The question I have for you right now is, what did you have for breakfast?
In particular, I am asking what your protein part was?
Was it milk, cheese, eggs, fish, meat, chicken or legumes?
Or none of these at all?
It may have been a coffee, toast, breakfast bar…
Then your body will be working hard to do all the housekeeping it needs without your protein meal.
Did you know that all protein is not the same? That is, they can all be broken down into different types and amounts of smaller particles called Amino Acids. You may be familiar with the name of amino acids as found in protein drinks or energy bars.
So out of 20 amino acids nine are essential to eat. The proteins that have all of these are called complete proteins.
Others, are lacking some or all of the nine essential amino acids are low-quality proteins. They don’t have all the essential amino acids or have smaller amounts of them that aren’t enough to contribute to making a full protein.
When this happens is it said they are limiting amino acids. And what does that mean? Once a limiting Amino Acid is used up then even if there is plenty of other amino acids available to make hormones, build muscle, carry red blood cells, make digestive enzymes and a number of other really important jobs in the body, it can’t because that one limiting amino acid has run out.
So you say, okay, well, I haven’t had all my amino acids this morning, I’ll make up for it at lunchtime. But guess what, you can’t! The body does not store excess Amino Acids.
Every meal is unique and you can’t do catch up later. That’s really insane and makes you really think about what your next meal is composed of.
A part of getting the benefits of the proteins is how well they are digested.
We need to be able to break down our proteins via our digestive system, which begins in the mouth, with tearing and chewing, then into the stomach where strong Hydrochloric acid begins the breakdown of the protein and pepsin begins work here as well. Then into the small intestine, there are more enzymes that continue the breakdown, until the protein that you ate is now singular, double or triple amino acid groups that get transported in the intestinal cells.
So if you have issues with digestion, burping belching, indigestion it is quite possible you are not breaking down your proteins well.
In general Animal, proteins are well digested – 90 – 99%, plant proteins not as well 70-90% with the exception of soy and legumes at 90%.
When proteins are being recreated in the body for important jobs to be done in the body, all the necessary Amino acids are needed at the same time. A bit like baking a cake and not having the flour or eggs to make it. It can’t be done.
Remember how I spoke about Complete proteins at the beginning, these have all the nine essential amino acids. If we are baking our cake and are putting milk into the mix to make it the right texture and we run out of milk and leave the mix very sticky and hard to handle, then we have a Limiting ingredient – Milk. Amino acids also have Limiting Amino Acids. So if a protein is being made and it may have to stop because there are no more of the amino acids that it requires.
This is where, if we are not eating complete protein in a meal, it is vital that we eat a combination of proteins called Complementary proteins. An example is eating legumes with grains. The Legumes have a reduction of two amino acids that the grains are in abundance of and vice versa. So eaten together will give plenty of amino acids to build proteins the body can use to make what we need.
This is exactly why the nutrition plan I use in my methods works so well.
If you’d like to know more, you are welcome to join my free membership on facebook. Thyroid, Metabolic, Hormone Harmony Hub.
I’d love to see you there
Inspiring Wellness
Beth
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