Beautiful hair, skin and nails starts with great nutrition. Like everything else in our bodies our hair, skin and nails depend upon the food we feed it to grow strong and healthy. Our bodies also need adequate amounts of rest and personal grooming habits. Although a beautiful head of hair isnt necessary it does make us feel good!

Your first consideration for good nutrition for hair, skin and nails is great hydration. Water is an essential carrier of nutrients, helps to feed the skin vital trace minerals and hydrates the skin and hair and nail matrices to improve the growth and development of cells. Make sure you drink 8-11 8-ounce glasses of water each day. And the water should be as pure as possible. Spring water is high in mineral content that is good for your body as well.

Receiving enough sunlight each day, while still protecting your skin and hair from UVA and UVB radiation, is important to development of Vitamin D and your continued health. Our bodies manufacture Vitamin D by converting energy from the sun.

A good diet high in essential fatty acids, amino acids, vitamins and minerals is essential for good nutrition for hair, skin and nails. Diets that are high in animal fat have been shown in research to negatively impact the growth and development of skin, hair and nails. This saturated fat will stimulate the sebaceous glands to secrete more oils. These oils will clog pores, attach dirt, and increase oil in the hair.

There was once a common myth that gelatin would increase the strength of your nails. Although this has been debunked the fact of the matter is that your body needs adequate nutrition to continue to grow healthy skin, hair and nails. Because your hair and nails are mostly protein it stands to reason that you need adequate amounts of protein to keep them healthy. However, the American Dietary Association states that most Americans get an over abundance of protein each day. A deficiency of protein isnt the issue more likely there is a deficiency of vitamins and minerals found in fruits and vegetables, which arent eaten as well.

Some of those vitamins and minerals that can be deficient in your body are Vitamin A, Vitamin E, Iodine, Iron, B vitamins, Niacin and zinc. These vitamins and minerals are found in fruits and vegetables that should be incorporated into your diet on a daily basis.

While researchers and scientists continue to search for the perfect vitamin combination for the human body they have yet to perfect on nature. A pill will often help to supplement a poor diet but it wont be able to take the place of raw fruits, vegetables and seeds that provide the vitamins and minerals in the exact combination the body needs.

Many of doctors and researchers today advocate that a diet should consist of 50% fresh fruits and vegetables to meet the daily requirements of the body. The interesting part of this eating pattern is that youll be able to eat more while getting more nutrition and maintaining a healthy weight.

Add foods that are rich in sulfur and silicon such as onions, broccoli, fish and sea vegetables. Foods that are rich in biotin, one of the B vitamins, are brewers yeast, brown rice and soybeans. Our bodies require both omega 3 and omega-6 fats. We get omega-6 oils from baked products or cooking oil and can get a good amount from flaxseed or cold water fish such as salmon or mackerel.