Chances are you’re already taking the Foundation Supplement we’re going to discuss today. But the “kicker” is that no matter how much of this mineral you take, your bones can’t retain it unless certain key organs are functioning well.
I’m referring to magnesium, a mineral that is blatantly ignored by the Medical Establishment with regard to osteoporosis. But the fact is, when it comes to bone health, magnesium is every bit as important as calcium. It’s involved in an astounding number of vital body processes.
In today’s post, you’ll discover seldom-mentioned bone-building benefits of magnesium, its role in your overall health, and the crucial role your kidneys play to maintain optimal levels.
So let’s delve into the fascinating world of this Foundation Supplement!
Your Bones Crave Magnesium
Magnesium (Mg+) is one of the primary minerals found in the bone matrix. When the body is deprived of magnesium, the body will tap into the bones’ magnesium stores. In fact, about one-third of the body’s skeletal magnesium is exchangeable, or available for use in case of deficiency.
Magnesium levels in the bone can decrease with age, making this “emergency store” less bioavailable when your body is faced with low levels. And even if you’re taking plenty of magnesium, you still may be suffering from a deficiency, which can seriously impair your bone-building efforts.
Your Doctor Will Never Tell You This: Chronic Acidosis Affects Magnesium Levels
If you’re following the Osteoporosis Reversal Program, you’re fully aware of how important it is to avoid chronic acidosis, a metabolic state that occurs when too much acid accumulates in the body.
Besides calcium loss from bones to balance the pH, when the body is acidic magnesium excretion via the urine greatly increases, reducing blood levels of this vital bone-building mineral.
As we noted above, the body takes magnesium from the bones when blood levels are low. Complicating matters further, as we age, our kidneys tend to become overworked and less efficient, setting the stage for imbalanced magnesium levels (more on this later).
The bottom line is that when combined with an acidic blood pH, inefficient kidney function can set the stage for significant bone loss.
How And Why Your Body Maintains Optimal Magnesium Levels
Your body has emergency reserves of magnesium because this mineral is involved in so many body processes in addition to bone health. In chemistry terms, magnesium is referred to as a cation – a positively-charged ion that is formed when electrolytes are dissolved in the body. Magnesium is an intracellular cation, meaning it acts in this capacity within cells where it is involved in a startling number and variety of cellular functions. It has extracellular roles as well.
Magnesium is required for the transfer, use, and storage of energy in cells, and it plays a role in the metabolism of fat, protein, and carbohydrate. It also helps regulate the secretion of parathyroid hormone, lowers blood pressure, and maintains cell membrane functionality.
Magnesium serves as a cofactor in multiple enzymatic reactions, and regulates muscle contractions including heart rhythm.
There’s even more that magnesium does. In an extracellular capacity, it regulates acetylcholine, thereby influencing neurological and synaptic activity. Magnesium also modulates the hormones involved in the body’s response to stress.
Even your digestion is affected by magnesium. It actually plays a part in producing hydrochloric acid, thereby influencing the absorption of nutrients to a significant degree.
As you can see, if your magnesium levels are off, just about every organ system in your body will be affected.
How Much Magnesium Do I Need To Take?
If you’re following the Osteoporosis Reversal Program, then you’re already eating lots of magnesium-rich vegetables. You should still supplement with a magnesium dose of 400 mg a day to maintain strong bones and overall health.
Organic magnesium from foods is ideal, but it’s difficult to reach those levels with foods alone. So amino acid chelated magnesium is an excellent bioavailable choice for supplementation.
Healthy Kidneys Regulate Magnesium
Levels of magnesium in the blood are directly regulated by the kidneys, with excretion peaking at night and backing off in the daytime. The kidneys filter magnesium differently than other minerals; under normal conditions, 60-70% of the magnesium gets reabsorbed. But the kidneys regulate this process by increasing or decreasing this reabsorption. In fact, taking excess magnesium is futile since kidney excretion increases significantly when you ingest too much of it.
Simply put, you can’t maintain magnesium homeostasis without properly functioning kidneys. Given the vital nature of this mineral, it makes sense to keep your kidneys functioning at their optimal level.
The Bottom Line For Magnesium And Your Bone Health
At the beginning of this post, I pointed out that no matter how much magnesium you ingest, you won’t absorb it if your kidneys are not functioning optimally. So the ideal solution is not to take more magnesium; it’s to get your kidneys in top shape so magnesium levels are regulated to the maximum benefit of your bones.
The best way to do this is with a targeted kidney and whole-body cleanse.
Because of our toxic environment, the kidneys get overloaded with poisons and are unable to perform their job. Pesticides, synthetic chemicals, medications, and a host of other toxic substances invade your body every day, whether inhaled, absorbed through the skin, or ingested. These overload your kidneys, which are detoxification organs (not to mention that they also play a huge role in balancing the pH).
Your bones depend on receiving many vital nutrients, magnesium included, which are regulated by the kidneys. It’s vital that these “filters” be cleansed periodically.
The Osteoporosis Fresh Start Cleanse, the 7 Day Bone Building Accelerator, is the perfect solution to the problem of over-taxed kidneys. This powerful yet easy-to-follow cleanse is specifically designed to rid the body of osteoporosis drugs and other toxins in just seven days.
I recommend the Osteoporosis Fresh Start Cleanse, the 7 Day Bone Building Accelerator at least once a year to ensure your kidneys are functioning at optimal levels to help build your bones more effectively so you can get the bone-building results you’re looking for.
Please click here to learn more about this unique cleanse, which is delivered directly to your inbox within minutes of placing your order.
Till next time,
You May Also Like These Related Articles:
The 2023 Dirty Dozen and Clean 15 : Your Guide to Safely Navigating the Produce Aisle
Drug-Induced Osteoporosis: Could Your Medications Be Harming Your Bones?
Study: A Full Day Of Activities Fuels A Longer, Happier LifeComments on this article are closed.
-
-
Does having a soak every night in Epson salts, which is made up of magnesium,
get absorbed into the bones as well as taking the supplement?-
Hi Dale,
“Transdermal” methods like soaking in Epsom salts are an alternative and effective way to get magnesium into your system.
-
-
strontium, lithium, hops, should we take supplements for them
-
One of the side effects of Strontium is significant hair loss, in addition to its taking the place of other more vital minerals in the bone. It does make the bones harder and denser, but also more brittle.
-
-
I am wondering whether MagnesiumBisglycinatePlus, which contains 150mg magnesium (from magnesium bisglycinate) plus 30mg 2-Aminoethanesulfonic acid (Taurine) is a product that will improve my bone health.
-
I am recovering from back surgery and have pain and weakness in my legs. It has been suggested that I try a rebounder for strengthening my muscles, improving my balance and improving lymph circulation. What do you think about rebounders?
-
I have been taking Magnesium as magnesium oxide 400 mg, which you say is not absorbed well. I also sometimes use a magnesium chloride hexahydrate body spray which claims to be the purest form of magnesium on the planet. What do you think of this? Very anxious to find out if I should use it regularly and stop the capsules. Thank you so much for your response. I look forward to all of your helpful information.
-
Your bone health programme is awesome and I am following it as much as I can
God bless you.
-
-
I take calcium mg citrate 250 each am and pm. Plus I expect the fruit and veg add more mg. I have used mg citrate powder in juice to assist better sleep, but it can soften bowel movements. Not sure the sleep assist works for me. I do wonder if there is an absorption problem but I have been thin all my life and that is a risk factor. Severe osteop is my situation now and people wonder why I don’t use drugs. Also have used a ppi for quite a few years and tried to wean off but have the weak sphincter muscle. My lower back especially is fragile. Am doing exercise to try and keep it and my body flexible. Hoping and praying for stronger bones……..
-
Hang in there, Betty! Getting off the ppi was a good move. 🙂 Keep up the good work!
-
Vivian I wasn’t able to get off the pill as I got serious rebound effects which I couldn’t tolerate. I tried more than once. Just read an article that I clipped quite awhile back stating the epidemic of people on acid reflux meds and the danger it is to our overall health. But neither do I want cancer. Tough choices that’s for sure!
-
Betty, have you considered gradually decreasing the ppi over time? Many people have had luck cutting the pill into smaller and smaller pieces over weeks or even months. 🙂
-
How I got rid of severe Acid Reflux that stopped me sleeping. OK as long as I sat fully upright during day. Propping with pillows didn’t work at all – whole bed must be raised. Gave up caffeine but this didn’t help. Tried Aloe Vera – apparently good for low acid sufferers but this made it worse.
*Found You Tube Channels from Dr Veronica Waks on GERD. She gives various causes.
*Identified mine was probably due to drinking water at the wrong times, often right before meals. So, drank water half hour before food.
*Restricted myself to spring water only (not the usual filtered water I drink here in the UK – no fluoride in my area) in case there was some irritation caused by tap water as I was desperate to get back to sleeping normally.
*Did Not drink anything other than a couple of mouthfuls of water with meals to take tablets.
*Then did not drink for 1.5 to 2 Hours as suggested by the Water Cure program by Dr Batmanghelidj. It was a bit of a struggle but started to work Immediately. Continued to drink water at 1 fl oz per half of body weight in lbs as per Water Cure. Water Cure calls for ½ tsp salt per day with the water but I kept this lower as I think I get a fair bit from food.
*Raised head of bed by 6” – 9” on two 9 litre Very Useful Boxes (Amazon) for single bed plus at its worst two half depth 4 litre ones on the top of those. I continue to use the two 9 litre ones just in case but can stay away from home without problems.
*Slept only on left side – right side makes reflux worse as the stomach is flatter on the right and the reflux can come up more easily.
*Avoided straining on the toilet.
*Found some of the Savers supplements in capsules were irritating so broke these open and sprinkled on my breakfast.
*Although theoretically not overweight, my stomach was quite large which can put pressure on the stomach valve, so made a determined effort to lose the extra stone I was carrying and this made a real difference as well. Roughly followed Dr Joel Fuhrman nutritarian/vegan program, which works well with the Savers one. Lost 1 or 2 lbs a week.
– Good breakfast of oats, nuts, seeds, berries and unsweetened additive free organic soy milk/yogurt (no GMO in the UK).
– As it was summer, lunch was either a very large salad with protein of organic tofu or beans and small portion of carbs or a smoothie of 200 ml of coconut water with 2 scoops of alkaline vanilla pea protein plus a banana and maybe apricots or berries, plus 2 tsp barley grass or a handful of spinach, watercress and rocket salad leaves. I would probably have a bean soup and slightly smaller salad in winter.
– Evening meal was cooked veggies in curries or tomato sauces plus protein source.
– Carbs were not eliminated as this causes me to lack energy but restricted to half of my normal portion.
– As soon as I started to feel full I stopped eating and used up the rest the next day by extending the food with vegetables and extra protein if needed.
– No food between meals.
– Evening meal by 7.30 if poss.
– No food after evening meal. Body will burn fat after 12 hours without food. (Lack of food at night helps with weight loss but I didn’t sleep as well, so I now have a cup of soy milk at bedtime as I’ve done for years to ensure I’m not awake with hunger in the night.)
– Weighed myself daily. Contrary to popular belief this didn’t cause me to become obsessed but was motivating. It was easy to make a small adjustment if the weight wasn’t going down.
As soon as I began to lose the weight I began to feel so much better that the motivation continued and I’m now down to 2 lbs above my pre-menopause weight, having been up to more than 2 stone heavier. I now feel ‘normal’ again as I was always slim before.
Hope this helps someone else. I can honestly say I don’t hear from my stomach now and I’ve been able to eat and drink as and when I like again. To maintain weight I have a morning snack and the nightime soymilk drink. I just keep a check on my weight to see it isn’t creeping up again but it hasn’t so far. I’m sure weight loss was instrumental in relieving the acid reflux.
-
-
-
-
-
What amount of magnesium should we shoot for? I get around 250 in food and then my algae calcium supplement has 100 but not sure from what source and then I take 200 of taurate at night, I read it has a calming affect and is better absorbed. So that comes to around 550 but I’ve read magnesium should equal calcium so is 500 not enough?
Thanks for all your help,
Diane -
I was interested to read that kidney problems can interfere with the absorption of magnesium. I suffered with an acute kidney injury caused by a prescribed medication, and then was diagnosed with kidney inflammation. As I now have osteoporosis, caused by 3 years on steroids. I didn’t realise that the kidney condition could lead to problems in absorption. I don’t take much in the way of supplements, depending instead on vitamin containing foods. Maybe these are not being absorbed, but how else can we ensure we get sufficient amounts of magnesium and other vitamins?
-
Another way you become Mg deficient is to take Nexium or Prilosec, the proton inhibitor drugs. These drugs strip you of your Mg. There needs to be a huge campaign to alert the public about this. My Dr. had me on a double dose of Nexium for 2 years and didn’t understand why I had severe muscle problems—-not to mention the statins I was on which also damaged my muscles and gave me Type 2 diabetes. I figured out the Mg deficiency and self treated. I do not take proton pump inhibitors any longer. I eat alkalizing foods instead. I finally recovered after 2 years of hard work. Thank you Vivian for your work. Let the public know about the problem with Nexium
-
Bonnie, thank you for this . I have been taking Nexium for a few days, which did relieve all my symptoms, but I’m not happy about taking it.
Not sure why I got sick or what to do about it, but I will definitely up the magnesium before I get a deficiency.
-
-
Very interesting. I take a Magnesium tablet every day 300mg, made up of Magnesium as Oxide 271mgs and Magnesium as amino acid chelate 29mgs. So are you saying that I should be taking 400mgs of Magnesium as amino acid chelate. Magnesium as Oxide wasn’t mentioned, so is this mineral of no benefit?
-
Hi Alison,
Magnesium oxide is an inorganic form of magnesium, so you’re probably not absorbing much of it! If you can derive all of your supplemental magnesium from amino acid chelate, then you’ll obtain a lot more. 🙂-
Thank you for answering Vivienne. So if Magnesium oxide is not absorbable, could it cause cloudy urine? Because my urine is sometimes cloudy and I am linking it to after I take the magnesium. I have had a urine test and it is normal, but I still have cloudy urine sometimes.
-
-
-
I use magnesium spray often and find it calms and promotes better sleep. Nice to read it’s doing my bones good too. 🙂
Vivian, my husband is stage 3 , chronic kidney disease. Is it safe for him to use the osteo cleanse?
Thank you.