| If you want to maintain strong teeth and bones and keep healthy gums, there is no substitute in your diet for calcium. In addition to these benefits, Calcium also helps muscles work properly and nerves to send their messages through the body more smoothly. If you follow these tips below, your body can more efficiently absorb the calcium you consume.
Sunbathe two or three times a week for about twenty minutes at a time, without sunscreen. This will help you absorb some vital Vitamin D – which helps with the absorption of calcium. If your doctor has advised that you avoid sunbathing, Vitamin D supplements can do the trick as well. To avoid skin damage, do this before ten o-clock in the morning, or after three o’clock in the afternoon.
If you're not lactose-intolerant, you will have more luck absorbing calcium in your diet. The lactose in milk helps your body take in the calcium that you're drinking.
Instead of taking one supplement in the morning, take two or three smaller doses throughout the day. Research has shown that this optimizes absorption.
Take a supplement that has Vitamin C and calcium in it, or take a calcium supplement with orange juice, or eat a citrus fruit at the same time. Vitamin C also helps your body take in calcium more efficiently.
Do not take iron and calcium supplements at the same time. The way they interact actually reduces your body's absorption of both of these nutrients. Zinc and calcium interfere with each other's absorption in a similar manner. Foods with oxalic acid, such as spinach, and nuts such as cashews and almonds, can also hinder calcium absorption.
If you drink several sodas throughout the day, you may want to cut back. Soda contains phosphorus, and if you're getting too much phosphorus, that can take calcium out of your body, through your urine. Caffeine is also a culprit that will decrease calcium absorption.
Wheat bran is good to eat, but you can get too much of a good thing. If you take in too much, the extra fiber will sweep calcium out of the body.
Choosing the proper all-natural dietary supplement form of calcium also affects the rate of absorption. Calcium citrate is absorbed most efficiently – and you can take it without eating food at the same time. Calcium carbonate is also good form, but it requires your body to generate stomach acid for it to break apart and be absorbed. If your supplement contains bone meal, oyster shell or dolomite, make sure that it does not contain heavy metals. |
