Vitamin C: what they don’t tell you.JASON HOMMEL·SATURDAY, JANUARY 14, 2017
Updated Jan 5th, 2019: Vitamin C is widely regarded as the safest vitamin. However, for me, sometimes C gave me problems. Here’s how I learned to fix these problems, over the last 28 years. (I still take Vitamin C.)
My mom gave me chewable vitamin C tablets when I was a kid. When I was about 5, I had two problems already; nosebleeds and sweating. Vitamin C can deplete copper, and copper can stop nosebleeds and sweating, thus indicating that vitamin C may have created a copper deficiency in me at such a young age. At age 13, I went to live with my dad. By age 18, I was getting bad nosebleeds, and I “rediscovered” vitamin C to fix my nosebleeds on the advice of a family friend. I took 1-2 or even 3 tablets of 1000 mg. of vitamin C. It worked. But then, sometimes it didn’t work, and the nosebleeds got worse, but I still had not figured out why.
It took me a lot of trial and error and further learning until I read that the Vitamin C was giving me “rebound scurvy” when I would forget to take it for a few days. What happens in theory is the body makes more enzymes to digest and use up the C, and then, when not taking C, the body moves quickly into deficiency mode. That might not be accurate. Maybe the Vitamin C acts as a chelator, removing metals such as copper, and without copper, bleeding problems begin.
Vitamin C was good for my nosebleeds because it strengthens the walls of the blood vessels. But the rebound survey effect, or copper depletion effect, caused excess bleeding from time to time.
I found two ways to beat the “rebound scurvy” effect, besides trying to be more consistent with taking C regularly without forgetting, and besides taking smaller more consistent doses of only 1,000 mg/day.
First taking bioflavonoids with the C helps keep the Vitamin C in the body longer, and this helps to prevent the effect of the rebound scurvy. But note, it did not completely eliminate it, and if the theory is wrong, then the solution will be wrong, too. Perhaps copper depletion is the better theory.
Second, I found out about the herb Cayenne pepper, which stops bleeding. Cayenne Pepper also contains vitamin C and biovlavonoids, so it’s a really good in combination. Today, I either try to eat hot sauce on my food, or take Cayenne pepper at least a few times a week.
Cayenne is said to be a great source of copper. But it’s not. 1 capsule, 1 gram of cayenne pepper contains 0.0037 mg of copper. Source: https://www.nutrition-and-you.com/cayenne-pepper.html
This helped me get through my ski racing days up to age 23 or so, but nosebleeds were still somewhat of a problem. I had heard also that Vitamin C can deplete zinc, and taking zinc can deplete copper, and that both copper and zinc should be taken with magnesium, so for years I took the minerals on and off from time to time. I was never a big fan of calcium supplements.
When I was in my late 30’s, I created my own herbal formula that contained over 240 different herbs in it. As a happy side effect, this greatly helped prevent my nosebleeds. This product is not for sale. At age 42, I re-discovered the “green smoothie”, even going so far as to make my own in a home blender, and even consuming from 1-2 quarts a day for a while. This extra vitamin K really helped stop my nosebleeds, and it also got me on my way to fixing my joint pain, until I discovered that taking a green smoothie once a week right before doing isometric stretching was even more beneficial than drinking greens all the time, and far better than doing stretching at radically different times of the day than the greens.
Last year, at age 45, I discovered I was zinc deficient, and also in copper, but more deficient in zinc. I had to think for a bit as to why and how this happened, and of course, taking extra vitamin C my whole life probably was a big reason as to how I ended up zinc deficient, because too much C can cause zinc deficiency. I now believe that the greens, while they contain copper, chelate the minerals, as does distilled water, vitamin C, and coffee; they all chelate minerals and metals.
I was also high in iron and selenium. High iron can also block zinc and block copper.
I was also low in testosterone! Zinc, of course, boosts testosterone. Sure enough when I started taking a zinc pill, my testosterone increased. Did I have it tested again? No. I didn’t feel the need, because the change was so obviously successful.
Increased testosterone after taking more zinc led to: SEXUAL POWER oh my! Increased recovery in the gym, wow. I felt like I had discovered steroids, which I have never taken, by the way. Increased sleep. And you need sleep for testosterone. It all builds on itself, you start doing good things, and everything starts going better.
Typically, I used to wake up with morning wood about 1 day in 10. These days, it’s every day. I used to feel embarrassed if I woke up with morning wood. Now, I recognize that not having morning wood is really a zinc deficiency, and morning wood is simply a sign of good health, and being “normal”; even though, for me, it was not typical.
After three months on zinc supplements I was still not zinc sufficient. So I had to look up how to boost my absorption of zinc. I found out that taking zinc with meat, and citrus, and oils, can help the body absorb it. That seemed to help.
After bragging about my success with zinc on facebook, a man suggested boron and iodine. Well, one thing at a time. I started with boron, it seemed safer and easier.
Boron kills candida, and sure enough, I got a candida die off reaction, and got a little sick the first week. Boron also boosts testosterone, and detoxes fluoride. Boron is primarily known for fixing joint pain, and sure enough, even though my joints were feeling so much better, like 95% improved, the boron gave me another layer of strength and healing everywhere in my joints. Boron felt almost as good as a green smoothie! For more information, google “the borax conspiracy”. Great well researched article on boron and why to supplement with it, and why it’s so safe.
Boron gave me an interesting brain boost. The day I first took it, I wrote 7000 words of some of my personal traumas.
What that article did not mention, and it’s always what they don’t tell you, isn’t it…?
Boron can cause depression. Well, I was already suffering from quite a bit of depression, and so this amplified it quite a lot. The depression lifted a month later on the day I took my first drop of iodine.
Wow. Wow. Wow. Iodine gave me my brain back. I could control my thoughts so much better. Iodine was better than meditation, better than therapy, the best thing I’ve ever done! On iodine, right away, I had improved focus, concentration, memory, like I was 10-20 years younger mentally. The first three days on iodine, I got the “iodine detox headache”, and the solution was to take sea salt. Within a few weeks, I’m like, “dude, do the rest of the co supplements they are saying, have you not learned your lesson, and I finally got the selenium, but I eased into that, because I was already high in it, as I mentioned.
But I might have been iodine deficient for the following reason: I did test high in selenium, and selenium and iodine appear to both be needed to make thyroid. So, with excess selenium, maybe my body was able to use up all the iodine it got, or something. Also, certain greens like kale, can block iodine, and I had been drinking a lot of green smoothies over the prior three years. After my huge success with zinc, copper, boron, and iodine, I wondered, “What other trace vitamins are known as super safe in mega doses that the establishment doesn’t seem much to care for? I already knew about B12 and D, and so I ran out and got the mega doses of each of these. I think at this time, I was already so healthy, that these extra things didn’t do too much for me that I could notice. Even still, I now take B12 and D in levels that should actually work, 5000 IU’s of each.
What do all the others have to do with C? Vitamin C led me to my zinc and copper deficiency. Fixing the deficiencies really, really helped improve my health. Taking zinc and copper led me to boron, iodine, selenium, then large doses of B12 and D.
And why do I mention all the success I had with minerals?
Again, Vitamin C depletes minerals. Turns out Dr. Linus Pauling got prostate cancer, perhaps from zinc deficiency. Turns out, boron and iodine, like zinc, are also likely cures for prostate cancer. And it turns out, that vitamin C also tends to react with iodine in funny ways. On the one hand, C makes iodine more effective, because Vitamin C helps the iodine symporter absorb iodine better. On the other hand, Vitamin C blocks elemental iodine, some say converting it to iodide, but the body needs both kinds that are found in Lugol’s iodine solution. The prostate especially needs elemental iodine.
I have learned this month that the high iodine protocol can overstimulate, and eventually weaken the adrenals. Salt, B3, and B5 and specific herbs AND COPPER can strengthen the adrenals.
Yes, zinc depletes copper. I had been taking from 23 to 46 mg of zinc every night, and from 0-3-9 mg of copper every day. This was enough to totally fix my nosebleed problem, and copper does help prevent bleeding. The vitamin C might help the body use up, and thus deplete copper. So that might explain why I was low in copper. So, In the last two weeks, I increased my copper to 20 mg/day and I feel so much better in several ways. My night sweats stopped. I was soaking several T-shirts a night, and now I’m totally dry for the last three days. I feel more energy and stronger, all day, and in my workouts. I have better mental energy.
Further research:
http://www.doctoryourself.com/
https://www.seanet.com/~alexs/ascorbate/
LINUS PAULING INSTITUTE
Micronutrient Information Center: Vitamin C
http://lpi.oregonstate.edu/mic/vitamins/vitamin-C
Linus Pauling Institute » Micronutrient Information Center: Minerals » Copper
https://lpi.oregonstate.edu/mic/minerals/copper
Update for Iodine Users: How can we improve the original Iodine Protocol?: Mentions zinc, A and C