muscles in minutes and it was of value to soldiers as a ration given them just before an attack was launched." The sugar pushers have been harping on the energy-building power of sucrose for years because it contains nothing else. Caloric energy and habit-forming taste: that's what sucrose has, and nothing else. All other foods contain energy plus. All foods contain some nutrients in the way of proteins, carbohydrates, vitamins or minerals, or all of these. Sucrose contains caloric energy, period.

The "quick" energy claim the sugar pushers talk about, which drives reluctant doughboys over the top and drives children up the wall, is based on the fact that refined sucrose is not digested in the mouth or the stomach but passes directly to the lower intestines and thence to the bloodstream. The extra speed with which sucrose enters the bloodstream does more harm than good. Much of the public confusion about refined sugar is compounded by language. Sugars are classified by chemists as "carbohydrates". This manufactured word means "a substance containing carbon with oxygen and hydrogen". If chemists want to use these hermetic terms in their laboratories when they talk to one another, fine. The use of the word "carbohydrate" outside the laboratory-especially in food labeling and advertising lingo-to describe both natural, complete cereal grains (which have been a principal food of mankind for thousands of years) and man-refined sugar (which is a manufactured drug and principal poison of mankind for only a few hundred years) is demonstrably wicked. This kind of confusion makes possible the flimflam practiced by sugar pushers to confound anxious mothers into thinking kiddies need sugar to survive.

The use of the word "carbohydrate" to describe sugar is deliberately misleading. Since the improved labeling of nutritional properties was required on packages and cans, refined carbohydrates like sugar are lumped together with those carbohydrates which may or may not be refined. The several types of carbohydrates are added together for an overall carbohydrate total. Thus, the effect of the label is to hide the sugar content from the unwary buyer. Chemists add to the confusion by using the word "sugar" to describe an entire group of substances that are similar but not identical. Glucose is a sugar found usually with other sugars, in fruits and vegetables. It is a key material in the metabolism of all plants and animals. Many of our principal foods are converted into glucose in our bodies. Glucose is always present in our bloodstream, and it is often called "blood sugar". Dextrose, also called "corn sugar", is derived synthetically from starch. Fructose is fruit sugar. Maltose is malt sugar. Lactose is milk sugar. Sucrose is refined sugar made from sugar cane and sugar beet. Glucose has always been an essential element in the human bloodstream. Sucrose addiction is something new in the history of the human animal.

To use the word "sugar" to describe two substances which are far from being identical, which have different chemical structures and which affect the body in profoundly different ways compounds confusion. It makes possible more flimflam from the sugar pushers who tell us how important sugar is as an essential component of the human body, how it is oxidized to produce energy, how it is metabolized to produce warmth, and so on. They're talking about glucose, of course, which is manufactured in our bodies. However, one is led to believe that the manufacturers are talking about the sucrose which is made in their refineries. When the word "sugar" can mean the glucose in your blood as well as the sucrose in your Coca-Cola, it's great for the sugar pushers but it's rough on everybody else.

People have been bamboozled into thinking of their bodies the way they think of their check accounts. If they suspect they have low blood sugar, they are programmed to snack on vending machine candies and sodas in order to raise their blood sugar level. Actually, this is the worst thing to do. The level of glucose in their blood is apt to be low because they are addicted to sucrose. People who kick sucrose addiction and stay off sucrose find that the glucose level of their blood returns to normal and stays there. Since the late 1960s, millions of Americans have returned to natural food. A new type of store, the natural food store, has encouraged many to become dropouts from the supermarket. Natural food can be instrumental in restoring health. Many people, therefore, have come to equate the word "natural" with "healthy".

So the sugar pushers have begun to pervert the word "natural" in order to mislead the public. "Made from natural ingredients", the television sugar-pushers tell us about product after product. The word "from" is snot accented on television. It should be. Even refined sugar is made from natural ingredients. There is nothing new about that. The natural ingredients are cane and beets. But that four-letter word "from" hardly suggests that 90 per cent of the cane and beet have been removed. Heroin, too, could be advertised as being made from natural ingredients. The opium poppy is as natural as the sugar beet. It's what man does with it that tells the story. If you want to avoid sugar in the supermarket, there is only one sure way. Don't buy anything unless it says on the label prominently, in plain English: "No sugar added". use of the word "carbohydrate" as a "scientific" word for sugar has become a standard defense strategy with sugar pushers and many of their medical apologists. It's their security blanket.

The Cold and Flu Season is Upon Us. This will help!

The Cold and Flu Season is Upon Us.

Here are some simple things to help keep you breathing and speed up recovery.

Blocked nose or Stuffy nose is the common term used for the problem Nasal Congestion which if not treated at the earliest will result in sinus problem or even blockage of nose and several other serious issues. Reasons for this stuffy nose can be viruses, increased nasal membrane, allergic reactions and several others which if not resolved at earliest will surely give lot of discomfort to any individual.

Boost Your Immune System With Vitamins and Herbs

Can cold-busting vitamin C also help zap congestion? “Vitamin C has been demonstrated in some studies to shorten the duration of a cold and decrease the severity of symptoms — however, it doesn’t directly affect congestion,” says Stringer. So, if you’re battling congestion related to a cold, popping some extra vitamin C may help you get over your cold symptoms faster. But if your congestion is related to allergies, vitamin C won’t bring relief.

Drink hot liquids

Hot liquids relieve nasal congestion, prevent dehydration, and soothe the uncomfortably inflamed membranes that line your nose and throat. If you’re so congested you can’t sleep at night, try a hot toddy, an age-old remedy.

Use a Humidifier or Vaporizer

Battling a cold or the flu can leave you feeling dried out and dehydrated, so many people turn to humidifiers or vaporizers to relieve congested sinuses. “Extra humidity via humidifiers can provide a lot of relief,” says Stringer. Humidifiers help break up congestion by adding moisture to the air, which helps to thin the mucus in your nose.

Xylitol (HIGHLY RECOMMENDED)

Xylitol is a healthy sugar (yes I said a healthy sugar) It has a very low glycemic index rating in the mid-20's and is diabetic friendly. It has less than half the calories of regular sugar. The one thing that is awesome about this product is it has very strong anti-bacterial, anti-viral and anti-fungal properties. It will cure a sore throat or a tooth ache is just a few hours. It will also clear out you nasal and sinus cavity as well. Simply take one table spoon of Xylitol and drop it into boiling water 4-6 ounces. Then allow it to cool and gargle with it and drop it into your nose and ears. This will wipe out the infection quickly. You may repeat this several times a day, but a fair warning, too much xylitol will cause diarrhea because of its slow digestion. A small price to pay for breathing!

Garlic

Garlic acts as a natural anti-viral which is quite used in the treatment of viral infections like cold, influenza, sinus that causes stuffy nose to fight against the infection. Garlic contains a pungent taste which releases secretions that helps to drain the nasal passages and makes you breathe comfortably. It also helps to increase your immune system when taken regularly.

Ginger

Consumption of fresh grated ginger (1 teaspoon) with a glass of warm water can provide relief from the problem of stuffy nose. An individual can consume a tea prepared with a mix of ginger, lemon juice and honey to obtain effective results.

Apple Cider Vinegar (ACV)

Apple cider vinegar helps to clear the stuffy nose by thinning the mucus quickly and drain out the sinuses, if it is taken straight without any flavorings. It helps to clean your nose and nasal passage for a comfortable breath.

Tomato Juice

Tomatoes are rich in vitamin C which will boost your immune system and also works to open up the sinuses to remove the mucus and also reduce the inflammation in the vessels.

Herbal Tea

Consumption of a tea prepared with the use of different herbs such as chamomile, peppermint and blackberry can provide relief from the problem of stuffy nose. Consumption of a tea prepared with the use of ginger and rosemary leaves can cure the problem of stuffy nose.

Hot Soups

Hot chicken soup is a best remedy for stuffy nose as it effectively heals the cold symptoms while giving relief from nasal congestion.  You can also drink vegetable soups to get healed up quickly.

saline nasal sprays

Use saline nasal sprays or make your own salt water rinse to irrigate your nose. Salt-water rinsing helps break nasal congestion while also removing virus particles and bacteria from your nose.

Drink more fluids

Drink plenty of fluids to help break up your congestion. Drinking water or juice will prevent dehydration and keep your throat moist. You should drink at least 8 to 10 eight-ounce glasses of water daily. Include fluids such as water, sports drinks, herbal teas, fruit drinks, or ginger ale. Your mother’s chicken soup might help too! (Limit cola, coffee, and other drinks with caffeine because it acts like a diuretic and may dehydrate you.)

Onion

Peel off and cut an onion. Smell it for 4-5 minutes. It will clear your nose, giving you relief from nasal congestion.

Pepper

Pepper is a great remedy to cure a stuffy nose. Put a teaspoon of black pepper along with a tablespoon of honey in a cup. Fill it with boiling water and let it steep for about 15 minutes. Now, stir it well. Drink this mixture to relieve from a stuffy nose.

Spicy Food

Increase your intake of spicy foods while you are suffering from stuffy nose. Include lots of red chillies, onions, ginger and garlic to your food. It will facilitate the easier flow of mucus from nasal passages, thereby relieving you from blocked nose.

Eucalyptus Oil

Eucalyptus oil is one of the most effective home remedies to relieve a stuffy nose. Pour a few drops of eucalyptus essential oil on a handkerchief or on a small piece of cloth and inhale its fragrance. You can also pour some on your pillow in order to get the benefit even when you are asleep.

Honey

Consumption of honey (2 teaspoons) on a regular basis can treat the problem of stuffy nose. An individual can consume a glass of warm water containing honey (2 – 3 teaspoons) to obtain better results. Honey can be also taken with milk to treat the problem of stuffy nose.
Lemon

An individual can apply a mixture prepared with lemon juice (2 teaspoons), black pepper powder (1/4th teaspoon) and a pinch of salt around the nasal area to treat the symptoms of stuffy nose.

The Dangers of Drinking Soda Pop!

The Dangers of Drinking Soda Pop!

Some people drink soda pop as if it is water, some even instead of water. Sure, the primary ingredient is water, but, with all the other “stuff” it contains it can have a…toxic…poisonous…lethal…venomous… seriously harmful effect on your entire body. Drinking soda pop is a sure-fire way to age faster. Here’s why:

Soda Pop (or carbonated soft drinks) has an alarming amount of sugar, calories and harmful additives in it that have absolutely no nutritional value. Studies have linked soda to osteoporosis, obesity, tooth decay and heart disease. Despite this, soda accounts for more than one-quarter of all drinks consumed in the United States….and we wonder why we can’t lose weight and why we have health problems. So very often our health problems do not BEGIN on their own. WE encourage illness and disease little-by-little every day by NOT preventing their cause. We know better, we try to fool ourselves, but our bodies’ cells can’t be fooled about what we put in our mouths. I hope the next time you look at a can of soda pop you take note of the ingredients and smarten up for the good of your own healthy lifespan and that of your children and grandchildren. …What you are about to read should turn you away from sodas altogether.

Here’s what’s in Soda Pop:

Phosphoric Acid: May interfere with the body's ability to use calcium, which can lead to osteoporosis or softening of the teeth and bones. Phosphoric acid also neutralizes the hydrochloric acid in your stomach, which can interfere with digestion, making it difficult to utilize nutrients.

Sugar: Soft drink manufacturers are the largest single user of refined sugar in the United States. It is a proven fact that sugar increases insulin levels, which can lead to high blood pressure, high cholesterol, heart disease, diabetes, weight gain, premature aging and many more negative side effects. Most sodas include over 100 percent of the RDA of sugar.

Aspartame: This chemical is used as a sugar substitute in diet soda. There are over 92 different health side effects associated with aspartame consumption including brain tumors, birth defects, diabetes, emotional disorders and epilepsy/seizures. Further, when aspartame is stored for long periods of time or kept in warm areas it changes to methanol, an alcohol that converts to formaldehyde and formic acid, which are known carcinogens.

Caffeine: Caffeinated drinks can cause jitters, insomnia, high blood pressure, irregular heartbeat, elevated blood cholesterol levels, vitamin and mineral depletion, breast lumps, birth defects, and perhaps some forms of cancer.

Soda is one of the main reasons, nutritionally speaking, why many people suffer health problems. Aside from the negative effects of the soda itself, drinking a lot of soda is likely to leave you with little appetite for vegetables, protein and other food that your body needs.

How many sodas have you had today? How about your kids? The average American drinks an estimated 56 gallons of soft drinks each year, but before you grab that next can of soda, consider this: one can of soda has about 10 teaspoons of sugar, 150 calories, 30 to 55 mg of caffeine, and is loaded with artificial food colors and sulphates.

Teenagers and children, who many soft drinks are marketed toward, are among the largest consumers. In the past 10 years, soft drink consumption among children has almost doubled in the United States. Teenage boys now drink, on average, three or more cans of soda per day, and 10 percent drink seven or more cans a day. The average for teenage girls is more than two cans a day, and 10 percent drink more than five cans a day.

It also raises the question of how one determines a product's caffeine content. Nutrition labels are not required to divulge that information. If a beverage contains caffeine, it must be included in the ingredient list, but there's no way to tell how much a beverage has, and there's little logic or predictability to the way caffeine is deployed throughout a product line.

Let’s take a look at some of the major components of a can of soda:

Okay, so most enlightened consumers already know that colas contain a fair amount of caffeine. It turns out to be 35 to 38 milligrams per 12-ounce can, or roughly 28 percent of the amount found in an 8-ounce cup of coffee. But few know that diet colas -- usually chosen by those who are trying to dodge calories and/or sugar -- often pack a lot more caffeine.

A 12-ounce can of Diet Coke, for example, has about 42 milligrams of caffeine -- seven more than the same amount of Coke Classic. A can of Pepsi One has about 56 milligrams of caffeine -- 18 milligrams more than both regular Pepsi and Diet Pepsi.

Even harder to figure out is the caffeine distribution in other flavors of soda pop. Many brands of root beer contain no caffeine. An exception is Barq's, made by the Coca-Cola Co., which has 23 milligrams per 12-ounce can. Sprite, 7-Up and ginger ale are caffeine-free. But Mountain Dew, the curiously named Mellow Yellow, Sun Drop Regular, Jolt and diet as well as regular Sunkist orange soda all pack caffeine.

Caffeine occurs naturally in kola nuts, an ingredient of cola soft drinks. But why is this drug, which is known to create physical dependence, added to other soft drinks?

The industry line is that small amounts are added for taste, not for the drug's power to sustain demand for the products that contain it. Caffeine's bitter taste, they say, enhances other flavors. "It has been a part of almost every cola -- and pepper-type beverage -- since they were first formulated more than 100 years ago," according to the National Soft Drink Association.

But recent blind taste tests conducted by Roland Griffiths at Johns Hopkins Medical Institutions in Baltimore found that only 8 percent of regular soft drink consumers could identify the difference between regular and caffeine-free soft drinks.

The study included only subjects who reported that they drank soft drinks mainly for their caffeine content. In other words, more than 90 percent of the self-diagnosed caffeine craves in this small sample could not detect the presence of caffeine.

That's why the great popularity of caffeinated soft drinks is driven not so much by subtle taste effects as by the mood-altering and physical dependence of caffeine that drives the daily self-administration.

And the unknown could be especially troublesome for the developing brains of children and adolescents. Logic dictates that when you are dependent on a drug, you are really upsetting the normal balances of neuro-chemistry in the brain. The fact that kids have withdrawal signs and symptoms when the caffeine is stopped is a good indication that something has been profoundly disturbed in the brain.

Exactly where that leads is anybody's guess -- which is to say there is little good research on the effects of caffeine on kids' developing brains.

Bone Weakening
Animal studies demonstrate that phosphorus, a common ingredient in soda, can deplete bones of calcium.

And two recent human studies suggest that girls who drink more soda are more prone to broken bones. The industry denies that soda plays a role in bone weakening.

Animal studies -- mostly involving rats -- point to clear and consistent bone loss with the use of cola beverages. But as scientists like to point out, humans and rats are not exactly the same.

Even so, there's been concern among the research community, public health officials and government agencies over the high phosphorus content in the US diet. Phosphorus -- which occurs naturally in some foods and is used as an additive in many others -- appears to weaken bones by promoting the loss of calcium. With less calcium available, the bones become more porous and prone to fracture.

The soft drink industry argues that the phosphoric acid in soda pop contributes only about 2 percent of the phosphorus in the typical US diet, with a 12-ounce can of soda pop averaging about 30 milligrams.

There's growing concern that even a few cans of soda today can be damaging when they are consumed during the peak bone-building years of childhood and adolescence. A 1996 study published in the Journal of Nutrition by the FDA's Office of Special Nutritional s noted that a pattern of high phosphorus/low calcium consumption, common in the American diet, is not conducive to optimizing peak bone mass in young women.

A 1994 Harvard study of bone fractures in teenage athletes found a strong association between cola beverage consumption and bone fractures in 14-year-old girls. The girls who drank cola were about five times more likely to suffer bone fractures than girls who didn't consume soda pop.

Besides, to many researchers, the combination of rising obesity and bone weakening has the potential to synergistic-ally undermine future health. Adolescents and kids don't think long-term. But what happens when these soft-drinking people become young or middle-aged adults and they have osteoporosis, sedentary living and obesity?

By that time, switching to water, milk or fruit juice may be too little, too late.

Research presented at an American Diabetes Association gathering this summer found that women who went from drinking less than one, non-diet soda a day to one or more daily sodas were nearly twice as likely to develop type 2 diabetes over a four-year period as women who drank less than one soft during a day. (The women who drank more soda also gained more weight over the same period.)

A study published in the Journal of Clinical Endocrinology and Metabolism suggested that fructose, a sweetener found naturally in fruit juice and typically used in concentrated amounts in soft drinks, may induce a hormonal response in the body that promotes weight gain.

Soft Drinks, especially light-colored drinks, and canned iced tea appear to “aggressively” erode teeth enamel in laboratory tests—and it didn’t matter whether they were diet drinks or regular ones, according to a study published in General Dentistry.

Nutrition 101 Part 3 What is a Carbohydrate?

Nutrition 101

Part 3

What is a Carbohydrate?

What are carbohydrates?

Yesterday I defined what a calorie was and that it did not display nutritional value, calorie measurement marks the energy units in foods. Once you break foods down they go into 3 categories Fat, Proteins and Carbohydrates. Within each of these three groups there are a numbers of subset groups in each. Today we will focus on one category and that is Carbohydrates.

The simplest way to understand carbohydrates is to break down what they do for us. Our bodies break down carbohydrates in order to make glucose. Glucose is a sugar that our body uses to give us energy. Carbohydrates generally provide us with fiber, vitamins and minerals.

What Are the Different Kinds of Carbohydrates?

There are two kinds of carbohydrates: simple and complex. We get our simple carbohydrates from foods such as milk, milk products, fruit or table sugar. Complex carbohydrates, on the other hand, come from starches like whole grain-cereal, whole grain bread, beans, potatoes, and starchy vegetables.

As I stated before there are subset categories in each of the three nutrient groups. Simple and complex is a basic subset yet we can further break these groups down into the types of sugars these foods contain. We can also measure them on a ratio scale like the Glycemic Index Ratio. This scale measures the speed at which the carbohydrate is broken down into fructose and glucose in the body. The higher the number the faster the carb converts to sugar in the body. The lower the number the slower the carb converts into usable energy. Too high of a number is typically found in simple carbs and the lower numbered carbs are typically found in the complex carbohydrates.

The trick to staying lean is to keep your blood sugar normal all day long by eating complex carbs based on your activity levels for the next 3 hours. By keeping blood sugar levels in normal range your body can not store fat and makes it difficult to burn muscle fiber.

That is why it is so important to understand what type of carbs you need throughout the day.

As I have already mentioned there are many subsets in carbohydrates so I will briefly give you the description of these different catagories. Carbohydrates may be classified into monosaccharides, disaccharides, oligosaccharides, polysaccharides, and heterosaccharides. The most fundamental type is the simple sugars called monosaccharides, such as glucose, galactose, and fructose. These simple sugars can combine with each other to form more complex type. The combination of two simple sugars is called disaccharide whereas carbohydrates consisting of two to ten simple sugars are called oligosaccharides, and those with a larger number are called polysaccharides.

Carbohydrates are produced in green plants by photosynthesis and serve as a major source of energy in animal diets. They also serve as structural components, such as cellulose in plants and chitin in some animals. Their derivatives play an essential role in the working process of the immune system, fertilization, pathogenesis, blood clotting and development.

Bottom line is understanding carbohydrates can be made very complex. Each and everyone of us eat or have eaten carbohydrates on a daily basis. However simple carbs have become the general populations worst enemy. The introduction of fructose and in particular high fructose corn syrup (HFCS) has become societies number one problem. You see our bodies are not designed to eat high amounts of the sugars and the proof is in the population. HFCS can be compared to crack rock cocaine in its ability to cause addiction. It triggers L-Dopamine response in the brain the exact same way as cocaine or a number of illegal and legal prescription drugs do. HFCS triggers the pleasure center in the brain and it shuts down the production of Leptin (a protein hormone that controls hunger). The more HFCS you consume you more damage you do to your body and its functions. The list of damage HFCS is far too long to list here in this article,

Fact: Obesity is at an all time high, diabetes and cancer are also at epidemic levels. 50% of all Americans are now overweight! Obesity rates in some states are passing 30% of the population.

Fact: Look back in history and you will see a distinct relationship between disease and sugar consumption. The history goes back several hundred years. However HFCS is the new kid on the block and disease and obesity have exploded since it entered our food supplies.

I will be posting a 5 part series on the history of Sugar and the health damages it causes.