Vitamin Supplements

Phytochemical

Plants are a rich source of nutrition, but everything that is found in plants is not necessarily a nutrient.

Nutrients are things that our bodies need to grow and function correctly. If you think of a person’s body as a chessboard, nutrients are the chess pieces that are needed to play the game. Sometimes, however, the plants also contain some substance_s that are not chess pieces, although they can influence the game.

Many plants contain chemicals that, just like prescription medicines, have a modifying effect on the body’s processes. About 25% of prescription medicines come from plants. Aspirin, for example, comes from the bark of a type of willow tree, but is a chemically purified and modified form of the original salicylate.

If plant products are used as medicine in their unaltered state, it is called phytotherapy. One of the most popular forms of phytotherapy is ginkgo biloba, an extract of the leaves of a tree found in China, used to treat loss of memory because it dilates the blood vessels of the brain.

If you are taking an anticoagulant like warfarin or aspirin, you should not take ginkgo as it can cause blindness as a result of bleeding inside your eyes.

Make sure that you know enough about the substance you are taking. Discuss it with your health worker. There is a great deal of information available on the advantages and disadvantages, as well as the contraindications, of phytotherapy.

Antioxidant

A lot of the commotion around food supplements is about the group of substances called antioxidants. Antioxidants (also known as anti-free radicals) combat harmful breakdown products (free radicals) that form in our body, or enter our body from the environment.

Free radicals can damage the delicate structures in the body’s cells and therefore should be eliminated as soon as possible. The body has its own set of anti-free radicals that do the elimination work, but sometimes we are attacked by an abnormally large number from the environment or as a result of illness.

Amino Acids

Amino acids are the building blocks of protein. We manufacture many types of amino acid ourselves, but there are a few important ones that we have to get from our food. These are known as essential amino acids.

Some multivitamin preparations contain small quantities of these, but they are also available separatelyand in larger quantities. It is usually necessary to consult a knowledgeable health worker when it comes to taking these expensive, high-dosage preparations.

Fatty Acids

Fatty acids are another group of important components of the body processes. They participate in many reactions, but are especially important as the building-blocks of the cell walls.

Included in this group are a few that are not manufactured by the body, and are therefore known as essential fatty acids. The importance of essential fatty acids in the diet is the reason why people should not go on a fat-free diet. A low-fat diet is better.

Olive oil, flaxseed oil and fish oils are important and convenient sources of this group.

Water

Most of the water that we need each day should preferably com_e from our food. If this is not the case, then water can also be regarded as a food supplement. When you take your vitamin and other supplements every day, you might just as well swallow them down with enough water.

Homeopathic Preparations

Homeopathic preparations are not food supplements. They ar_edifferent substances that are prepared in a specific way in order to act on the body in a unique manner.

A simplified explanation of these treatments, which have been used for restoring the body’s functioning for about 150 years, is as follows: one drop of an extract or active substance from plants, animals or other sources in the environment is added to 99 drops of water mixed with alcohol. The mixture is then fervently shaken a certain number of times (also known as potentiating). A drop of this potentiated mixture is again added to 99 drops of alcohol-water mixture and the new mixture is shaken again in the same way. And so it goes on until the desired dilution or potency (strength) is achieved. (Different stages of illness require different strengths of these homeopathic mixtures to attain the required reaction.)

With the repeated dilution of the original drop used there comes a point where no active ingredients of the original drop are left in the mixture. The potentiating (shaking process) causes the information in the drop’s active ingredients to be transferred to the water molecules, which are conveyed to the body from the water molecules in the form of energy. (The alcohol is there to facilitate the absorption of the homeopathic preparation by the lining of the mouth.)

Homeopathic preparations cannot rectify deficiencies of vitamins or other nutrients, but the energy in the preparations helps to normalise the body’s processes — a lot like the software of a computer making the hardware work better.

Tissue salts are homeopathic mineral preparations used in _very low doses for all kinds of complaints. There are twelve different preparations that are usually suggested, each with a diff_erent function. However, the functions are relatively specific and you are advised not to take all twelve on a regular basis. This is just like watering a plot of land with a whole dam of water.

There is no such thing as a miracle pill. Balance and variation are the basis of a healthy diet. The fresher and less overcooked the vegetables and fruit you eat, the better your absorption of the nutrients they contain. Few people actually manage to follow a diet that contains enough of all these nutrients to enable them to meet the demands of a stressful lifestyle. You therefore have to take your vitamins. A good combination of the extra things you need does not need to cost you a fortune.

I believe in a “vitamin holiday” every now and again. One day a week or one week every two months I don’t take any supplements and just make sure I drink enough water.

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