Calcium can CURE a Fever?

It is so hard to see our wee babies fighting a FEVER, whether they be infants or young adults.  However, did you know there is a cure for your child's fever in your medicine cabinet?

Most women take a calcium supplement, and so most of us have CALCIUM CITRATE next to our prenatal pills in our cupboard.  If you do not already take calcium-citrate or calcium-magnesium, you can find a bottle of these pills at your grocery store in the vitamin section.

So what does calcium have to do with a fever?  Well, let's first break down and understand what a fever is.  A fever is the body's way of fighting off infection or a bacterial threat.  However, most people do not know that a fever is a result of a calcium deficiency in the body.  When the body fights off infection, it uses little soldiers called White Blood Cells.  White blood cells are transported via the bloodstream to the impending threat, and it is their duty to the body to surround and absorb the germ.  These white cells are made mostly of calcium, and is easy to remember because we associate milk with calcium, which is also white.  See THIS ARTICLE for more information!

So there is an infection going on in your body.  To use a military analogy, the normal battalion of soldiers is being used up and spent.  The white blood cells are literally giving their lives to defend the nation called Body.  Body needs reinforcements!  Body has no choice but to steal calcium from our bones.  Sacrifice must take place in order to save the entire Body.  A fever is the body super-heating (which for our sensitive bodies can be accomplished in just a few degrees) in order to turn some of our hard bone marrow into a liquid, easily transportable form for the bloodstream.  Are you familiar with the ACHING feeling often accompanied by a fever?  You are feeling this bone marrow transition from a solid to a softer, almost liquid form.

However, with this information, we can help our bodies fight infection and reduce the fever by giving it extra calcium so our bones are not robbed.  By keeping a supply of CALCIUM CITRATE or CALCIUM-MAGNESIUM on hand, adults can rid their fever with just a pill or two.  You can even rid your child's fever with a little work ahead of time.

**Is your sweet baby teething?  You can help her out by giving her extra calcium in her drink.  After all, teeth are made of calcium, and it requires extra calcium fuel for the teeth to move up their gums.**

Here is what I do:
1) Using a food processor (I happen to have the small, 2-cup KitchenAid food processor), grind a handful of calcium pills into a powder.
- store in an air tight container.  I use a small glass jar with a mayonnaise lid labeled "calcium powder"
- as with any medicine or home remedy, keep away from children.  I have a certain high cabinet in my kitchen that houses all my pills, salves, extracts, essential oils, etc.

2) Give a little less of a teaspoon to children over 2 every four hours or until the fever is receding.
- I mix it in my son's favorite juice or in chocolate milk, and he wouldn't know any better.
- Believe it or not, even infants can receive this treatment because their bodies are used to receiving calcium via breast milk. However, their dose would look more like 1-2 pinches of the powder into their bottle, again every feeding until the fever is leaving.

3) THANKFULLY, one cannot overdose on calcium! :-)  Your body will simply expel the excess without any adverse effects. 

A GREAT science lesson for even the elementary child is to use mini marshmallows as white blood cells and chocolate chips to represent germs. Have your children smash the marshmallow over the chocolate chip and eat it, showing the germ being destroyed.  Then, make sure there are a few more "germs" than there are "white blood cells" and explain that now the country called Body (or use their name!) needs more soldiers so it is going to heat itself to borrow soldiers from the villages (use stick pretzels for the village boundaries) called Bone (or Arm Bone, Leg Bone, etc).  Then explain how those other villages are now hurting (muscle aches) because their fathers and brothers have gone to war to defend Body.  :-)