Product Reviews from a Scientific Perspective

Sunday, January 9, 2011

Curing Allergies with Vitamin C, Part II

Note: By using the information presented in this blog, you agree to the terms described in the post entitled "Mission Statement and Disclaimer." Basically, you can't sue.

Or How to Cure Your Allergies, Part II

So this is the routine you should follow.

  1. Every day, take at least 5 grams (5,000 milligrams or mg) of Vitamin C
  2. Spread them out throughout the day. Don't take them all at once, otherwise your body won't be able to digest all of that Vitamin C at once (remember diffusion in high school chemistry and biology? Your intestines absorb vitamins and nutrients into the blood stream via diffusion. If you have too much Vitamin C running through your intestines, your blood stream can't absorb it all).
  3. For faster results, you can increase your daily intake of Vitamin C as much as you want, until you start to have loose stools (ie diarrhea). Once you have diarrhea, you can lower your dosage by 500 milligrams (half a gram) until it's gone. But even if you're having diarrhea, you're many many grams away from having more serious health risks.
  4. You should notice results within a month, if your allergies results from Vitamin C deficiency.
  5. Drink lots of water. It'll help directly with the allergies, your general health, and with the absorption of Vitamin C.
Speaking of absorbing Vitamin C via water, we need to make a very important distinction between two types of vitamins. One is water-soluble vitamins. The second is fat-soluble vitamins.

If you go back to your high school chemistry, like dissolves like. That is, polar molecules like water can easily dissolve in, and mix with, other polar molecules like salt. Nonpolar molecules like oil can easily dissolve in, and mix with, fat. But they have trouble dissolving in, and mixing with, each other!

 Vitamins are exactly the same way. Water soluble vitamins, including vitamin C, can be easily gotten rid of your body because it doesn't accumulate anywhere. Your bloodstream is water soluble, so it's easy to spread out and easy to pick up. Your blood stream is kind of like a pipe and sewage system for your cells, in that way. This makes it hard for you to overdose on water-soluble vitamins, because they are hard to hold onto. It's still possible to overdose, but you'd have to try pretty hard.

On the other hand, fat soluble vitamins will hang out for a really long time in your fat cells. They're really hard to remove, because they don't like to be in the blood stream. They'd rather sit at home in fat tissue. Just like fat cells themselves, they're hard to get rid of! So it's easier for you to overdose on fat-soluble vitamins, like Vitamin E and D (which is unsurprisingly found in milk).

Here are a list of fat-soluble vitamins: Vitamin A, D, E, and K
Here are a list of water-soluble vitamins: Vitamin B and C

6 comments:

  1. Thanks for this info. I'm going to give this remedy a try!

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  2. Thanks for the valuable info. I'm going to give it a shot, what worse can it do? Only Vit C.

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  3. I've been suffering from severe allergies year round for 18+ years. I read something about vitamin C helping with allergies a few weeks ago so I've been eating kiwis and oranges. I'm definitely going to give this a try. Thanks!

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  4. I'm a lot better with vitamin C, thank you very much

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  5. Thanks for the info about water soluble and fat soluble vitamins - I didn't know that.

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  6. I just began taking vitamin C supplements as I had bad allergies. I know they will enhance my immune system.

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