General Discussion

Today, I had a great conversation with a friend of my Aunt's about vitamins.  She had several excellent questions...all valid...and all that I've heard before.  Rather than posting a recent study or new info, I though I would share some of that info with you here.

A question was raised referring to the fact that many people don't feel any different when taking vitamins.  My response is always, "How do you know?".  Let's just say you are taking a multi-vitamin and fish oil to try and lower your cholesterol.  Can you actually SEE or FEEL your cholesterol coming down?  Or how about your blood pressure?  Unless you are monitoring your BP at home, you really can't see or feel a difference.  The point is, just because you can't SEE or FEEL as difference, doesn't mean changes aren't happening in your body.

Your body is made up of billions of cells.  Every day, cells die and new cell regenerate.  In fact, in the span of 9-12 months your body will regenerate all new cells.  Yes, in 1 year you are a "new person".  The trick is to get rid of the bad cells in your body and and keep the old healthy cells, as well as the new cells, healthy.

Cells become bad through a process called oxidation.  And how does that happen you ask?  Think of a car left out in the rain for an extended period of time.  What happens?  It rusts, or oxidizes.  The same thing is happening in your body.  And to fight that, you need to take anti-oxidants.  Free Radicals are the cause and they carry a charge with them.

A quick analogy is this.  Remember when you were young and you would rub a balloon on your head and stick it to a wall?  You are giving the balloon a static charge.  That charge is what causes it to stick to the wall.  Likewise, let's take cholesterol as an example.  If cholesterol becomes charged in your body, it sticks to the walls of your arteries.  But if it's NOT charged, it won't stick to the walls and won't create blockages.  Therefore, the way to combat damage to your arteries is to make sure your cholesterol doesn't become charged from free radicals.

Dr. Ladd McNamara has an excellent book call 'The Cholesterol Conspiracy ' which details this further.  But for now, it's worthwhile knowing the basics.

Keep this in mind when thinking about free radicals.  Smoking (1) cigarette creates 1 quadrillion free radicals in your body (http://www.hyperhealth.com/demo/free_radicals.htm).  OK, that sounds like a big number, but have you even HEARD of a "quadrillion".  Oh, it's a number.  Let me put in into perspective.  If you spent $1 Million dollars every DAY since Christ was born (AD 0) that would equal $733 Billion Dollars.  A quadrillion is the next step after a billion.  That's a lot.  And we are exposed to free radicals every day.

Ben Franklin once said, "An Ounce of Prevention is Worth a Pound of Cure".  Those are words to live by.  Literally.