Vitamin D or Super-vitamin?

Why Vitamin D is important.

Vitamin D – or the sunshine vitamin – is an extremely important vitamin, especially in higher-latitude countries such as Ireland, where we don’t get enough of the sunlight required to make sufficient amounts of D. Consequently, this is having an effect on our health.

The current Irish RDA is 10µg (though this is just enough to prevent poor bone health. Some experts such as Dr. Hollick, recommend 25µg daily for optimum benefits). But it is almost impossible to reach your requirements through food consumption.

That’s where the sun is meant to come into play. But of course, if you live in a place like Ireland – where when we see the sun, we practically fall on our knees and sing songs of worship – then that’s not going to help you out much either.

So what the heck should we do? Ahhhhhhh!

No, its okay, don’t panic! Vitamin D supplements are here to save the day.

Now, personally, I like to get my supplements in Holland and Barrett. You should look out for their sales. I always get mine in their "half-price" sale – a 250 pack of 25 µg Vitamin D for €10.99. €10.99 divided by 250 = 4.4 cent a tablet. #Bargain.

Here's the link for the ones I use.

Vitamin D’s most eminent function is its contribution to healthy and strong bones. But researchers are constantly finding links between vitamin D and other health factors such as cancer, immunity, and diseases.

Intrigued yet? You should be. Now, let’s have a look at its role in our health.

Bones

We’ll start with the basics. Vitamin D – as many already know – is essential for proper bone formation. Lack of vitamin D in children leads to soft, malleable bones that end up buckling under the child’s weight. This is a bone disease called rickets, and causes pain for the child, as well as deformities that will affect the child’s physical abilities. It can occur in adults too, in which case it’s called osteomalacia. There’s been a sudden reoccurrence of rickets-cases in Ireland, which is why all children should receive supplements, starting with newborns which the FSAI recommend receive 5µg.

But please do not be sceptical when it comes to vitamin D supplementation. You might think “Well, supplements aren’t from nature, so we shouldn’t need them.” But here’s the catch:

Why we even need Vitamin D supplements

Evolution just assumed we’d live our lives in the outdoors. You know – semi-naked people, draped in leaves and fur, picking berries from the trees, smelling like our own waste products – yup, those kinds of cavemen. But, Evolution totally excluded the possibility that we might get clever, and wealthy, and materialistic, and build houses and cities, and never actually spend time in the sun at all. Evolution is very naturalist-pro.

And if you’re Caucasian you haven’t got the worst of Evolution's hindrance. Because if you are dark-skinned, that means your skin is

very resistant to the sun’s rays. Again, this is due to Evolution, which thought it was being kind by protecting dark-skinned individuals (who natively lived near the equator where the sun’s rays are strongest) from UVA rays that damage the skin. But again, it didn’t take into consideration that we might create planes that fly us from the middle of the earth to the top. And so, dark-skinned people in higher latitudes are at greatest risk of D-deficiency. So, please, do take your vitamin D. It’s not expensive. And it’ll do your health the world of good.

Just some of Vitamin D's Health Benefits

1.Current cancer research has shown that there is significant evidence that Vitamin D prevents many types of cancer. (You can find more information about this here.)

2.Our immune systems benefit from adequate Vitamin D intake. This makes sense when you think about how every winter everyone comes down with colds and flus. The correlation being the reduced sunlight in the winter, thus the inability for us to produce any vitamin D in our bodies. Winter-time is when we need our supplements the most.

You know, as a little anecdote, I only began taking vitamin D in September 2016. I usually get very sick every winter with bronchitis, flus, colds, that one case of pneumonia… but this year, I thought “I’m frickin' invincible”. I went through the entire winter without even a sniffle. But... then I got a flu at the beginning of February 2017, and it really put a damper on my super-woman feels. I was just about to stitch the superhero-costume with a great big “D” on the torso. But anyhow, one flu versus the many flus and colds I usually get – I’d call that a win!

3.There is also a link between inflammatory diseases and vitamin D deficiency. In fact, for anyone suffering severe arthritis and even multiple sclerosis, you should consider looking into vitamin D as treatment. Dr. Hollick aka Mr. Vitamin D, has a book called “The Vitamin D Solution” found here, and in it he names the many diseases that vitamin D can help treat, and what dosages to take etc.

The benefits don't stop there, there's a multitude more.

Sun exposure

When the sun comes out, it is very important for our health to expose our bare skin to it. While suncream is essential to block the UVA rays that cause skin damage, it unfortunately blocks the UVB rays that convert the chemical in our skin to vitamin D. For this reason, in mild but sunny conditions, we should allow a few minutes of sun exposure before we apply cream. And a few minutes means about fifteen. But you must be very careful in intense heats, in which case you should just protect yourself with cream, and take your supplements to meet your vitamin D RDA. Because I can just imagine someone shuffling up to me, as red as a lobster, groaning through their slit of a mouth: "But you said I needed vitamin D."

So as a conclusion: Vitamin D is a crucial factor in our health. So please, make it your duty to take your vitamin D as a single vitamin. Avoid getting it in a multivitamin, because you likely don't need the others in the complex, and the quantity of vitamin D is usually very low in multivitamins. So strive for just a Vitamin D tablet, and remember, Holland and Barrett sells their 250pk of 25µg Vit-D supplements for €10.99 when its on sale.

#vitaminD #sunshine