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Renovating Your Minds Makes A Social Call To The First Member of The B-Complex Family, B1-Thiamine

By rkutchjm on March 25, 2013

In the past, Renovating Your Mind has written about B12. Here is the link to that article:

B12 Highest Numbered B Drives Up The Complexity

I decided to give B12 the day off so we are meeting with the first member of this important nutritional family. They perform so many essential roles in the body. Together the B brothers play an all for one and one for all scenario in helping release energy from food. If you are short on one B, there is good possibility you are deficient in other members in the group. The B-Complex family are known as water-soluble vitamins as is Vitamin C.

Want to introduce:

Thiamine

What Thiamine Looks Like-Amine (From Vitamin) Group Is NH2

Thiamine’s role in the body is helping to break down carbohydrates for energy and to build up proteins. B1 does not provide calories. The vitamin enables our system to efficiently utilize calories from our foods. It also aids in the production of neurotransmitters (brain chemicals that transmit messages) allowing the brain to tell the body how to proceed with the input from our senses.

Some Symptoms Similar To Ones In Diabetics

B1 (thiamine) deficiency disease is called beriberi. If you’re in Sri Lanka speaking Sinhalese, it means I can’t I can’t. With a profound shortage of this vitamin, you are completely exhausted.

Types Of Thiamine Deficiencies

Two kinds of beriberi exist, wet and dry. Wet causes congestive heart failure and fluid backup in the body. Dry beriberi progressively destroys the central nervous system.

Alcoholics usually have multiple B member deficiencies. In the case of thiamine, interaction with alcohol causes two major problems. First off, the alcoholic has a lower food intake and fills that void with excess alcohol. Therefore the diet doesn’t contain enough B1 for normal functioning. Second, alcohol destroys any small amount of thiamine that is present in the diet. About 25% of alcoholics will show a thiamine shortage. With alcoholism, the deleterious effects of thiamine deficiency are reversible over the short run. With time, that cul-de-sac road to reversibility becomes a dead-end with irreversible side effects that include uncoordinated movements of lower extremities, dementia and inability of the eyes to move normally.

After 10 years or longer of heavy drinking, the patient develops a condition known as Wernicke-Korsakoff’s Syndrome (WKS).

Please Push The Button By Calling AA

This syndrome may progress into permanent brain destruction resulting in amnesia and nerve damage. I would encourage that alcoholics get treatment by visiting AA (Alcoholics Anonymous). In addition, initiate ingestion of a B-Complex vitamin daily under your doctors supervision.

Thiamine is an extremely sensitive nutrient. It requires the acid environment of the stomach to be absorbed into our bodies. When we add baking soda to vegetables to maintain the green color, it will destroy the thiamine. Why? Baking soda is alkaline which causes thiamine to break down and become completely inactive. In addition, heat also changes the shape of thiamine and destroys its beneficial activity. The best way to preserve thiamine in your food is with no baking soda. In addition, lightly sautéed, steamed, blanched, microwaved or even raw vegetables will preserve thiamine in your produce.

Some Food Sources Of Abundant Thiamine

Thiamine is found in abundance in dried beans, peanuts, peanut butter, wheat germ, nuts, whole grain cereals, milk, whole grain breads, meats, fish, green leafy vegetables, peas and legumes. Many cereals are sprayed with thiamine which ends up in the bathing milk. Make sure to indulgence in that milk if you want to get all that cereal’s thiamine inside your body.

The daily requirement for thiamine is 1.2 mg for men and 1.1 mg for women. Most of us get at least 2.0 mg per day from an average diet.We have a storage capacity for this vitamin of about 2 weeks. Deficiencies start developing after that time if we are still continuing to get less than the daily requirement.