If You’re Bored By This Article, You’re Doing It Right

Let’s just say you’re eating normal food: veg, dairy, some meats, grains, etc. You know, what healthy people do all over the Earth.

Let’s say I came to you and breathlessly told you how amazing this new amazing stupendous molecule was (Vitamin K2, OH. EM. GEEEEE), and that you can get this amazing elixir vitae by eating these special foods called chicken, cheese, eggs, butter, and even sour kraut.

If you looked at me, first feeling like you kinda just don’t get it, and that there is WAY too much hyperventilation going on here. You must have missed something, because these are normal foods. Normal. No miracles, shiny angels, or anything, and you don’t even have to go to fancy expensive stores to get them.

If this is you, then you’re doing it right. If you look at normal foods and think, yeah I should really add that into my diet, then that’s another story altogether.

Here’s the point:

in a world where the media scraps for every click-scrap they can get, the informational diet you’ll be fed is an all you can eat buffet of over-hyped everything — they need you to click through.

And you may want to go ahead and click through, read the material, and suspend disbelief like you do when Luke lifts the X-wing fighter from the swamp … with his MIND! But when you’re at the grocery store, you should still shop on science fact, not science fiction.

This article was originally pubbed here.

Vitamin K may be one of the more recent vitamins discovered, but it has a major role in our body – especially the elusive vitamin K2.

Vitamin K1 is obtained from your diet in the form of leafy greens such as kale, collards, romaine lettuce, cauliflower, spinach, broccoli. Vitamin K2 is manufactured by beneficial bacteria found in your gut and found in certain organic animal products and fermented foods.

Roles Of Vitamin K2

Bone Health – K2 is vital for calcium regulation in the body, building strong bones and breaking down unwanted calcification. Its interaction with other nutrients such as Vitamin A (Retinol not Beta-Carotene) and Vitamin D play an important role in creating a healthy bone.

Dental Health – Dr. Weston A. Price showed that dental decay, tooth sensitivity and other issues can be addressed naturally, simply by ensuring adequate K2 in the diet. He found that indigenous people with healthy teeth had diets rich in K2, vitamin A and vitamin D.

Cardiovascular Health – Vitamin K2 has an important job in preventing cholesterol congestion within the arteries. The cholesterol that gets plastered on arterial walls is mainly made up of calcium. Since it has the job of distributing calcium where it belongs, vitamin K2 keeps calcium out of your arteries and in your bones.

Wrinkles – There is a strong correlation between early signs of aging (wrinkles, loose skin) and low bone density. Looking at cultures that ingest high vitamin K2 foods, such as the Japanese, one can see how wrinkles are not a common problem.

Men’s Health – A vitamin K2 study done on more than 11,000 men was recently published by the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition (EPIC). The research revealed that increased intake of vitamin K2 may reduce the risk of prostate cancer by 35 percent. Vitamin K1 on the other hand did not offer any prostate benefits.

Women’s Health
– Vitamin K2 is especially important for women including relieving menstrual cramps. Dr. Kate Rhéaume-Bleue, author of Vitamin K2 and the Calcium Paradox, says:

“For the prevention of everything from wrinkles to cancer, Vitamin K2 is the missing nutrient for women’s health. Most women don’t need a calcium supplement, but Vitamin K2 will channel dietary calcium to the right places. And everyone is taking Vitamin D, but without K2 we’re not getting all the benefits of Vitamin D, and even risking harm from it.”

Brain Health – Vitamin K has been shown to have a protective action on brain cells. Although it is not known as a common antioxidant, vitamin K2 helps to prevent oxidative damage within the brain.
Other K2 functions include:

• Helping to protect cells against oxidative damage
• Supporting your immune system
• Encouraging the flow of urine
• Enhancing liver function
• Promoting brain function
• Supporting growth and development

Why is deficiency so common?
Since the development of commercially processed foods, vitamin K2 has dramatically diminished. Our new high carbohydrate diets are the perfect food for pathogenic bacteria in the gut. Plus a lack of organic animal products and naturally fermented foods together compromise the intestinal environment limiting its capacity to produce vitamin K2.