I have a secret formula for getting through the holidays. I can maintain my energy with all of the seasonal pressures on me and I come out of the season feeling good rather than feeling deeply exhausted. The secret is dried beef liver tablets (desiccated liver) or Brewer’s Yeast.
My first pick is the dried beef liver because it is loaded with vitamins and minerals, notably vitamins in the B vitamin family. It apparently has an “anti-stress factor” that helps your body deal with stress. My friend Joanne at Nourished Magazine wrote about the anti-stress factor a couple of months ago. But the idea was popularized by Adelle Davis, the nutritional icon that my own mother read back in the late 60s when mom was busy having my sister and me. Mother Adelle recommended that in very busy times we load up on desiccated liver or brewer’s yeast to give us additional energy to make it through.
Brewer’s Yeast has the anti-stress factor as well and provides a vegetarian option. I used it to get through my dissertation defense. (I actually used beta blocker as well for the defense itself but that’s really not a top-notch health story.)
So what I have started this season is consuming the equivalent of about two ounces of liver a day. (Look for a desiccated liver product from cattle on grass. There are many products made from cattle from Argentina or New Zealand which should fit the bill.) My mom is taking a scoop of “de-bittered” brewer’s yeast three times a day (whatever “a scoop” is). We are both spreading our doses throughout the morning and early afternoon. Neither of us are taking our supplements after about 2 p.m. because they can interfere with sleep. And my mom warns that if you find yourself making sugar cookies at 1 a.m. on this regimen, you are taking too much.
Adelle Davis warned against taking very large doses for extended periods of time because you can wear yourself out. There is a fine line apparently between taking enough to get a bit of a boost and taking enough to give you superwoman powers. The superwoman thing would have been somewhat appealing to me had I not already “been there, done that” this fall and am in a long recovery state as a result.
So how much should you take to get a boost but not be left with a bit too much energy? It just depends. Some of us are probably so deficient in B-vitamins that high doses will only shave the edges off of our depression and fatigue. Some of us may get a huge energy boost on a small amount of these supplements. So you’ll have to experiment and use your judgment.
Stress takes nutrients out of us. Be proactive and put some back into your body. Early January could look a lot better.
