The weather has been kind of stormy here lately which always makes it harder for me to sleep.  Over the past few years I have found that I sleep much better and feel happier overall if I take a dose of magnesium before I go to bed.  I usually alternate between 2 or 3 tablets of Marilyn Farms Mag Calm and 1 scoop of Marilyn Farms Essential Calm in a small glass of water.  Either choice provides about 300 mg of magnesium in a very absorbable form (chelate, glycinate, and citrate are the best – avoid magnesium carbonate and oxide if possible).  This dosage puts me right to sleep and I wake up feeling pretty good (though I would feel better if my early bird husband would sleep a little later so I could enjoy my rest without feeling guilty).

The best way to figure out what dosage of magnesium works for you is to start with a small dose (about 100 mg) and gradually work your way up over the course of a few days.  You’ll know you’ve had enough magnesium when you start to have loose stool.  When that happens, just reduce your dosage back to whatever you were taking the day before you had loose stool (for example, if 400 mg gives you diarrhea, go back to 300 mg) and take that for maintenance.  Needs for magnesium will vary based on stress and activity levels as well as how much you’re getting in your diet. 

For more info on magnesium as well as a list of foods that contain magnesium, see this website:

http://lpi.oregonstate.edu/infocenter/minerals/magnesium/
NOTE: This blog is not intended to replace the advice of a qualified healthcare practitioner.  If you are being treated for impaired kidney function, you should not use magnesium supplements without the consent of your physician.

Last week I attended a 4-day conference in Chicago on nutrition and chronic disease.  The conference itself was fantastic, but I’m writing this blog to tell you of my 4-day love affair with the free samples of magnesium glycinate (the same form of magnesium found in our very own Mag Calm and Essential Calm) that were provided at the conference.  You see, the conference was sponsored by a supplement company that wanted to make sure the practitioners in attendance knew all about the wonders of their supplements so they had open bottles of their entire product line for us to sample.

Magnesium is commonly used for the nutritional treatment of a diversity of issues including osteoporosis, pre-menstrual syndrome, fatigue, fibromyalgia, arthritis, insomnia, high cholesterol, high blood pressure, arrhythmia, and diabetes.  I personally experience none of the above but since an estimated 80% of the US population doesn’t get enough magnesium in their daily diet I thought I’d take advantage of the free samples.

After just one day of taking about 400 milligrams of magnesium I found myself sleeping better, waking up easier, and just generally feeling relaxed and refreshed – which is not usually how I feel when sitting in a chair for 8 hours a day listening to scientific lectures.  The dosage I took is slightly above the RDA of 310 mg/day for women but magnesium is hard to overdose on when taken orally – if you get too much your body will eliminate the extra via the bowels (translation: if you find yourself running to the bathroom, you took too much).  The only exception to this would be if you have inadequate kidney function or are on medications that alter your metabolism of magnesium.

As I write this blog I’m staring at my own bottle of Mag Calm, which I keep by my computer to remind me to keep up the experiment I started at the conference.  It’s been a week and I’m still feeling energetic and waking up refreshed and happy in the morning which is highly unusual for me when it starts getting cold outside!

Magnesium has so many amazing qualities that I couldn’t do it justice in one blog so I wanted to also provide you with a link to one of my favorite reference websites on nutrition – the Linus Pauling Institute.  Here is the link to their page on magnesium.  Enjoy!
http://lpi.oregonstate.edu/infocenter/minerals/magnesium/