By Dionie
Sometimes a scary doctor's visit yields surprising consequences. Take for example, any heart related issue really scares me and because of family history I tried (not my best) to really stay within the healthy zones of diet and exercise yet there I was scared enough to take an unscheduled visit.
On this particular visit was a kick in the butt because the finding proves to be a vitamin D deficiency. Isn't that something we are told we get in the sun and our parents use to just coerce us to drink milk fortified with vitamin D ? This deficiency if left unchecked has health effects including but not limited to cancer, skeletal and cardiovascular problems, low self-esteem, depression, disturbed sleep and even weight increase.
However, the amount of vitamin D we get from food and other sources other than sunlight, gives us only miniscule amount in the range tens to a few hundred international units (IU) of vitamin D. Yet, 20 minutes of summer sunshine direct to our skin gets us 10,000 IU of vitamin D which is 50 times more than the US government recommendation of 200 IU.
Sunlight we are getting should not be blocked by clothing, glass like in cars or windows or even with sunblock protection, in fact, a low SPF sunblock hinders 95% of the vitamin D from sunlight from being absorbed by the skin.
With this, I am starting out a photo diary to have a reason to be out in the sun and have fun.
This image was taken when I took my family to Great Falls, MD to see the falls last May 1st, 2010.
Thursday, May 6, 2010
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