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Originally Posted by caedmyn
I've seen some recommendations on this board to take quite a bit of Vitamin C...but if 500 mg does the trick for me, do I really need to take more than that? I started taking Vitamin C (as ascorbic acid) when I got 2 colds in the first 6 weeks I was pregnant with DD. I took 500 mg time release (Shaklee brand if that makes any difference) daily while pregnant, plus another 500 mg if I had a sore throat, which for me is pretty much always a sign of a cold coming on. I haven't had a cold since, and it's been 10 months...even with all the sleep deprivation the last month of pregnancy and the first few weeks post-partum (I normally catch colds more easily when I don't get enough sleep). So...after all the rambling, if this works for me do I need to do anything different?
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If it works for you fine. No idea what Shaklee brand is.
I'm presuming your diet is really good.
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| Also, if illnesses help build the immune system, is it sort of counter-productive to take Vitamin C to prevent illnesses? |
As an adult, technically speaking, your immune system should be routinely in top gear now, and have a fairly smooth transitional time. Education should have been completely since you were three. "Building" the immune system is a redundant concept at this point. The only concept relevant is to "shore it up" if it needs a hand into the saddle so to speak. Those times might be when your body is nutrient deficient or if you have an immunodeficiency, knowing what you are doing helps put up detours to give a helping hand.
From my perspective with an immunodeficiency, I wouldn't survive without vitamin C on a daily basis. My body has different requirements for different times. If, for instance, I go to the big smoke, I know that in order to get through the day and detoxify properly, my body will need about 5 times the amount of vitamin C, and double my normal total mineral intake to stay on an even keel. And that's how the body works.
So for instance, if you get really stressed, your body will pull a lot more vitamin A, EFA's, B vitamins, Folic acids etc, just to run on the spot, so you need to just watch that at the time. You will soon read your body well, which it sounds like you are doing.
Another example. We might need 150mcg of selenium to get through a "normal" day. In our country because of the soils, we must supplement. We have no choice. BUT if the flu came around, I would up that to 400 mcg a day, because that is what is required by the glutathione system and the immune system under those circumstances. By supplementing selenium every day, means that I am supplying it with what it needs to do its biochemical work..
We also live in a copper deficient area. I love it when people talk about healthy diets
and then talk about their family history of aneurisms, and how they are doing this, that and the other (drs prescription usually....) to avoid it.
YET... if they bothered to think, if they KNEW the soils were copper deficient, they would supplement with Copper (and other micronutrients) and the "family history" of aneurysms wouldn't be there. "Family history" is nothing more than generational mineral deficiency, and being ignorant of that. And usually, people with aneurysm in the family have multiple diverse heart problems, yet don't consider that that too might be a mineral problem.
It's a fascinating and complex issue.
Unfortunately, I have not yet found this nutritionally complete food paradise in this country that enables me to live without supplements.
