Relief from Muscle Pain & Spasms with guest Dr. Rob Silverman
May 6, 2017
Do you ever wake up in the middle of the night with leg or foot cramps, with your toes curling up? Or maybe it’s pain in your back, jaw or shoulders? All of the above are muscle cramps and today we’re sharing why you might be experiencing them and what to do about it. We’re joined by special guest Dr. Rob Silverman author of the book Inside – Out Health, as he helps explain why so many people today experience pain, inflammation, muscle cramps, and spasms. Listen in!
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Transcript:
DAR: Well, welcome to Dishing Up Nutrition. I'm Darlene Kvist, licensed nutritionist, certified nutrition specialist, and host of Dishing Up Nutrition. Our show is brought to you by Nutritional Weight & Wellness, a company specializing in life-changing nutrition counseling and also life-changing nutrition classes.
BRENNA: That's right. Good morning, Dar. Yes, I am Brenna Thompson, registered and licensed dietitian. I've been teaching and counseling clients for the past eight years. Five of those years right here at Nutritional Weight & Wellness. And so, our topic today is getting relief from muscle pain and muscle spasms. Let me ask you a question. Do you ever wake up in the middle of the night with a leg or foot cramp with your toes curling up? Well, we've certainly heard that a lot of times. In consultations lots of people experience that. And it's painful when you're out of bed and you're jumping around or you're just lying there just waiting for it to pass. Well today we are going to talk about those muscle cramps and why you might be experiencing them and what to do about it.
DAR: Brenna, we always say food first. So, do you mean that there is a connection to the food you're eating and muscle cramps? I mean I wonder how many people would ever think that.
BRENNA: Probably not too many. Unless they're thinking about football players and bananas.
DAR: Certainly foods for certain people can actually create muscle spasms in your lower back or muscle spasms in your jaw or those little mini muscle spasms in your neck that give you a headache and then shoulder pain.
BRENNA: Or little eye spasms where your eye’s twitching. Well, we have had clients who when they eat corn, corn chips, or corn tortillas they end up getting back spasms.
DAR: Isn't that interesting?
BRENNA: It is.
DAR: So, rather than reaching for an Advil or a Tylenol or a narcotic, think, “What am I eating that may be creating a muscle spasm or a muscle cramp or what is my body lacking that could be causing all of the pain and inflammation in my body?”I personally have asked that question many times over the past year and do I have all the answers? No, but I have a lot of them now.
BRENNA: Dar, if you don't have all the answers, and I certainly don't have all the answers, maybe we can get a few of these answers from our guest today because we have Dr. Robert Silverman, author of Inside Out Health joining us by phone from New York. He's going to help answer the question why are so many people today experiencing pain, inflammation, muscle cramps, and muscle spasms. Dr. Robert Silverman is both a chiropractor and a certified nutrition specialist with a master's degree in nutrition. He presents simple and cost-effective solutions to many health problems.
DAR: So, welcome Dr. Silverman.
DR. SILVERMAN: Good morning, everyone. How are you?
BRENNA: We're great. We also put out on our Weight & Wellness Facebook page asking people if they would have some questions and we got a couple. And our first question is from Corinne and she would like some more information on plantar fasciitis. So, can you share some knowledge with us about plantar fasciitis?
DR. SILVERMAN: Absolutely. About 10 million Americans have plantar fasciitis. You take away other than being the number one reason for heel pain, it's typically not plantar fascia, in that it's not the muscles. It's more of a nerve that's hidden under the muscles in the bottom of the foot. And that totally changes the treatment and the dynamic. So, right out of the box I tell people to have anybody who's looking at them: podiatrist, chiropractor, orthopedist, and the like to start evaluating any kind of nerve entrapment. Number two about plantar fasciitis, a lot of it comes from new shoes, moving too much, and a change in your gate, how you walk and run. So, another thing I would recommend when you go to somebody is to really evaluate how you move. In addition, there's a lot of great natural alternatives to help with plantar fasciitis.
DAR: Well let's talk about some of those natural ones. Actually, Dr. Silverman, I read an article in the paper the other day about flipflops and how much damage they're doing to people's feet. You want to talk a little bit about that?
DR. SILVERMAN: Absolutely. Don't be a flip flop, as I say. Flipflop doesn't allow you to what they call endorsee flex and that means it doesn't enable you to point your toes up and push the heel down. When you stay flat, you're actually stretching the back of your calf and the back of your calf pulls on that Achilles tendon and pulls on those structures in the heel and they actually yank and trap those nerves. So, flip flops aren't really good. They don't enable you to move in an appropriate manner. No sandals unless you're on the beach. Tennis shoes would be better. However, one of the biggest culprits, ladies, for plantar fasciitis is high heels.
BRENNA: Yes. Which is why I don't wear them.
DR. SILVERMAN: A good flat shoe will help you greatly. Any shoe that has three quarters of an inch puts 22 percent increase in pressure on your heel and the structures there, that may impinge the nerve and cause what they call pseudo plantar fasciitis.
DAR: So, you talked about some natural remedies for getting rid of some of that nerve pain. Just give listeners a couple of ideas on things that might help.
DR. SILVERMAN: Well, like you guys said, food first. Most people that have problems in heel, they need to lose weight. Most Americans are overweight.
DAR: 68 percent.
DR. SILVERMAN: So again, it falls into exactly what you're saying and reporting every week. Lose some weight. Fix the structure and the pressure off the structure. So, with that being said, food there are foods that are inflammatory. Foods like shrimp, trans fats, sugar being a toxin, gluten, and things of that nature. So, I always tell everybody the first thing you want to do, whether it's just to get healthy or musculoskeletal, is through the GPS of health. That is very simply no gluten, no processed food, no sugar. With that being said, some alternative methods, there's low level laser that works so fabulously to help heal the body from the inside out, and there’s specific nerve entrapments, soft tissue techniques, like factor and active release that I've seen works so well in the chiropractic model. So, those are some things that I would consider to help aid with plantar fasciitis.
DAR: So, when you mentioned about no sugar and no gluten, Brenna just created a recipe for some brownies. Let's talk about brownies that are healthy.
BRENNA: Yes, so we are creating a recipe for Mother's Day. And it is actually made with black beans. There's no gluten. There's actually no grains in it at all. And there is a little bit of a sweetener in the form of maple syrup in it. But the rest of it is just like eggs and cocoa powder and listeners can be looking for that on our Facebook page or our Web site.
DAR: Dr. Silverman, we always try to give people options or substitutes for some of these things that they're used to eating. And so, Brenna came up with this idea for Mother's Day.
BRENNA: And we typically don't do dessert substitutes, but we figured Mother's Day was a special one.
DR. SILVERMAN: That's outstanding. I love that recipe and I think that's great. And as you guys well know, recipes are a key component in talking about food and how to help people make tasty, healthy food. And what's most interesting about food is the perception of America. They did a survey and they thought healthy food didn't taste good, so giving a yummy recipe like you're doing is really enabling people to eat well. In addition, most Americans think that healthy food is more expensive and we found out that a good diet like the Mediterranean diet is cheaper per day than the standard American diet.
BRENNA:We'll be right back.
BREAK
BRENNA: Good morning and welcome back to Dishing Up Nutrition. We're talking with Dr. Rob Silverman author of Inside Out Health. And let me just tell you I loved this book. It's short, it's sweet, It's to the point. And considering all of the stress fractures I had in high school, the tendonitis I had in college, I wish I had this back then. I don't say that lightly about many books.
DAR: So, how can people get your book, Dr. Silverman?
DR. SILVERMAN: Easy enough. Amazon.com. go to Inside Out Health, Robert Silverman, or go to Facebook and you can download it right there.
DAR: OK. So we have a caller. Yes we have Fran on the line.
CALLER: Oh yes, good morning. I have a quick question. I don't know how to describe it, but it’s kind of a cramp that feels like death on the back of your calf. It usually happens at night. It's a very deep cramp and I heard before that when it happens you sit on top of cool water and I've tried it so many times and it doesn't work. What is that and what can help with that?
DAR: I think Dr. Silverman, lets maybe just at least first start talking about insufficient amount of magnesium but then you can go from there.
DR. SILVERMAN: Sure. Great point. Insufficient amount of magnesium. Most Americans are magnesium deficient, over 60 percent at that point. Part of the problem is they've recommended an average intake of 400 milligrams, which isn't enough. The average person is getting to three hundred. One of the problems with not taking enough magnesium is night cramps. So, foods that I would recommend, or something you may want to consider to increase consumption of: dark leafy greens, nuts, seeds, fish, beans, avocados, dark chocolate. And if it's tangible for you, brown rice. The biggest problem is there's three reasons why were magnesium deficient. Number one: we have this calorically-rich diet, typically with micronutrients from poor fats that are very deficient. Number two: everybody drinks coffee. Coffee is the number one consumed beverage in America. Coffee strips the body and does not allow for magnesium to get absorbed. And number three: because of that, most Americans also drink alcohol. And that doesn't allow magnesium to be absorbed. The best form of magnesium for muscles, a lot of people ask me that, magnesium glycinate.
DAR: We talk about magnesium glycinate all the time on this show and we use it in our office all the time. It's what people call the miracle supplement because it relieves cramps.
BRENNA: I was just going to jump in there and say I think about like, I don't know, 90 percent of our clients are taking magnesium.
DAR: And I think Dr. Silverman, you said most people are getting 2-300mg maybe in their diet and maybe not even that. And we always go 400, but sometimes when people are having a lot of these cramps, I bet you go higher than that with many of your patients, don't you?
DR. SILVERMAN: Absolutely. And you're able to go very high with magnesium glycinate because it has no gastrointestinal upset. When they take normal over-the-counter magnesium, they may have a diarrhea-type effect, but that form that you guys are recommending is the choice form because it goes through the stomach and it's absorbable with no gastrointestinal upset. So I usually go eight hundred to a thousand milligrams to get over those muscle cramps.
DAR: I totally agree. We agree 100 percent. So that was a great question, Fran. Thank you for calling. I hope we answered. That’s a beginning place with that is to make sure that you've got enough. And I think you have to supplement with some magnesium to get enough until you get rid of the cramps for sure and then maybe you can back down and that's really what I usually find is I might start someone with 800-1000 milligrams and then I can back down and finally get down to 400 and they still don't have any muscle cramps and they're good to go.
BRENNA: So, in Dr. Silverman's book you have a fun little quote in there saying that nobody ever thinks that having a beautiful liver is a lot better than having high cheekbones. So, why do we want a beautiful liver? And what are we doing that might be hurting our liver?
DR. SILVERMAN: Absolutely. The liver and the gut, without question, to me are the true emphasis of how we fix the body from the inside out. But to speak to the liver: toxins, toxins, toxins. The hidden load is really invisible is truly hurting us. We are just unfortunately here in America, here in Minnesota, I'm here in New York, were exposed to toxins.
DAR: So, let's talk about, Dr. Silverman and our listeners, they hear that word “toxins” and then they think, “well what does that really mean? What are you talking about? What are some of those liver toxins?
DR. SILVERMAN: Great question. Flame retardants- they’re like in your couches, in the plastics that we all use, the plastic bottles. Something called BPA. BPA, for instance, is maybe one of the bigger culprits increasing obesity in children and teenagers. Increased incidence, about 50 percent of diabetes, decreased testosterone in men. Where is the BPA most prominent? Well, it’s hidden, believe it not, in cash receipts. Our currency, our dollars have it. So that poses an issue, too. BPA for women have increased so much so that it's decreased fertility in America. Some of the toxins are in a regularly drunk beverage coffee called acrylamide. So, when you go to one of the different coffee shops and they burn it a little bit to get that real coffee taste that little burn taste. That's called acrylamide. Seafood has mercury and just walk outside you'll be exposed to some secondhand smoke. Those are all toxins that we would really discuss.
DAR: Well, we're talking about inflammation and pain and all that today, and one toxin that I think of is Tylenol.
DR SILERMAN: My God. Tylenol. Wow, talk about something that can raise liver enzymes. I can give you case studies of patients coming in wanting to go for blood tests and taking Tylenol. Tylenol, without question, is poison. And that really gets to the grand idea of Tylenol and some other things, not to get off topic, like non-steroid anti-inflammatory Aleve, Advil, and ibuprofen. These are things that people use so regularly. They do decrease pain, but they impair healing. The nutraceuticals in food do decrease pain also, but they promote healing. Which do you want?
BRENNA: Exactly. I know which I would want and we do have a caller on the line here. If we could take Pat really quick. Do you have a question for Dr. Silverman?
CALLER: Yes, I do. I have two bad knees. What I'm calling about is the muscle on my right side in the front of my leg. I think it's over-used because I think that those muscles above my knee are working so hard. And so besides rest I've tried topical things and I do the magnesium glycinate and I'm thinking maybe the doctor even has other things that I can try to help keep these muscles feeling better.
DR. SILVERMAN: Now, I'm assuming you're asking manual stuff, food stuff, things like that.
DAR: Everything because I know when you have that kind of pain, it is…
CALLER: Oh, what about marijuana, medical marijuana oil or something like that? I've been asking some people about that, too?
DR. SILVERMAN: Ok I’ll cover all that. Number one, I'm a big proponent when anybody comes with any condition, we talk about lifestyle and I make sure everybody's diet is pristine. So, of course, once again I'm going to put you on an anti-inflammatory, gluten-free diet. Again, I'm going to talk about no processed foods. I'm going to talk about possibly decreasing all the toxins in there. Now to speak specifically to your muscles, I do like the glycinate. I'm a big proponent of probiotics, something really good for the gut. It’s one of my bases for it Inside-Out Health. As far as treatment protocols, I have no problem with massage. I think massage will help well. Ultimately, the concept of what your problem is, you need someone to go in and analyze it and analyze it in such, he who treats the side of pain is lost. So, when you point to your quadriceps, that's the muscles in the front of your thigh, if it's just that, that doctor may be lost. So, for instance, I may put you through a movement. I’ll have you walk, I’ll have you bend. And I may find that you bend too much of your knees. And most people don't move their hips. So, once I do this movement analysis, I may be able to tell you how to move and this way you won't be over-utilizing your quadriceps.
In addition, we've talked about magnesium, the intake of calcium. We love a nice ratio of magnesium to calcium. So, when somebody has a muscle spasm, we usually like to give an intake of magnesium to calcium in a 2 to 1 ratio. Whereas we may switch that for a normal multivitamin, normal multi mineral, and we may cover something like osteoporosis and calcium a little bit later because that's pretty pertinent and we have some ladies on the phone and I think that may be of some interest.
So, I hope I was able to get that in two and a half minutes to give you something to start feeling better as I like to say on Monday morning implementation.
CALLER: Thank you, doctor. You said two to one calcium to magnesium?
DR. SILVERMAN: Calcium: magnesium 2 to one in a normal multivitamin. If it's a muscle spasm we like to invert that ratio make it magnesium to calcium 2 to 1.
BRENNA: That was awesome. So, we do have to go to our break here. You are listening to Dishing Up Nutrition. It's only two more weeks until Mother's Day and if your mom likes to cook and loves reading cookbooks let me suggest the Weight and Wellness Cookbook and Nutrition Guide. This cookbook has easy to follow recipes that will help your mom reduce inflammation and just feel better. Stop in to one of our seven locations here in the Twin Cities. Or you can order it online at weightandwellness.com. We'll be right back.
BREAK
BRENNA: We're back with Dr. Silverman, and Dr. Silverman, In your book, Inside Out Health, you wrote that here in the U.S. we don't have a healthcare system, we have a sick care system. And standard medicine usually involves drugs that work quickly by shutting off pathways that are causing the pain. So, can you kind of talk a little bit more about that?
DR. SILVERMAN: Absolutely. It's unfortunate, our medical systems more is symptom first, not system first. So, what drugs do is they shut off all pathways and in functional medicine and in natural medicine we want to harness specific pathways to enable ourselves to heal. The body does have a natural process and pathways to help it heal. Unfortunately, the drugs shut everything off, both good and bad. So, there's no healing involved with drugs and that's why there's so many deleterious and/or side effects that we hear from specific drugs. So, once again I'm a proponent.
We should be looking at systems, not symptoms. There's only 11 to 14 body systems out there, where there's a ton of symptoms. So, when you go to a doctor you come into your office. I'm sure everybody there is looking at systems. They're making it personalized, individualized for that person because even the people on the radio right now that are talking, we all don't need the same thing. You get to ideology and the big thing is what we do is there is a collaboration. You're giving recipes. I'm talking to the patients. There's no script, “Here you go, see you later in six months.” That collaboration is critical. Therefore, when we work with patients, we have a predictive, preventative, personalized, and a participatory type of healthcare system. And prevention is probably the thing that will make the biggest dent in bringing our healthcare costs down.
BRENNA: That was an excellent answer. So, we talk about how drugs kind of shut down all of the systems or they just shut down that one system. And I think later on in the show we were going to talk about Osteovantiv. But, there is a very specific ingredient in Osteovantiv that kind of works in some of these pathways that may cause pain. Can you explain a little bit more about how Osteovantiv works in the body to help reduce pain?
DAR: That's a supplement that Metagenix makes and have perfected and we have a lot of success with clients with that supplement. So, now I'll let you talk.
DR. SILVERMAN: Osteovantiv is one of my favorite supplements. It is my go-to supplement for any kind of joint health. The particular ingredient that you're talking about is undenatured collagen type 2. It's chicken soup or chicken sternum, if you will. Chicken sternum cooked at a very low temperature over a duration of time where they keep its protein helix or its properties, if you will, in perfect form and don't break it down. That's why they call it undenatured. So, it's very interesting. When don’t denature this type of collagen and you take it orally, it goes through your body, and your body assumes and assesses it as a natural substance. Therefore, it doesn't attack it and cause any auto immune or inflammation. It then provides, and I don't want to get too heavy, something as an auto-antigen. Guys, that’s as heavy as I’m going to get. Essentially, all the bad guys come to it and it sucks it up. No damage is produced to the joint and the research on it is fabulous in that it actually even beats something like glucosamine. So, we've seen increases in range of motion in the knee, whereas that is the key element to osteoarthritis. So Osteovantiv, in that specific ingredient, undenatured collagen type 2, works through the stomach and enables people's joints not to break down anymore. A big takeaway is not only in the knees, there's now research to show it's positive to avoid disc herniations.
DAR: Wow, that's amazing. So, we love that supplement, but we also really encourage people to make their own chicken bone broth and simmer for eight hours or whatever it is to get the minerals out of the bones and to make their own undenatured collagen product and also use it with the Osteovantiv if they've got a lot of joint pain. So, we're kind of trying to cover it from a food-first point of view and also from a supplement point of view.
DR. SILVERMAN: It's a great perspective because when you think about it, it is food first. Food should be your medicine. Medicine is your food. There's a problem and hence the word supplement. Supplemental to lifestyle and food, you may want to take something that's extracted that you may need for a duration of time or you may need more of.
DAR: One of the other things that I think we should talk about is osteoarthritis. Because I can't tell you how many clients walk into the office thinking, “My grandmother had it. My mother had it. It has to be a genetic factor.” Can you speak a little bit more to osteoarthritis? Because we're always trying to get people to look at what they're really eating that's causing their joints to break down. And if you talk about it it will be one more voice.
DR. SILVERMAN: Absolutely. It is not a genetic component. It is a lifestyle component. It's the body's response to inflammation that causes osteoarthritis. So, let's take it from a food perspective. Let's take it just from gluten and sugar. They’re inflammatory. Sugar is a toxin. Gluten means glue. It sits in your stomach and damages your gut, the house of your immune system. So, osteoarthritis is your body's response to inflammation. There are foods that are inflammatory. We've talked about them before: white bread, trans fats like a doughnut.
Foods that are good and soothing that will help your joints like grass-fed beef, nuts and seeds, fruits and vegetables, they're fabulous choices. Part of the problem, and the biggest problem that people have osteoarthritis in America is we’re too heavy. There was a study that just came out that if you lost 5 percent of your body mass, quality body mass, you would decrease your incidence of knee osteoarthritis by 60 percent. America's too heavy, this strain of the weight strains the joints, and fat cells are depositories for toxins and when you're too heavy, you are inflamed.
DAR: I think one of the things, Dr. Silverman, is that so many people believe that they can develop new habits. I mean we hear this, we read this all the time. You can develop a new habit in three weeks. And as I have been working with clients over the last few years, like 25, I've come to realize that, no, you don't develop a new habit in three weeks. I think at least this nutritional habit, this good eating habit, takes three to five years to actually develop that habit. For most people.
DR. SILVERMAN: I concur. Did you know it takes at least a year to change the hormonal release in your brain? So, to speak to what you say, it's a lifestyle. People think changing their diet has a negative connotation like jail time. It's not. It's not a diet. It's a lifestyle. Why wouldn't you want to take care of your most valuable asset, your health.? Jim Rohn once said, “Take care of your body. It’s the place you have to live.”
DAR: That's right. It's so interesting. We hear for breakfast the commercials say, “Eat this bowl of cereal.” What do you eat for breakfast?
BRENNA: Well, I took a nod from Alyssa's breakfast last week on the show and I made it soup this morning for breakfast. It had chicken in it and I made it with my homemade chicken bone broth and then it had a bunch of spinach and broccoli slaw mixed in.
DAR: But you could use beef, couldn't you?
BRENNA: Oh, you could use beef easily.
DAR: And that's another one of those things that so many people walk into our office believing that they can't eat beef. Now, Dr. Silverman, I know we have to go to break, but maybe when we come back let's talk a little bit about, hey it's OK the beef and it's good for you.
BRENNA: You are listening to Dishing Up Nutrition. We're having a great discussion about the importance of nutrition and its connection to muscle spasms muscle cramps and muscle pain was Dr. Rob Silverman, author of Inside Out Health.
BREAK
DAR: Welcome back to Dishing Up Nutrition. Dr. Silverman shared a lot of information today, so you may find that you want to really listen and I think a lot of people do listen. So, if you want to go to our website and click on podcasts. And if you want more answers, you just say, “What are they talking about?” Give our office a call at 651-696-993438 and ask for Brenna or leave a message and you will get back to them.
BRENNA: I do get back to people and we actually over the break had a question. A listener just wanted some information on liquid magnesium. We do carry we carry a powder that you mix into water.
DAR: And we have a great liquid magnesium that has no bad taste to it.
BRENNA: No, but just take a tablespoon of it and it has a little of like apple juice in it so you can mix that into a little water or just take it right off the spoon.
DAR: So, it works great for kids and for adults who don't like to swallow pills.
BRENNA: Alright, we have kind of three questions to cover. One, we wanted to talk about beef. And then Katie from Facebook wanted to know how long after making diet changes would we expect to see positive results? Dr. Silverman, let's talk about beef and when to see results.
DR. SILVERMAN: I'm like you guys, I'm a proponent of beef, grass-fed is my choice. There's also bison and things of that nature and I think a healthy beef should be and could be a backbone of anybody's dietary supplementation. Beef before certain fish to be perfectly frank with you. If it's not a wild fish, I'm going with beef.
DAR: We're so on the same page. Exactly what I say.
DR. SILVERMAN: Absolutely outstanding. And how soon? I think early, you'll see a change. No body electrical analysis, aesthetic, energy levels, you'll see a change within a month.
BRENNA: And I think, depending upon what changes people are making, oftentimes if people have a gluten sensitivity and we tell them to cut it out, it's like within a week.
DR. SILVERMAN: Gluten sensitivity without question. But, as we all know, nobody should be consuming gluten. It is without question an issue. The gluten in North America isn't healthy. Jack LaLanne once said, “If man makes it, I won't eat it.” Gluten is sprayed. I mean, our wheat is sprayed with chemicals which are in Roundup. And the world health organization calls them cancer-causing ingredients. So, just let’s stay away from it.
BRENNA: Can we please explain to listeners why phosphoric acid, found in both regular and diet soda, can lead to bone loss and therefore osteoporosis, which can lead to a lot of pain.
DR. SILVERMAN: Yeah, phosphoric acid, any one of these sodas, whether it be diet or not, pose an issue because of this phosphoric. Well, number one, it’s acidic. Number two, it binds with specific ingredients to rid the body of calcium out of the bones, to speed up the process of osteoporosis, which is inherent, unfortunately, with women.
DAR: It's really amazing when you think about the women or you think about the people who are drinking soda, especially diet soda, and it's probably more women than men that drink diet soda. I'm not saying any soda is good, but some of the research recently is that diet soda is actually even worse than regular soda. They’re both bad.
BRENNA: And we actually have a caller on the line. Ms. Pat, you have a question for Dr. Silverman?
CALLER: Oh yes. I’m calling about leg cramps. They’re so ungodly painful that I can’t feel my toes, I can't turn any way in bed. I have to get out of bed and try to walk it off. Just the other night, I woke up in the middle of the night with pain in my groin. What causes that?
DR. SILVERMAN: Yeah, those are terrible. I've had them before also. So, as opposed to try to walk it off, I usually stretch really quick. So, when you get that in the middle of the night it just takes you over. I would pull my toes back, that would typically relieve it within about five seconds.
CALLER: No. Nothing helps unless I jump out of bed.
DR. SILVERMAN: All right. Well, you can continue with that, but let's avoid it. And I think the best way to avoid it is to take some magnesium and up your electrolytes. And a great way to help electrolytes and some potassium would be to eat half a banana. Wouldn’t need to eat a whole banana. It’s a little high on the glycemic index. I would up my intake of bananas, I would up my intake of green, leafy vegetables. With that potassium and magnesium, that should help you with your cramps.
DAR: I think one of the other things, Pat, is look at how much water you're drinking through the day, because a lot of times people are just really dehydrated. And that's why they're having muscle cramps. And so, you need to drink at least eight glasses of water a day to make sure that you don't have those muscle cramps. And again, as Dr. Silverman said earlier in the show, take probably about 800 milligrams of magnesium glycinate before you go to bed. And I think what will happen is you just won't have those muscle cramps.
BRENNA: And we actually have one last caller and I think we have time to take that. Good morning, Ms. Tammy, you have a question for Dr. Silverman?
CALLER: I do. Yeah, thank you. I'm wondering if you've worked with anybody that has costochondritis, and what your thoughts on using Osteovantiv. I’ve had it for six years and I keep trying different things.
BRENNA: Great question. Dr. Silverman take it away.
DR. SILVERMAN: Great question and with costochondritis, I feel that Osteovantic would be a great choice.
DAR: Well, Dr. Silverman, explain to other listeners what that is. What is she dealing with?
DR. SILVERMAN: Costochondritis is an inflammation in the rib area. It's very common in women. A lot of people are concerned about calcium intake, but there's no calcium with the Osteovantiv. So, the Osteovantiv is a great choice because it will block inflammatory signals to different joints. Ribs are joints. So, therefore, I really like that concept of taking Osteovantiv for costochondritis. Most people don't come and ask us enough about that but it's a very common growing ailment.
DAR: And I think when we think in terms of food first, again you may want to repeat this again because people need to hear it over and over. What would you recommend for an eating plan for somebody that has any kind of inflammatory condition in their body?
DR. SILVERMAN: Absolutely. Well, without question I would say let's start with the GPS of health. No gluten, no processed food, no sugar. If it as a food label that's longer than your last name, forget about it. There's no healthy foods that have labels. The only label I want to see is “organic” or “natural” or “fresh.” Something of that nature. If man makes it, I won't eat it, like Jack LaLanne said. And just use that GPS of health. Understand that food is your medicine. And don't let medicine be your food.
DAR: It's so interesting, Dr. Silverman. Usually if people are on a prescription medication, a lot of times they have to take it several times a day, and actually when you think in terms of food, we recommend people eating five times a day at least. And that just blows people away, especially women. So, many women are used to eating, what would you say, Brenna?
BRENNA: Three, sometimes two times a day. Sometimes they eat two times a day and then they snack all day because they're so hungry.
DAR: Yes. I don't know. Could you maybe even address how many times a day people should be eating and maybe what a meal should look like?
DR. SILVERMAN: Sure. I agree with you 100 percent on the five meals. Think about it. Your metabolism is like a fire. If you feed it slowly, it'll burn efficiently. If you put a lot of wood, a lot of food in one time it busts up, and then it shuts down. So, those five meals a day encourage a good metabolic rate and encourage the fact that we're going to get a lot of nutrients. So, we talked about breakfast this morning. What did I have for breakfast? I had five egg whites with two yolks, avocados, and a green drink.
DAR: That sounds great. And then people are going, “Oh my gosh, he can't eat five eggs. Oh no.” But, yes you can and your cholesterol is probably perfect.
DR. SILVERMAN: My cholesterol is wonderful. Whenever I go to the practitioner that does all my bloodwork, he always wants to know what my diet is. “What can I do?” And I'm like, “Dude, you just gotta change your lifestyle.” I just put it bluntly that the Mounds bars that you’re consuming don’t work.
BRENNA: We actually have to go. Our show is over.
DR. SILVERMAN: You got me warmed up!
BRENNA: I know. Thank you so much for joining us.
DAR: Thank you, Dr. Silverman. You’re a great guest.
