Anyway, Kelly - wow! Your weight loss is quite an accomplishment! What type diet did you follow? Biotin is good for your nails too isn't it? Can you tell a difference there? Tina, I first started on Weight Watchers and exercise but even though I had wonderful success I decided that I wanted to know more about the calories and nutrients I was putting into my body. I switched to using an online journal (myfooddiary.com) that gives me more detailed info including what percent of my calories are coming from fat/carbs/protein. I'm doing some serious weight lifting and need to keep my protein up to 30-35%. My total calories that I eat everyday is based on my resting metabolic rate and the calories I burn through working out. If I have a light workout day I eat fewer calories. When I'm really on top of things and meeting my daily goals I can easily lose 2.5 to 3lbs per week. Biotin is great for nails and hair as well as boosting the metabolism. I have a hypothyroid and starting taking medication a year ago and my hair fell out badly. It's still not back to the way it was but is a little thicker. Yes, the niacin reaction is immediate. I don't get the hot flash feeling or flushing (which is weird because I am very fair and flush very easily). My rash is/was a ring around my neck and slightly raised. It took a little over a week to go away.

So, if I understand correctly calcium is the key here and anything that interferes with it can causes obesity depending on our bone's health? So, electronics oscillating at around 900 Mhz shake loose calcium ions with a +2 charge? What a powerful free radical to have in our bodies. Drugs like "Beta Blockers" reduce blood calcium levels in an attempt to control heart nerve function? GMOs stop intestinal mineral absorption again reducing our calcium levels? wow! Lack of calcium in the body causes insomnia? McDonald's food contains GMOs and depending on a persons sensitivity (intestinal damage), gluten can cause both weight loss or weight gain? We digest carbohydrates first then vitamins, proteins, fats, and minerals last. So, even a mild food allergy to a chemical found in processed food can interrupt calcium absorption? In order to make calcium work in all 147 of it's functions in the body it requires 76 more minerals, 16 vitamins, 12 amino acids, and 3 fatty acids? And, our bodies are hungry until our mineral needs are satisfied? I have one last thought, eating the same poisonous or nutritionally challenged food in a bad environment only in smaller quantities while sweating to the oldies and expecting really positive results is the definition of insanity. Hosea 4:6 BT- toxin is just half of the equation with GMO food. Glyphosate is the other. BT-toxin damages the intestinal track; that's how it kills bugs. Glyphosate renders manganese inert causing bone, joint, and lung damage. Oh, this is also how it kills plants. Yum yum, Round-Up ready GMOs. Last note: lung cancer doesn't require smoking; it is a selenium deficiency. However, aggravating it by inhaling a free radical regularly while impeding oxygen (an anti-oxidant) is always a good idea! Here is a brain teaser: Free rascals are positively charged ions. Anti-oxidants are negatively charged molecules. Oxygen's dual molecule can neutralize up to 4 positive charges per molecule making it an anti-oxidant. So, anti-oxidants really oxidize free rascals?

i am surprised that so many people took extra vitamins . Why not eat properly, just the right amounts of Rice, Patatoes, lot's of vegetables, seefood (weeds) nori, kombu, wakame, some fisch or poultry, .You can do hard sport and working hard just by that. Natural food is just combined in the right amounts of minerals, proteins, fat,...Its the farmacie compagnies who want to belief us that you need all this extra pills, but thousant years we just eat our domestic food. Are people now stronger, healhter, happier than 100 years ago ?

Processed foods that are fortified with inorganic minerals and synthetic vitamins, as well as vitamin/mineral supplements, make me very ill - literally - all kinds of stomach issues that can include vomiting. If I want to get really sick -- just eat a bowl of highly-fortified TOTAL Cereal, or take a vitamin/mineral supplement. That's my body reacting to something that is really BAD for me! So NO THANKS to vitamin/mineral supplements and fortifying foods. I'll get my nutrients from FOOD, by choosing a wide variety of WHOLE foods, which is why I grow as much as possible. Even in the winter I use my "garden-in-a-jar" for sprouts, grow micro-greens and wheatgrass and juice it, make good natural sources of probiotics with water kefir and milk kefir, using real kefir grains, mill my own flour from whole grains/seeds/beans. There are soooooo many things wrong with the Standard American Diet (sugar, chemicals, unhealthy fat, and too much sodium) - without very many naturally- occurring vitamins, minerals, fibers and antioxidants in them. Vitamin C (the synthetic isolate - ascorbic acid) found in Tang is nothing like the complex vitamin C found in an orange. There are so many food-related illnesses and conditions, and taking a" pill" or "supplement" to cover any inadequacies is a lot of advertising hooey! -Grainlady