Supplements, Nutrition and Health

I had great success taking Vitamin D supplements and Cod Liver Oil. Now, when I say great success, I mean pretty darn close to life changing. It has become the difference between going through my days feeling constantly down and completely apathetic about everything, to the point where I would feign interest or excitement, as opposed to being able to go about my day with genuine excitement and joy.

Currently I'm also taking a zinc supplement. At least for a while, I want to see if it has a particular positive influence on my female health. And I'm oil pulling daily, if nothing else then to keep my teeth healthy and cavity free, which I'm happy to say that I certainly don't miss that toothache!

But then, today as I walked down the supplement aisle in the supermarket, and looked at all the bottles, I started wondering. What else could have such a big positive impact on my health, that I just hadn't know I was missing before. There are literally thousands of supplements out there!!

I debated the acidophilus, but then figured I eat plenty of yogurt so I'm sure I get plenty of those good lactobacillus bacteria. Then I looked at the lysine, which is good apparently for cold sores, herpes and I don't what else. There's the CoQ10, your run of the mill vitamins and minerals, plants I'd never heard off, all kinds of extracts, enzymes, etc. etc.
Not to mention all the things out there like oil pulling and drinking apple cider vinegar solutions, that could be weird but genuinely work, or could be by total whack jobs.

I wish there existed a good primer on these things. What to use, when, and why. It's so hard sometimes doing the research myself. I don't trust 90% of the websites I find online. Much of it are sales pitches, pseudo scientific theories, hippy wishful thinking, and mainstream closed mindedness. I always have to check the pro and con websites, and run back to my university library link, and check against actual medical studies that I look up on there.

I read probably 2 dozen websites and things before deciding to take zinc, and determining that it's safe. I checked all the overdose and deficiency symptoms, double checked what the dosage should for someone with a decent diet and of small body weight, and made sure I was aware of how my body was reacting. Same with the oil pulling. I looked at the people swearing by it, and the people laughing and saying it's a hack. Only after making sure there was no real harm in it I tried it myself. I was even nervous about overdosing on vitamin D. When I found out that you can get 10,000 I.U. from spending only 30 minutes tanning, I figured I could take my 2000 I.U. safely.


Nutrition and Kids

Digressing here a little, I was also thinking about how I ate growing up. Or I should probably how I didn't eat. I say this as a cautionary tale for upcoming future generations of kids.
I think it might shock dad especially, to know the deceptions and lengths I went to as a 7 to 14 year old kid to avoid having a meal I didn't really like. It didn't matter if I got yelled at, it only made me try harder to cover up the fact that I didn't eat, and make my story solid enough to stand the questioning. Skipping lunch (bland white rice and an icky stew, or worse, zuchinni stuffed with rice!) and eating cookies later to fill myself up made perfect sense to my ten year old mind. Getting nutrition was vague unexplained concept that seemingly consisted of me having to eat a lot not so tasty food, and some weird irrelevant food pyramid at school that we never really discussed nor followed at home. Watching what you eat was only for old or fat people.

Sometimes I wonder whether that has had a lasting effect on my health, and whether my problems are directly related to that, or simply incidental. I guess I'll never know.

My point is this. People underestimate the importance of teaching children, especially ones without such a big appetite, to eat well and enjoy food. To understand what nourishment means, why nutritious food like meats, vegetables, fruit, dairy etc. are important to the body, and why sugars can be damaging and must be eaten in moderation. Honestly, growing up, I wanted to eat grilled chicken, steaks, grapes, mandarins, cheese without any bread, and more grilled chicken all the time. I certainly tried my best to, but when I couldn't, I ate cookies instead.
I'm just really thankful that I got some nutrition. Dad always indulged my seemingly endless appetite for chicken when I was younger. And I still can't believe mom woke up everyday at 5:00am before school for 4 years, and made me a whole wheat bread sandwich with beef or chicken cold cuts, cheese, lettuce, green peppers, tomatoes and mustard. Gosh, that sandwich was so good! My lazy butt got tired just typing that!!!

So my most important advice as someone not too far from being a hard to feed kid: DO NOT force kids to eat bland white rice (or heck, even rice) and bland white bread, I can honestly say it's terrible. If kids hate a meal, they hate it for a reason. They usually find it bad tasting. I suggest finding a way to make it tastier to them (I've found adding cheese to anything will make it really good :P )
And don't buy that box of cookies, candies, sugared cereal, sugared Cerelac (which has very little nutritious value for little toddlers and babies!!), or soft drinks. Generations grew up without it, they can too. If they want to ruin their health as adults that's their choice, but as kids at least you can give them their best start.