When’s the last time YOU slipped on the ice?
A few months ago when I was carrying 4 gallons of drinking water from the water filling station back to my car, I tripped over my feet and fell face first across a concrete sidewalk. Still holding on to the 4 gallons of water when I landed, I did a belly flop on the concrete, with arms stretched overhead. Feeling like a total dork, I got up and walked away from the scene unhurt. It was surely an LOL moment for anyone who was able to witness my clumsiness. Later on, I wrote about this in my status update on facebook because I thought it would give people a good laugh. (Video footage would have been hilarious. Where are the paparazzi when you need them?)
Instead, many people commented with extreme concern.
“You fell?! Oh no! Are you hurt? Did you break a bone?!” Facebook friends were freaking out, and incredibly surprised when I informed them that I had emerged unscathed from falling on concrete. I’ve fallen on ice, rock, and concrete, and most recently even somersaulted out a window. Despite having a petite frame, I’ve never broken anything (at least not any body parts).
But unfortunately, there are many women — even those only in their teens and twenties — who suffer from bone breaks just doing regular everyday stuff (walking, running, skating, hiking, falling, somersaulting out windows, etc.). The conventional health information being spread by misinformed health professionals and mainstream media tells us that women who have a small bone structure are at a high risk for osteoporosis.
To combat osteoporosis, women are told to drink our milk (at least 3 glasses of pasteurized milk a day!), take a calcium supplement (1000 mg/day for women under 50; 1200 mg/day for women 50+), perform weight bearing exercise (dumbbells anyone?), and make sure we have an average BMI according to the BMI chart that was created by the Metropolitan Life Insurance company. And when we hit forty, we are supposed to expose ourselves to high levels of radiation each year by getting a DEXA scan. If our bones are found to be less dense than the “average” woman, we’re told to take Boniva. [Please note: Men get osteoporosis too, but the calcium marketing hype is primarily directed at women because supposedly we lose bone mass like crazy after menopause.]
But is this really the way to prevent osteoporosis and bone breaks?
And does menopause precipitate bone loss? Well, for anyone willing to look beyond what we’re told by the mass media and the drug companies, the actual scientific research and population studies don’t support the information so many Americans have been lead to believe. And that’s why osteoporosis continues to be a growing epidemic — even among women who are diligent with their calcium pills and Boniva. Why do Americans have one of the highest rates of osteoporosis even though we also have the highest intake of calcium in our diets? We’ve been fed lies so that we’ll need more pharma drugs.
What’s causing the osteoporosis epidemic?
Lack of vegetables in the diet (multiple mineral deficiencies), too much caffeine from soda, sedentary lifestyle, smoking, extreme vitamin D deficiency caused by false belief that the sun causes cancer, use of antibiotics causing disruption in our intestinal biota, extreme vitamin K deficiency, chronic stress, and a low-fat diet which hinders calcium assimilation.
Keep in mind that your bones are living tissue, and bone “density” is not really the best indicator of bone health, strength, and vitality. Having “big bones” (a stocky skeletal structure) as opposed to the so-called “at risk” small bone bone structure can make your bones appear more dense under a DEXA scan, but this does not necessarily mean you are less susceptible to developing a hunched back or breaking a bone. To avoid bone breaks and a decrease in height as you age, the key is to avoid having brittle bones.
Based on the real science, the top things you can do to strengthen your bones, keep them strong, and avoid osteoporosis are listed below:
1. Eat your veggies. You really should be getting at least 10 servings of veggies (especially the green leafies) daily for optimal health. The minerals (not just the calcium) in the vegetables actually feed your bones and keep them strong and healthy. To get more vegetables into your diet, start juicing them and also using a superfood greens powder.
2. Make bone broths. These are tasty mineral-rich soups that are really not that difficult to make. Just throw some bones into a big cooking pot, add a little lemon juice or apple cider vinegar, and simmer.
3. Do yoga. The physical aspect of yoga is called yoga asana, and if you can find a yoga teacher who is skilled at teaching asana, you will learn special bodyweight exercises that are weight-bearing exercises that strengthen both your muscles and your bones. If you cannot find an asana instructor in your area, you can learn yoga online. Another aspect of yoga incorporates mindfulness, breathing exercises, and meditation. These are important for helping you to act wisely in stressful situations, which not only benefits your entire life and the people around you, but it also lowers your cortisol level. (Cortisol is a stress hormone made by your adrenal glands, which are located in your lower back above your kidneys. High cortisol levels contribute to bone loss and osteoporosis.)
4. Eat fermented foods every day or take a probiotic supplement and a vitamin K2 supplement. And don’t avoid healthy fats such as coconut oil, palm oil, butter, fats found in grass-fed beef, fatty fishes, and olive oil. These bone loss prevention methods help your body to absorb and assimilate the minerals from your diet that feed your bone tissue. Learn more about vitamin K2, the “missing link” vitamin here.
5. Take an astaxanthin supplement to protect your skin from sun damage and photoaging instead of using sunblock. Wearing sunblock can increase your risk of obesity as well as skin cancer and osteoporosis by blocking your body’s natural production of vitamin D (the only hormone that you can purchase without a prescription). If you spend a large portion of your day indoors, if you have a dark complexion, or if you don’t live in a sunny tropical area, you most likely will require a vitamin D supplement as well as some natural sun exposure in order to have an optimal amount of vitamin D in your body to prevent osteoporosis and other conditions.
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• 2000 IU per serving
Servings per Container: 365
Amount Per Serving
Vitamin D3 (cholecalciferol) 2000 IU
Vitamin E (as d-alpha tocopherol) 1 IU
Other Ingredient: Medium chain triglyceride oil (coconut and palm source).
Sugar-free, soy-free, corn-free, wheat-free, gluten-free, natural color, preservative-free.
