WHY SUPPLEMENT
Can we get all the NUTRITION from our food?
I hear it from my clients all the time, “I am eating healthy home-cooked food so why do I need to take supplements? Plus I don’t like taking so many pills, so can’t you just tell me a diet plan that will be enough for me?”
It’s a perfectly valid question and one which even I wondered about at one point. Growing up in India, I was brought up on a healthy diet and I never saw my parents, grand-parents or family members take supplements. The only pills they used to take were the ones prescribed by the doctors. In India we have Ayurveda so if I ever had any health issues, I would go to the ‘Hakeem’ (Ayurvedic doctor).
So when I was first introduced to supplementation, I was really surprised by the amount of energy I felt when I started taking them. Since I couldn’t understand the energy changes, I decided to do some research on supplements and how to tell which ones are good.
True Health begins with taking the time to educate yourself and this is exactly where my health journey began. I learnt about the environmental impact on our health, the nutrition gap that we are currently dealing with and also about how to tell if the supplements I am using are good quality or not.
In this article I will break down everything I learnt from my research and why that changed my mind about supplementation.
Free radical damage from THE ENVIRONMENt:
1. Air Pollution
These days we are living in an environment where most cities have a lot of air pollution which is ongoingly introducing heavy metals into our system. These toxins can run havoc on our bodies and cause liver congestion along with other health issues.
2. Radiation
We all carry cellphones and/or laptops everywhere we go, so we are at all times surrounded by radiation. Again this radiation impacts our health whether we believe it or not.
3. Toxins
Our food is heavily sprayed with pesticides/insecticides which are extremely harmful for our body and don’t necessarily wash off (Tip: Pesticides etc. are fat soluble, so if you wash them with one part vinegar and three parts water, you have a much higher chance of getting rid of quite a bit).
4. Use of medication
These days people depend more and more on pharmaceutical drugs for all sorts of health issues ranging from headaches, colds to major diseases like diabetes etc. Our fast paced life means that no matter how our body feels, we need to work, so we pop a pill and keep going.
5. Stress
We live in a time and age where its common for most people to have a lot of stress in their lives. This stress could be money related, job-related or a number of other situations. Think how you feel when you send an email or a text message to the wrong person. Yup that’s the feeling I’m talking about.
All the above factors, create a lot of free radical damage in our body. This on going damage over time causes degenerative diseases. The only things that help protect and repair this damage are antioxidants. We get our vitamins, minerals and antioxidants from fruits and vegetables.
But do you know that there’s a huge nutrition gap we are dealing with when it comes to fruit and vegetables?
A GLIMPSE OF THE NUTRITION GAP:
1. Soil Depletion
The soil these days is highly depleted (There’s a lot of research available to show this), mainly due to the mass production of food. Therefore, if the soil is depleted and doesn’t have enough nutrition, it’s impossible for the plants, (that are grown in this soil) to have it. And if the plants don’t have enough nutrition, then how are we supposed to get it?
Because of the soil depletion, if we are going to get all the nutrition our body needs per day from our food alone, we will need to eat a LOT of food. For example, you will need to eat 44 large eggs a DAY to get 1800 IU of vitamin D or 80 bananas a day to get 32mg of vitamin B6 which is what our body needs each day.
2. Fast Foods
Lets face it, in our fast paced lifestyle, we don’t have the time to plan and cook balanced meals anymore. So we depend more and more on takeaway foods and quick fixes that have little nutrition value.
3. Shipping & Distribution
Have you noticed that you can get fruit and vegetables that are off-season and from a different country quite easily in the supermarkets nowadays. It is because they are preserved and shipped from place to place. It is wonderful to have it all available but its also important to know that these foods have a very low amount of nutrition as they are plucked from the plants too soon and preserved for a long time.
Therefore, given the above factors, you can see that the stress on our bodies is high and the nutrition that helps our body with the repair process is low. I believe that this is the reason why more people are dying from degenerative diseases these days than ever before.
This is where Supplementation comes in. These days, the easiest and most effective way to fill this nutrition gap and to equip our bodies to deal with the everyday stresses is to take high quality nutritional supplements alongside a healthy diet.
But before you go and buy just any supplement off the shelf, remember, not all supplements are created equal, so its really important to do your research before choosing one.
THINGS TO LOOK FOR WHEN CHOOSING A SUPPLEMENT:
Pharmaceutical Grade:
Pharmaceutical grade products are tested rigorously and have to meet the GMP standards to ensure the highest quality. The government requirement for pharmaceutical grade products is 100% (which means that 100% of what’s on the label has to be in the bottle).
Most supplements available in the pharmacies and supermarkets are Food Grade. The government requirements for Food Grade supplements is 20% (As long as 20% of the ingredients on the label are in the product, they are passed for distribution). So you really can’t know how much of the nutrition is in the products and there is a possibility of there being toxicity and fillers in them.
Nutrisearch Comparative Guide to Nutritional Supplements:
This is an amazing 3rd party tool. It’s easily available on amazon. In this book, Lyle MacWilliam (former member of the Canadian parliament), has compared over 1600 different products in the market and rated them on the basis of their quality. This is great because its an impartial rating for different brands based on the quality of their products and not the marketing hype. Because let’s face it, every company says that their product is the best, but to get that proof from a third party is indisputable.
Consumer Lab:
www.consumerlab.com is another great resource for people to check the quality of the products they are taking. Feel free to check the products here before purchasing.
I personally use and recommend the supplements from USANA Health Sciences, because they meet all of the above criteria and more. They have an FDA approved manufacturing facility and their products are pharmaceutical grade. They have the highest rating in the Nutrisearch comparative guide and on consumerlab.com.
This gives me a lot of confidence to recommend these products to my clients because I know that they are getting the highest quality and will get the results they are seeking. Our health matters and it’s important to make sure that what we are putting in our body is good quality and not something that might create more damage than good. Making our health a priority and investing in ourselves can ensure a lifetime of health and happiness so make sure you get on the health wagon and choose wisely.
You can check out the USANA products HERE.
OVER TO YOU:
What were 2 of your Aha moments where you learnt something and what are 2 action steps you can take? Please comment below. We love hearing from you and read every single comment. Also if you have any specific topics you would like us to discuss, please feel free to comment below or email us at glamourandpurpose@gmail.com
Lots of Love,
Simar xo
