Hack Your Hormones
Come on Barbie, Let's Go Research!
The one in which WillPowders goes head to head with the collagen industry on how much our bovine collagen peptides can do for you.
No blow up dolls, here, Willpowderers!
If you’re familiar with WillPowder values, you’ll know that we don’t treat our collagen as something that is skin deep. Of course, our Swiss bovine collagen peptides and protein powders, have you covered for those four golden goals of muscle, skin, hair and nails, that’s a given. But, it’s not all that we’ve got because we know that it’s not all that you are. We believe we owe it to ourselves and to you to do even better, bring you more bang for your buck and spring for your step. In the same way we would never treat your intellect as if you were kewpie dolls, neither will we treat you as if you were a hollow dolly shell with nothing but air on the inside. Only glow ups, not blow ups here, thank you kindly!
When Type I and Type III Collagen become Good Friends
Skin, hair and nails are part of the integumentary system. It’s just one of the body‘s eleven vital systems so of course we applaud and support it. Alongside giving you the outer materials to look great, which is a bonus but not so much Mother Nature’s intended role for our outy bits, it’s a crucial part of our immune system as the first line of defence against any nasties in the world that could harm us. This system also includes some glands that keep us well - sweat glands for cooling us down and sebaceous glands for oil. While its gloriously human to cherish thriving in our skin and enjoying healthy nails and hair, and we adore the ritual and power of building and dressing our outward signs of health: that highlighted glow, the festival nails, the vest with the cut that enhances your toned shoulders, it can be easy to forget all this started beneath the skin’s surface. The nail beds act as the nursery for our nails, hair is pushed out as each cell attaches then hardens in the hair follicle found within the epidermis of the skin, and our skin granulates from the bottom of the lower epidermis upwards, the process taking about four weeks. Our body’s collagen is quietly beavering away, preparing the way for the championing of all these outward signs of us. And it’s Type I and Type III collagen that are doing this within us. Marine collagen companies will have you believe that it is merely Type I collagen that counts, maybe because it is the most prevalent collagen type in our bodies, but we know that it is typically co-located with Type III collagen and why would you want to support one without the other? In short, when it comes to collagens, there is a lot happening beneath the skin, scalp and cuticles before we even get to see repair and replacement on the outside.
When Collagen Met Protein...
Building muscle mass is an internal body goal for lots of people. Collagen supplements can help with that too. Collagen provides the extracellular matrix within which muscle cells gather. If you’re taking a protein supplement, but failing to support your body’s collagen, then you’re not optimising your body’s chance to build anew to its most favourable potential. Luckily, we’ve got your back for both phases of repair and replenishment when it comes to nutrition for muscle mass with a squeaky clean protein range that is delicious and nutritious and our award winning Swiss Bovine Collagen Peptides
#teambovinecollagen
So, yes, we’ve doubled down on the four golden goals and provided you with the necessaries in supplements to help you achieve them, however, we want to help you understand how, at the very same time, with the very same bovine collagen product, you can love more of you yet. In WillPowders conversations with you, you’ll notice that we understand humans exist because of super important stuff, like the fascia as a sense organ, and hollow organs such as, amongst a myriad of others, the heart, gut, the bowel, oesophagus, urinary tract and bladder, gallbladder, the stomach, arteries, and, for some of us, fallopian tubes and a uterus. All these organs are part of our various vital systems and they all rely on Type III collagen because they have to stretch and retract. This is something that those in the Type I - aka the marine collagen camp - willingly (dare we say, irresponsibly?) ignore. But, the WillPowders gang are #teambovinecollagen which is derived from types I and III collagen and helps your body produce Type I and Type III collagen. Type I will help your skin, but so will Type III, so to leave the amino acid profile of Type III out of the discussion of great skin is, we feel, a little disingenuous.
WillPowders Vs The Others
We are so certain of our decision to look after the whole of you, and that this cannot be said of some other collagen supplement merchants, that we’ve gone head to head, or, more accurately, Google headline to Google headline, with other purveyors of collagen supplements who talk to the look of your shell alone or might leave out, well, most of your body in their discourse. Companies placing their focus entirely on Type I collagen, which provides strength, are missing the idea that we also need stretch for these internal organs to function. Type III collagen is the collagen of your hollow organs. We also need it in our skin which has to stretch as we move. Type I and III collagen are typically co-located. Marine collagen companies rely heavily on encouraging you to supplement with Type I marine collagen (ever noticed how marine collagen loses its romantic allure when you call it what it typically is, fish collagen?) in order to improve skin, hair and nails. If they cared for the whole of you, wouldn’t they also be the bringers of the good news that Type III collagen brings? Given that these two types of collagen are typically co-located, you could be forgiven, if you swim in certain seas, for believing it’s all about Type I.
Come on, Barbie, let’s go window shopping. Yes - Ken and Allan can come too!
We’ve always had an eye on the way that collagen entered the wellbeing market. The great irony of collagen, of course, is that our ancestors reaped its benefits for eons; it’s hardly a new edible. Scientific evidence of the benefits of collagen supplementation has snowballed over the last century and into this. All the while, our great grandparents have been giggling up their youthful sleeves as they spring up, joint pain free, from their seats and brew up another batch of bone broth, accessing collagen in the way humans have traditionally accessed it for as long as we’ve been equipped to boil bones. Tell them, yes, it’s a great way to take in some collagen, but, in truth, you need both collagen from bone broth and WillPowders Hydrolysed Bovine Collagen Peptides.
Remember we left you on the edge of your seat in our Collagen 101: It’s Not for Dolls blog?
We promised a delve into the ethos and relationships some of the collagen industry has with customers? Like the temptresses we are, we told you we had entered into research for absolute collagen beginners and had found ourselves in a place akin to The Valley of the Dolls? On your behalf, we’d taken a tour of the products that topped an internet search for ‘collagen’? Well, here we show you that it isn’t long before there is a huge assumption that you’ll need to look after your outsides first when it comes to what other collagen suppliers will tell you. It’s said you have a few seconds to make a first impression and, once made, that impression is hard to erase. We searched ‘collagen’ for the companies we go headline to headline with here and we searched ‘WillPowders collagen’ for the match! So, let’s see who loves you, the whole of you …
The ‘WillPowders Way’ Window
- 100% pure Swiss grass fed hydrolysed bovine collagen peptides powder. It's tasteless! Add to food or drinks.
We lead with the fact it’s a clean product with provenance - no nasties here. We know exactly where our cows were raised and how they were grazed - it’s Swiss grass for these ladies and gents! Historically, Swiss herds are the most protected cattle in Europe, possibly the world. Their hides become a bi-product so, by using them to create collagen peptides, environmentally speaking, our peptides are Mother Nature’s friend. While these hides are being used, the planet doesn’t have to provide the same nutrition from elsewhere. Excellent.
Grass-fed means that our cattle are not being pumped up with feeds that aren’t good for their health and well-being. Not all bovine collagen companies can make this claim. When you think of our cattle, you can think of great visuals of Swiss pastures, no urban sprawl for them!
Equally, we don’t add anything into our collagen peptides - it doesn’t need to be made palatable with sugars and sweeteners because it’s taste and odour free. And would you look at that - this is what makes it utterly versatile. You don’t need to buy a whole variety of collagen products, one for this and another for that. We know you are busy so we make it as easy as possible to pop some bovine collagen peptide powder into your diet, be that food or drink, hot or cold, savoury or naturally sweet. No need to make our collagen supplement an ‘add on’ in your day - it can go in your everyday foods as we’ve chosen to bring you our collagen peptides in the most bioavailable, ingestible, absorbable way. All in all, be less frazzled and have one thing less to remember - because that is good for your health too.
Whereas, others lead with this:
To be fair, we didn’t quote this company directly so as to spare blushes and all that! But, full transparency, this site was sponsored. It linked collagen with two abilities: controlling ageing and helping skin stay firm, healthy and hydrated. We don’t argue that collagen plays a proven role in these aspects of wellness. We would, however, ask a big WillPowders Way question of any wellness company that jumps on the bandwagon of feeding society’s subtext, which is particularly and painfully mainly aimed at women, that ageing is somewhat shameful and needs hiding. We somehow don’t think this company is discussing potential natural chronological ageing of joints that can lead to osteoarthritis, for example and usher in co-morbidities, given that the phrase ‘helping skin stay firm, healthy and hydrated', chases the tail of ‘controlling ageing’. We reckon they mean controlling the visible signs of ageing of your skin, which healthy collagen does, of course, but it does seem like there’s a certain feeding into the narrative that we need to rail against time and begin to hate ourselves for getting older.
Secondly, at WillPowders, we’ll tell you this for free!
- Our collagen powder supplements help to: lubricate joints; build connective tissue; heal injuries; promote healthier, stronger, younger-looking skin, hair …
Ooh, now, that’s more like it - insides and outsides. Lubricated joints, repaired connective tissue, injury healing alongside the skin and hair benefits? Check, check, check, check! Finally, an opportunity to learn you can look after the whole of yourself with collagen supplements and who wouldn’t want to make friends with WillPowders as a result of that?
Back to the other side, er … sites
Whereas, the second site that we researched, also sponsored, went hard on a self-commissioned clinical trial reporting that their collagen support did something at the rate of 100% - this company didn't reveal what in the highlight, but fair play to them, the suspense of this mysterious 100% ability of collagen was enough click bait to trigger our curiosity. So, with one click, we ventured in through their virtual shop window and got the skin, hair, nails mostly for the girls and the muscle agenda for the boys subculture. Maybe this company was heavy on the skin, hair, nail triple because it’s a marine collagen brand? Marine collagen is made up of Type I collagen. But, remember, we know that Type I is co-located with Type III and so will do more for your overall health. Overall, then, for this site, a rating of: heavy sigh!
In at No. 3 for WillPowders
- Collagen is an amino acid that keeps us away from sugar; this combined with critical fatty acids such as omega 3 and MCTs are the building blocks to maintain[ance].
Well, take a look at us helping you to steer clear of sugar and helping you learn more than school science ever taught you about how to look after vital systems in your body, like the endocrine and muscular system. Plus, bonus, look at us joining the dots of the symbiotic relationships between nutrients themselves and your vital systems. We are just a little bit chuffed with ourselves. None of your cells exist in a vacuum, they are all interconnected thanks to the lovely fascia. If you’re eating sugar, you are wrecking your collagen. Sorry, about that, sugar lovers. We know this is bad news for those of you with a sweet tooth, but we do support you stepping away from the sugar bowl armed with knowledge and other craving support. Try our Protein Powder range if you want to support yourself with stopping being a slave to sugar. Come closer while we whisper, other companies will sell you a collagen peptide but may be remiss on educating you on the fullest range of ways to support the collagen in your body and remain sane while battling a craving. We know your mind is wired to your body.
Site number 3
Site number three somewhat underplayed collagen as we know it to be at WillPowders . It gave us a lovely headline that collagen is the most abundant protein in your body. Don’t get us wrong, we are onboard with this, afterall, a fact is a fact. However, the same site gave us another headline suggesting that collagen had several health benefits. Now, this made us laugh out loud (it is also quite possible that a little bit of pee came out), plus scream and weep a little in frustration all at the same time.
That’s because, the truth is, collagen is not a health benefit - it is the human material of life itself. Allow us to step into the world of science for a moment. Collagen is the extracellular material on which all tissues in the body rely. To be given the idea that collagen is a health benefit is like saying we benefit from having a heart or endocrine glands or we benefit from having bones or a nervous or muscular system. Silly me, I left my lungs on the bus which is a shame because I could really have benefitted from those today, said no one, ever. It’s simply nonsensical and, if we are rookies in collagen land, we might be left with the idea that collagen is like an optional extra we could add on to our bodies, like we might add a higher spec to our car and upgrade our regular wheels to alloys.
To be fair, maybe this company did mean that collagen peptide supplements can offer health benefits, but, since we were posing as novices googling information on collagen, we could be forgiven for thinking that collagen was something we could opt for, or not, should we desire, from a wellness pick and mix stall. Fundamentally wrong! Not collagen 101 at all!
And so to WillPowders’ headline No. 4
- Pure Swiss Grass Fed Bovine collagen sachets. A tasteless collagen powder supplement providing 18 amino acids
The building blocks of collagen are amino acids. WillPowders is a company that supports your knowledge of how collagen is produced in the body - it’s from amino acids that derive from animal collagen. Your body will do most of the work of building collagen naturally when you’re very young but it’s a downward trend from early adulthood onwards. Understand that you are helping your body to continue to produce healthy collagen when you supplement with collagen peptides and now things are starting to make more sense. Plus, I hear you cry, I can pop the amino acids out of their travel sachet and into my mid morning coffee at work and all the while support both Type I and Type III collagen? Yes! we say. Now that is worth sharing with colleagues around the work watering hole.
Let’s swap to a highstreet shop for site number four …
In at number four in our collagen pop chart came a company who will cover all your ‘collagen’ bases, whether that be surf or turf collagens, from a variety of suppliers. We fully understand that, for a range of reasons such as religious observance or allergy, bovine collagen is not for everyone. However, we are staunch about the fact that, if you can consume grass-fed bovine collagen, then you should choose that over marine collagen because of the way Type I and Type III collagen is co-located inside and outside of your body and the range of support it brings across your well-being needs. You can read more about the differences between marine and bovine collagen here. If you cannot take bovine collagen supplements due to religious observance, at WillPowders, we’ve got you, and offer Halal Bovine Collagen Peptides Powder. It’s still grass-fed so you are reaping the benefits of cattle with a great food source.
Get a Grip on Life!
Our last Google headline highlight from WillPowders for today is this -
- Research has shown that pairing a collagen supplement along with strength training has significantly impacted both fat loss and muscle growth.
Since we don’t think being older itself is a problem, in fact, we think there could be more of a spotlight on older people in this world, we do want to extol the virtues of collagen supplementation to help you to feel well as you age chronologically. And ask yourself, older than what age? Is there an age range that is acceptable and after this we have to crawl under a rock? However, we don’t deny that chronological ageing of the tissues in our bodies does affect collagen production. We don’t have a time machine (yet) at WillPowders HQ, so, let’s remember, chronological ageing is something that, if we are privileged, we get to experience - it’s totally natural - and it certainly doesn’t mean you should start to become invisible or hide behind masks. However, ageing does kick the body’s natural collagen production in the ass, so we say, help pump it back up!
Remember, while many companies will concentrate on your outsides ageing, WillPowders understands that Great Father Time can also be wearing away at your insides. This is true of all tissues in your body, of course. Collagen supplementation can prevent collagen assembling itself in dysfunctional ways as you age, as this makes it less effective.
Muscle mass tends to decline with age. Cells do not replicate themselves quite as well as they did. Collagen peptide supplementation has been proven to improve muscle wastage in older people when combined with resistance training, helping support muscles that can naturally atrophy as we age. This research was conducted on a demographic that traditionally struggles to build muscle anymore, that is older people. Worth noting that hand grip in particular was improved in that study for when you are ready to take the bull by the horns and come to the bovine side! If it can work for those most chronologically challenged, then it surely helps anchor muscle mass for all.
We want you to know you can continue to rebuild muscle mass into older age more successfully when you supplement with WillPowders Collagen Peptides Range and this means that you could reduce fat mass as increased muscle mass needs more calories to fuel it which is why we can reduce fat mass alongside the building of muscle mass with collagen peptides. The better your muscle mass as you age, the better your mobility, reducing co-morbidities, those pesky diseases that start to somehow gang up on us as we become chronologically older.
We know this doesn’t read as sexily as the allure of glowing skin but being able to stand up effortlessly from sitting when you're old, without making a sound like a labouring walrus, to wrestle the screw lid of your pickled gherkins into submission will certainly turn heads! Keeping your mobility for as long as you can is directly linked with longevity. Those other marine collagen companies may do well to remember: no one ever died of wrinkles!
Back to you, the rest of the collagen industry...
Fifthly for the other side, Google tipped up a further site which focussed on marine collagen and feeling confident in your skin. Here we were reminded that collagen is linked clinically to improvements in skin and hair quality. Agreed.
We tried to overlook the fact that there was something about the word ‘quality’ when it was coupled with skin and hair that made our bottoms scrunch up, though. It somehow made people sound like something a judge in the show ring at a country show might check for. Correct us if we are wrong, but the compliment, your skin looks to be of such good quality isn’t really the skin vibe most of us are aiming for. We are getting flashbacks to poor Barbie being trapped like a boxed doll again as the quality of our doll’s hair did used to matter to us - it had to be long and it had to be very smooth in quality, every self-respecting doll lover knew that not all nylons were equal, but, even then, we didn’t feel the need for our own hair to be, well, er, of quality, then or now.
We do concede, however, that the wig makers on the set of Bridgerton may demand human hair of quality from their suppliers in order to weave the latest elaborate wig for Queen Charlotte, but it's hardly a mainstream, everyday demand, is it, certainly when it’s still attached to our head? But, Dear Gentle Readers, and all the Fashion Gods and Goddesses in charge, please note, just for fun, we would fully embrace a Regency wig revival, should one occur, although maybe not in the hot summer months …
Respect is a Discipline
All in all, we think WillPowders rocked it for intelligent, holistic respect for all that you are. Disappointingly, though, on the other side of the fence, we were back to being treated like the role of collagen is only for show and we must be truly hollow inside, so much so that we had to check we’d searched for collagen, not dollagen! We believe it’s why you can place your trust in WillPowders Swiss Bovine Collagen Peptides as well as WillPowders as a Holistic Whole.
Further reading:
How did Diagnostics Keep the BSE Program a Step Ahead in a Crisis gives a background on how Swiss cattle are rocking it for health and well-being
Sarcopenia: A Time for Action discusses a trial using collagen supplementation to increase muscle mass in healthy men over 50
Collagen Peptides and Resistance Training Improves Body Composition in Perimenopausal Women discusses a trial of women taking 15g of collagen peptides a day and combining this with resistance training
Regulation of Collagen Type I and Collagen Type III in Tissue Injury and Regeneration discusses how these two collagen types are required for repair
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Disclaimer
Our blogs are written with love in the hope that they go some way in helping you feel like the rockstar you are, and whilst we do our due diligence, research like maniacs and fact check our stuff, we know everyone’s journey is different. They are intended to educate and empower you, not usurp medical advice. We would never advise you to stop, adjust, or modify any prescription medication without the direct supervision of your healthcare practitioner, but don’t be afraid to talk to your doctor about your new found knowledge, brought to you by the marvels of nature because they don't know everything! Blogs are always informed by Davinia but often written by a member of the team. Not all blogs reflect Davinia's experiences and sometimes provide alternative perspectives
