Stress protection, more energy, better mood, fat loss help, and cancer prevention....

Today's Post: Tuesday, 11-9-2010

1. Recently, I got an email saying that extra iodine intake had helped turn off breast cancer and prevent it.

The larger amounts they used might not be safe for some women and likely are too high for regular intake as a preventive for many women. (It did work for the woman they wrote about. But I know of no large studies verifying that info.)

But the Wikipedia article on Iodine had some fascinating information!

Iodine and two other supplements together may help with fat loss, protection from stress, having enough energy, AND in preventing or reversing cancers.

One of them helps with stress tolerance and feeling good also.:

2. One of those supplements, tyrosine, has been found to increase the resilience and increase the tolerance for stress and performance in male soldiers.

If your job or life work or regular life is stressful and challenging, this suggests strongly that if you take 1,000 mg (two 500 mg capsules) on an empty stomach each morning, you will handle your day better and perform better.

(I’ve done that ever since I read the information on the study on soldiers. I want to perform well and be as stress proof as possible!)

Tyrosine also helps your body to make dopamine which your body uses to trigger your reward and enjoyment response in your brain.

And, the dopamine boost may help you feel better and make depression less likely – plus you may enjoy your food and sex life more due to the extra boost it gives your reward circuits in your brain.

3. The Wikipedia article also explains the biochemistry of the way your body uses iodine, tyrosine, and selenium to ensure you have adequate thyroid levels.

For everyone, and for older women particularly, this helps ensure your metabolism stays high enough to make fat loss possible and an adequate level of energy.

We just covered why tyrosine is valuable in other ways.

Selenium is available as a 200 mcg capsule. It is an antioxidant in addition to its importance in making thyroid hormones. It may well be worth taking that much daily.

(BUT, do NOT take more than that or eat more than one Brazil nut a week since above about 400 mcg a day selenium begins to be toxic and you do get some selenium in some foods. Brazil nuts have a week’s supply of selenium. So eating more than one a week could be problematic.)

4. Ensuring an above average level of iodine intake looks like a third essential way to have enough thyroid hormone. It seems that Iodine helps keep your metabolism from becoming too low because your body uses it to make thyroid hormones.

That helps ensure you have a good supply of energy and to be able to lose fat and keep it off since your metabolism stays high enough.

And, the Wikipedia DOES have some information suggesting that doing so does help prevent or get rid of breast cancer and other cancers. Breast cancer, oral cancers such as tongue, throat, and esophageal cancers, and skin cancers sound most likely from their description.

(Note that NOT smoking or putting tobacco products in your mouth or nose also helps prevent these cancers!)

Iodine’s ability to help your body kill off sick cells, aptosis, and its positive effect on your immune system is the likely reason it actually helps prevent or reverse cancers.

The daily Dietary Reference Intake recommended by the United States Institute of Medicine is Wikipedia’s source for the Tolerable Upper Intake Level (UL) for Iodine for adults is 1,100 µg/day (1.1 mg/day).

“The tolerable upper limit was assessed by analyzing the effect of supplementation on thyroid-stimulating hormone.”

This upper limit may be a bit low as many of them are. The Wikipedia article suggests that people in Japan eating their traditional diet may average that much which suggests the real upper limit to be at least twice that high. But there may be individual differences.

“As of 2000, the median intake of iodine from food in the United States was 240 to 300 µg/day for men and 190 to 210 µg/day for women.”

In Japan, consumption is much higher due to the frequent consumption of seaweed or kombu kelp.” The Japanese also eat a lot of seafood.

Taking 150 mcg in a multivitamin and mineral daily supplement plus getting two to seven times that in food sounds likely to be OK for most people. That would range between 450 & 1200 mcg a day of Iodine which is about what people in Japan get. Most adult Americans tend to get 200 to 350 mcg of Iodine now.


All kinds of seaweed including Nori & Kelp & Wakame and most kinds of seafood such as clams, oysters, sardines, herring, mackerel, and tuna tend to be moderately high or high in iodine. (Those seafoods also contain the health supporting omega 3 oils.)

Seaweed is a fat loss aid in two other ways as well. It’s a very low calorie, moderately high fiber, nonstarchy vegetable. The more of those you eat of every kind, the easier it is to be healthy and free of excess bodyfat. (You are filled up and less hungry on almost no calories!)

In addition, seaweed is traditionally a component of soup. Eating soup at a meal is also a proven way to feel satisfied with the amount of food you eat on fewer calories.

Lastly, in people who exercise regularly and eat right, the seaweed Wakame has been found to boost metabolism and to help you lose more visceral and belly fat.

So, to have good thyroid function. taking 500 mg to 1,000 mg a day of tyrosine and 200 mcg a day of selenium and at least the 150 mcg a day of iodine in a multi vitamin plus mineral supplement may make good sense.

And, eating the foods high in iodine also looks like an excellent idea!