Thursday, February 7, 2008

Is Food Enough?

I have watched with great interest over the past year an ongoing debate that pits food against vitamins.

Which is better? Which do we need more of? What is the proof for either side?

The simple answer to the food versus vitamin debate is that you can benefit immensely from food and should always eat healthy, but you can also benefit immensely from proper supplementation.

Foodists argue that Mother Nature has placed everything we need right here for us and that eating healthy is all we should ever have to do.

Supplementers like me have a different opinion.

Everyone should make every attempt to eat healthy. I do, and so should you.

But I do not for one minute believe that most people do it all the time or even enough to really derive great health benefits from it.

I always tell my typical patient to take a multi vitamin and fish oil. It’s inexpensive insurance against serious gaps in the diet.

Now what about all the other great things you miss in food, like fiber and the rich interaction between antioxidants and vitamins?

No one can argue with that, but remember, lands and seas are polluted and nutrient deficient compared to 100 years ago, and a significant number of foods contain more water than vitamins these days.

Go to the store in the dead of winter and buy a tomato. Do you think that sorry excuse for a tomato has anywhere near the vitamin C or lycopene your local farmer gets from his crops at the end of the summer?

I sure don't.

Remember, we are talking now just about the very basics of nutrition; just enough to get by.

Now let's throw long hours, family, work demands, stress and exposure to sickness into the mix.

Kinda makes you want to pop an extra multi vitamin or some super berry concoction, doesn't it?

And for good reason!

Neither food nor drugs got rid of my high blood pressure. Supplements did.

Neither food nor drugs help me to sleep when I absolutely have to. I use a supplement when needed.

I don't rely on food or drugs to protect me from the flu, I use a supplement.

And when I work out too hard and start to ache, I reach for fish oil, not mercury laden fish, Motrin or Tylenol.

When I want and need big doses of nutrients and vitamins to help me live at my highest level, I use supplements.

I cannot even imagine a day without them.

I used to try to eat healthy enough that all my aches, pains and fatigues would go away.

It didn't work.

If you are like 99% of individuals out there, it won't work for you either.

Why fight it?

Do both: eat right and take your supplements. I promise you'll have the last laugh in more ways than one!

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