Well, just my food. I was told to eat more calcium from my doc. I'm back to eating cheese and milk in my coffee (well, I still have a habbit of buying soy milk). I thought I was getting enough. I guess not. My bones are week. Well, not too bad now, but he said that it won't be long before I have week bones at 33! OMG! My job doesn't help either. It's very physical, and my B12 is going down again, too .... I was here before with the same job and the same problem (I got my old job back) ggggrrrrrr. It's not too bad. I was a lacto veg for a long time, but I perfer veganism. But I don't want my health to go downhill either.



Vegans, I need a little advice. PLEASE!



Thanks in advance

there are vegan calcium supplements!

http://www.veganstore.com/495.html?g...FQgIbAodynP0EQ

that and daily soy milk should do the trick!

good luck

As I understand it, dairy products aren't the best sources of calcium because your body can't absorb it well. Plant "dairy" products have the same amount of calcium as the cow ones. Dark leafy greens, almonds, sesame seeds/tahini, enriched tofu, and blackstrap molasses are also good sources of calcium.



You should be taking a B12 supplement or eating B12 enriched foods if you're eating a vegan diet.



Weight bearing exercises also help to build bone density. How did the doctor determine your bones were weak? And really, cows milk in coffee, even if you were using it to boost your calcium, wouldn't be enough to do anything.

The whole "milk prevents osteoporosis" thing is a myth. You're much better off without milk. Doctors usually don't take any courses on nutrition, and even those of us who do study it are bombarded with misinformation perpetuated by none other than the dairy industry themselves.



Here is some information on vegan sources of calcium. I would also recommend a calcium + vitamin D* supplement (whether you continue to drink milk or not).



And don't forget about weight bearing exercise. It can vastly improve your bones too.



As for your B12, simply take a sublingual B12 supplement.





* Generally D2 (ergocalciferol) is vegan whereas D3 (cholecalciferol) is not



ETA: Yeah, what RC said (was posting this before I saw her response)



ETA 2: And drop the coffee - it can reduce your absorption of calcium. Also reduce your sodium intake and avoid any carbonated sodas with phosphoric acid - these things may have a negative impact on your bones.

I throw sunflower seeds and seaseme seeds to almost every food what I do because in the 100 grams of sunflower seeds have amost same amout of calsium than in milk and in seasame seeds have six times more. But check too that you get enogh D vitamin because it helps calsium to absorb, if you are short of that than it's not helping that you eat food with calsium. Too bad that the info what I have from calsium in vegan diet is in Finnish and I'm not that good to translate but I would say that try to find information from calsium in general because there is a lot of more stuff to know what effects to the calsium level what you have in your body than how much you eat it and if you have problems with it I think it would be important to you to know how to minimalize example it how much your body lose calsium daily. If I find good English page about it I post it to you.

Yes! It doesn't matter how much calcium you eat, if you are low in Vitamin D. In fact, too much dietary calcium when your D levels are low, and your diet is too full of acidic foods, will cause more harm to your joints and kidneys, since it will be deposited around your joints as painful spurs, and can damage the kidneys as the crystals are filtered through.



Unfortunately, dairy foods are very acid-forming, which makes their calcium useless. I have no links, because I've read this in books, but there is a positive correlation between the highest rates of dairy consumption, and the highest rates of osteoporosis. Countries with the highest rates of dairy consumption, like the US and Scandinavian countries, also have the highest rates of osteoporosis. You can probably do a search and find some studies.



So I would definitely rely on supplements if I felt I needed them, and reduce or avoid all acid-forming foods, which are dairy, meats, and grains, and focus on fresh fruits, vegetables, seeds, and nuts in order to stop my bones from dissolving in the first place.

This is what I was going to say. Your body doesn't absorb the calcium in dairy as well as it does other sources. A year ago I found out I was allergic to dairy (not just lactose intolerant like I thought for years). My nails alone show that my calcium is fine. They are growing like crazy and have never been so strong.

Nobody has mentioned magnesium yet. I read in The China Study that you need a good calcium/magnesium balance or all the calcium in the world isn't going to help your bones. In fact, it makes it worse. The calcium ends up causing arthritis instead of going to your bones. PLANTS tend to have the best calcium and magnesium balance for our systems. Hence beautiful correlation between a country's dairy consumption and its rate of osteoporosis.

Major magnesium-containing foods are pumpkin seeds, spinach, soybeans, chard, sesame seeds (calcium AND magnesium!). Or you can find a vegan supplement.

allergic?

what happened

I think I am allergic

I was lacto veggie in the past and I was having some cheese and my throat felt it was closing in on me

and then I had some yougurt the other day and it happened

I avoided dairy from then I do not know if I am allergic but I assumed because when I eat other stuff I never have this reaction

It was instantaneous after eating dairy

You guys are the best. So much info here. I didn't know about the vitamin D thing. The only problem is, I hate taking pills. I don't remember to, anyways (which is why birth control is bad for me LOL). Should I look up foods with these items in it? I'm willing to buy/cook them.



As far as weight bearing exercise, I get enough of that at work by itself. I carry heavy items all day long. I was in martial arts for years, but no longer do that. We did a lot of kicking, punching, falling (breakfalls for you martial arts buffs), and breaking of boards (which I loved doing ... I have many metals for it). I wasn't vegan then, though. I was lacto veg at the time.



I'm back to lacto veg again, but I'm hoping I can go vegan for the third time. Back to research .......

Here are some links what I found.



http://www.vrg.org/nutrition/calcium.htm



In there are couple days example meals with amounts of calcium what you get from those.






http://www.veganhealth.org/articles/bones



This seems to be quite good article about calcium and vitamin D.






http://www.vegfamily.com/dietician/0507b.htm



I think this is also good thing to read.











I hope that those will help you.

I've also read this before, and it was enough to convince me that dairy is not the answer to calcium deficiency.



Thanks for those links Virpukka!

I guess I should say that my doctor's best guess was allergy and not just lactose intolerance. I get a weird throat thing too, but mine is more like something is stuck. Then I get severe stomach cramps, usually within 30 minutes and they can last a couple hours. The doctor thought the dairy might have also been, if not causing, then at least making my headaches worse. He said that it seems that there is more than just the lactose that was causing my problems. I feel a lot better since eliminating it completely.

I find that interesting. I have to dig into that.

I heard that you need to take calcium with magnesium and boron for it to be effective. Calcium causes more problems than it solves. They also have things like Orange juice supplemented with calcium.

And countries like Japan, where dairy used to be virtually unheard of, had virtually NO osteoporosis until American culture and diet introduced dairy... THAT is my biggest reason right there. I would find other sources even if I DID feel that consuming it was OK for other reasons.

http://www.milksucks.com/more.asp. Print some info and shove it in your dcotors face. Cheese and other milk products are NOT a good source of calcium or anything else. Even beer is better!

Thanks for posting all these links

You don't need dairy! Period. Toss it now! Or give it away. Remember what they say about doctors and nutrition.

Beer is better? Yay! I'll drink more beer