I usually drink a protein shake for breakfast every morning. I start sippin' away when I get to work around 7:30 and it generally takes until noon to finish. I put the same thing in it every time. Fruit, protein powder, flax seed oil, coconut oil, flax seeds, water, a little oj for flavor, and some nutritional yeast. Mostly it's just a fat free, protein rich breakfast, and I get some good oils and vitamins in the process.
Sometimes if I'm feeling exceptionally lazy, I'll just put the yeast in a cup of juice and call it breakfast. Yeast is awesome stuff. It's not the bread-baking stuff, it's more like brewer's yeast. It's nutty-tasting flaky stuff that has a bunch-o-vitamins and minerals. It does all kinds of things like keep me from having bad dreams, regulates my blood sugar, and gives my body a ton of amino acids.
So this morning I was feeling exceptionally lazy. I grabbed my juice, dumped in my yeast, and hi-ho-hi-ho, it's off to work I went. I had some form of granola around 8 that sustained me long enough to get some work done. And about 11 I decided to drink my juice.
Gulp, gulp..
About half way through I started to feel a little itchy. And then sort of warm.
Am I allergic to juice now too?!
Gulp, gulp..
Then my face starts to feel hot. I don't want to be allergic to juice! I like juice!
Gulp, gulp..done.
Okay, now the hair on my head is standing up. Is this what hives feel like?
Well, I guess it's a little late now..
Wait! I know what it is! I'm having a niacin flush!! Sweet! Well, sort of not. But cool! I haven't had a niacin flush in years!
Niacin, a.k.a. Vitamin B3, is one of the plethora of vitamins in my yummy nutritional yeast cocktail. It naturally dilates your capilaries allowing the cells in your body to dump toxins in the blood to be filtered out by the liver. But it also generates this nice warm flush and a bit of itchiness caused by the histamine hormone. Neat right?
You know you really need niacin when you get a flush, because you develop a sort of tolerance to the amount of the vitamin your body is accustomed to having. So I'm super excited! Even though it means I haven't been taking my niacin. Bad!! But yay! I love to see my 'voodoo' working for me.
