What supplements do you guys take and why?

[ZenAlex]

Also do you guys ever get concerned about the impact of putting unnatural things in your body like supplements? Do you ever worry about side effects, depletion of other nutrients etc?

 

Edited June 14 by ZenAlex

[PsychedelicEagle]

In my mind I distinguish between "essential", "non-essential", and "low impact", focusing on longevity. Here's what I'm currently on. I only take what I can't easily get from whole foods on a plant-based diet.

Essential

• Omega 3 (EPA/DHA), 835mg/day
• Vitamin D + K2 (only for winter months, when I can't sunbathe), 5000 UI + 100 mcg
• Vitamin B12 (I eat vegan 6x/week), 500ug 1-2x/week
• Iodine (I eat an SOS-free diet, which means I never use iodized salt), 250ug/day
• Zinc (also due to vegan eating), 14mg/day
• Extra-Virgin Olive Oil, 2 tbsp/day (together with my two meals)

Non-essential, high impact

• BroccoMax (for sulphoraphane, when I don't have broccoli sprouts at hand or when I'm traveling)
• Taurine (added recently, seems impactful on longevity), 500-1000mg/day (on the conservative side)
• Vitamin E (since my intake from food is "only" 12mg/day, which seems to be on the lower side), 322mg/400 IE 1x/week

Non-essential, questionable impact

• Ginkgo Biloba, 200mg/day (since I had tinnitus)
• Creatine, 1g/day (on the convervative side)
• Pea protein isolate (since I do moderate/heavy weight training 5-6x/week, I try to eat 1.2g of protein/kg of bodyweight), 30g/day (24g protein)

I usually take them together with my green smoothie, to avoid putting too much of a highly concentrated thing directly into my body. I am aware that this may compromise absorption (e.g., oxalate food such as spinach may interfere with calcium absorption, etc.), but in my mind this is a more conservative approach to supplement taking.

5 hours ago, ZenAlex said:

depletion of other nutrients

Great point. This is something I learned more recently. One has to think about the entire metabolism and not only at hitting a "recommended daily intake". That's why I try to stay around the daily limits (except for Vitamin D, which seems fine). For instance, I've heard that animal food/protein and salt increase calcium excretion, just as an example. So by eating less animal food & less salt I am happy with my calcium intake of "only" 800mg/day.

Edited June 14 by PsychedelicEagle

[Schizophonia]

None, it's a lost of money.

[Schizophonia]

1 minute ago, nuwu said:

@Schizophonia 

Food and water are not required, insolent mortal.

Taking showers neither, but mom don't want hear anything 😤

[ZenAlex]

On 14/06/2024 at 4:58 PM, PsychedelicEagle said:

In my mind I distinguish between "essential", "non-essential", and "low impact", focusing on longevity. Here's what I'm currently on. I only take what I can't easily get from whole foods on a plant-based diet.

Essential

• Omega 3 (EPA/DHA), 835mg/day
• Vitamin D + K2 (only for winter months, when I can't sunbathe), 5000 UI + 100 mcg
• Vitamin B12 (I eat vegan 6x/week), 500ug 1-2x/week
• Iodine (I eat an SOS-free diet, which means I never use iodized salt), 250ug/day
• Zinc (also due to vegan eating), 14mg/day
• Extra-Virgin Olive Oil, 2 tbsp/day (together with my two meals)

Non-essential, high impact

• BroccoMax (for sulphoraphane, when I don't have broccoli sprouts at hand or when I'm traveling)
• Taurine (added recently, seems impactful on longevity), 500-1000mg/day (on the conservative side)
• Vitamin E (since my intake from food is "only" 12mg/day, which seems to be on the lower side), 322mg/400 IE 1x/week

Non-essential, questionable impact

• Ginkgo Biloba, 200mg/day (since I had tinnitus)
• Creatine, 1g/day (on the convervative side)
• Pea protein isolate (since I do moderate/heavy weight training 5-6x/week, I try to eat 1.2g of protein/kg of bodyweight), 30g/day (24g protein)

I usually take them together with my green smoothie, to avoid putting too much of a highly concentrated thing directly into my body. I am aware that this may compromise absorption (e.g., oxalate food such as spinach may interfere with calcium absorption, etc.), but in my mind this is a more conservative approach to supplement taking.

Great point. This is something I learned more recently. One has to think about the entire metabolism and not only at hitting a "recommended daily intake". That's why I try to stay around the daily limits (except for Vitamin D, which seems fine). For instance, I've heard that animal food/protein and salt increase calcium excretion, just as an example. So by eating less animal food & less salt I am happy with my calcium intake of "only" 800mg/day.

Understood. 

I'm reluctant to put unnatural things in my body. I will take a vit D supplement around winter though since I live in the UK and our weather sucks. 

Besides this I'm always concerned about side effects.

[PsychedelicEagle]

1 hour ago, ZenAlex said:

Understood. 

I'm reluctant to put unnatural things in my body. I will take a vit D supplement around winter though since I live in the UK and our weather sucks. 

Besides this I'm always concerned about side effects.

Makes sense, whenever we take too much/too little of something we're shifting "out of distribution" as I said, so your concern is real. What makes me believe that taking supplements may be beneficial is that the soils onto which we grow our food have been drastically modified/depleted of trace minerals & perhaps even other substances such as Vitamin B12. So from this perspective we're already out of distribution without taking anything.

Btw, as for Vitamin D, I take the aforementioned 5000 UI once a week during winter. Just for maintenance, since I know my current level is good.

[ZenAlex]

6 minutes ago, PsychedelicEagle said:

Makes sense, whenever we take too much/too little of something we're shifting "out of distribution" as I said, so your concern is real. What makes me believe that taking supplements may be beneficial is that the soils onto which we grow our food have been drastically modified/depleted of trace minerals & perhaps even other substances such as Vitamin B12. So from this perspective we're already out of distribution without taking anything.

Btw, as for Vitamin D, I take the aforementioned 5000 UI once a week during winter. Just for maintenance, since I know my current level is good.

That's a good point. I guess we're living in an unnatural environment so we may need to rely on unnatural solutions.

[cjoseph90]

does anyone take probiotics for gut health? what are your experiences? i know that things affect people differently