Dr. Weeks Comment: You are NOT what you eat. You are not even what you absorb from what you eat. You are what you can fully digest, absorb and distribute throughout your body and to optimize digestion (the breaking down of food into amino acids and sugars – the currency of your biochemistry), you need to do three things: 1) eat slowly 2) chew thoroughly 3) have adequate stomach acid (HCL). I have offered a mixture of Betaine HCL and Pepsin to patients for over 30 years and told them that if I could have only 1 nutritional supplement when shipwrecked alone on a desert island, it would be this digestive aid because with Betaine HCL and Pepsin, I could eat ANYTHING organic and render it into nutrition. I have discussed this need for digestive forces and the importance of avoid antacids(mostly dairy products which bind and neutralize stomach acid) in these prior posts Dropping Acid and I Scream. So how does Betaine help you regain health? Read on!
Front Immunol. 2018 May 24;9:1070.
doi: 10.3389/fimmu.2018.01070. eCollection 2018.
Betaine in Inflammation: Mechanistic Aspects and Applications
Abstract
Betaine is known as trimethylglycine and is widely distributed in animals, plants, and microorganisms. Betaine is known to function physiologically as an important osmoprotectant and methyl group donor. Accumulating evidence has shown that betaine has anti-inflammatory functions in numerous diseases. Mechanistically, betaine ameliorates sulfur amino acid metabolism against oxidative stress, inhibits nuclear factor-κB activity and NLRP3 inflammasome activation, regulates energy metabolism, and mitigates endoplasmic reticulum stress and apoptosis. Consequently, betaine has beneficial actions in several human diseases, such as obesity, diabetes, cancer, and Alzheimer’s disease.