1.  Causes of Neuropathy - Neuropathy, why the pain, the tingling and the numbness?
2.  The Difference Between Drugs and Nutrition Supplements 
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Neuropathy, why the pain, the tingling and the numbness?

Neuropathy has many symptoms.   It may start with a tingling feeling and end up with numbness.   It can be a pricking, or burning sensation, loss of reflexes and muscle shrinkage, abnormal sensations, or sensitivity to touch.  Its worse symptom is pain, sometimes so excruciating that a person would amputate rather then continue the pain.  

It is called many names such as paresthesia, neuritis, neuralgia, dysesthensia, hypoesthesia, hypesthesia, hypalgesia, hypealgesia and hyperesthesia due to its many different kinds of symptoms. 

But, what underlies all these symptoms?

They are created by a specific type of nerve damage. This nerve damage can come from too much sugar in the blood (the reason it is a side effect of diabetes). It can be caused by exposure to chemicals such as cancer treatments, poisons, alcoholism, or a side effect of some medications.   It can be the result of kidney or liver failure, infectious disease or nutritional deficiencies especially B vitamins.   The reasons are many; the damage they produce is the same.

What creates the problem is damage done to the outer lining of the nerve cell.   Cells have coverings much like an electrical wire has an insulation of plastic.  Have you ever seen a wire whose insulation is damaged – the electrical current doesn’t flow correctly. It can send electricity out from the area where it is damaged, it can stop the flow of electricity or it can damage what its supposed to be supplying electricity to.

A damaged nerve covering does the same thing.  It can send out “sparks” that cause tingling, it can stop the flow resulting in numbness.  It can create feelings of hot or cold or a sensitivity due to crossed signals.  It can definitely cause pain especially as the damage gets worse.

The idea is to fix this outer covering.  This is called the myelin sheath.  What is needed is specific B vitamins.  The only question is how to get these B vitamins in sufficient amounts so that the body can actually repair the damage.   Isolated B vitamins that are sold at the health food stores or local drug stores get washed out of the system too quickly to fix the damage.  It would be hard to take enough of this type of nutrients to make a difference.  You can’t get it from vitamins made in a laboratory.

What is needed is a whole food supplement with methylcobalamine and benfotiamine and other B vitamins that the body can use to repair the cells.  That is one of the functions of the body, to repair cells.  But it does need specific nutrients to do its job.  

Nutrients are what a body runs on.   A car runs on gas.  If you drive the car down the road, it uses up a steady amount of that gas.  If you take that same car and speed down the freeway, you will use up a lot of gas.   When you take a body “out on the freeway”, or put it under physical stress, it uses up a lot more nutrients.  Thus, getting the right supplements in the right amount is important.

Just as a car won’t drive without giving it gas.  A body can’t repair itself (or function correctly) without the proper nutrients it needs to “drive”. In the case of neuropathy, it needs these B vitamins.

Neuropathy can be a side effect of many things.   Although most often it is caused by too much sugar in the blood - Diabetes - there are many factors.

Chemoitherapy and some drugs have neuropathy as a side effect and it can be caused by surgery damaging the nerves - there are others such d by prescription medications, surgeries, toxins, vitamin deficiencies and injuries.

The Difference Between Drugs and Nutrition Supplements 

For what every ails you, , a person has only a few choices about what to do about it..

The Drug Approach

What a drug does is it forces the body to do something that it normally wouldn't do.. When it comes to a medication, the body reacts in certain ways to this medication and it is done in order to achieve a desirable effect.  For instance,  in order to balance itself and handle the effects of a drug, the body has to lower its blood pressure.   If this is what you want to happen because its a blood pressure medication, it's a good thing.   However, there are also various other ways the body can react to the drug and sometimes this is not such a good thing - this is called a "side effect".  It is the reason someone can wind up on 4 blood pressure medications.  Each drug is given in an attempt to balance another drug so as not to create the various side effects of the other drugs.  It is a balancing act. 

The Natural Approach

What a nutritional supplement does is give the body the actual tools it needs to fix the body. 

In the case of neuropathy, it is the nerve cell that is damaged.  The body needs certain tools (nutritional factors) to do this repair.   Drugs don't repair anything; they treat the symptom, not the cause of the problem. 

As with our example of blood pressure, if they don't know what is causing the high blood pressure, the drug just lowers it artificially.  the supplement doesn't force the blood pressure low, but addresses the cause of high blood pressure and brings your body into better balance, and the blood pressure goes to normal.  

The cause of nerve damage is known - it can be the result of too much sugar in the blood, the chemicals used in cancer treatments, injury to the nerve, etc. - but one thing is known,  the damage is done to the cell and this causes the pain.  

You can cover this up with pain killers, or with other drugs that are manufactured to handle this, but the drugs aren't repairing anything.   They are trying to forces the body to not give you pain, not give you numbness, etc.,  And sometimes more damage to the nerve cell might happen due to the drug or other drugs you are taking,

The Nutritional Approach

Nutritional supplements are actually vitamins and minerals that the body needs to repair the cells.  The body needs certain nutrients to function properly.  

In the case of neuropathy, there are specific ingredients needed by the body to repair the cells.  These are the supplements you want to take.

Another difference is that if you are taking a drug and just covering up symptoms, you have to continue to take the drug to get relief and sometimes even have to increase the drug to get the same relief.

If you take natural supplements, the body can fix the problem, and as long as you don't do anything to damage the cells again, there is an end to taking the supplements.

For neuropathy see:   Nerve Support Formula

For High Blood pressure see High Blood Pressure

For other health challenges, see McVitamins.com

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