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The stunning Kelly Ripa announced in her talk show “live with Kelly and Ryan” that she adheres to an alkaline diet as a measure to retain a healthy body, mood, and as a prevention measure against diseases.
Actually, Kelly is not the only celebrity to publicly embrace the alkaline diet; Victoria Beckham, Jennifer Aniston, and Kate Hudson have also followed an alkaline diet and became hooked on the promising results they achieved.
It’s not only Hollywood stars who are able to achieve their health and body goals from adopting the alkaline diet, but, rather also athletes whose activities demand a high level of physical activity and performance.
NFL superstar Tom Brady explained in his book “The TB12 Method: How to Achieve a Lifetime of Sustained Peak Performance” that the alkaline diet has helped to fight inflammation and recover faster from his arduous workouts and cross-training.
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First, you might hear this diet called by several names. The Alkaline diet or alkaline ash diet or alkaline acid diet is concerned with alkalizing the body through eating a certain food to protect it from diseases and inflammation. The alkaline diet is based on consuming fruits, vegetables, and legumes and cutting out all dairy foods, meat, eggs, grains, fish, poultry, booze, and peanuts. The concept behind this limitation is that when consuming any of these restricted foods, acidic byproducts are produced, which make the body prone to diseases and infections.
Scientific studies relating to the long-term health benefits of following an alkaline diet are still lacking, but what we we can’t ignore is that the body’s pH is acutely affected by complex mechanisms and food is only what of the factors maintaining this homeostasis. Here’s a bit more info on the basics: pH is a scale of how acidic or basic we measure something to be. The range for pH is from 0 to 14, with pH 0 meaning that a certain medium is extremely acidic and a pH of 14 means that this medium is extremely alkaline or basic and that of a 7 is considered neutral.
So back to our bodies. Our blood sustains itself at a nearly neutral pH of 7.3 to 7.4 and any changes to this value can seriously affect our health.To be clear, the only pH that the alkaline diet can affect is urine.
Our kidneys act as the body’s filter of all waste products and they discard the metabolic by-products of this biological process when we urinate. When our body metabolizes food molecules, energy is generated and either an acidic or basic ash is produced that is excreted in the urine. Alkaline foods mean that the net result of their biological metabolism is alkaline ash and hence the name “alkaline ash diet”.
So, what is the point of alkalizing the urine by eating alkaline foods? To some extent, science approves that a more alkaline urine is able to help remove toxins from the body more than acidic urine is able to. For this reason, advocates promote that the diet helps todetoxify the body.
Eating fresh fruits and vegetables, while omitting any processed foods, GMO-products, and refined sugars is arguably a healthy lifestyle to follow. However, the alkaline diet is also one of the most strict diets you will ever hear about as it cuts out even coffee! Coffee, of course, will result in acidic ash. So, as a word of warning, if you’re an uncompromising coffee addict, the alkaline diet just isn’t for you.
Despite the restrictiveness of the alkaline diet, Dr. Daryl Gioffre, author of “cut off your acid” says “all we ask for is 80% commitment.” Tom Brady also support this line of thinking by stating in his book that eating a diet that includes 80% alkaline food and 20% acidic food would achieve a desirable balance for hishealth. So, coffee addicts, you might have a way out if you factor in a 20% margin to get your caffeine fix. We can’t blame you.
If you’re following or even partially following the Alkaline diet, supplementation can be tricky. We don’t often discuss if a supplement is acid or basic for example. However, as more and more people opt to integrate a daily collagen supplement into their diet, it’s worth understanding what might be the most suitable. After all, collagen provides your body with incredible health and graceful aging benefits for your skin, bone health, tendons, metabolism and even your hair and nails. (1)
The Alkaline diet, which is said to support bone health pairs well with a high bioavailability collagen supplement, which also works to encourage the same. Collagen is closely related to bone health and it helps to achieve one of the goals of an alkaline diet, which is to keep bones stronger as we age.Amandean’s Premium Collagen powders, which include both marine and bovine sources are non- GMO, soy-free, dairy-free, and gluten-free, which help to keep followers of an alkaline diet on track.
Going back to basics, collagen is a naturally occurring protein in the human body. It’s the main structural protein of the body, which is responsible for giving the skin its elasticity, firmness, and tone. It also helps our bones to stay rigid and strong, and even our blood vessels to remain intact.
The bad news is that collagen synthesis decreases as we age and consequently, its role in maintaining overall health diminishes with it. The good news is that supplementing with aneasy-to-use collagen powder everyday is a simple and effective way to restore its function in the body as we age and many studies have confirmed its effectiveness.
A double-blind, placebo-controlled, randomized, clinical study on the effectiveness of supplementing collagen peptides on patients suffering from osteoarthritis provides the highest approval conclusion regarding a specific fact. The study concluded that collagen peptides can be considered as a therapeutic agent for the management of osteoarthritis and maintenance of joint health (2). The results from this study are very promising regarding the fact that collagen accounts for more than 90% of the bone’s organic mass in the human body (3).
You may have heard little about collagen’s effect on cardiovascular health, but you will be interested to know that collagen acts as an effective antihypertensive agent, and clinical studies show a promising application of collagen supplements in managing cardiovascular diseases such as atherosclerosis and thrombosis-related diseases (1).
One of collagen's most talked about benefits is its support for our skin. Collagen exerts an effective anti-aging influence on the skin, by increasing the skin’s hydration, decreasing the formation of deep wrinkles, and improving the skin’s elasticity. These effects are some of the most obvious effects collagen supplements are known for (1).
Two major detoxifying organs of the body are the liver and the kidney. The liver principally metabolizes any molecule that enters into the body and the kidneys excrete metabolic byproducts out of the body through urine.
The Alkaline diet is said to help reinforce the kidneys’ ability to effectively detoxify the body, and the science behind that is that urine alkalization enhances the elimination of toxins.
When it comes to detoxifying the body, we can never ignore the role of naturally occurring antioxidants such as phenolic flavonoids, lycopene, carotenoids, Vitamin C, E, b-carotene, and glutathione to mention some of them.
One of the most effective antioxidants that can be easily consumed when following an alkaline diet is Vitamin C. Vitamin C results in an alkaline end product after being consumed by the body. For this reason, Vitamin C is considered an easy, cost-effective way of alkalizing the body when following this regime. Furthermore, Vitamin C is a water-soluble vitamin C. This means it can protect compounds in water-soluble portions of cells and tissues by donating an electron to oxidized reactive species.
Unlike other anti-oxidants that the human body is capable of synthesizing, Vitamin C must be provided from an external source, which is why it’s very important that we both supplement and eat foods that are rich in vitamin C daily. As an antioxidant, Vitamin C not only prevents, delays, or removes oxidative damage caused by free radicals, it further ensures that the body maintains an optimum energy state.
Vitamin C plays several roles in the body to help maintain overall health, including boostingimmunity through enhancing lymphocyte development and function (4). Vitamin C is also required for the synthesis of collagen by the body (5), and by synthesizing collagen, Vitamin C acts to unlock numerous beauty and health benefits attributed to collagen. These two supplements give you even more health and beauty benefits when used together daily.
Each individual is different and we often only take Vitamin C during winter months when we are more susceptible to cold and flu symptoms. However, when considering your daily dose of Vitamin C, we can’t ignore the recommendation made by the Nobel Prize-winning scientist Linus Pauling, who recommended consuming 2.3g daily for optimum health.
He emphasizes the accuracy of this value logically, and the multitude of studies he conducted are now confirmed in recent medical studies. (6) Pauling’s results don’t suggest that his recommended dose of Vitamin C be taken purely as a supplement because we’re still able to absorb some Vitamin C through the foods we eat. Instead, his studies suggest that you probably should have access to a high bioavailable formula of Vitamin C to maintain an optimum state of health.
A high bioavailable formula of Vitamin C can be obtained through two formulas, either through an IV Vitamin C treatment, which can be inconvenient and expensive, or through a revolutionary high absorbency delivery system called Liposomal Encapsulation Technology (LET). Vitamin C supplements using this technology are called Liposomal Vitamin C. Liposomes are nanosized spheres that are biocompatible, biodegradable, and safe carriers of hydrophilic or hydrophobic molecules that improve the pharmacological and pharmacokinetic properties of antioxidants (7). Liposomes are the answer to the failure of regular forms of antioxidants to achieve remarkable benefits in clinical studies, largely because their absorbency into the cells that need it most is very poor (8).
The success of liposomes in clinical trials can be attributed to the fact that they facilitate intracellular delivery and prolong the retention time of entrapped antioxidants inside the cell.
Another super antioxidant that is best supplemented via liposomal delivery is glutathione, also known as the body’s masterantioxidant. Glutathione is linked to the body’s most important functions including keeping our vital organs health and supporting functions of the brain and the liver. Reduced glutathione (L-g-glutamyl-L-cysteinyl glycine) is the most powerful intracellular antioxidant. Glutathione differs from Vitamin C in that the body produces its glutathione, but at the same time, it’s more likely to be depleted due to oxidative stress states in the body. Everyday exposure to UV rays, pollution, chemicals, and even rigorous exercise can all contribute to the depletion of glutathione.
If the body suffers from glutathione depletion, the body will be more susceptible to suffering from heart disease, dementia, autoimmune diseases, chronic fatigue syndrome, chronic infections, diabetes, autism, Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's disease, arthritis, asthma, kidney problems, liver disease and much more (9). Unlike dietary Vitamin C, eating foods that are rich in glutathione is not an effective way to increase circulating glutathione to a clinically beneficial extent, because of the hydrolysis of glutathione by intestinal and hepatic gamma-glutamyltransferase (10). Thus, the repletion and maintenance of intracellular GSH levels requires careful supplementation from a reliable formula. Once again, a liposomal formulation will offer the highest bioavailability in this regard.
Luckily, clinical studies have revealed that oral supplementation of reduced liposomal glutathione has an impressive enhancement in biomarkers of oxidative stress and enhancements in immune functions with subsequent reliving of inflammatory reactions in the body (11). Glutathione is fundamental for mental and physical activity, as glutathione acts to minimize muscle damage, reduce recovery time(12), increase strength and endurance, as well as enhance learning and memory capacity (13).
In conclusion, even if science is still investigating the effectiveness of the alkaline diet, adhering to a diet based on consuming a high amount of fruits and vegetables would be very advisable. Adding alkaline-friendly supplements to your diet such as collagen, as well as high bioavailability Liposomal Vitamin C and Liposomal Glutathione will help to maintain your diet goals andoptimum health along the way.
Providing your body with quality supplements adjacent to a healthy lifestyle can achieve wonders. For more information on the premium supplements recommended in this article, shop Amandean today!
