You might know your blood pressure and cholesterol levels, but do you know your Vitamin D level?
We are fortunate to live in a day and age when we can measure so many aspects of our biology. You can walk into labs all over the U.S. and order blood and urine tests, you probably have an app that tracks your steps, you can wear a continuous glucose monitor on your arm, and you might even own a pulse-ox and a blood pressure machine. In fact, my Oura ring tells me how much deep sleep I got last night!
Bottom line, we have the ability to know a lot about our body and how it's functioning.
Of all the things to measure, your Vitamin D level might be the most important. Not
knowing your Vitamin D level puts you at a distinct disadvantage in your quest for health. Some people don't pay attention to their level or can't remember what the results said, but this must be because they don't understand the profound importance of this vitamin and the life-threatening dangers of below optimal levels. For many biohackers (people who are actively trying to optimize their health and biology) Vitamin D is a starting point that they build on. If you consult with a Functional Medicine doctor, they'll often make sure your Vitamin D level is optimized before they even check other things.
It's like when you call the support line about a piece of electronic equipment malfunctioning and the first troubleshooting question they ask is: "Is it plugged in?". The first question that you should ask when you're trying to build a healthy body is: "Is my Vitamin D level optimized?". If your Vitamin D level is not between 40-60 ng/ml, you need to rectify that first.
Why is optimizing Vitamin D levels so important?
1. Vitamin D is actually a hormone, sometimes referred to as a "pre-hormone", that affects the function of nearly every cell in the body.
2. The sun is the optimal source of Vitamin D.
These two facts taken anthropologically help us understand the fundamental role that Vitamin D plays in our biology. Whether you believe in creation or evolution or both, we can probably agree that humans need the sun. We were created or evolved to be biologically dependent upon sunshine. Not only does our planet's plant life need it to grow, our human bodies need it to make Vitamin D among other benefits. When you consider that our ancestors lived outdoors and had plenty of sun exposure, it makes sense that our biology became intertwined with that daily sunshine.
Our bodies are dependent upon that Vitamin D that the sunshine creates. Virtually every cell in the body has Vitamin D receptors. A cell wouldn't have a Vitamin D receptor if it didn't need to interact with that Vitamin D. Cells don't have receptors for things that they don't need or don't use.
Why do you need to get tested? Vitamin D levels matter!
There is unanimous agreement amongst scientists and researchers across the globe that an ideal Vitamin D level is between 40-60 ng/ml. Here are a couple of reasons for this conclusion:
1. When they study populations of people from around the world who live and work outdoors, they find that their average blood level of Vitamin D is in this range.
2. Research that shows correlations between people with Vitamin D levels in the range of 40-60 ng/ml having less occurrence of disease compared to people with lower Vitamin D levels. This exact topic will be the content of a future blog post.
Now you can get your Vitamin D tested from the convenience of your home. With the Vitamin D Home Test available on HealthtotheRescue.com you can find out if your lifestyle is creating optimal Vitamin D levels or not.
Are you confident that your combination of sunshine, diet and supplements are creating an optimal Vitamin D level? There's only one way to find out!