Tag Archives: nutrition

Magnesium Deficiency Symptoms

Magnesium Deficiency Symptoms: Sleep, Cramps & Stress Fix

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If you’re waking at 3 a.m. with a clenched jaw, a cramping calf, or a heart that won’t settle, low magnesium is one of the first things worth ruling out. Roughly half of Americans aren’t getting enough from food, and your body burns through what it has faster under stress. This guide explains the symptoms, the research, and exactly what to do this week.

Why Magnesium Deficiency Is So Common

Magnesium is a cofactor in more than 300 enzyme reactions. In plain English: it’s a tiny helper your cells need to make energy, relax muscles, calm nerves, regulate blood sugar, build bone, and steady your heartbeat. When it’s low, a lot of small things go sideways at once — and most people never connect the dots because the dots don’t look related.

Your body can’t make magnesium, modern soil delivers less of it than it used to, and stress accelerates how fast you lose it (Fiorentini et al., 2021, Nutrients). That’s not a personality flaw. That’s a mineral gap.

Signs of Low Magnesium in Women Over 45

Magnesium deficiency is bio-individual. Your symptoms may be sleep; your sister’s may be migraines; your friend’s may be constipation and anxiety. Same hub, different spokes on the wheel:

  • Trouble falling or staying asleep, especially around 3 a.m.
  • Muscle cramps, twitches, restless legs
  • Migraines or tension headaches
  • Jaw clenching and teeth grinding
  • Heart palpitations or that “fluttery” feeling
  • Anxiety, irritability, low stress tolerance
  • Constipation
  • Sugar and chocolate cravings (chocolate is magnesium-rich — your body knows)

What the Research Actually Says

That’s a lot of spokes on one wheel — and a lot of reasons to take this seriously.

Best Magnesium-Rich Foods

Food first, always. Build daily intake from:

  • Pumpkin seeds (about 150 mg per ounce — a third of a day’s needs)
  • Almonds, cashews, walnuts
  • Spinach and Swiss chard
  • Avocado
  • Black beans
  • Dark chocolate (70% or higher)
  • Wild-caught salmon

Start with one simple move: tonight, eat an ounce of pumpkin seeds with dinner and notice how you sleep. It’s a small experiment you can run before the week ends.

Best Magnesium Supplement Form for Your Symptoms

If you’re going to supplement, match the form to the job:

  • Magnesium glycinate — gentle, calming, best for sleep and nervous system support.
  • Magnesium citrate — moves the bowels. Useful if you’re constipated, inconvenient if you aren’t.
  • Magnesium L-threonate — the form most studied for cognition and brain health.
  • Magnesium oxide — poorly absorbed. Skip it, even though it’s the cheapest and most common on drugstore shelves.

Quality matters more than the label promises. Avoid proprietary blends and mystery fillers. Pair magnesium with whole-food fats — avocado, walnuts, raw butter — because it does its best work in a body that has the raw materials to use it.

A word of caution: if you have kidney issues, take heart medication, or are pregnant, magnesium dosing is not a guess-and-go situation. Talk to your naturopathic physician before making changes. If you don’t have a naturopath, you can check out mine at LeaveBigPharmaBehind.com.

Other Ways to Raise Magnesium Levels

  • Epsom salt baths, twice a week. Magnesium sulfate, 20 minutes, warm water. Your skin will absorb what it needs — and it forces you off your phone.
  • Topical magnesium spray on calves and feet before bed if cramps are the main issue.
  • Cut the magnesium thieves. Soda and excess coffee deplete it. You don’t have to quit — you have to notice.
  • Plan ahead. Put pumpkin seeds, dark chocolate, and leafy greens on the grocery list this week. Every meal is a vote.

The Bottom Line

Your body isn’t broken — it’s asking to be heard. The 3 a.m. ceiling stare, the calf cramp, the clenched jaw, the migraine that arrives like clockwork — those are messages, not malfunctions. Magnesium is one quiet answer hiding in plain sight.

Start with food. Add an Epsom salt bath. If you supplement, choose glycinate, citrate, or L-threonate based on what you actually need. Then watch the small things start to settle.

Get More Like This

If this resonated, subscribe to the free Your Health Unbound newsletter on Substack for weekly, research-backed guidance on sleep, hormones, gut health, and energy for women over 45: substack.com/@yourhealthunbound.

Your body has been talking for a long time — magnesium might be the first place worth listening.

This post may contain affiliate links. If you purchase through them, I may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. This content is for educational purposes only and is not a substitute for personalized medical advice.

Reprinted with permission from YourHealthUnbound.com

Red-Light-Therapy

Red Light Therapy for Gut Health: What Research Shows

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You cleaned up your nutrition, added bone broth and fermented foods, and the bloating still shows up at 4 p.m. like clockwork. Emerging research on red light therapy — specifically photobiomodulation aimed at the abdomen — suggests photons of certain wavelengths may shift the gut microbiome and calm the inflammation your protocol can’t touch. Here is what the science actually says, and a simple at-home protocol you can test in two weeks.

What Is Photobiomodulation (Red Light Therapy)?

Red light therapy goes by a more clinical name in the journals: photobiomodulation, or PBM. The mechanism is straightforward. Specific wavelengths of red and near-infrared light — roughly 630 to 850 nanometers — penetrate the skin, reach the mitochondria inside your cells, and stimulate them to produce more ATP. ATP is the cellular fuel that powers everything from immune response to tissue repair.

More mitochondrial energy means more capacity for the gut lining to do what it’s designed to do: repair, defend, and communicate with the trillions of microbes living on top of it.

Can Red Light Therapy Heal the Gut? What the Research Shows

A 2023 review by Jahani-Sherafat and colleagues, published in Gastroenterology and Hepatology from Bed to Bench, examined photobiomodulation in conditions tied to dysbiosis — the medical term for an out-of-balance gut microbiome where the wrong bacteria have outvoted the right ones. The authors concluded that PBM appears to modulate the microbiome itself, increasing populations of beneficial bacteria and reducing the inflammatory signaling that comes with dysbiosis. In animal studies, abdominal red light shifted bacterial diversity in a direction that tracked with reduced gut inflammation.

Let’s be clear about what that does and does not mean. It does NOT mean you can shine a light on your belly and skip the work of cleaning up your nutrition. Inflammation is a signal, not a root cause — it points upstream to food triggers, gut barrier dysfunction, and environmental exposures. Diet and environment drive most chronic inflammation, not genetics.

What it DOES suggest is that for many women, red light may be a useful adjunct that helps cells do the repair work nutrition is already setting up. The clients who get the most from these tools are the ones who have already pulled the obvious triggers off their plate. The light is the amplifier, not the foundation.

A 10-Minute Red Light Protocol for Your Gut

You don’t need a clinic or a four-figure panel to test this. A small at-home device is enough to see how your body responds over two to four weeks.

A starting framework — adjust to your bio-individuality and the device you have:

  • Wavelength: Look for a device in the 630–660 nm (red) and/or 810–850 nm (near-infrared) range. Both have research behind them.
  • Distance and time: Start at 6 to 12 inches from bare skin, 10 minutes per session, once daily. More is not better.
  • Where: Over the abdomen — lower belly, around the navel, and the lower right quadrant where the ileocecal valve lives.
  • When: Morning is ideal. It pairs naturally with sunlight on your skin and eyes within the first hour of waking, which is its own circadian medicine and costs nothing.
  • Track it: Keep a two-line journal. One line for what you ate. One line for how your gut felt. Two weeks of honest data tells you more than two months of guessing.
  • Pair it with the basics: Two tablespoons of raw butter daily, wild-caught fatty fish a couple of nights a week, fresh-squeezed lemon and apple cider vinegar instead of bottled oils, and pasteurized cow dairy off the plate during any reset window.
  • Sunlight first: Before spending a dollar on a device, get 10 minutes of morning sun on your skin and in your eyes (no sunglasses, don’t stare at it). Free, ancient, and the original photobiomodulation.

Always consult your naturopathic physician before adding red light therapy, especially with a photosensitizing condition, pregnancy, or a history of skin cancer.

How to Choose a Red Light Device Without Getting Burned

The red light therapy market exploded, and most of what’s on the shelf is overpriced or underpowered. Look for a device that publishes its irradiance numbers (the actual power output in mW/cm²) and the specific wavelengths it emits. If a company won’t disclose those specs, that is your answer.

For the nutritional foundation that makes any light therapy worth trying, professional-grade supplements through a practitioner dispensary are a cleaner option than Amazon roulette. Essential oils that pair well with gut work — peppermint, ginger, fennel — should be therapeutic-grade from a brand that publishes third-party testing.

For medically complex situations — long-standing autoimmunity, multiple diagnoses, or a body that is not responding to nutrition alone — homeopathic and naturopathic care is where deeper work begins. Always consult a qualified practitioner before changing your treatment plan.

The Bottom Line

Red light therapy is not a cure for a struggling gut. It is a credible, research-backed tool that supports the cellular repair your nutrition and lifestyle are already driving. If you have done the food work and still feel stuck, ten minutes of red light over the abdomen is a low-risk experiment worth two weeks of your attention.

Get More Like This — Free

If this is the kind of evidence-based, no-hype guidance you want more of, subscribe to my free Your Health Unbound newsletter on Substack: https://substack.com/@yourhealthunbound. Each issue digs into one practical strategy for women navigating fatigue, gut, hormones, and weight after 45.

Start with one change, track honestly, and let your body tell you what it needs.

Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links. If you purchase through them, I may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. I only recommend tools and brands I trust and use with clients.

Reprinted with permission from YourHealthUnbound.com

Grounding Benefits

Grounding Benefits: The Free Anti-Inflammatory Reset

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If you’re dealing with stubborn inflammation, poor sleep, or a body that feels wired and tired no matter what supplements you take, there’s a free practice most people overlook: putting your bare skin on the earth. Grounding — also called earthing — is one of the most underrated anti-inflammatory tools available, and the research behind it is more solid than you’d expect.

You’ve cleaned up your nutrition. You’ve tried the protocols. You’re still inflamed. Part of what your body may be asking for is something you can do barefoot, for free, in the next ten minutes.

What Grounding Actually Is

Grounding is direct skin contact with the surface of the earth — grass, soil, sand, unsealed stone, or a natural body of water. The premise is simple: the earth carries a mild negative electrical charge, and when you touch it, free electrons transfer into your body. Those electrons appear to neutralize excess free radicals, the unstable molecules that drive chronic inflammation when they accumulate.

Think about the last time your bare feet touched actual dirt or wet grass for more than thirty seconds. For most adults, the answer is sometime in childhood. We sleep in beds off the floor, walk on rubber soles, drive in cars, and live in buildings wrapped in synthetic materials. Every human who came before us spent hours a day in direct contact with the planet. We don’t.

What the Research Says About Grounding and Inflammation

This isn’t woo. A 2015 review in the Journal of Inflammation Research pulled together the existing studies on grounding and reported measurable shifts in inflammation markers, cortisol rhythms, blood viscosity, and pain scores when subjects were grounded versus not. A 2010 study in the Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine found that grounding reduced delayed-onset muscle soreness and shifted white blood cell counts in a pattern consistent with a calmer inflammatory response. Mayo Clinic and Cleveland Clinic have both acknowledged the early but promising data on stress and sleep.

Here’s the honest framing: inflammation is a signal pointing upstream to a food trigger, a gut barrier issue, a toxic exposure, a nutrient gap, or a nervous system stuck in overdrive. Grounding doesn’t fix the upstream cause. What it appears to do, for many people, is turn down the volume on the body’s stress and inflammatory response so the rest of the work — the food, the sleep, the gut repair — has room to land.

How to Practice Grounding: A Simple Protocol

You don’t need a gadget. You need skin and earth. Start here:

  • Twenty minutes, bare feet, on grass or dirt. That’s the entry-level dose most of the research used. Morning sun plus bare feet is a two-for-one — grounding plus circadian light cues for better sleep.
  • Wet grass or wet sand conducts better than dry. Morning dew, the edge of a lake, damp soil after rain — all stronger conductors than parched ground.
  • Sit or lie down, don’t just stand. Hands on the ground count. More skin, more contact.
  • Concrete poured directly on earth (unsealed) works. Asphalt, sealed concrete, painted decks, and rubber soles do not. Indoor wood floors don’t either.
  • Try it before bed. Many people report falling asleep faster after even ten minutes of evening grounding.
  • Stack it with a walk. Five minutes barefoot at the start or end of a daily walk — it doesn’t have to be a separate appointment.
  • Pair it with breath. Four counts in, six counts out, for two minutes while your feet are on the earth. You’re signaling to your nervous system that the threat is over.

One related anti-inflammatory note: skip the bottled seed oils. Two tablespoons of raw butter a day, wild-caught salmon a couple of nights a week, and dressings built from fresh-squeezed lemon, apple cider vinegar, salt, and pepper will do more for inflammation than any bottled oil ever will.

Always consult your naturopathic physician before making changes to your treatment plan, especially if you’re managing a circulatory condition or are pregnant.

What About Grounding Mats and Indoor Alternatives?

If getting outside barefoot isn’t realistic — high-rise living, long winters, mobility limitations, or no access to clean ground — grounding mats and sheets are marketed as alternatives. These typically plug into the grounding port of a standard outlet.

Direct contact with the earth is the gold standard. I don’t sell grounding products, don’t recommend a specific brand, and don’t have an affiliate relationship with any manufacturer. Some people report benefits; do your own research, read both positive and critical reviews, and speak with your naturopathic physician first if you have cardiac, circulatory, implanted-device, or other medical considerations.

The Best Source Is Outside Your Back Door

No purchase required, no app, no subscription. This is one of the few health practices that costs nothing and that no industry can monetize, which is probably why it rarely comes up in a ten-minute doctor’s appointment. Follow the money — there isn’t any here. There’s just you and the planet you live on.

If your inflammation picture is more advanced or medically complex, Dr. Glidden’s work at Leave Big Pharma Behind offers deeper natural strategies beyond nutrition.

Your 10-Minute Grounding Experiment

Tomorrow morning, before you check your phone, walk outside and put your bare feet on the ground for ten minutes. Notice how you feel an hour later. Notice how you sleep that night. That’s the entire experiment.

Get More Practical Health Tools

If this kind of straightforward, evidence-backed approach to inflammation, gut health, and hormones speaks to you, subscribe to the free Your Health Unbound newsletter on Substack at https://substack.com/@yourhealthunbound. Each issue delivers one practical tool you can use that week — no fluff, no fear-mongering.

Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links. If you purchase through them, I may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. I only share resources I personally use or trust.

Sovereign Sisters

Sovereign Sisters Podcast | Episode 13 | Toxic Temptations: Exposing the Dangers of Fake Foods

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Unveiling the Hidden Dangers in Baby Formula and Synthetic Breast Milk

The episode begins with a shocking overview of a topic that hits close to home for many—baby formula. The alarming presence of harmful ingredients often found in commercial baby formulas is exposed. These products, which are a necessity for many parents, can contain everything from high oleic sunflower oil to a variety of additives that are hard to pronounce and even harder to justify feeding to a newborn.

The discussion takes an even more intriguing turn when the hosts explore the emerging market of synthetic breast milk. Companies are now investing in biotechnology to create lab-grown breast milk that mimics human milk as closely as possible. The harvesting of mammary cells that get processed through a bioreactor is the farthest thing away from mother’s milk. The question of the long-term implications of feeding infants milk from a lab opens the concern for the effects of these synthetic options on the baby’s development.

The Dirty Secrets of the Food Industry

The episode is not just an eye-opener but a call to arms, urging listeners to take a stand for their health and fight against the manipulation by the food industry. It’s packed with insightful information, empowering messages, and practical tips for making healthier food choices.

These processed fake foods are nutritionally void despite being calorie dense. They offer no actual nutrition, leaving the body starved of the essential nutrients it needs to function properly.

A Call to Action

This segment is particularly effective as it not only informs but also empowers listeners. The Sovereign Sisters provide practical advice on how to scrutinize product labels and advocate for all consumers to read nutrition labels and understand what is in these products. Through this powerful discussion, the podcast not only sheds light on a critical issue but also aligns with its broader mission to challenge the status quo and advocate for the health and well-being of all, starting from the very youngest in society.

There is so much more jam-packed in this episode about food-like substances and the future of food, including replicator food. So, if you’re ready to challenge the status quo and make informed decisions about what you eat, Check out Sovereign Sisters Podcast Episode 13, Toxic Temptations: Exposing the Dangers of Fake Foods.

LIVE MONDAYS at 4pm PT~5pm MT~6pm CT~7pm ET on Rumble and YouTube

Reprinted with permission from YourHealthUnbound.com

26 Pounds Lost in 20 Weeks

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That’s the official count – I’ve lost 26 pounds in the last 20 weeks. I feel  like I have discovered a hidden treasure. Eating has never been so easy for me than it is now. I have tried every conventional diet with the same results. Lose a few pounds and then gain it right back and more when you stop eating that way. That’s no way to live. Eating for a lifetime is the right way.

It has been such an amazing journey.  It has been such a life transforming event that I’ve enrolled in nutrition school to get my certification. I want to help others learn this process and make their lives better. I feel better than I have in a long time. I’ve started weaning myself off my medications. My blood pressure was down to 103/70. I don’t need medicine anymore if I can sustain that type of pressure.

I have contacted a close friend who is a chef. We’re going to partner to bring new, whole food recipes to people. This is going to be exciting for me. I can’t wait to set up a web site and begin doling out information to help folks like me.

I haven’t forgotten that I said I would post a picture. I’m still 5 pounds away from my goal. When I hit it, I will post those pictures. It’s hard to looks at them now, realizing how heavy and unhealthy I was. It’s taken years for me to get the right “prescription” for health and I did it on my own!

More than anything, this has been an empowering journey. Learning how to heal my gut, lose weight, and keep it off has been so satisfying that I never want to go back to the way things were before. This time I know I can keep the weight off and feel better every day.

Keep an eye out for the upcoming pictures – and soon, a new website.

Successfully Managing Food on Vacation

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I did it! I managed to go on vacation at a all-inclusive foreign resort and gain only 1 pound in eight days. I proved to myself that I have changed my eating habits permanently. I ate all the great food that I wanted but avoided all the things that I knew would be my downfall.

All week, I didn’t have desserts because they were mostly cakes and since I don’t eat grains, they were easy to avoid. On Friday there were chocolate covered strawberries. I let myself enjoy the sweet taste of fresh strawberries and some high quality dark chocolate. I even found it easy to eat just a couple and not eat as many as possible, like I would have in the past.

There was so much good food to choose from that I didn’t feel that I was missing out. I skipped the pasta and crepe stations and headed to the roast beef carving station. I ate three lobster tails one night! There were great choices of vegetables and salads. I never went hungry. Plus, I was pleasantly surprised that the kitchen staff were aware of Celiac Disease and would guide me away from food that was made with flours.

I’ve been working on increasing my knowledge in nutrition and overall health. I’m listening to webinars and reading as much as I can get my hands on food as medicine. I’ve realized my personal journey has brought me to the decision that I want to be a nutrition coach. I’d like to help people find their optimal nutritional formula. Since everyone is unique, it will be a personal journey for every person. I’d like to help guide people so they don’t have to go through the painful process of self discovery and take years to finally get there.

I’ll be posting along the path to my new career. I hope you join me.

Getting Close to My Goal

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Every day brings me a little closer to my goal of losing 30 pounds. I’ve lost 21.5 pounds now and not stopping until I reach my goal. I am so happy that I finally figured out the food combinations that work for me – and what doesn’t work. Here’s the list of food that I have eliminated to burn fat to lose weight:

  • All grains
  • Limited dairy – I only eat a small amount of cheese
  • No peanuts, pistachios, or legumes
  • No soy or soy products
  • No sugar or artificial sweeteners, except stevia
  • No processed foods of any kind

When I say no grains, I mean none. I am not eating anything that could be made into a cereal – wheat, rye, barley, corn, rice, oatmeal, etc. This may not be permanent but I won’t go back to eating foods with gluten because of the Celiac Disease. I can tell my insides are healing because I don’t feel bloated after I eat, no gassiness or other issues.

I thought giving up sugar would be difficult. But I managed to ease myself out of the hold it held on me. At first, I was making low carb desserts to get me through the transition, using stevia as the sweetener. After about a month, I was able to give up the desserts. Now I eat a simple snack when I want something like a sweet treat – cashews and dates. Here’s how I make them:

  1. Take 1 cup of cashews and chop them up in a food processor. Set aside.
  2. Remove the pits from 9 dates and chop them up in a food processor until they look like a lump.
  3. Add the cashews to the dates in the processor and pulse them until they are thoroughly mixed.
  4. Using a small cookie scoop, make small cashew date balls. Refrigerate.

Once you are free of the sugar addiction – and I know I was addicted – this treat will be all the sweetness you need. I eat two for a snack and feel satisfied. As I get closer to my goal, I know I can’t afford to let up on the good nutritional habits I’ve developed. I’m never going back to being fat!