Transcription
The number one magnesium mistake that nearly everyone makes. If you're taking magnesium to fix your sleep or your anxiety or a muscle tension, like a muscle cramp, and it's not working, you might be unknowingly making a massive mistake.
Look at the back of your magnesium supplement bottle. You will notice that the average dosage is between 350 to 420 mg per dose. Here's what they never tell you. That number was never designed to optimize the amount of magnesium you really need for your brain, for your nervous system. That number was calculated to give you the survival threshold to prevent serious deficiency diseases like seizures. That's it. Just the bare minimum. And when you take the bare minimum amount, which is directed on the back of the label, and you're expecting certain results, and you don't get the results, don't be surprised because that amount was never designed to create a therapeutic effect.
And this all boils down to one misunderstanding on what RDA really means. Here's a definition of RDA. Check this out. The RDA is the average daily level of intake sufficient to meet the nutrient requirements of healthy individuals. The RDA numbers were designed for people that were already healthy that don't have muscle cramps or high blood pressure. If you have serious muscle cramps, insomnia, anxiety, the demand and requirement for magnesium goes higher. And on top of that, if you drink coffee with caffeine, if you're eating some sugar, if you're taking in an acid, the demand for magnesium is higher. The RDA assumes that you are a healthy person eating a healthy diet. And personally, it's rare to find people out there that are healthy that are eating a healthy diet.
Now, the RDA for magnesium was set up in 1997 based on body weight, which correlated to women that weigh 133 lbs, which nowadays a lot of women weigh more than that, and men that weighed 166 lb, which nowadays they weigh a lot more. So if we actually recalculate and do the numbers on someone like me that I weigh 195 lbs, the adjustments from about 420 mg for magnesium for me should be about 600 milligrams per day, not 420. I'm just talking about the RDA. The bare minimum amount to prevent a disease. We're not talking about corrective doses. We're not talking about the doses. They even used in certain studies that showed improvements in anxiety, depression, blood pressure, and migraines. Those studies use up to like 800 milligrams of magnesium per day, sometimes for weeks, and sometimes even higher than that. One clinical group stated that the minimum dosage to begin correcting a deficiency is 600 milligrams per day. And they mention it should be continued for more than a month before you even see any results. So when someone starts taking 300 or even 400 milligrams of magnesium for a couple weeks and says it doesn't work, of course it's not going to work because it's like filling up your swimming pool with a garden hose and they turn it off within 10 minutes.
And this brings us to the next massive mistake. The form of magnesium that most people take and that most research is historically based on is something called magnesium oxide. Now, magnesium oxide is super cheap. It's compact, so you could fit a lot of it in one capsule. You could fit like 400 milligrams in one little capsule. That's why people like it because they don't have to take multiple capsules to get their 400 milligs. But the problem with magnesium oxide is it only has a 4% absorption rate. That means if you're taking a 400 mgram magnesium oxide pill, the body might absorb 16 millig. And then if you try to compensate and take more, you're going to get diarrhea, cramping, GI distress because all of that unabsorbed magnesium pulls water out of your intestines. And then think about magnesium research. Most of the research on magnesium is using magnesium oxide. So, first of all, you know, they're not going to be able to give them too much because they're going to get diarrhea and the absorption is so small. 16 mg per 400 mgram tablet is just not going to show the results. And this is why when you look up the research on magnesium, many of the studies don't really prove or show significant benefit. I don't recommend anyone taking magnesium oxide unless you have severe constipation and maybe you're taking it just for that as a temporary thing.
A much better form of magnesium would be to take magnesium glycinate. First of all, you won't have the GI problems. You won't have diarrhea. Secondly, you absorb 80% and magnesium glycinate comes with the glycinate part which actually helps calm down the nervous system. It helps increase something called GABA, which actually can help you sleep a little bit better.
But now, let's talk about something even more interesting and how magnesium affects your brain. Your brain has an accelerator, gas pedal, and it has a break. So, the neurons can get really excited or they can wind down and calm down and get in a relaxed state so you could sleep. And without getting too far in the woods, okay, glutamate is the gas pedal. That's the thing that excites the neurons. And there's a little receptor connected to this that allows this to work. And this is a normal thing that happens, right? When you hyperfocus on something, when you react very quick, when you need brain power, this system kicks in. But then it's supposed to wind down when you're about ready to go to sleep. And then when you're sleeping and you're recovering. Okay? So we have this onoff situation. Glutamate is the on. And then GABA is the off switch or the calming effect in the neurons. And so what you need to know is magnesium is the helper. It's called the co-actor for this receptor to help wind this system down to allow the overexited neurons to turn down. But when magnesium is low, we have no way of turning down this gas pedal. So the neurons stay overexited. So the brain tends to run hot even when you're sleeping.
Well, what does that feel like? It feels almost identical to high levels of cortisol. And this is why high levels of cortisol and neuron overexitation produce virtually the same symptoms. Okay? Anxiety, insomnia, especially the latter part of the night. Okay. Irritability, like little things bother you. You tend to crave certain things, racing thoughts, cramping in your calves or your feet or a Charlie horse, palpitations that can lead to arrhythmias. So, in other words, all of these symptoms could be either a cortisol issue, which is a stress issue, or something going on in the brain that can't turn off. And most people assume it's just cortisol. So, they might take ashwagandha. They might take other things, adaptogens to help calm them down. And sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. Sometimes I even take magnesium, 400 milligrams, and they might feel a little bit better. But for a lot of people, the problem might not be cortisol. It's this over here. In which case, you're going to need a lot more magnesium to turn that thing off. Because a lot of people, if they have these symptoms, are not in a healthy state.
So, one of the most frustrating things for people is when they try to take supplements for a certain thing or vitamins and just don't see change. Well, one of the reasons is you're not taking enough. But the bigger interesting question is, are there other symptoms that can differentiate or determine if you have more of a cortisol problem or an overactive brain? Okay. And the answer is yes. For cortisol, you're going to have a tendency to have more belly fat. You're going to have higher blood glucose. You might have more cortisol in the morning, which will actually create more glucose in the morning, too. That's called the dawn phenomena. You may have problems with the immune system because cortisol suppresses the immune system. You might have more of a problem with high blood pressure.
But now let's take a look at this problem over here. You'll have problems with insomnia despite exhaustion. So many people are exhausted, but they just can't sleep through the night. Okay, that's this problem right here. It's a problem with glutamate. They have too much glutamate that just won't turn off. They might have muscle twitches. They definitely have jaw tension and bxism, which is grinding of the teeth. Restless leg syndrome. I used to have that. But also, the good thing is that if you have this, you're going to respond to magnesium within hours. If you take magnesium and it's a cortisol problem, it might take days before you see the results. The good news is both of these problems are caused by the exact same thing, a deficiency of magnesium. But to correct both of these problems, you can't just correct them by taking the bare amounts. I mean, this relates to a lot of other vitamins, too, like vitamin D. They say take 600 IUs. That's ridiculous. Or what about B1? 1.2 milligrams. Are you kidding? You're not going to create any change in the body if you're taking tiny amounts.
But a really common problem with both of these issues is insomnia because as soon as you can't sleep, cortisol goes up. Cortisol then depletes more magnesium. The requirement of magnesium goes up. The more brain excitation that happens, the more demand for magnesium. The more tapped out you are, the more insomnia you have. So it's a neverending cycle. All because the raw material that allows this to turn off and allows this to turn off is missing.
Now, this next thing is fascinating because when you go to the doctor to get your magnesium tested, it's virtually impossible to test because most of this magnesium is inside the cell. It's not in your plasma, okay? Only 1% is in your plasma. So if you're deficient in magnesium, your bones will literally dump some of the magnesium into the blood to maintain that 1%. So you cannot accurately figure out how much magnesium you have through your blood. 99% of it is not in the blood. So then someone might say, well listen, we'll just get a red blood cell magnesium test. That way we can look beyond just the plasma. We can look in your red blood cells. Well, here's the problem with that. It's slightly better, but it's not a good test to do because of this one simple thing. 65% of the magnesium is attached to what's called ATP in your mitochondria because we desperately need magnesium to run our energy factory. That's how we make energy with magnesium. Well, guess what? There is no mitochondria in the red blood cell. So, it's not a good test to evaluate how much magnesium you have. I mean, there is a test that's not practical. You can get an IV of magnesium and then they can measure how much is excreted from your urine. It's a whole process, but you can test it, but rarely does anyone go through the hassle of figuring that out. In one study, they found 50% of people that were deficient had normal blood magnesium levels. And this was a test that they actually did a biopsy and they tested the tissues directly because that's another way to figure out if you have enough magnesium. Do a biopsy.
A doctor named PJ Weston gave magnesium to 50 patients with severe agitated depression. Well, guess what he found? 220 out of 250 depressed people improved. That is a 90% success rate. That study was published in the first volume of the American Journal of Psychiatry. And of course, it's been forgotten, but it's been sitting there for over a hundred years. And in that study, they didn't give the 400 milligrams per day. They gave between 500 and 1,200 milligrams per day. 60% of depression nowadays is classified as treatment resistant. Okay? Because the drugs don't work. Well, okay. Well, it could be something else, right? It could be a nutritional deficiency. I mean nowadays, not only do doctors not test for vitamin deficiencies, they don't even recognize them as being important. And also the problem is it's very difficult to get magnesium from our foods because the modern farming fertilizers with the NPK, nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium tend to inhibit magnesium. But we have these beautiful looking crops. Of course, they're empty of minerals, but they look good on the outside. And then, of course, on top of that, we have stress. We have caffeine. We have junk foods. All of these things deplete magnesium. Exercise depletes magnesium because it increases the demand for magnesium at a massive level, especially if you do intense exercise.
So, what is the solution? Very simple. Take the right form of magnesium, magnesium glycinate. And if you're trying to create a therapeutic effect, don't do just 400 milligrams once a day. Do 300 or 350 or 400 milligrams several times a day spread out to lower blood pressure and help palpitations and arrhythmias and migraines and even seizures and even insomnia. Sometimes it takes doses a,00 to,400 milligrams per day and that is significantly more than the RDA. But now you know why because this is just based on the bare minimum. So just try it for 30 days and prove it to yourself. If you have this problem right here, you're going to notice changes within one day because typically when you start beefing up your magnesium levels, within hours you start turning this off because with addictions and cravings, the glutamate is really driving you to these unhealthy habits. So, I did create several videos on that, but I didn't talk about the magnesium. So, you'll have to add that to the protocol, but I'll put those links down below. Now, magnesium is a fascinating topic. There's more to learn about it. And if you have not seen this video on magnesium, you should check it out. It's very important.