Living Magazine Fall 2014 Living Magazine | Page 10

Nutrition Corner with Dr. Tory Parker, Ph.D.

V I T A M I N
How to make a D-lightful summer into a healthy winter!
As a University professor, I taught Nutritional Biochemistry for many years. During that time, I learned that
certain nutrients—such as vitamin D—can be hard to get enough of, even with a well-rounded, healthy diet.
In fact, before joining doTERRA and taking the Lifelong Vitality Pack, I would tell my students that if they
only took one supplement, it should be vitamin D.
Vitamin D is also known as the

“sunshine vitamin” for the fact that your
body produces it when your skin is
directly exposed to sunlight. Your liver
makes cholesterol that circulates to your
skin, allowing UV light from the sun to
convert the cholesterol into vitamin D.
It is especially interesting that you can’t
get a toxic dose of vitamin D, no matter
how long you are in the sun. If too many
UV rays hit the vitamin D in your skin, it
gets converted into another compound
that your body excretes, leaving you
with a perfect amount!
Vitamin D is also added to orange juice
and breakfast cereals, and can be found
naturally occurring in fish and eggs.
Between the sun and mentioned
food sources, you would think most
people get enough vitamin D in their
systems; however, this is often not the

case. Worldwide, an estimated one
billion people have inadequate levels of
vitamin D in their blood, and deficiencies
can be found in all ethnicities and age
groups.
Vitamin D was added to milk in the 1930s
to help with rickets, a deforming bone
disease in children that was particularly
prevalent in the northern latitudes. In
the winter, people who live at higher
latitudes (typically about 40°) can’t
make much vitamin D from the sun.

sunlight to reach the skin. During the
Industrial Revolution, rickets was prevalent in cities where tall buildings and
air pollution blocked the sunlight needed
for vitamin D production in the body.
It was thought that bone-building
properties in fortified milk would solve
the population’s vitamin D deficiencies, but it was only a partial solution
to the problem. Getting vitamin D
through natural sunlight is important
to the body in many other ways.

Additionally, thick winter clothing makes
it impossible for the little available

Worldwide, an estimated one billion
people have inadequate levels of vitamin D in
their blood, and deficiencies can be found
in all ethnicities and age groups.

10 / FALL 2014 LIVING MAGAZINE