Magnesium is particularly well known in connection with magnesium deficiency and cramps. This applies to nocturnal calf cramps, but also massive cramps in athletes. But this important role that magnesium takes on for well-functioning muscles, only reflects a tiny aspect of its very broad spectrum of activity with diverse, vital functions.

What is magnesium

Magnesium is a mineral and belongs to the group of metals. This mineral is essential. This means that the body cannot produce magnesium itself, but the mineral is vital and must therefore be supplied with the diet. It is then absorbed through the intestinal walls and gets into the blood. Any excess is excreted through the kidneys with the urine. High fat foods, oxalates and phosphates can slow down the absorption of magnesium in the intestine.

Around 25 grams of magnesium are present in the organism (in a person weighing 70 kilograms). A good half is in the bones, a little less in the muscles and only one percent in the blood. The bones also act as magnesium stores. However, the magnesium content in bones decreases over the course of life.

In addition, minerals are divided into bulk and trace elements. Magnesium is one of the bulk elements because the body needs relatively large amounts of it, unlike trace elements such as iodine and copper.

Why Magnesium is Vital

Magnesium is involved in the activation of over 300 enzymes in the body, including in the protein structure. The mineral takes on decisive tasks for energy and cell metabolism and regulates many vital functions, including:

• Impulse transmission in muscle and nerve cells, magnesium ensures normal conduction of excitation in nerves and muscles. In connection with nerves, magnesium also supports brain functions and via the muscles, for example, the heart muscle. Adequate magnesium intake even seems to reduce the risk of sudden cardiac death, a study suggests.
• Magnesium influences the heart rhythm and blood pressure.
• It relaxes muscles, nerves and blood vessels and can reduce the production of stress hormones. This normalization of the excitability of nerves and the vascular tension is probably responsible for the fact that with an adequate supply of magnesium, among other things, the number of migraine attacks demonstrably decreases, as the analysis of several studies showed.
• Magnesium can reduce the clumping of blood platelets, so it can support normal blood clotting. The risk of having a stroke decreases when the body receives enough magnesium, further research shows .
• It is involved in the utilization of glucose and in blood sugar control. The risk of type 2 diabetes has been shown to decrease if the mineral is taken in sufficiently.
• Magnesium is an important antagonist of calcium, prevents too much calcium from being stored, for example in muscles, but also vessels and organs. Magnesium can prevent the formation of kidney stones, which often consist of calcium oxalate.
• In addition, magnesium can neutralize too much stomach acid somewhat and thus reduce the risk of heartburn.
• In conjunction with calcium and vitamin D, magnesium controls the bone metabolism. Among other things, magnesium supports the activation of vitamin D in the kidneys. Magnesium is therefore an important factor in preventing osteoporosis. Already existing osteoporosis could be slowed down somewhat by adequate intake, as a study suggests.
• The mineral regulates important messenger substances that also play a role in the mental mood. Studies show that magnesium can have a similar effect on mild depression as certain antidepressants , the selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs). 

Overall, these and similar studies provide strong indications that an adequate supply of magnesium, including through dietary supplements, is associated with a lower risk of numerous common diseases.

I don’t know about you, but do you always feel so drained and overfed, especially in the first few months of the new year? Yes? My condolences. I do not anymore. I’m out of the number. But I’ll also be happy to tell you how I did it. Or as my friend Inke said the other day: “You are always so slim – despite feasting. How does that work?”

“Diets are not about the ‘what’, but the ‘how'”

My answer to that, when her eyes got bigger and bigger: “Very simple: In principle you can eat anything, it’s not about the ‘what’, it’s just about the ‘how’. Carbohydrates are okay, even chocolate is perfectly fine. ”And the best thing is: I actually only found that out on the side while I was trying to eat my family and myself as healthy as possible.

For a year I cooked my way through all the usual diet trends: from paleo and superfoods to apple cider vinegar and algae sweets to bog water, I tried a wide variety of methods.

Carbohydrates make us happy and relaxed

Since then, I’ve always shook my head a little when I hear again that Jennifer Lopez and others are calling out “No Carbs Week” on Instagram again. Carbohydrates only bark, but they don’t bite. They are not angry – on the contrary: They make us happy, let us relax and increase our ability to perceive. The brain needs carbohydrates, otherwise it will cook on the back burner.

“But they should make you fat?” My friend Inke explains to me again. Whereupon I have to laugh: “Yes, we all think so. Because we combine them incorrectly. If we only ate one type of carbohydrate per meal and took enough breaks, we would not gain weight at all. ”

Incidentally, a theory that I stumbled across during my research from Hamburg to Hollywood. Even Hollywood stars are taught that – only not the fat average German.

The body needs carbohydrates – but not too much at once

Need an example? Let’s take our breakfast. Hands up, who eats a jam roll in the morning? Mistake number one! Because there are three types of carbohydrates in jam rolls per se. The first is the cereal in the bun, the second is the fructose from the jam and the third is perhaps a refined sugar for preservation.

Our body then thinks: “Great, I know the grain, I’ll use it, but I’ll put the other two carbohydrates on my hip right away. And then I get tired and lie down first. “Hello afternoon low!

So my trick – if it has to be a roll – would be to top it with a neutral hard cheese. This meal doesn’t make you fat or tired. But please don’t use a soft camembert, because it contains lactose.

Now you also know why I never offer my children a few cornflakes with milk and sugar before school. In terms of metabolism, the dwarfs would prefer to go straight back to bed – with such a combination of milk and industrial sugar and cereals, no wonder.

Select carbohydrates specifically

“But that’s terribly complicated – I have to know all the carbohydrates!” Interjects Inke.

Actually, it’s not difficult. Meat and fish as well as vegetables, hard cheese and eggs are neutral. And you wouldn’t actually eat rice, potatoes and pasta together with that. Actually, I just make sure that I only eat one sugar or only one type of cereal or only one starch together. When I fry something, I don’t mix the fats, I stick with one. In the restaurant, I don’t eat the bread basket empty if I’ve ordered potatoes with the fish anyway. And if it should be a glass of wine (also contains carbohydrates), then I enjoy it best after dinner.

Give your digestion breaks

We come to factor two: The ‘how’ does not only refer to the composition of our meals, but also to the ‘when’. In general, I noticed that we are actually digesting continuously.

In the morning we eat our fattening breakfast, which nobody really needs because it takes away all energy, then we drink a carbohydrate bomb in the form of a café latte with lots of milk and sugar afterwards, push ourselves into the canteen, then need it caffeine again because we’re so tired from eating before we go back in the evening.

Our body actually just wants a break. And maybe a green tea, a smoothie, or just nothing so he can send the cleaning crew through. We eat and eat and don’t even know why.

What can you still eat? It is confusing

I admit, everything has gotten very confusing too: gluten is bad, milk full of hormones, meat the devil, everyone is confused. I often hear that you can continue to eat as normal. It is worthwhile to feed in more precisely. If we buy it cheaply in the bakery for twenty cents, the dough can contain additives such as corn, potatoes, glucose syrup, i.e. sugar, and there are also flavor enhancers.

Do you notice what? Again several carbohydrates and chemistry. And immediately we get fat and tired, have a stomachache like we did in the ninth month and in the end even stomach ache, migraines and sleep disorders. With organic you are on the safe side. And with breaks and some kind of carbohydrate too, I think.

Sinning is allowed – but then there is a long pause

And whoever has sinned, simply waits five instead of two hours. Who is perfect and always obeys all the rules? If I am invited to a friend’s house, I sometimes skip five, but I always return to the one-carbohydrate principle. This also applies to snacking: at the moment I like to treat myself to a bar of chocolate in the evening – from Monday to Friday.

Yes you’ve read correctly. Chocolate is my insider tip, because the cocoa practically covers the sugar, which is why chocolate is just one type of carbohydrate. Or as my nutritionist Dörten Wolff once put it: “If you know how to eat chocolate correctly, it doesn’t necessarily work!”

In my case, eating right means: If I notice that I have to put in another chocolate unit in the evening, then I eat meat and vegetables instead of high-carbohydrates for dinner. My dessert, the chocolate, is my carbohydrate component. Without question, it should be high quality chocolate and not cheap, adulterated one.