While you only need around 70 milligrams of vitamin C every day to prevent scurvy, some lifestyle factors increase your daily requirement for vitamin C intake. Diets that are high in caffeine or alcohol and low in fresh fruit and vegetables put you at an increased risk of deficiency, since both of these substances interfere with your body’s ability to absorb vitamin C from food. Other lifestyle factors that increase the requirement for vitamin C include smoking, stress, and being exposed to excessive sunlight without protection.
Too Much Heat
Certain lifestyle factors can increase your body’s need for vitamin c, including heat. Scientists have discovered that being in a hot environment can cause our bodies to release more hormones that break down vitamin c, making it less available to our cells. Hot weather also stresses the immune system and causes a person to sweat more. And what goes on outside your body matters: air pollution, extreme weather conditions and smoking can all increase a person’s requirement for vitamin c. More than one of these factors together are even worse! So, keep cool and drink lots of water so you don’t have an increased requirement for vitamin c–literally!
Alcohol Abuse
It is essential to have a balance in your life between healthy habits and unhealthy habits. Alcohol abuse can lead to negative health outcomes, just like a poor diet. The requirement for vitamin c is greater when people drink alcohol because it increases their risk of developing kidney stones, osteoporosis, and hypertension from dehydration. If you choose to drink alcohol, it is recommended that you add in some extra servings of fruit or vegetables (which contain vitamin c) to offset the increase of your need for vitamin c. Some signs of having an excess requirement for vitamin c are easy bruising, low immune system response, slow wound healing, and brittle nails.
Being Overweight
Studies have shown that being overweight increases your requirement for vitamin c. There are many reasons why. As you gain weight, you may not be able to process or utilize vitamin c as well, meaning your body needs more of it. In addition, if your muscle mass goes down and fat mass goes up from weight gain, you will need more of the nutrient to protect against cells that are less resistant to oxidative stress. This can lead to an increased risk of diabetes and high blood pressure–which we know increases our requirement for vitamin c as well. In addition, a byproduct of taking in more calories when gaining weight is free radicals in the blood stream–an issue that vitamin c helps combat!
Family History
The requirement for vitamin c can be greatly increased by high levels of exercise, chronic illness or disease, and smoking. These things can significantly increase the need for this vitamin in a person’s diet. The best sources of vitamin c are citrus fruits such as oranges, grapefruits, lemons, limes and papayas. Eating more vegetables will also help you get your daily requirement of vitamin c because it is found in many vegetables that are cooked such as broccoli and cabbage. Vitamin c is also present in green peppers, kiwi fruit, pineapple, and strawberries. The requirement for vitamin c may vary depending on individual needs so consult with your doctor to find out what level would work best for you
Conclusion
The answer to this question is some of the lifestyle factors that increase your requirement for vitamin ca, are being a vegan or vegetarian, pregnancy, and getting enough exercise. A lot of people think that if they don’t eat meat, they don’t need to worry about eating foods with vitamin c. But because vitamin c is necessary for repairing any cell damage due to their high activity rates, vegetarians still need a higher intake of vitamin c than other people. And as you probably know from your biology class back in school, being pregnant also increases your requirement for vitamin c by 50%. You might not be eating meat either, but you’ll be burning through it as energy in between a healthy diet heavy on fruit and vegetables. And finally, there’s getting enough exercise.
