2 | Mineral Blueprint : Why you feel "off" before your labs do

Welcome back to Decode your Health with Christa. I'm Christa, wife, mom, and register naturopath. Today, we are going to explore minerals and why you can't heal without them. If you've ever dealt with heart palpitations, low energy, difficulty sleeping, tight muscles or unexplained anxiety, then this episode is definitely for you. These are all the signs that your minerals may be out of balance. And today, we're going to break down exactly what that means. But before we get started, just a quick reminder, everything I share here is for educational purposes only. It's not to be used as medical advice and it doesn't replace speaking with your doctor or pharmacist. So all right, let's dive in. Now, before we get into minerals today, I just want to just circle back on something that I think is really important to understand. So before I recorded this episode, I actually did a little dive into the rules just to make sure I can safely discuss this without any liability issues. And everything looks good. I just have to be mindful of the language I use which leads perfectly into what I want to explain. So as naturopaths, our scope is very, very different from medical doctors. Medical doctors are the ones who prescribe medications and diagnose conditions. We don't. And that's completely fine. It's simply thorough, not ours. And because of that, we have to be very careful with the wording we use. So instead of seeing something like, this will help with diabetes, you'll hear us instead say something like this may support healthy blood sugar levels because diabetes is a diagnosis and legally we're not allowed to use that type of language. Even when we've seen approaches help hundreds of times, we still need to say this may help because that's how we respect our scope and the lingual language we're required to use because only medications can technically help medical conditions, but honestly, it's not just a legal thing. We also choose not to use diagnostic labels for another reason. Once something has a name, it can take on a whole identity of its own. And yes, a diagnosis can feel validating like finally having an explanation for what you've been experiencing, but it can also become limiting. Once it has a name, it can start to feel like a part of who you are, almost like it becomes an entity that follows you around. So let's break down what a diagnosis actually is. A diagnosis is simply a label given to a recurring pattern of symptoms. That's it. It's just a name assigned to a set of experiences that tend to show up together. And that's why we as nature paths don't diagnose, not only because it's outside our scope, but because we don't want to attach a fixed identity to something that can absolutely shift, change, and improve with the right support. And if the collection of symptoms starts improving, what happens to the diagnosis? And when we look at it that way as a collection of symptoms rather than a permanent identity, it allows us to focus on the root causes and support the body without reinforcing the label. And the main reason why I'm bringing this all up is because oftentimes online, I'll get asked, what can I do for my IBS? And I can't answer that. I can't tell you what you can do for your IBS, but I can tell you what you can do to improve your intestinal health. So it was just really important that we differentiate that. All right. Now, with that foundation in place, let's shift into today's topic, minerals, because once you understand how your body communicates through symptoms, minerals are one of the clearest places to start listening. So have you ever felt really bad and got some blood work done? And you knew something was off, but everything came back normal and it left you even more confused, well, minerals shift long before blood work changes. So you can be feeling all these things. Your blood work can come back normal, but things can still be off. And it's because your body will always protect your blood levels, even if that means pulling minerals out of your tissues, muscles or bones. So that's why symptoms often show up first long before blood tests detect anything. This is where HTMA, hair tissue, mineral analysis becomes so helpful. With HTMA, we take about half of an inch to one inch of new hair growth from the nape of your neck. You won't even realize it's gone, but it does show us how your body has been using minerals over the last three months. HTMA is the number one best way to test how your body has been using minerals. You can also give us insight into things like stress patterns, energy output, metabolic speed, and so much more. When you have a hair tissue mineral analysis done, there's many things that we look at, but I'll go over the main four minerals. So to start off, we have sodium. Sodium tells me a lot about adrenal function, energy output, hydration, and how the body is handling stress. I know a lot of people fear sodium, but sodium is essential for life. And generally, sodium isn't an issue if your potassium is at healthy levels and you're consuming the right type of salt. It's refined salt and processed food that has given in its bad reputation. Table salt is basically 100% sodium chloride. It's stripped of all the natural minerals your body would normally use alongside it, which causes imbalance. So natural salts like Himalayan, pink salt, Celtic salt, and sea salt contain full mineral spectrum along with the sodium, so that's what keeps the sodium balanced. Sodium also gives you quick energy. So if you're feeling flat, off-light head or foggy, sometimes just a quarter teaspoon of natural salt and water can give a noticeable lift. But like I mentioned, sodium only works well when its partner, potassium, is balanced. So that leads us into our second main mineral, potassium. So potassium, I often see low in people due to like I mentioned the processed foods, the refined table salt, and even stress that all pushes potassium down. Sodium and potassium control each other. When one rises, the other falls, they also power your sodium potassium pump, which fuels the electrical gradient in your cells. We talked about this a little bit in episode one, about inside your cells, they have potassium outside your cells. We have sodium, and the difference between them creates this energy that allows your cells to fire, take in nutrients and push out waste. So when they're imbalanced, we can only imagine what happens to that pump. So exactly if potassium drops, everything becomes sluggish, and common signs of low potassium include muscle cramps, heart palpitations, or flutters, constipation, feeling dehydrated despite drinking water, anxiety, restless sleep, and fatigue. But remember, so so important, potassium supplementation is not safe for everyone. Certain blood pressure meds make the body retain potassium and supplementing on top of that can be dangerous. Food potassium is usually fine, but supplements require checking with your doctor or pharmacist. Now we move on to our third main mineral, which is magnesium. Magnesium is a mineral that 90% of the population is deficient in. So I often recommend magnesium to almost everyone, because years ago you could get your daily magnesium from a cup of spinach. But with the commercial farming or soils that are depleted, there's not enough minerals in the soil to properly grow our food, which makes it really hard to get from our diet. So magnesium helps regulate stress, sleep, mood, muscle tension, digestion, and energy productions. If supplementing is something that you would like to do, I would advise you to stay away from magnesium oxide. The most pharmacies that you go into, if you look on the back of their supplements, 95% of them only have magnesium oxide, which your body cannot absorb. Your body can't do anything with it. It will just essentially be a laxative. But if you want something that's going to be really beneficial, better forms include by glycinate, this is a very good overall magnesium. It's good for calming, good for stress and relaxation. You also have magnesium 3 and 8, which crosses the blood brain barrier so that one is really great for brain and mood support. Or you also have magnesium mallet, which is really helpful for muscles and tension. So you can pick which one fits best with your symptoms. However, what I prefer to do to just cover all bases is get a blend with all three. So low magnesium often shows up as muscle tightness, heart palpitations, irritability, headaches, poor sleep, feeling overwhelmed or tensed, all those things. Now we can move into our fourth main mineral, which is calcium. So that's the one that most people seem to be worried with, especially as we age as women. But most people do get enough calcium from their diet. The issue isn't usually low calcium, it's where the calcium is going. For calcium to go to the bones and teeth where it's needed, you need magnesium, potassium, vitamin D, vitamin K2. So these guide calcium into the right tissues. So it would be more important to balance those first before turning towards a calcium supplement. However, let's say all those are in check and you really do need a calcium supplement. Most prescriptions and calcium found on pharmacy shelves are in the form of calcium carbonate, which is technically like limestone. It's really hard for our body to break down. It almost can't break it down. So where it'll tend to show up is in the arteries and as kidney stones, unlike magnesium oxide that's just a laxative and if you take it, you just won't get the benefits, you'll have to go to the bathroom. This calcium carbonate is a little bit different. I personally feel like it's more on the dangerous side and that it should be avoided completely because since our body can't break it down, it can deposit in other places which we want to avoid. So if a calcium supplement is truly needed, something like calcium citrate would be really more appropriate. And if you're looking for things for specifically teeth and bones, calcium hydroxyapatite would be really good, especially in the form of a toothpaste. So you can buy it as a toothpaste and it's really good for your teeth. So I just walked you through the main four minerals I look at on a neat TMA. Of course there are many more minerals that affect the energy, hormones, mood and overall health, but there's way too many to cover in a single episode. But there's one mineral outside the main four that deserves its own spotlight today and that's zinc. So zinc supports the immune system, hormones, skin, mood and hair. So low zinc can show up as breakouts, mood fluctuations, feeling run down, hair shedding, and zinc's biggest relationship is with copper. They work like a sea saw when copper rises and drops, almost like the sodium potassium that we saw. All minerals work like that in pairs. So that's why we never want to hyper focus on one single mineral and without taking into consideration the others because we can really throw things off balance whenever we hide dose one without others. And the zinc conversation becomes especially relevant if you're someone who's on oral birth control or have a copper IUD because those are things that can really affect your zinc levels by driving up copper. So if you're someone who experiences extremely uncomfortable and painful periods, this could be a sign that your zinc to copper ratio is unbalanced. Another thing that we see on HTMA is that we take into account is the zinc to iron ratio and it gives us a slight insight into immune patterns, but iron must always be tested through blood work. I just want to say that on an HTMA, it's not super accurate. Most minerals are better through hair tissue, mineral analysis to get a better view. We get a little bit of insight in iron, but blood levels are really the gold standard for iron. So now what can you do at home? Let's say you're feeling some of these symptoms, some heart palpitations. You don't really know where to start. Something that you can do simply at home starting right today is drink some coconut water. It's naturally super rich in most of these minerals, especially potassium, magnesium, and sodium. And if you don't have any issues with potassium restrictions due to any medications, you can also add a quarter teaspoon of cream of tartar to really boost that potassium even more. You can also, if you don't care for the taste too much just like that, you can blend it with some berries or keep it simple up to you. But it is a small change that can have a surprisingly big impact. Now if I could add a little visual just to depict to you how important minerals are in our body, just picture them as spark plugs. They literally give life. Without the spark, we cease to exist. And we can't talk about minerals without also talking about heavy metals. And the reason for this being is because our body is so dependent on minerals, it can't work without them. If it doesn't have enough, it will look for something that's chemically similar to using its place. And those things end up being heavy metals. So HTML doesn't just show minerals. It also shows the heavy metals like aluminum, lead, mercury, arsenic, cadmium, nickel, barium, uranium, all those things can take the place of a mineral. The heavy metals are also very present in our modern day-like style. So aluminum can be found in cookware, aluminum foil, the odorance is a big source, cosmetics, even our water. And if we have aluminum displacing mineral, oftentimes it will show up as brain fog, fatigue, headaches, tension, there's also lead which can come from old paint plumbing soil. And this can show up as irritability, constipation, focus issues. Then we have mercury which can be found in seafood, old dental fillings and can show up as anxiousness, mood swings and memory issues. We have arsenic which can be found in groundwater, old pressure-treated wood and rice. And that can show up as low energy and skin dryness. Then we have cadmium which can be introduced to our system by smoking or even second-hand smoking fertilizers. And this can show up as fatigue, brittle nails, blood sugar swings. Then we have nickel which can be found in jewelry, cookware and coins. This can show up as rashes, allergies and sinus issues. Nickel also competes with iron, but it's very chemically similar. And so sometimes if you have an iron deficiency looking at nickel levels can be very appropriate. Barium can also be found in contaminated water and if you live near drilling sites and can show up as twitching, tingling, heart rhythm sensitivities. And then there's uranium which can be found in groundwater and that would be more geographical. But if it's something you are exposed to it can show up as signs of kidney stress, dehydration and mineral loss. So this can all sound very scary but the important part to remember is that when your minerals are supported properly your body is able to eliminate these heavy metals a lot more efficiently. This process may also require liver and kidney support as well as a binder to help bind them up more efficiently for elimination. So that would look like something like zeolite or activated charcoal or even chlorella. But it's always best to work with someone who has experience in this domain. With this episode resonated with you and you feel like your mood, energy, heart, sleep, digestion or your muscles feel off, testing can possibly give you some real answers. So I want to thank you so much for listening and if you'd like a personalized support or full overview of your mineral patterns, you can book a consultation with me. All my socials are linked in the episode description. I do offer HTMA testing anywhere in Canada. You get to get by mail. You send a tiny hair sample back and about three weeks later we review your results together. You can look for any of your path in your area, but it's very important to make sure that they specialize in HTMA to make sure your results are properly interpreted. And if you found this episode helpful, don't forget to like, follow and subscribe so you'll be notified when the next one comes up. This is decode your health with Christa and I'll see you next week. [MUSIC]