The Alarming Signs Your Body Needs Trace Minerals

0:00There are some really important signs or indications that our body is desperately demanding trace minerals. So let's talk about trace minerals. What is a trace mineral? It's a mineral that is needed in trace amounts or tiny, tiny amounts many times below even one milligram in the microgram level. So an example of a trace mineral would be like zinc, iodine, selenium, copper, manganese, versus other minerals that are needed in larger amounts like potassium, calcium, magnesium. So what is so significant about these trace minerals? Why do we need them in such tiny amounts if at all? Well, trace minerals are essential to enzymes. Enzymes are proteins that basically do the work of the body. You might think of enzymes just for digestion, but enzymes are involved in all of your biochemistry in making cells, in repairing DNA, and proofreading DNA, in making hormones,

1:03in converting hormones into the active form, in turning glucose into fat. There are thousands and thousands and thousands of biochemical pathways involving these enzymes. And it's incredibly complex. And one thing we know for sure about these enzymes is there's a lot we don't know, but we do know these minerals, including trace minerals and regular minerals and vitamins, are the cofactors that these enzyme or biochemical pathways depend on and without them our biochemistry does not work. So let's just take for example zinc. Zinc is involved with over 300 different enzymes, having functions ranging from the breakdown of alcohol to the production of testosterone to building immune weaponry to kill off pathogens, also involved in detoxifying chemicals, and even making neurotransmitters that greatly affect your mood. And there's actually over

2:03two billion people on this planet that are deficient in zinc, primarily because of another compound called phytic acid that is in grains like sorrows and crackers and breads and things like that, that basically prevent the absorption of zinc and other minerals. And if someone doesn't consume meat or red meat or animal products, it's very difficult to get the right form of zinc that is bile available. So zinc is really high at red meat and organ meats and definitely shellfish, seafood. And then we have iron. Iron is the number one deficiency in the entire world. More people have an iron deficiency than any other deficiency. Well iron is needed in over six and a half percent of all enzymes in every cell in our body. Iron is also needed to detoxify hydrogen peroxide. Your cells may cut hydrogen peroxide to actually kill off pathogens. And so if there's

3:05too much of that built up, it can cause damage to our own cells. Iron is needed for certain proteins that carry oxygen to the blood. And without iron, you can't carry oxygen to your blood. You become anemic. Iron is also needed to make collagen. And a lot of your body is collagen, the skin, the nails, the hair, the joints, the tendons, the ligaments. And there's even collagen in your bones. And the trace metal iron is mainly in like red meat, organ meats, it's also in shellfish. But the iron and spinach is a different type of iron, which is not nearly as bioavailable as from red meat. Let me get this other trace mineral called selenium. This is a really important one as well. And selenium does a lot. It helps you convert the inactive thyroid hormone to the active form. So the enzyme involved with that is dependent on selenium. So you might be making enough thyroid hormone because you have enough iodine. But if you're deficient in selenium, you can't convert

4:06from the inactive to the active form. And even the master antioxidant called glutathione is dependent on selenium. Glutathione is necessary to protect against all the free radical damage. And all the oxidative things and pollution and chemicals that hit our body. Glutathione is there to balance that or curb that or buffer those effects. And then we have iodine, right? If a mother's deficient in iodine, when she has a baby, that baby will be deficient and that will severely affect the brain to the point where they can even have a lowered intelligence and a lowered IQ. So iodine is really important, not just in helping make thyroid hormones, but brain development. It's also involved in enzymes that help protect you against excess amounts of estrogen. And if you're deficient in iodine, you can end up with fibrosistic breast, with cysts down the ovaries. And so you get iodine from shellfish, seaweed, like sea kelp,

5:10and egg yolks. Now a big problem with the trace minerals is that they're not available in the soils nowadays because a lot of times when we grow crops, we don't put that iodine back in the soils. We put three minerals in there, like phosphorus, nitrogen, and potassium, but farmers don't normally put the trace minerals back in the soil. Now the soils probably do have trace minerals in them, but they're locked up in rocks and things that are difficult for that plant to get to. You see, it's really the microbial life in the soil that's responsible for mobilizing these minerals to make these minerals available to the plant. And so when we till the land, the soil, we just throw the soil with glyphosate and pesticides and chemicals, now we're dependent on adding fertilizers and other things to keep that plant growing. Now if we take a look at this entire food chain, you have this human body where you have these cells that are at certain levels of health.

6:12Your cells are really a biochemical photograph of what's going on in the soil. That's really where your health comes from because if you don't have the microbes, they're destroyed to mobilize the minerals, then the roots of the plants can't get nutrients. And then the plant suffers, it's not going to be healthy and the animals that eat the plant or the grass then become deficient. And of course, anytime we eat the plants and the animals that are missing nutrients, we become deficient. And trace minerals are a really key part of this whole chain, especially not just giving us the trace mineral, but allowing all this bowel chemistry to occur that if we were deficient, we wouldn't have enough enzyme to detoxify hydrogen peroxide. We wouldn't have enough glutathione to protect us against oxidative stress. We wouldn't have the ability to convert T4 to T3. We wouldn't have the enzymes to break down alcohol or even make testosterone. So I hope now you're becoming more aware of how

7:16vital these trace minerals are for your health. So let me just briefly talk about what are some common signs to know your deficient in trace minerals? Well, zinc, you're going to lose your hair, you're going to have these little white spots on your nails, you're going to have low testosterone, and you may even have diarrhea. Now with an iron deficiency, you're going to have anemic symptoms, like you're going to feel kind of withered, tired, weak, you're going to be on the cold side, you're going to have the brittle nails and the hair loss. And then we have selenium, you can have infertility with a selenium deficiency. You're definitely going to have fatigue, but you can also experience hair loss. And then with an iodine deficiency, you might notice swelling in the lower part of your neck because the thyroid is enlarging to a certain degree. But typically, these trace minerals are not just involved with making strong nails or making strong hair. They're involved with all of your bowel chemistry. And many times you might not have an obvious

8:19symptom right away, but it can definitely contribute to all sorts of chronic diseases down the road. And even putting you at risk for cancer, there's a very fascinating book. And this book, which I had to get it, even though it was $250, unfortunately, talks about the link between human and animal health and mineral balance of the soil, fascinating data on the bowel chemistry that happens below the soil, above the soil in grasses, and then showing the link between a deficiency and a trace mineral and how that ends up in the grass and how that affects the animal as far as their health and then how it affects the human health. See, way back in the day, people bought food from local farmers where they can actually have a lot of transparency with their soils. Nowadays, we don't know where our food is grown. Maybe it's grown on hydroponic, maybe it's grown

9:19in some soil that has to be fed fertilizers because the soil is so poor, we don't know. Now, on top of that, we have most of our children that are living on ultra-processed food, not processed food, but ultra-processed foods. And this is why, of course, they have to fortify the food with certain synthetic vitamins, only a few. I tell you one thing, when you're replying to food, you pull out more than just a few vitamins. I mean, just think about institutional food. The food that they feed children in school, nursing homes, assisted living, and even prisons. So this food is extremely low in nutrients. Back to one study, I think they did this in a nursing home. Over 50% of the people eating these foods were deficient in zinc. Over 50% of the men eating this food were deficient in zinc. And almost 50% of the women were deficient in selenium, simply because they're not focusing on the quality. You go to the grocery store and

10:20you look at the salad or the vegetables or the tomato. It looks good, but it doesn't have a lot of flavor. And the flavor chemicals are an alignment with how nutrient dense that food is. So I really think we're literally starving with consuming a lot of calories because the calories are empty, but we're starving of nutrients and trace minerals is at the top of the list. I think the most important time to make sure we have all the nutrients is if someone is pregnant or an infant. But on the flip side, as we get older, we also need those nutrients. But unfortunately, a lot of these assisted living homes don't focus on that. As far as trace minerals go and other nutrients, seafood is at the top of the list. Organ meats, eggs, seaweed or sea kelp, and a high quality sea salt. Now, since we're talking about trace minerals deficiencies, if you haven't seen this real popular video, and how to identify different nutritional deficiencies, I put it up right here, check it out.