The Top five vitamins to improve breathing for those with asthma.

What Is Asthma?

Asthma is a disease where the airways in your lungs become inflamed, tight, and restricted. This can cause you to breathe more rapidly than normal as your body is trying to get more air. It may also cause tightness in the chest, coughing, or wheezing. So what’s really going on here?

Inside the lungs are the airways called the bronchial tubes. When you breathe normally, air travels through these tubes into your lungs so that you can exchange oxygen with your blood. However, if you have asthma, your airwaves become more sensitive than normal and they start reacting to different triggers, like pollen or dust, for example, which causes a flare-up of asthma because the tubes become more narrow.

When this happens, the walls of the airways become inflamed and reddened, which can block the normal flow of air. They can also produce more mucus, and the muscles around the tubes can start to tighten and spasm.

Symptoms Of Asthma

All of these different problems make it much harder to breathe, which causes you to feel short of breath, making you breathe more rapidly in an attempt to get more oxygen. It can cause severe tightness pain or pressure in your chest as the muscles around your airways become more restricted and tightened. You may notice a whistling wheezing sound as you breathe, and the extra mucus that’s being produced can cause coughing, especially at night time when your cortisol levels drop.

Although medical research is ongoing, studies show that asthma is actually caused by an imbalance in the immune system, where the body is overreacting to particles in the environment, causing massive amounts of inflammation and constriction in the lungs.

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Doctors will often prescribe inhalers to help control an emergency asthma attack, which is very important. However, the steroids in these medications can make asthma problems worse over the long term. Fortunately, there are many natural ways to improve asthma symptoms by supporting both the lungs and the immune system. In this article, we will be exploring the top five vitamins for asthma patients to lower inflammation in the lungs and improve breathing. You’ll also learn about some simple lifestyle changes you can make to help fix the root causes and the triggers of asthma.

Bear in mind that I’m using the words vitamins broadly to include minerals and nutritional supplements that you can use to improve your asthma. Just a quick reminder this article is for educational purposes only, so do speak to your doctor before taking supplements or making any changes to your medication.

Vitamin D

The first item on my list is vitamin D. Vitamin D is, hands down, the most important nutrient to help prevent chronic inflammation in the lungs, especially in asthma patients. Vitamin D is a hormone that is produced when the skin is exposed to sunlight. The production of Vitamin D plays an important role in human health, as it has been linked to calcium absorption, immune function, and more.

Studies show that 74% of asthma patients are deficient in vitamin D, which causes structural changes to the tissues in the lungs, leading to tight, thickened, and constricted airways that become inflamed, and this blocks the normal flow of gas through the lungs. If you wish, you can take 20k international units of vitamin D3 on a daily basis, along with 200 micrograms of vitamin K2.

This higher dosage of vitamin D is usually prescribed by doctors of functional medicine to lower inflammation in the lungs and prevent further thickening of the tissues in your airways. It’s also recommended to take daily walks in the fresh air, exposing your skin to sunlight for at least 45 minutes to boost your vitamin D levels.

Vitamin C Complex

Number two is also very important for the human body. The Vitamin C Complex Vitamin C is an essential nutrient that we have to consume regularly in our diet from raw plant-based foods like salad leaves, vegetables, berries, and fruits. Eating foods like cabbage, sauerkraut strawberries, bell peppers, and cruciferous vegetables boosts the antioxidant network in your body with vitamin C.

This helps to rapidly lower inflammation in the lungs and prevent bronchoconstriction in order to open up your airways for easier breathing. Vitamin C also helps to improve how cortisol works in the body, a hormone that can cause spasms in the smooth muscle of your lungs if it’s not working properly. Please make sure, however, to avoid over-the-counter sorbic acid supplements, as these contain only 5% of the true vitamin C complex.

If you do decide to supplement, use a teaspoon of whole freeze-dried organic fruit powder such as Acerola Cherry, Rose, Hips, Amla, or Camu Camu, and you can do this in a glass of water or a smoothie on a daily basis. Real vitamin C contains J factors which help your blood to carry oxygen through your body again making you less likely to suffer from shortness of breath and breathing difficulties.

Electrolytes

Right, jumping back now to number three, which is three important electrolyte minerals calcium, magnesium, and Potassium. Electrolytes are essential minerals that your body uses to carry electrical impulses and send messages throughout your body. It’s important to consume foods rich in electrolytes on a daily basis to support the motor control of the smooth muscle in your lungs, especially leafy green vegetables.

So to make this very clear, if you are deficient in calcium, magnesium, sodium, or potassium, the muscles in your lungs can begin to tighten and spasm, causing asthma symptoms. This will tend to get worse when you’re exercising or performing lots of physical activity because your body uses up its minerals and these spasms can occur.

Asthma medications can also burn through your stored electrolytes, so simply start using a high-quality electrolyte powder of around one to two teaspoons with 16oz of water every day to fully hydrate your body, relax the muscles in the lungs and also reduce swelling. Make sure that your chosen brand contains at least 1000 milligrams of potassium citrate, 100 milligrams of magnesium citrate, and 75 milligrams of calcium lactate.

Cod Liver Oil

Now let’s talk about an age-old remedy for many different ailments extra virgin cod liver oil. To lower inflammation in your lungs and reduce the amount of mucus that’s being produced, it’s very important to load up on omega-three fatty acids. Virgin cod liver oil is one of the richest sources of DHA and EPA, the active omega threes that reduce inflammation in the body in order to protect the lungs and other internal organs.

If you wish, you can consider taking one teaspoon of virgin cod liver oil on a daily basis. Please make sure that you avoid the cheapest supplements that have synthetic vitamins added, as these can be toxic to the body. Icelandic virgin cod liver oil is usually the highest quality, which you will want to refrigerate to keep fresh.

In addition to omega-three fats, raw cod liver oil is also loaded with retinol, the active form of vitamin A, which can help to regenerate the mucosal tissue in the lungs, helping to prevent immune reactions to everyday particles like pollen, pet hair, tobacco smoke, and others.

Vitamin E (Tocotrienols)

And finally, we have number five vitamin E. Like vitamin C, the vitamin E complex is a powerful antioxidant helping to protect the body and the lungs against damage from inflammation and immune reactions. When you have asthma, your white blood cells are creating cytokines that trigger inflammation in the walls of the bronchial tubes or airways. Over time, this can lead to scar tissue forming in your lungs, which makes the tube stiffer and tighter and can trigger asthma attacks.

However, a powerful form of vitamin E called tocotrienols can be used to help prevent this fibrous scar tissue from making your airways stiff. A standard dosage would be around 300 milligrams per day of tocotrienols, which have been extracted from a pigment called anato. I also highly recommend eating foods that are naturally rich in vitamin E, such as avocados, sunflower seeds, hazelnuts, extra virgin olive oil, Swiss chard, and leafy greens.

All of these can help to increase your lung capacity and reduce the need for oxygen in your tissues so that you’re less likely to struggle when you breathe. Later in this article, we’ll talk about some simple lifestyle changes that you can also make to prevent asthma attacks and support your lungs and breathing.

Asthma Causes And Triggers

But first, let’s go a little deeper into some of the root causes and triggers of asthma. One of the main causes is exposure to a lot of antibiotic drugs or corticosteroids, especially when you were a child. These cause structural changes in the lungs, which are often irreversible. Another early trigger for asthma is when children grow up in an overly sterile and clean environment and don’t get exposed to enough pathogens and bacteria.

This stops them from building the necessary antibodies, making you more likely to have allergies to particles in the air as you get older, eating too many inflammatory foods like gluten, sugar, refined flour, and vegetable oils can all lower antioxidants in the body and trigger inflammation in the lungs. Other triggers that may be causing your asthma to flare up would be mold toxins that are living in your home, particularly on damp walls.

Or perhaps your immune system is overreacting to other pollutants in the air, like dust mites, smoke, or air resolves if your head shifts out in front of your body. This is called forward head posture, and this can put pressure on the nerves in the lower part of your back, which can cause problems with your lungs. And also high levels of a hormone called cortisol that’s triggered by prolonged mental stress, can weaken your immune system and also trigger inflammation in the lungs.

How To Strengthen Your Lungs?

Now let’s take a look at how you can strengthen your lungs with simple lifestyle changes.

• Cut back on grains, sugar, and flour-based foods like cereals, biscuits, bread, donuts, cakes, sweets, fruit juices, and pasta. These refined foods deplete your antioxidants, like vitamins C and E, which triggers inflammation in the lungs and narrows the airways. Instead, you want to eat foods that are naturally rich in quercetin and bioflavonoids, such as asparagus, extra virgin olive oil, garlic, dark cherries, peppers, blackberries, etc. The antioxidants in these foods work with the vitamin C complex to protect the tissues of your lungs against immune reactions.

• Check your house for mold, as this can often cause asthma flare-ups. This can be present on old clothing, damp walls, contaminated carpets, old furniture, and behind water heaters. You see, mold thrives in areas of dampness, and it gives off spores that can trigger asthma attacks. So you need to get this in check in your work and living environments.

• Take long, gentle walks in nature every single day for at least 45 minutes, especially in the winter if you can. Exposure to infrared light emits from the sun and is able to penetrate through clothing and skin. This exposure has been shown to increase melatonin production in cells, reducing inflammation and increasing oxygen levels within the body. Sunlight also triggers vitamin D production when it contacts your skin, which is the main vitamin needed for healthy lungs. And also, the fresh air itself can help your lungs expel irritants that you may have inhaled whilst you’re living or working inside.

• Stand flat with your back against a wall. If you notice that your head pushes out forward a lot, you may have a forward head posture. This can put pressure on the T1 to T4 vertebrae which affects how you breathe. Visit a chiropractor to help improve your posture if this is a major problem.

• If you come down with a cold or flu infection, consider using oregano oil to help improve breathing and expel mucus from your lungs. This concentrated oil is rich in thymol and carbachol, which help to open the airways for improved breathing.

• Switch out caffeinated drinks like coffee, tea, and soda for soothing alternatives, I recommend decaffeinated green tea, lemon balm tea, and peppermint tea. These will all help to normalize your cortisol levels and soothe the irritated tissues in your lungs. Thank you so much for reading my article today, and as always, I wish you excellent health, wealth, and happiness.