Ascorbic acid is not Vitamin "C"

Deadeye. It looks like you are getting into the swing of things with your new life and diet. But I can't understand why you are taking so much Vitamin C.
The following information may help you understand that what you are taking is not going to help you in the long run. I hope this information does not overload your brain.
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Ascorbic acid is not Vitamin "C"
The following excerpt is from a newsletter supplement from Dr. Bruce West.
LOW-DOSE, WHOLE-FOOD VITAMINS
The average person who uses nutritional supplements wonders how in the world a few IUs of vitamin E or a few dozen mgs of vitamin C from raw food materials can equal the potency of several hundred or thousand IUs and mgs of synthetic vitamin E and ascorbic acid. The answer, found in this article, is the same for these two vitamins as it is for almost all nutritional supplements.
People who truly understand the body agree that vitamins are used most effectively by your body when they are obtained from food. That's because the whole mix of nutritional factors that make vitamins work properly are present. In fact, vitamins from whole food are a mix or compound which is exquisitely interlaced with the whole food itself. Therefore, although considered a single substance, truly active vitamins are actually a group of chemically related compounds.
Producing synthetic vitamins separates the group of related compounds, the end product being a single, incomplete vitamin fraction. This fractionalizing converts the whole vitamin compound from an active, biochemical, physiological nutrient into a disabled, debilitated chemical of dramatically lowered efficiency, activity, and usefulness in your body.
The reason synthetic vitamin fractions are vastly less active in your body is that they need to reassemble the whole vitamin compound in order to work for you. And this is done by drawing on your body's stores of all the nutrients that are missing in the synthetic process.
The perfect example is ascorbic acid as a supplement for vitamin C. Ascorbic acid will acidify your body simply because it is an acid. But for it to work as vitamin C it has to reassemble the whole vitamin C compound in your body.' That would include a host of hundreds (if not thousands) of phytochemicals and enzymes, other vitamins, and ancillary micronutrients, including organic copper. That's why huge doses of ascorbic acid can induce a copper deficiency. And since copper is necessary for a strong immune system, you can see how the well-intentioned use of a high-dose synthetic vitamin can backfire.
In order to produce a truly natural (made from raw food-source materials) vitamin C supplement that contained 500 to 1.0(X) mgs of ascorbic acid, the pill would be tough to swallow--somewhere in size between a golf ball and a tennis ball. That's because ascorbic acid makes up only a small part of the ingredients of the whole, real vitamin C complex.
That vitamin C example demonstrates why dozens of milligrams of whole food nutrients work as well or in most cases better than thousands of milligrams of synthetics. For synthetics to reassemble into active compounds in your body is not always easy. There is great waste and sometimes a net loss of energy. In the waste process, much or most of the synthetic vitamin is excreted via your kidneys because it could not be used by your body. This is why Americans are sometimes said to have the world's most expensive urine! It also explains the requirement for huge doses of synthetics in order to deliver even the small amount of nutrient really needed. In reality, vitamins are needed and used by your body in small or even tiny amounts.
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The best to be expected of synthetic vitamin fractions or even natural vitamin fractions is a drug effect. Natural vitamins build nutritionally, while synthetics build medically. Synthetics are "dead", inert, cheaper and present much fewer handling problems. As with any inert material, greater mass production creates cheaper bargain prices....
Go to http://www.absolutehealth.infinity2.info/technical/1452.asp to read some more information on Ascorbic Acid.
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Go to http://www.glycohealthservice.com/s-vit-whole.htm to read an article of what Judith DeCava, MS, LNC, has to say about natural supplements.
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Go to http://www.wellnesschiro.com/synthetic_supplements.htm to read an article on the Properties of synthetic vitamins.

http://www.absolutehealth.infinity2.info/technical/1452.asp
http://www.glycohealthservice.com/s-vit-whole.htm
http://www.wellnesschiro.com/synthetic_supplements.htm