When I first started my herbal practice, I met an incredible artist & activist. He was living on a fixed
magnesium is the relaxation mineral
income and struggling with multiple health problems including debilitating back pain and heart trouble. His case was enough to terrify any new practitioner. Not only could he barely afford any herbs or supplements, but he was taking lots of medications that have a high potential for herb-drug interactions. Even green veggies could mess with these meds! The best I could do was suggest that he take a mineral supplement; I was certain that he was very deficient in magnesium.
A few days later, he wrote to tell me that his back pain had nearly vanished. Not only had he stopped taking his painkiller, but he was able to bend down to sweep the floor and walk around his apartment. He couldn’t believe it.
Almost a year later, I received another email from my artist-friend. He wrote to thank me for recommending the magnesium. Now he credited it with saving him from having a Pacemaker implanted in his chest. His atrial fibrillation had completely stopped. A pacemaker was no longer necessary.
Missing Magnesium
Even if you’re free from crippling back pain and atrial fibrillation, it’s highly likely that your body doesn’t have the magnesium that it needs. Magnesium is vital for nerve function and for bone-building. It works in conjunction with calcium in the body, carrying out more of the “relaxation” functions while calcium supports contraction. Both are so essential to life that your body keeps significant stores of each mineral on-hand so that it can maintain a constant blood level of each whether or not you’re getting them in your diet. Just like a lack of calcium in the diet leads the body to pull calcium out of the bones, a lack of magnesium leads the body to pull this mineral from the muscles. The trouble is that muscular reservoir of magnesium isn’t just packed away in storage boxes; it’s required for the muscle to stay relaxed and supple. When the muscles (including the heart muscle) have their magnesium reservoirs dry up, it creates a number of problems that sound very familiar to many of the clients I work with.
What about you? Do you have any of these symptoms?
- Digestive complaints, especially constipation or straining
- Chronic muscle tension and discomfort
- Anxiety, insomnia, or feeling “tense” and unable to relax
- Grinding your teeth at night or clenching your jaw during the day
If you think you might be magnesium deficient, there’s an easy way to screen yourself. Head over to a free online nutrition tracker like this one and enter everything that you eat over the course of three days. After three days of eating your typical diet, see how your magnesium intake stacks up against the recommended daily intake of about 350mg for women and 420mg for men. If you come up short, it’s well-worth supplementing magnesium AND shifting your diet so that you’re taking in more magnesium-rich foods.
Why supplement? Aren’t whole foods best?
There’s one major problem with relying on whole foods for magnesium and other minerals. Plants’ mineral content is determined by the mineral content of the soil in which they’re grown, and these days even organically grown veggies are shown to contain significantly fewer minerals than they did in the beginning of the century.
Magnesium can also be difficult for the body to absorb, especially if you have any digestive problems. I absolutely recommend eating magnesium-rich foods, but if you’re struggling with multiple symptoms connected to magnesium deficiency, you may need to consume well above the RDI in order to refill the reservoirs in your muscle tissue. If you just consume the recommended amount, you’ll prevent further deficiency but won’t have any extra magnesium leftover to put back into storage.
How to Take Magnesium
Adding supplemental magnesium to your routine is inexpensive, generally safe, and highly effective. If you take more than your body can absorb you’ll trigger a strong laxative effect, so it’s important to taper your dose up slowly to avoid any unpleasant surprises.
1. Purchase liquid magnesium if at all possible. You’ll likely have to order it online, but it’s inexpensive. It does have a strong taste, but it’s much more bio-available than tablets or capsules. (Make sure to get magnesium all by itself, not combined with calcium.)
2. Start with 200mg per day in a little water, taken at bedtime.
3. If you have loose stools after taking 200mg, drop the dose back to 100mg per day. (And if this happens with liquid magnesium at such a low dose, you’re probably NOT deficient.)
4. If your stools are normal, increase your dose by 200mg per day, taking half in the morning and half at night.
5. When you do experience loose stools, you’ll know you’ve reached a dose that’s more than your body can absorb at a time. Drop the dose back by 200mg.
6. Continue taking that dose until it begins to cause loose stools. Drop the dose back again.
7. Continue in this way until your symptoms improve. You should see results in two weeks or less.
Take action: Just reading this isn’t enough!
Check your symptoms against the ones listed above. If you have 2 or more of them, keep a food diary for 3 days to see how much magnesium you’re getting in your diet. If you’re coming up short, consider using liquid magnesium as a supplement to bring your levels back up to normal.
Note: As always, this content is for educational purposes only and does not constitute medical advice. Please consult your health care provider regarding any symptoms that are troubling you.
