Tag Archives: vitamins

Why Does My Body Need Vitamin B6?

There are a lot of different vitamins and minerals listed on that multivitamin label — but do you know what each one does for your body? Vitamin B6 is found in three substances: pyridoxine, pyridoxamine, and pyridoxal. So what does this vitamin do for your body? Prevent heart disease — without pyridoxine, compounds in the blood can damage blood vessels. Pyridoxine also can help lower blood pressure and cholesterol levels. Relieve PMS — vitamin B6 can help reduce bloating, breast tenderness, and premenstrual acne. Reduce sensitivity to MSG — pyridoxine can relieve symptoms like headache, pain, nausea, and vomiting. Reduce … Continue reading →

Why Does My Body Need Vitamin D?

Back in the 1920s, people prevented rickets by taking cod liver oil. Lucky for us, these days milk is fortified with vitamin D! But vitamin D does more than prevent rickets — do you know what this vitamin does for your body? Vitamin D helps your body absorb calcium and phosphorus — two minerals that are important in bone and tooth growth. But it doesn’t only help you absorb the minerals; vitamin D helps your body regulate their use. In other words, the vitamin helps tell your body whether to deposit these minerals into your bones or take them out … Continue reading →

Why Does My Body Need Vitamin A?

What’s number one on that multivitamin label? Vitamin A! It may be at the top of the list, but do you know why your body needs it? Vitamin A is critical for your vision — especially night vision. A deficiency of vitamin A is a major cause of blindness around the world. This vitamin (also known as retinol) also helps promote growth, skin cell regeneration, and reproduction. Vitamin A drops can help relieve dry eyes. Vitamin A also helps keep your mucous membranes healthy and your immune system functioning. The moistness of your mucous membranes helps your body trap and … Continue reading →

Buy One Get One Free Vitamins – Plus Coupons

I’m a firm believer in supplements. Not because they are better than eating whole foods (they aren’t), but because since I’ve been tracking exactly what I eat, the areas in which I am lacking are now very clear. I take a daily prenatal vitamin. I’m neither pregnant nor likely to become so, but the prenatal contains folic acid that helps prevent the neuropathy that is common among diabetics. It still doesn’t cover everything. Though the jury is still out, I have found that my blood sugars are somewhat better when I am taking chromium piccolate. I was surprised when looking … Continue reading →

How to Stay Healthy at the Office

I work in an office where people tramp in and out all day long. Employees, clients, and random people with nothing better to do (I’ve had a couple of those in the last week) all come down to the office to talk, which is fine, of course, except when they leave “presents” behind–those nasty things called germs. I have already been yucky sick this winter when I got a bad case of bronchitis and laryngitis. I was out of work for two days, which isn’t an experience I want to live through again any time soon. Problems are not solved … Continue reading →

Herbs and Surgery

If you’re heading in for any sort of surgery, it may not occur to you to talk to your doctor about the herbal supplements you’ve been taking. Sure, you always keep track of your medications and keep the list updated with your health care professionals, but you should also let your doctor know about herbal supplements. Herbal supplements that don’t interact with your everyday prescription medications may affect the outcome of a surgical procedure. You may need to stop taking herbal supplements as long as three weeks before surgery to make sure they are out of your system. Some herbal … Continue reading →

Migraines and Magnesium

Some recent research from a team at the State University of New York shows that magnesium may have an impact on your migraine suffering. Migraines affect a lot of people in the United States — approximately eighteen million women and five million men. I can remember my mother being practically incapacitated by occasional migraines when I was a child; she would lie in a dark room and we couldn’t turn on the lights or make too much noise. Eighty percent of patients in the study done by the State University of New York responded positively to magnesium within fifteen minutes … Continue reading →

If Diets Don’t Work …

I’ve been there. I’ve thought the same thing. If dieting really doesn’t work, what is the point of dieting? Dieting itself isn’t meaningless, the problem is that we associate dieting with a short-term solution. We think of a diet as something we go on – ergo it is also something we will go off. The changes we need to make are lifelong ones. We need to improve our eating habits. We need to exercise more regularly. We need to make better choices in what we do or don’t do. If you can’t imagine yourself doing a diet for the rest … Continue reading →

What your hair can tell you about your health

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A couple of years ago, I started finding that my once thick, long, almost perfect hair was falling out in clumps, breaking easily, and thinning considerably. I’d just had my daughter and spent a month in and out of hospital with pancreas and kidney problems caused by a trapped gallstone – so I assumed it was because, of course, my body didn’t have enough vitamins to support my hair. I guessed right, but its taken far longer to restore even some of than balance than I ever expected. When your hair changes texture, or starts falling out in noticeable amounts, … Continue reading →