Calcium Shell occurs when calcium salts are draw out of the bones and teeth, and float around the body in precipitates, building up in areas where they form a kind of shell around the cells in places like your muscles, brain, joints, and arteries.
This ‘protective shell’ if you will, can cause a person to experience emotional numbness and spaciness among many other symptoms, which I will go through below!
And of course it’s not great seen as we want 99% of our calcium in our teeth and bones, not in our soft tissues, if we want them to be strong!
WHAT ARE THE SYMPTOMS OF CALCIUM SHELL?
Often symptoms of Calcium Shell can overlap with other conditions including the symptoms of:
Slow Oxidation (fatigue, sugar cravings, low blood sugar, constipation, weight in hips and thighs insomnia, postural hypotension, poor ability to sweat, low blood pressure)
Copper Toxicity/Dysfunction (mood swings, PMS, racing thoughts, panic attacks, depression, feelings of despair, eating disorders, brain fog, frontal headaches/migraines, heart palpitations, social withdrawal, problems concentrating, problems with memory, infertility, miscarriages, endometriosis, fibroids, ovarian cysts, oestrogen imbalances, low libido, and candida) , and
Hypothyroid (weight gain, cold hands and feet, lack of sweating, fatigue, dry skin and hair, constipation).
Other symptoms include:
- Joint and muscle pain, cramps, spasms, and or twitches
- Arthritis, osteoporosis, bone spurs
- Premature greying of your hair
- Arteriosclerosis
- Kidney stones
- Low vitamin D
- Fibromyalgia, Chronic Fatigue Syndrome
- Impaired circulation or reduced spine movement
- Poor dental health and tooth decay (Ca pulled out of teeth into tissues)
- Tinnitus
- Sensitivity to EMFs (calcium is very conductive)
- Apathy, brain fog
- Feeling of being disconnected, apathetic
- Emotional numbness, psychological withdrawal
- Feeling out of touch with reality, depression, brain fog
- Anxiety, irritability, emotional outbursts
- Anger, and a racing mind if copper toxicity is driving the pattern
WHAT CAUSES CALCIUM SHELL?
Calcium needs the proper cofactors to direct it and keep it in the bones and teeth, one big one being vitamin K especially the MK-7 form, as well as magnesium, sodium and boron.
Imbalances of minerals can mean calcium builds up which is very common with people that have a very slow metabolic/oxidation rate. Over 80% of people are slow oxidisers nowadays, so this is a prevalent issue! These people generally have lower sodium and potassium levels, which are the body’s primary solvents that dissolve the hard calcium allowing it to get metabolised into the bones and teeth. Without sufficient levels of such minerals, calcium precipitates and builds up in the soft tissues.
Copper toxicity is therefore another driver of Calcium Shell due to copper lowering potassium and raising sodium initially then dropping sodium as it burns out the adrenals, again resulting in calcium building up in the soft tissues.
Calcium shell can also occur due to an emotional trauma or chronic stress as the body uses calcium to protect the cell from a stress response. This is why we can often feel emotionally dead inside when we have Calcium Shell.
Iodine deficiency is another cause of Calcium Shell as this makes it hard to hold on to potassium causing calcium to build up in tissues. Iodine also decalcifies, hence if low, we generally have high calcium. This means Calcium Shell is also often associated with hypothyroid or Hashimotos’s.
Excessive calcium supplementation is another cause (especially when there isn’t adequate magnesium, sodium and boron to use it properly).
Hard drinking water (limestone, calcium containing stone area where water supply comes from) is another.
HOW DO I KNOW IF I HAVE CALCIUM SHELL?
Unfortunately this is not likely a condition your GP may recognise and so it is important to work with a Functional Health Practitioner trained in preventative, holistic, alternative (or what I like to call ‘original’) health care, that focuses on finding the root cause of dysfunctions using patient symptoms and functional lab testing as a guide.
A full health inventory should be taken to assess symptoms and, when considering Calcium Shell, because calcium can build up in different areas of the body, one often being the hair, a Hair Tissue Mineral Analysis, HTMA, can help us determine if you have this condition.
Because of the link with thyroid health it’s often a good idea to also run a full thyroid panel including total T3 and rT3.
In fact, when we see discrepancies with testing, for example the results of the HTMA show hypothyroid whereas the blood test results show hyperthyroid, this shows there is decreased cellular permeability, which can be due to calcium shell, low sodium and low potassium.
HOW DO I BREAK UP MY CALCIUM SHELL?
Doing just a little work to break down your calcium can get you feeling dramatically better.
It is important to work with a practitioner that will help you go slow and steady when your body is ready. It is important that you are able to manage stress and past trauma as Calcium Shell detox can leave you feeling emotional and you may re-experience past trauma as the shell broken down.
You can even sometimes feel the calcium moving from the joints and soft tissues as it moves back into bone, so you may experience more joint, and muscle pain (calcium is a sharp mineral and it’s moving so you may feel it!) as it does this.
Other Calcium Shell detox symptoms include migraines, increased awareness, and improved mood.
You will likely need vitamin K2 in the MK-7 form, which helps to direct calcium back into the bone, Vitamin A (my favourite source is Rosita Cod Liver Oil) and iodine (care must be taken and you must seek practitioner help when using iodine but you can start with something like Nature’s Way Kelp) as these help to break down calcium…
…and you may need extra thyroid support.
Of course if Copper Toxicity is associated then this also need to be addressed.
Because Calcium Shell is often associated with emotional trauma release, therapies like EMDR, talk therapy, acupuncture, and EFT may be required as part of your healing.
I am here should you want to investigate whether Calcium Shell is what’s causing your health struggles, or if you have any further questions.
Click HERE to find out more about working with me to break down your shell.
Click HERE if you just want to run a HTMA without working with me in a program.
