Vitamin D and Blood Sugar
Well, well. Vitamin D is, after all, turning out to be quite the wonder vitamin. Vitamin D, a very easily obtained vitamin which is also fairly inexpensive in pill form, and can be freely obtained via sunlight exposure, has long been thought to be a pivotal part of preventing cancer, helping to maintain bone density, and helping to prevent asthma and heart disease, among a host of many other health benefits.
After the villification of the sunlight as a cancer causing agent, a lot of research has instead pointed to combining sunlight with hazardous chemical-laced sunscreens and tanning products as a major contributor as well. This is not to say that excessive exposure to sunlight cannot cause skin cancer.
It most certainly can. However, it seems more and more likely that a combination of not having enough vitamin D circulating in the blood stream and antioxidants, may be more the culprit than the sunlight itself in the burning and cell damage done on some people from the sun.
Researchers in Australia are also now uncovering significant evidence that vitamin D levels circulating in the blood may be linked to blood sugar levels remaining stable. They found a correlation between low vitamin D levels and diabetes, showing that those with low vitamin D levels had over a 50% higher chance of developing diabetes.
It is not known exactly why vitamin D seems to protect people from developing diabetes throughout their lives. Perhaps we will know why in our lifetime, this vitamin seems to be so pivotal to so many human body functions, including now diabetes prevention.
I must say that since I have been taking vitamin D and getting artificial sunlight via a UVB tanning booth twice a week, I have not gotten sick once. So I firmly believe that vitamin D levels contribute heavily to an awesome immune response, among a huge range of health benefits.
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Can Acai Really Help You Lose Weight?
It seems like as soon as the acai berry became a sensation for it’s potentially stellar antioxidant properties, and it’s trace element of omega 3 fats in the berry, that there was an instant monsoon of acai “diet products” on the market that purported to help you shed pounds through it’s antioxidant power. Wait a second here, antioxidants help you lose weight? That was certainly news to me, so I thought it sounded somewhat like hype, and apparently I was right.
The fact is, acai berry is definitely a great source of antioxidants for the human body. Just the fact that it is such a VERY deeply pigmented fruit that it’s almost black should tell you that it’s an excellent, nutrient packed and antioxidant packed fruit, just going off of the conventional wisdom that darkly pigmented fruits and veggies are traditionally the most nutrient dense.
Does ingesting a lot o nutrient dense foods make your weight loss goals a lot easier and more attainable? ABSOLUTELY! So, it’s not a stretch to imagine that eating a lot of acai fruit will help you lose weight, if the rest of your diet is in order too, but that’s true of any nutrient dense, calorie-spare food. What of it’s weight loss benefits in a pill?
Well, a good, but real and pure acai supplement can definitely help you achieve higher energy levels, and certainly adds a boost to your body’s antioxidant stores, but what most likely helps you to lose weight in most of these supplements is not the acai berry itself, but the stimulants that are included in the supplement, like caffeine or something similar that acts as an appetite suppressant, since there have been no singularly weight loss benefits identified in the acai berry yet.
I still say that if you are looking for a great antioxidant and a great diet pill, maybe you could try an acai “fat loss” diet pill, but make sure it’s actually pure acai in the ingredient label, since there are really no regulations governing this labeling yet. If it doesn’t at least make you feel better, then it may not be worth it if you are using it just for weight loss, or as just an antioxidant supplement, so judge for yourself how it interacts with your body and benefits you.