Could We Be Having Too Much Calcium? Calcium : Magnesium Balance Discussion

[tankasnowgod]

View attachment 11703

I find this last slide quite hilarious. With the exception of Arbys, all of the other restaurants listed have far more locations than Dairy Queen, yet it is displayed most prominently. The slide also doesn't include Subway or Starbucks, which have the most and third most locations, respectively.

 

[Ideonaut]

I like Levy, and think he brings up some good points, but I went through his "Death By Calcium" presentation, and was not impressed. He might have brought up some better evidence in his book, however. What points or studies do you think refute Peat's ideas? Here is Peat's core argument for increasing Calcium, which is basically that low dietary calcium is what leads to soft tissue calcification- Calcium and Disease: Hypertension, organ calcification, & shock, vs. respiratory energy

Also curious what Levy states about K2, prolactin, and PTH.

The main Peat idea Levy contradicts is drinking a lot of milk. Peat basically says live off of milk and oj.

Levy: " . . . the amount of calcium needed for healthy cellular function is infinitesimally small relative to the amount of calcium found in bones. Most of the adult population has no need for significant calcium intake."...once calcium deposition in non-bone sructures begins, the body's compensatory responses pull even more calcium from he bones as he deposite calcium is taken out of circulation . . . the degree of calcium deficiency in osteoporotic bone is actually an indicator of the amount of excess calcium that has taken up residence in non-bone tissues . . . if the calcium/phosphorous metabolism is sufficiently out of balance, deposition can occur without inflammation. Once calcium begins to accumulate--with or without an initiating point of inflammation--the presence of calcification ofen initiates or increases inflammation that facilitates further deposition."

So very, very little dietary calcium is needed by most people. Any excess over what is needed is toxic. Inflammation can trigger deposition and the deposition can cause more inflammation, in a positive feedback manner. He gives all kinds of supportive evidence that excess calcium causes cancer, coronary heart disease, degenerative disease in general. In this respect he says it is like iron and copper. Vitamin d is important and should be supplemented, but not with calcium. The d causes more calcium to be absorbed in the gut. Magnesium glycinate is the main antidote to excess calcium. So, if Levy is right, Peat has given very bad advice. People should not drink milk as a beverage, and definitely not d fortified milk, he says. Cream and butter and sour cream are better since they have less calcium and are not fortified.

Shane Ellison, "the people's chemist" says synthetic d3 causes calcium deposition in soft tissues and to take real codliver oil instead. Videos - The People's Chemist Peat say codliver oil is just a PUFA?

 

[tankasnowgod]

I want to address your last statement first-

Shane Ellison, "the people's chemist" says synthetic d3 causes calcium deposition in soft tissues and to take real codliver oil instead. Videos - The People's Chemist Peat say codliver oil is just a PUFA?

Peat did not say Cod Liver Oil is "Just a PUFA." Serious question..... have you read any of Ray Peat's actual articles? Here is the relevant quote from The Great Fish Oil Experiment

"With just a normal amount of vitamin E in the diet, cod liver oil is certain to be highly oxidized in the tissues of a mammal that eats a lot of it, and an experiment with dogs showed that it could increase their cancer mortality from the normal 5% to 100%. Although fish oils rapidly destroy vitamin E in the body, some of them, especially the liver oils, can provide useful vitamins, A and D. In studies comparing fish oil diets with standard diets, these nutrients, as well as any toxins besides fatty acids (Huang, et al., 1997; Miyazaki, et al., 1998) in either type of oil, should be taken into account, but they seldom are."

Far cry from saying it's "Just a PUFA." But based on the dog study he quotes, I'm guessing Peat would rather get his A and D from sources that aren't so carcinogenic.

The main Peat idea Levy contradicts is drinking a lot of milk. Peat basically says live off of milk and oj.

Levy: " . . . the amount of calcium needed for healthy cellular function is infinitesimally small relative to the amount of calcium found in bones. Most of the adult population has no need for significant calcium intake."...once calcium deposition in non-bone sructures begins, the body's compensatory responses pull even more calcium from he bones as he deposite calcium is taken out of circulation . . . the degree of calcium deficiency in osteoporotic bone is actually an indicator of the amount of excess calcium that has taken up residence in non-bone tissues . . . if the calcium/phosphorous metabolism is sufficiently out of balance, deposition can occur without inflammation. Once calcium begins to accumulate--with or without an initiating point of inflammation--the presence of calcification ofen initiates or increases inflammation that facilitates further deposition."

So very, very little dietary calcium is needed by most people. Any excess over what is needed is toxic. Inflammation can trigger deposition and the deposition can cause more inflammation, in a positive feedback manner. He gives all kinds of supportive evidence that excess calcium causes cancer, coronary heart disease, degenerative disease in general. In this respect he says it is like iron and copper. Vitamin d is important and should be supplemented, but not with calcium. The d causes more calcium to be absorbed in the gut. Magnesium glycinate is the main antidote to excess calcium. So, if Levy is right, Peat has given very bad advice. People should not drink milk as a beverage, and definitely not d fortified milk, he says. Cream and butter and sour cream are better since they have less calcium and are not fortified.

Well, no sources cited for those claims, no discussion of Prolactin or Parathyroid hormone, no discussion of K2's proven ability to decalcify soft tissues, no discussion of Peat's claim that low dietary calcium leads to soft tissue calcification. I agree that Levy's statements you quoted (and the Death by Calcium book and presentation) are basically opposite to Peat's recommendations, but I still don't see where he has refuted any of the points of Peat's article that I linked about Calcium and Disease.

 

[artist]

I recently started increasing my calcium intake a lot, mainly from cheese, and my knees have abruptly (within about a week) become very crackly/prone to dislocation like they used to be. I've suspected I don't do well with a lot of calcium in the past. It could be something else but I don't know what it would be.

 

[ecstatichamster]

I recently started increasing my calcium intake a lot, mainly from cheese, and my knees have abruptly (within about a week) become very crackly/prone to dislocation like they used to be. I've suspected I don't do well with a lot of calcium in the past. It could be something else but I don't know what it would be.

Might need more K2.

 

[Rafael Lao Wai]

Might need more K2.

Yeah, and also cheese lacks the same vitamins that milk has, so maybe that resulted in less co2 prodution, which contributes to calcification, since co2 keeps calcium flowing out of the cells.

 

[artist]

Might need more K2.

I take K2

Yeah, and also cheese lacks the same vitamins that milk has, so maybe that resulted in less co2 prodution, which contributes to calcification, since co2 keeps calcium flowing out of the cells.

Milk happens to make me sick and I eat an otherwise nutritious diet. I shouldn't be getting crackly/unstable joints just because I don't drink milk

 

[tankasnowgod]

I take K2

Well, he did say "more."

 

[Richiebogie]

Here is a Thomas Levy presentation on his book Death by Calcium:

 

[Richiebogie]

Ray favors a cal mag ratio of 4:1 with around 1600/400 mg of elemental calcium and magnesium daily.

That's in the Finland zone:

https://raypeatforum.com/community/attachments/upload_2018-12-31_1-30-45-png.11700/

Actually that may not be bad if most of the Finns who tend to die from CHD from eating such a high Ca to Mg ratio did not die from a host of other issues earlier!

Life Expectancy by Country:
Japan 84.7
Italy 82.1
Netherlands 81.2
Finland 80.8
Greece 80.4
USA 79.7

Graphing this against Ca to Mg ratio removes the trend!

In oxidative metabolism, CO2 is produced. Inside the cell, CO2 turns into carbonic acid, and because it is hydrophilic, it leaves the cell, taking with it calcium and sodium, and water. This keeps calcium from accumulating inside the cell, thus keeping calcification at bay.

Are you saying that high calcium is not an issue if you eat enough sugar with your dairy?

 

[yerrag]

That's in the Finland zone:

https://raypeatforum.com/community/attachments/upload_2018-12-31_1-30-45-png.11700/

Actually that may not be bad if most of the Finns who tend to die from CHD from eating such a high Ca to Mg ratio did not die from a host of other issues earlier!

Life Expectancy by Country
Japan 84.7
Italy 82.1
Netherlands 81.2
Finland 80.8
Greece 80.4
USA 79.7

Graphing this against Ca to Mg ratio removes the trend!

True! Seems that there are many ways to interpret the data, and to fool people.

Are you saying that high calcium is not an issue if you eat enough sugar with your dairy?

Yes. If hypothyroid and not really burning sugar using oxidative metabolism, where CO2 is produced, it makes it harder for the calcium to get out of the cell. Calcification will likely happen without carbon dioxide being produced by the cell to bring out the calcium that gets inside the cell as part of regular cellular activity.

 

[Richiebogie]

Here is Dr Robert Thompson introducing his book:



Calcium Lie 2 By Dr. Robert Thompson and Kathleen Barnes

 

[Dave Clark]

Here is Dr Robert Thompson introducing his book:



Calcium Lie 2 By Dr. Robert Thompson and Kathleen Barnes

Does he know that calcium is a mineral also? Hard to take a professional serious when they talk like that.

 

[Cirion]

Man, I am starting to see a trend in these forums...

- Iron is bad
- Calcium is bad
- Vitamin A is bad
- ?? is bad (whatever the next trend will be)

That's only a surface level investigation.

The real culprits is the bodys' metabolism of iron, of calcium, of vitamin A, etc.

It is true that many people have deranged iron metabolism, calcium metabolism, VA metabolism, etc. I think it is more interesting to find out why the metabolism is compromised. Ray says calcium metabolism can be deranged from excess stress, prolactin, estrogen, lack of CO2... to name a few.

I would agree though that just eating more calcium is not gonna fix the problem unless all the co-factors are also addressed.

Calcium derangement problems can be more readily seen in todays' society too because EMF's directly act on the VGCC (voltage gate calcium channel) letting any excess calcium in the bloodstream wreak more havoc.

 

[Logan-]

How Did Hunter-gatherers Get Their Calcium?

 

[lampofred]

If you have low CO2, then milk has too much calcium relative to magnesium. It also has too much copper relative to zinc. However, if you have high CO2, then milk becomes the ideal food. IMO, the better thing to do in the long run would be to increase CO2 (via regular bag breathing, thyroid supplementation) than to drink less milk.

 

[Cirion]

Yeah that's the trick isn't it. It seems to be hard to re-train the body to make CO2. Supplementation is great short term but I'd like to figure out how to fix it long term..

 

[lampofred]

Yeah that's the trick isn't it. It seems to be hard to re-train the body to make CO2. Supplementation is great short term but I'd like to figure out how to fix it long term..

Aside from mechanical ways like breathing less, moving to a high altitude location, or supplementing thyroid (which doesn't even work for me because I have low cholesterol), I think the only way to increase CO2 is PUFA depletion...

I think there is something special about honey that works to increase CO2 as well, but I'm not sure exactly what it could be because Dr. Peat doesn't distinguish honey from ordinary sugar. But IMO there is something special about honey...

 

[Cirion]

Aside from mechanical ways like breathing less, moving to a high altitude location, or supplementing thyroid (which doesn't even work for me because I have low cholesterol), I think the only way to increase CO2 is PUFA depletion...

I think there is something special about honey that works to increase CO2 as well, but I'm not sure exactly what it could be because Dr. Peat doesn't distinguish honey from ordinary sugar. But IMO there is something special about honey...

I make amazing jello with OJ, honey, and gelatin. It's the shiz. Virtually always elevates my metabolism.

 

[Richiebogie]

Here is a longer presentation by Dr Robert Thompson in Alaska.

He recommends getting hair tissue analysis to discover which minerals you are deficient in (usually sodium chloride and trace elements from sea salt) and which minerals
you have in excess (usually calcium, strontium, lithium..!)

He has also investigated hypothyroidism and has some theories on this!