Sunday, October 16, 2016

Magnesium: The Master Mineral

Perhaps more than anyone or as much as anyone, I have complaints about how information is presented in all of the nutritional journals. Even as I sit here in a coffee shop I am listening to a woman describe the demise of a friend's husband who went in for gastrointestinal complaints only to learn from his doctor that he had Stage 4 cancer with the doctor giving him 6 to 12 months to live. The medical industry has to create terminology for shock and awe. "Stage 4!!!  Oh, no!!!  It can't be!!!?  This is what I don't like--that doctors, trained monkeys inside the drug/military/industrial complex, are now in the business of offering life sentences instead of offering life-enhancing options, something that will awaken strength, revive energy, and extend life while improving its quality.  Acupuncture is one energy medicine.  They're in the business of increasing Chi.  Chiropractic care does the same thing.  It realigns your spine for greater energy flow.  There.  I'm not a doctor and I've provided two therapies that effectively and are proven to increase energy.  Increased energy means one's body works better, works stronger and more effectively.  But these trained monkeys get to peddle their narratives on the rest of us, narrowing our options instead of presenting a large range of choices.  Oh, they're very scientific, as if that means anything.  How many times do we read where scientific reports were skewed, biased, or otherwise fraudulently concocted to serve the financial reports or political interests of this or that industry or institute?    Just because vitamin or food or nutritionist guru says this or that about any vitamin or mineral doesn't mean that it is going to perform as promised.  Why? Because the reports are hardly ever specific.  Is this a marketing strategy to leave people open to trying and spending thousands of dollars on this or that vitamin or mineral?  Perhaps. That may be the likeliest answer.  Some point to the FDA's regulation on health claims.  If someone can say that Vitamin C cures colds, the fact that it cures renders Vitamin C a medicine, products under strict purview of the FDA. as though it is just an unfortunate thing.  So instead of being specific in their claims, authors cite studies to give weight and authority to their vagueness.  This is not good enough, so don't accept claims that are so vague.  Ask the question, "What do you mean?"  Insist on specifics, on specific meaning.  Some of the best, most well-known nutrition writers, like Mercola, Sardi, Blaylock, Saul, Weston Price, are regularly vague.  Here's one instance.  Sounds interesting, but there is so little if any specific support or citation to make the claim even remotely actionable.  I still read and cite despite the fact that they are frequently vague with their claims. Terms like "improves," "builds," "increases," "raises," "enhances" do not prove anything. They offer hope.  What's that great advice?  Oh, yeah, trust but verify.


First, magnesium's heart benefits:
I cannot emphasize enough the beneficial effects of magnesium supplementation on the health of blood vessels. Magnesium plays a major role in the operation of the endothelial cells, which line vessels and allow for better blood flow.
Abnormally functioning endothelial cells are the earliest and most important change that occurs with atherosclerosis (hardening of the arteries) — hence raising stroke and heart attack risk. Magnesium reduces inflammation in blood vessels (the real cause of atherosclerosis), deters platelets from adhering to the walls of blood vessels, and reduces free-radical damage to body tissues.

It is important to understand that when a person has a heart attack or stroke, it is not because plaque has occluded the blood vessel; it is because a blood clot has stuck to the wall of the vessel and blocked the flow of blood.
By reducing the ability of platelets to stick to vessel walls, magnesium greatly reduces the chance of a blood clot forming. (In general, black people have very low magnesium levels, and despite having lower cholesterol than Caucasians, they have higher risks of strokes and heart attacks.)

 "magnesium greatly reduces the chance of a blood clot forming." Is there anything about that statement that you did not like?  I am trying to understand the downside to magnesium.  I'd wished that someone would've told me of this mineral years ago.  Perhaps I would have scoffed at it then.  I knew better.  I didn't.  That was just my ego talking over my biology.  

One of the reasons that I started writing on food and nutrition is that I was beside myself with how doctors, colleagues, and television commercials pimped drugs willy-nilly.  Even with all of the fatal and debilitating caveats we listen to, if you could follow the fine print or the warp-speed with which they were reported in commercials, people still asked their doctor for them thinking that it was the easy cure, the very thing that would bring them back from the brink.  

Blaylock goes on . . . 
I find it ironic and upsetting that most doctors prescribe the anti-clotting drug Plavix to protect against clotting. Plavix is associated with very severe side effects — some even fatal — and it is very expensive. It works no better than using magnesium, omega-3 oils, ginkgo biloba, or garlic extract, all of which have few side effects and are much less expensive.  So opt for magnesium.  

 Its benefits are far-reaching.  For insomnia, there is nothing better. I prefer it much better to the melatonin.  Melatonin relaxes your muscles too much.  You wake up feeling like a numbing zombie. Don't know how doctors or nutritionists can recommend that. Incredible.  

Beyond sleep, magnesium improves blood vessel integrity, large and small blood vessels.  
One condition that has resisted treatment is progressive small vessel strokes involving cerebral arteries in the brain. In the beginning, one typically experiences few symptoms with this condition. But as more of these tiny blood vessels become blocked, a person can experience paralysis, loss of vision, or a gradual loss of mental function. Conventional treatments are hazardous, costly, and rarely work.
As mentioned above, magnesium improves blood flow in these tiny blood vessels, along with reducing inflammation and helping to prevent clotting. Other supplements that can reduce the conditions that lead to small vessel strokes include:
• Vitamin C (buffered forms)
• Curcumin
• Quercetin
• Ellagic acid
• Hesperidin
• Grape seed extract)
• White tea
It is also important to drink plenty of fluids, as this improves blood flow. 

 Seems to me if you want to ward off stroke, age-related dementia or dementia of any kind, then maintaining adequate doses of magnesium in your body throughout the day would be one, and a very important one, strategy.  How can you not be interested in this, "As mentioned above, magnesium improves blood flow in these tiny blood vessels . . . ."  If you're taking care of elderly relatives, would it not make their lives more painless, more pleasant? Then . . . ? 

Next, we've got Alan Watson from Diet Heart News.  Are you seeing a pattern here?  Articles on magnesium show up in journals and reports on the heart.  Ergo, magnesium is good for the heart. But idiots like me want to know specifics.  I want to know specifically how it is beneficial.  I like hearing about the benefits, but I also want proof.  Most people don't provide proof.  It's the proof that will save you time and money.  
As the late Dr. Atkins was quick to point out, while magnesium is the most important mineral for the heart, few cardiologists bother to (1) test for it properly and (2) prescribe it to their patients. While potassium is more abundant within our cells than magnesium, potassium on average is also 5 to 10 times more abundant in our food. (You don’t have to eat carb-dense bananas to ensure adequate potassium levels.)

Okay, that's good intel.  The nutritional and food media are always telling us how we need our potassium.  Perhaps.  But it seems to me that we're more likely to deplete our stores of magnesium than our abundant supplies of potassium.  I love bananas but their sugar doesn't jibe with me.  I eat bananas with peanut butter.  A delicious snack and certainly more nutritious than the banana all by itself.  So just know that potassium is more abundant in our bodies than magnesium.   
Although potassium is present in highest amounts, magnesium is dominant in regulating essential biochemical processes. Calcium also plays an important role in human chemistry – both are present in the blood, bones, and muscles – but magnesium is predominant in muscle cells and tends to control and balance other mineral electrolytes including calcium, potassium and sodium.

Okay, this too is good intel, "magnesium is dominant in regulating essential biochemical processes."  I don't know how many times I've heard a similar version of this cited by almost everybody, that "magnesium along with chocolate is responsible for 300 biochemical reactions in the body."  Okay.  Of those 300, which are the most important?  It's the irresistible, grandiose vague statements drive me crazy.  Be specific.  Cite one.  Cite five.  Cite all three hundred.  Yet people get away with these claims without ever having to be specific.  So I chase some of the specifics down online.  This statement gets to specifics, but magnesium is predominant in muscle cells and tends to control and balance other mineral electrolytes including calcium, potassium, and sodium.

Note well, magnesium is abundant in muscle cells and controls and balances other minerals in the cells, including calcium, potassium, and sodium.  Interesting.  So, of those 4 minerals, which do you think is the most important?  Yeah . . . .  Check out how magnesium regulates these other minerals:
The heart and the smooth muscles in the blood vessels are particularly sensitive to the balance of calcium and magnesium. Magnesium has a relaxing effect; calcium makes them more rigid. As a natural calcium-channel blocking agent, magnesium displaces and excludes excess calcium within cell membranes. As a natural muscle and artery relaxant, magnesium sufficiency is a key factor in maintaining normal blood pressure and heart beat.

Again, there's magnesium's role in heart health.  Just sayin'.  When I first tried magnesium supplements, I felt a flush, a sense that the blood volume increased or reached more places in my body.  The feeling was fuller, larger, building.  From a clinical standpoint, I don't know if that was good.  I don't have ways to measure if that experience was beneficial to my heart or if my heart was overwhelmed or struggling.  But after that building flush I do know that I felt better, more relaxed, less stressed.  I liked the effect.  
Overall, magnesium ensures that the heart can pump a larger volume of blood without increasing oxygen requirements. Magnesium’s anti-platelet activity enhances the flow of blood in all blood vessels and without the tendency like aspirin to promote bleeding. In the Physician’s Health Study, participants who took aspirin (Bufferin) had twice as many hemorrhagic strokes as those who took a placebo.

That comes from Alan Watson, who founded Diet Heart News. Part of the sifting through information means finding credible authors. Creating a curation site at least shows dedication and commitment to information on the subject.  His article lists 10 important functions of magnesium. 

Blood tests do not tell the whole truth on magnesium levels.  This is another way in which the drug/ military/industrial complex holds sway.
1.  Routine blood tests do not reveal intracellular magnesium. When your doctor says “your magnesium is fine,” she simply means the 1 percent normally found in the blood is present. A correlation does not exist between blood (serum) and intracellular magnesium. The measurement of magnesium in serum has very limited medical significance.

If your diet leans toward too many highly processed carbohydrates, you should definitely supplement with magnesium.
2.  Metabolizing highly processed carbohydrates – food products with corn syrup, sugar, flour, and box cereals – cause magnesium losses in the urine. Magnesium is required for optimum blood sugar control.  Poor blood sugar control, in turn, increases the rate of magnesium excretion further impairing blood sugar metabolism. (Dr. Atkins referred to type 2 diabetes as a magnesium deficiency disease.)

What I glean from the following is that calcium and potassium are more abundant, both in our bodies and in our food supply, than is magnesium.  For this reason, it is important, perhaps necessary, to supplement with magnesium.  Not everyone likes manufactured supplements.  And we can't just pick up any food to get the magnesium, for a calorie is a calorie and it will satiate us.  We may not feel hungry enough to eat that extra serving of spinach or chard. Further, if you drink coffee, a popular diuretic, on a regular basis, you probably should supplement with magnesium.
3.  Commonly prescribed diuretic drugs prevent the kidneys from recycling magnesium (and potassium and sodium), yet most doctors tell their patients to supplement with calcium – not magnesium. Excess calcium from supplements and so called fortified food products aggravates the important calcium-magnesium balance in favor of calcium.

Stress depletes magnesium.  I think we often feel lucky to have survived a stressful situation that we're grateful to gained life. Since we didn't lose our life, we don't think that we've lost much. Hubris perhaps?  Magnesium supplementation may be in order. 
4.  Stress of all kinds causes loss of magnesium. Extreme exercise, running, sweating, and even shivering in the cold promotes magnesium excretion. Anger, driving in rush hour traffic, depression, guilt, and fear all involve sympathetic nervous system activation, increased adrenaline – and loss of magnesium.

Magnesium is important for gut health.  Manufacturers of Pepto Bismal, Milk of Magnesia, Alka Seltzer, and others have bigger budgets.  These might treat the short-term symptoms, but do not treat the causes of gastrointestinal problems.  
5.  We need stomach acid to absorb minerals. Our bodies require magnesium to produce stomach acid. A magnesium deficiency reduces stomach acid which, in turn, reduces mineral absorption. (Keep in mind that the symptoms of excess and insufficient stomach acid are the same.) Don’t reach for an “antacid,” get your intracellular magnesium tested instead.

 Tell me again how doctors know best . . . . 
6.  Due to low stomach acid, reduced nutrient absorption, and the use of diuretic drugs for hypertension, the elderly are at greatest risk of magnesium deficiency. Most cases go unnoticed because doctors do not perform intracellular testing (see #1 above) and quite often discourage any type of nutritional supplementation.

You don't want to be deficient in magnesium.
7.  A quick way to produce kidney stones in animals is to put them on a magnesium deficit diet. Magnesium increases the solubility of calcium in the urine, helping to prevent stone formation. Also, most patients with Chronic Fatigue, fibromyalgia, Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s and MS are deficient in magnesium and would likely benefit from supplemental magnesium.

Want to take better care of your teeth?  The answer is not the dentist. It's magnesium:
8.  Magnesium, boron, strontium and many other minerals add significantly to the quality of bones and teeth. Magnesium regulates the absorption and utilization of calcium. Without sufficient magnesium, bone-building and joint health suffer. Regardless of calcium intake (usually too much), magnesium deficiency leads to arthritis, brittle bones, and osteoporosis.

That should be a concern for all people of all ages.  Bone health.  We all want strong, long-lasting, healthy teeth that can withstand the sugary assault and battery on those gorgeous things that make up our smile, you know--that thing that wins people over to ourselves, that has persuasive effects on others.  If your teeth are bad, you'll have a difficult time persuading others.  I wish this weren't true but it is.  Imagine someone with missing teeth or bad teeth.  What do we do when we see this?  We go closed mouth and feel sorry for the man or woman.  If you don't want people to feel sorry for you, then take care of your teeth.

Then there's heart.  
9.  Concentrated 18 times greater in the heart muscle than in the bloodstream, magnesium regulates heart beat. Magnesium is vital for the heart, arteries, and the cardiovascular system. People dying as a result of obesity, diabetes, metabolic syndrome and coronary heart disease have this in common: intracellular magnesium deficiency.

Wow.  If that's not a selling point, I don't know what is.

I mentioned earlier that I did not konw what the optimal ratio between calcium and magnesium should be.  Watson at least gives us a starting point: 1:1 or 2:1 in favor of magnesium.
10. Supplemental calcium and magnesium should be in a 1:1 ratio or perhaps a 2:1 ratio in favor of magnesium. (Multiple vitamins fail in this regard and often contain cheap, poorly absorbed calcium carbonate and magnesium oxide. While natural whole food is always our best source of minerals, magnesium levels in food have declined substantially during the past 100 years (USDA testing). Remember, too, that we cannot absorb minerals in food or supplements without adequate levels of fat-soluble vitamins A & D – found only in animal food. To increase your mineral absorption, use butter (vitamin A) and lard (vitamin D) on a regular basis.

 I cannot believe the details of this guy.  Fantastic!
Remember, too, that we cannot absorb minerals in food or supplements without adequate levels of fat-soluble vitamins A & D – found only in animal food. To increase your mineral absorption, use butter (vitamin A) and lard (vitamin D) on a regular basis.

See, this is helpful.  Telling a client that he has 6 to 12 months to live is not.  That only raises stress Got stress?  Take magnesium.   

Next, I was interested in internal scarring.  And given how magnesium restores small blood vessels and soft tissue, I thought, maybe, you know, that magnesium may have some benefits there. So I Googled it and found an interesting article from Dr. Sircus on inflammation and systematic stress.  What are his credentials?  He is an allopath with studies in oriental medicine and a Veritas Medical practitioner.  I don't know what that means and how it compares or contrasts with a medical doctor, whether it's an upgrade or not. 


UPDATE, Sun., Oct. 16, 2016, 4:45pm, MT: 
It appears I am guilty of the very thing I complained about: being vague.  In fact, I omitted even the basic critique of my recommendation of magnesium, that being the fact that in not all circumstances is magnesium of benefit.  Taking too much is a serious risk.  And with all the talk about deficiency, one could get into trouble trying to compensate for any perceived and unmeasured or self-diagnosed deficiency.  With supplements not only is there a real risk of taking too much, but your supplement might contain a less effective, more toxic forms of magnesium. One benefit of getting your nutrients from food is that you're less likely to overdose and get sick or worse.
Magnesium oxide is a popular supplement because it is inexpensive, but it’s important to know about the risks and problems associated with it. One thing to know about magnesium oxide is that it is non-chelated, so it doesn’t absorb well compared to other supplements, says Natural News. Chelated minerals have been chemically combined with amino acids so that the body can used them better. 
Magnesium oxide also can cause other side effects. Users commonly experience diarrhea with magnesium oxide, according to Drugs.com. Some other magnesium supplements also cause diarrhea, while some types don’t seem to have that effect and are gentler on the body.
 That comments only on magnesium oxide's poor absorption.  Byt there are some real hazards associated with this variety of magnesium that the manufacturers will never tell you about.  And if you take too much of the bad stuff, they'll only point to your bad judgment as the cause of ill health or demise.  Check out the first article in this list.
Breathing Magnesium Oxide can irritate the eyes and nose. Exposure to Magnesium Oxide can cause “metal fume fever.” This is a flu-like illness with symptoms of metallic taste in the mouth, headache, fever and chills, aches, chest tightness and cough. ... Magnesium Oxide is a white powder
There is more.  Remember that calcium hardens arteries and magnesium softens them?  Taking too much magnesium can cause problems.  Read here:
Humans take in between 250 and 350 mg/day of magnesium and need at least 200 mg, but the body deals very effectively with this element, taking it form food when it can, and recycling what we already have when it cannot.
 There is no evidence that magnesium produces systemic poisoning although persistent over-indulgence in taking magnesium supplements and medicines can lead to muscule weakness, lethargy and confusion.
But which type of magnesium do I take?  Good question.  And here are some very good answers.   
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