Vibrant Hair, Skin and Nails
Dear Friends and Readers,
So happy to share with you this month’s guest blogger post by my friend Thais Harris. A little about Thais: Thais Harris, BCHN has lead hundreds of people in their journey to optimal health, through her signature group cleanse, online courses, and individual + family wellness coaching. Her practice, Nourish Together, focuses on helping women create their own custom, realistic, ideal body and outstanding life.
This month Thais shares her thoughts on how to have vibrant, healthy hair skin and nails from a nutrition point of view. Please continue reading to learn more about how our diet choices can affect how we present ourselves in the world.
Vibrant Hair, Skin and Nails: understanding what happens as we age and what we can do about it!
By Thais Harris, BCHN
Getting older does not mean losing vitality, experiencing thinning hair, brittle nails or dry skin. Not necessarily. While aging causes a decline in hormones, and hormone imbalance is the major culprit here, there is a lot we can do to support health – including our hair, nails and skin – with food and daily lifestyle practices.
When our hormones are out of balance, we can experience:
- Hair loss
- Slow or no hair growth
- Thinning hair and eyebrows
- Brittle or cracked nails
- Nail ridges
- Dry skin
- Excessive wrinkles
- Eye circles
- Acne
Before we look at some foods and practices to boost vitality after 40, it is important to understand the many factors affecting hormones and getting proper labs to test levels.
Some of the many factors affecting our hormones, include: age-related estrogen decline; estrogen dominance and elevated androgens; environmental triggers such as pollution and exposure to hormone-mimicking products and chemicals; imbalances in our microbiome (dysbiosis); thyroid dysfunction; insulin resistance; and chronic stress.
So what can we do about all of this? Can we eat our way out of premature aging and the hormone roller coaster? And can eating well and managing stress bring back shiny hair, supple skin and strong nails?
Well, yes! Although some imbalances need further investigating and even medical treatment, there is a LOT we CAN do with everyday choices to support our hormones, and therefore look and feel healthy at any age.
Diet recommendations and nutrients to make your skin, hair and nails glow:
1. Drink enough water! Water is essential for health, including skin, nails, and hair. Without adequate moisture, nails can become brittle and break and peel easily, skin gets wrinkled faster, and hair looks dull. Drinking enough water helps them to retain moisture and stay strong. You can pinch your skin to see if you are dehydrated – it shows on it that fast!
2. Reduce or eliminate (white) sugar! Excess insulin is inflammatory and causes hormone imbalance, cardiovascular issues, metabolic chaos, and diabetes. Oh yeah, and premature aging! Choose whole foods like vegetables and whole fruits (not juice) and a small amount of raw honey, maple syrup or coconut sugar when you HAVE to sweeten something. It is also important to have some protein, fiber and a healthy fat when eating anything sweet to slow down sugar absorption so you can keep your body from fire hosing insulin. This includes cane sugar, beet sugar, corn syrup, rice syrup and all the other forms of sugar you can find on processed foods. White flour and rice can have the same insulin effect in the body, so reduce those too.
3. Vitamin A (including retinol) is essential for our vision, immune system, and skin health. Its deficiency may result in scaly, dry skin and loss of hair. The recommended daily allowance (RDA) is 900 micrograms daily for men and 700 micrograms daily for women. About one cup of raw carrots provides 900 mcg. To maximize your vitamin A potential, eat a well-rounded diet and include plenty of fruits and vegetables, along with dairy products, fish, and liver.
4. Vitamin C acts as an antioxidant in our bodies and plays an important role in our skin health. It supports collagen synthesis and helps protect against damage from UV-rays. The RDA is 90 milligrams (mg) daily for men and 75 mg daily for women and it is found in many fruits and vegetables; the highest sources include bell peppers, citrus fruits, and their juices. If juicing, make sure to add vegetables and leafy greens so you are not just drinking the sugar of the fruit (which is what fruit juice is).
5. Biotin: part of the B complex, this vitamin helps our bodies convert food into energy and metabolize fats and proteins. If you don’t get enough biotin, you may see thinning of hair, scaly skin, and brittle nails. Aim for 30 micrograms (mcg) per day. Biotin-rich foods include nuts, vegetables, salmon, and eggs.
6. Vitamin D is vital for skin and hair rejuvenation. Those who live in northern parts of the Northern hemisphere where sunlight is limited need extra support with vitamin D. Salmon, mushrooms, beef liver, and grains are great sources.
7. Essential fatty acids. Omega-3 fats have been shown to reduce inflammation and support skin and scalp health. You can obtain essential fatty acids from eating cold-water fish such as mackerel, salmon, sardines, anchovies, tuna, pollock, or shrimp. Keep the larger fish like tuna and pollock to once or twice a month because of possible mercury content. If you don’t like fish, or are vegan/vegetarian, a flaxseed oil supplement is a good alternative, as well as using lots of flax and chia seeds in meals.
8. Zinc: this essential mineral is necessary for cellular metabolism, immune function and wound healing. Zinc accelerates the healing process of wounds and burns due to its role in the synthesis of collagen. The recommended daily allowance (RDA) is 11 mg daily for men and 8 mg daily for women. Zinc is found in high-protein foods such as red meat, oysters, lamb, turkey, pumpkin seeds, and chocolate.
LIFESTYLE TIPS:
1. Use a diet journal app such as Cronometer (all my clients get free access) and enter everything you eat for 3 days. Then check out your custom report to see how much of these nutrients you are consuming on a regular basis. Supplement if there is a big gap.
2. Do you shower with treated water or hard water? Hard water can have a negative effect on skin and hair. Check out this link for more information.
3. Pay close attention to what you put on your skin. Anything that goes on the skin gets absorbed into your bloodstream, so ask yourself if you would eat a product before you lather it on. If the answer is no, then don’t feed it to your skin. You can use the EWG’s Skin Deep app here to check out how healthy your cosmetics are.
4. Give yourself a 12-hour fasting window. End your last meal at least 3 hours before going to bed and eat breakfast at the 12 to 13-hour mark. Letting the body do its rejuvenating and detoxifying tasks without any dietary input will allow for more full and efficient recovery.
5. Practice some form of stress-reducing exercise, meditation, and/or play. Stress is the top hormone disrupter, so lowering it will consequently help every system in the body and keep you younger longer. Lowering stress is one very effective way to look and feel younger!
— Thais Harris, BCHN
Want help implementing this? Reach out to me at thais@nourishtogether.com. You can book a free 15-minute session here. Questions? E-mail thais@nourishtogether.com
Thais is board-certified by the National Association of Nutrition Professionals and holds a certificate in Nutrition Consulting from Bauman College, in Berkeley, CA. She graduated from the California Institute of Integral Studies in San Francisco, CA, and also attended the University of Southern Santa Catarina. Thais served on the faculty at Bauman College as a Nutrition Instructor from 2016 to 2020 and as the Nutrition Education Manager at the non-profit Ceres Community Project, in California, from 2013 to 2018.
Visit nourishtogether.com, like Nourish Together on Facebook, and check out Thais’ Instagram feed @nourish.together.