By: Amanda Schroeder
In your body, right now, you have about 25 g of magnesium. That’s the weight of about 25 paperclips! Magnesium is a mineral that works like a puzzle piece, providing the necessary piece for more than 300 different regulatory reactions in your body. It plays a vital role in essential processes, such as regulating blood pressure and blood glucose levels. It maintains proper nerve function and regulates muscle contraction and heart rhythm. And it assists your body in making bone, protein and, even, DNA. This little mineral can do it all!
Despite its importance, magnesium intakes are consistently lower than recommended. According to a National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES), men who are 71 years of age or older and adolescent females tend to have the lowest levels. Clearly, we need to fix this! Thankfully, our bodies know just how important magnesium is and our kidneys will limit its excretion in our urine if we are running low. Therefore, having levels low enough to show symptoms is rare in most healthy people. Though, particular health conditions, including gastrointestinal diseases, type 2 diabetes, chronic alcoholism, and the use of selected medications can result in symptomatic magnesium deficiency when combined with low dietary intake. Symptoms of magnesium deficiency become progressively worse as low levels are maintained. At first, you may notice appetite loss, nausea, vomiting, weakness, and fatigue. If low levels are maintained, numbness, muscle contractions and cramps, personality changes, seizures, abnormal heart rhythms and, even, coronary spasms can occur. Scary! Check out this table to learn just how much magnesium you should be getting in your diet.
| Table 1: Recommended Dietary Allowances (RDAs) for Magnesium [1] | ||||
| Age | Male | Female | Pregnancy | Lactation |
| Birth to 6 months | 30 mg* | 30 mg* | ||
| 7–12 months | 75 mg* | 75 mg* | ||
| 1–3 years | 80 mg | 80 mg | ||
| 4–8 years | 130 mg | 130 mg | ||
| 9–13 years | 240 mg | 240 mg | ||
| 14–18 years | 410 mg | 360 mg | 400 mg | 360 mg |
| 19–30 years | 400 mg | 310 mg | 350 mg | 310 mg |
| 31–50 years | 420 mg | 320 mg | 360 mg | 320 mg |
| 51+ years | 420 mg | 320 mg | ||
*Adequate Intake (AI)
(https://ods.od.nih.gov/factsheets/Magnesium-HealthProfessional/)
It is impossible for otherwise healthy people to ingest too much magnesium from food. Your body is a well-oiled machine and will tell your kidneys to excrete any excess through your urine. (Those with impaired kidney function have a higher risk of magnesium toxicity.) There is, however, risk of toxicity with supplementation or large doses of certain magnesium containing laxatives and antacids. Symptoms of excessive magnesium include diarrhea, nausea, and abdominal cramps. Toxicity (extremely high levels) can result in muscle weakness, breathing difficulties, extremely low blood pressure, irregular heartbeat, and cardiac arrest. Supplementation of magnesium is not recommended unless under the care of a medical professional.
So where can you find it? It’s everywhere! Whole grains, legumes, nuts, seeds, and green leafy vegetables are all great sources of magnesium. Just 1 ounce of almonds or ½ cup of wilted spinach contains about 80 mg! It is also added to many fortified foods, like breakfast cereals. There’s about 60 mg in one serving of shredded wheat. It’s found in avocado (44 mg/cup), potatoes (43 mg in 3.5 oz., including the skin) and bananas (32 mg in 1 medium fruit). It can also be found in smaller amounts in dairy products (about 25 mg/cup of milk), certain fish (26 mg in 3 oz. of Atlantic salmon), chicken (22 mg in 3 oz.) and beef (20 mg in 3 oz.). Since we are all chronically deficient and it is nearly impossible to ingest too much magnesium through food, eat up!
Try these magnesium rich recipes this week!
Reference:
- https://ods.od.nih.gov/factsheets/Magnesium-HealthProfessional/