I think you
both make very good points!!!
I personally also supplement with magnesium - as you may have noticed
- but I also try to get as much magnesium as I can via food.
Ron (aka "Cajunboy47"),
You have been really lucky insofar as you met your Chinese wife who is so knowledgeable about food and so caring. I know that she has done absolute wonders in helping you to regain insulin sensitivity - amazing!!!
The thing is, I bet there are plenty of people out there who are not so far along in their journey as you and haven't quite got to where you are yet. For them, more aggressive supplementation probably is the best route for the minute: you can only acquire so much knowledge at a time!!!
Ted,
And I agree with you, too, Ted!!!
In my own personal case, I think I will have to supplement for a while longer in a relatively "aggressive" fashion, because of my only recently discovered gluten intolerance.
I had been trying to get my magnesium stores up for years - with very little success, I'm afraid. And now I think I have finally found out why neither eating Mg-rich foods nor taking supplements was working: so long as I still ate gluten-containing foods, I was never going to absorb much of
any of the goodness from my foods or supplements!!!
It's a crying shame, really, to think of all the money that I have wasted, but at least I have finally worked it out!!!
I now think I am absorbing nutrients better now as the worst of the symptoms definitely did go away in the last few months (I have been GF since Nov 22nd 2010). However, I stupidly let myself run out of my favourite Mg glycinate (and the German customs seem to be hanging on to my latest iherb.com shipments, expletives galore) and, sure enough, my symptoms have come back - they are not as bad as they were, but it seems to me that I had only just begun to build up a small storage supply of magnesium, which very quickly got used up again.
The only thing I could get hold of quickly here in Germany were those so-called "tissue salts" with Mg phosphate in them, which kept the worst symptoms at bay, but only just (night-time cramps and stiff neck came back, but the cramps weren't of the hopping-around-the-room variety). I also tried my Mg chloride "oil", which also helped.
Yesterday, some Mg glycinate and Mg chloride I ordered from a company in the UK arrived and, of course, I had plenty of Mg yesterday!!!
And, of course, have had the loose stools problem today!!! So, now I have received a timely reminder that there can indeed be "too much of a good thing"...
Anyway, I just wanted to add that supplementation and good food are all very well, but it is also important - if you seem to be having deficiency issues - to try and find out if some other problem is causing poor absorption, too.
I wondered if I had candida, bacterial overgrowth, pernicious anaemia, gluten intolerance, low stomach acid - all or any of these!!!
All of these problems would mean that you wouldn't absorb various nutrients very well, or not at all,
regardless of how aggressively you supplemented or how well you ate.
This was the case with me and, thank goodness, I was also lucky in having a supportive partner - my husband - who encouraged me to start a strict gluten-free lifestyle to discover if it helped. And, sure enough, the constant mild diarrhoea went away after five or so weeks and my energy levels and general well-being have improved immensely.
Now I just need to get some magnesium back in my system again...
Just my two cents...
amanda