Doing some research connecting nutrition to sleeping issues. Picked up my first edition of Vitamins and Hormones, printed in 1943. Came across this quote:
Recent knowledge concerning thiamin [thiamine] shows that many symptoms are produced by deficiency and exist long before the development of clinical beriberi...... there earlier symptoms are usually classified under the heading of a neurasthenic syndrome and consist essentially of the triad of anorexia, fatigability and sleep disturbances...... other symptoms are produce such as .... queer feelings in the abdomen [had to include that LOL], constipation, backache, headache....
This sounds like chronic fatigue, or depression or general blahness. I know headaches are the bane of GP's as there is normally no concrete reason/diagnosis.
Well how much thiamine do you need daily to prevent these symptoms? 1.8 mg of thiamine. (The current RDI is
1.0 mg to
1.4 mg.) I used the Linus Pauline Institute data on high vitamin B1/thiamine foods. The table below is the levels you need to eat to obtain 1.8 mg of thiamine :
| Food | Food amount | Units |
| Wheat germ breakfast cereal | 0.4 | cup |
| Fortified breakfast cereal | 1.8 | cup |
| Peas (cooked) | 4.3 | cup |
| Lentils (cooked) | 5.3 | cup |
| Long grain white rice, enriched (cooked) | 6.9 | cup |
| Cantaloupe | 8.2 | fruit |
| Long grain brown rice (cooked) | 9.5 | cup |
| Spinach (cooked) | 10.0 | cup |
| White bread, enriched | 16.4 | cup |
| Whole wheat bread | 18.0 | cup |
| Orange | 18.0 | fruit |
| Milk | 18.0 | cup |
| Long grain white rice, unenriched (cooked) | 45.0 | cup |
| Egg (cooked) | 60.0 | egg |
| Pork, lean (cooked) | 210.0 | g |
| Pecans | 265.3 | g |
| Brazil nuts | 280.0 | g |
I like eggs - but 60 of them?! Or have some milk, 18 cups worth that is only 4 and 1/2 liters!What I find somewhat ironic and rather disturbing is that
one of the best sources of thiamine is fortified cereal. This is a blatant statement that we need to supplement. We can't get enough through our normal food so we have to add a vitamin to cereals - This is supplementing, just hidden supplementation.
So to all of you who don't think you need to supplement - answer this - why do they fortify cereals? And secondly how do you achieve your 1.8mg of thiamine ?!
To make sure that I was only using one set of data I then used the data from
Worlds Healthiest Foods to create this table:
| Food | Food level | units |
| Sunflower seeds, raw | 0.5 | cup |
| Sesame seeds | 1.6 | cup |
| Black beans, cooked | 4.3 | cup |
| Green peas, boiled | 4.4 | cup |
| Split peas, cooked | 4.9 | cup |
| Navy beans, cooked | 4.9 | cup |
| Corn, yellow, cooked | 5.0 | cup |
| Lentils, cooked | 5.5 | cup |
| Pinto beans, cooked | 5.6 | cup |
| Lima beans, cooked | 6.0 | cup |
| Kidney beans, cooked | 6.4 | cup |
| Oats, whole grain, cooked | 6.9 | cup |
| Asparagus, boiled | 8.2 | cup |
| Spinach, boiled | 10.6 | cup |
| Brussel sprouts, boiled | 10.6 | cup |
| Winter squash, baked, cubes | 10.6 | cup |
| Pineapple | 12.9 | cup |
| Watermelon, diced | 15.0 | cup |
| Carrots, raw | 15.0 | cup |
| Tomato, ripe | 16.4 | cup |
| Oranges | 16.4 | cup |
| Cabbage, shredded, boiled | 20.0 | cup |
| Broccoli, steamed | 20.0 | cup |
| Green beans, boiled | 20.0 | cup |
| Eggplant, cooked, cubes | 22.5 | cup |
| Summer squash, cooked, slices | 22.5 | cup |
| Collard greens, boiled | 22.5 | cup |
| Grapes | 22.5 | cup |
| Kale, boiled | 25.7 | cup |
| Celery, raw | 30.0 | cup |
| Mustard greens, boiled | 30.0 | cup |
| Bell peppers, red, raw, slices | 30.0 | cup |
| Turnip greens, cooked | 30.0 | cup |
| Swiss chard, boiled | 30.0 | cup |
| Romaine lettuce | 32.7 | cup |
| Cauliflower, boiled | 36.0 | cup |
Now at least this table has some intakes that might be obtainable. I could have 1/2 cup of sunflower seeds in a shake or on top of my cereal. But 4 cups of beans..... I don't think so. How about juice asparagus and spinach cooked are 8 and 10 cups respectively. There would be loose in cooking, however there is also lose in juicing as it is impossible to get all the nutrients out of the vege's (if we could get it all the waste would be white). So let us say lose is same between cooking and juicing. Therefore need to juice 8-10cups. This is a rather large amount! When we make juice at home we have 1/4 - 1/3 of the juice as green stuff, otherwise it gets a bit over powering. So odds of doing 10 cups, slim and non.
Therefore if you ware not feeling 100%, bit tired, not sleeping quite right, having not much of an appetite, take some vitamin B supplements (well a multi would be better).
