The Vitamin and supplement dilemma

Ok, you’re eating a Paleo, Primal, Evolutionary diet. You are exercising regularly in the gym what’s next on your quest for better health supplements and vitamins right?  Well, yes, no, possibly. Confusing, I know and it only gets worse, but don’t worry I will attempt to navigate this most confusing topic and hopefully provide you with a simple solution to the Vitamin and supplement dilemma we all face.

First, let my start by saying supplements are just that and they are meant to (all together now) supplement our diet. Vitamins and supplements were never meant to replace a meal or to allow you to skip meals. With that being said, let’s understand that it’s pretty impossible especially in our current society with the radiating of fruits and veggies (to acceptable government standards you know. Hey wait a minute isn’t radiation bad for us?), preservatives, added hormones (steroids) and soy byproducts to our beef, Mercury in toxic levels in our seafood (need I go on?) to consume all the nutrients we need for a healthy existence.

Enter the Vitamin and Supplement Saviors

Not so fast sparky curb your enthusiasm I hate that show by the way. Vitamins too are full of interesting things like heavy metals, (personally I like 80’s metal best), artificial colors, fillers, dyes, and a host of other intruders all to government standards of course. Oh wait, the government doesn’t regulate the vitamin and supplement industry..hmmm?

But wait! Didn’t you say you were going to clear things up I mean hell I’m more confused now! Slow down sparky I got your backs now listen to this.

All is not doom and gloom I’m just a bit of a realist and I enjoy and expect straight talk so I can’t help myself for giving you the full dose. Despite everything I wrote above there are choices that we can make to avoid the toxic WAL-E world that we are creating for ourselves. By the way, if you haven’t seen WAL-E a Disney movie you got to see it. Although it is technically for children it sends out a very important message to us adults.

The Alternatives: Food

When it comes to food the best way to avoid pesticides, radiation, and all the crazy stuff that the government allows companies to spray, inject, or add to our foods is by going organic. Wow I can hear the belly aching from here! Organic is expensive I hear ya and in some cases it is and others not. Besides going to an organic market like Whole Foods if you live in a city that has an accessible within reason rural area shop at the farmers market and ask questions.

Yes ask questions, ask if they use pesticides on their veggies and fruits or hormones in their beef. Remember it’s your body don’t be afraid to ask and if they get annoyed the hell with them they are probably trying to hide something. Ok, you wanna be 100% safe (nothing is 100%) then shop at the organic market, read the damn labels and ask questions. Yes, there too, just because it says it’s organic does not mean it’s certified organic and that’s another topic for another day don’t get me going on this one. If you spend a little more money so be it. I guarantee you that it will be much cheaper than the medical bills you’ll be paying if you keep eat the processed and enhanced stuff.

The Alternative Vitamins:

Vitamins and supplements can also be expensive not every vitamin or supplement are created equal. I fully understand that we are living in a recession and money is tight. Again, how much is your health worth to you? Priceless I would hope.  Ok, here’s the skinny without confusing you too much. When shopping for vitamins and supplements do a little research first. Root around the internet read company policies on ingredients read read read.

A simple rule of thumb to follow is if you bought your vitamins and supplements from a discount warehouse or a major food market chain in a 5,000 pill jar buy one get one free for $10.99 chances are the quality and ingredients are not that good. You see, these mega buyers will buy truck loads of product but they will also pay the least for them. It’s all about quantity and profits folks. The vitamin company needs to sell their products and the giants will buy them by the truck load.

But how do they sell the products at a ridicules low price, very close to cost, at cost, or below cost?  Ding ding ding you got it sparky by reducing the quality of the materials used to produce the product thus they can make money! Hey don’t get me wrong I’m all for making money but not at the expense of my health. Ok, so where do we buy our supplements for god sake O’ esquire of doom. Well, if did your research and found a company that is reputable buy it directly from them.

If the company does not provide direct sales to customers to protect their distributers business then do a search on their web site for locations were there product is sold. See that wasn’t too hard or confusing was it?

The Grand Finale

Ok, your eating grass fed beef and organic veggies and fruits. You found a reputable company run by some Jewish Rabbi’s in upstate New York that make the number one rated best natural vitamins and supplements in the woooorld! How much do you take or better yet which vitamins you should take these guys have a huge catalog of products! I was kind hoping you didn’t ask that question. Oh well, here comes the full dose you ready?

When it comes to supplementation I believe that less is best providing you’re eating a healthy Primal diet. A good general rule of thumb I like to recommend to my clients is to take a good quality multivitamin multi mineral supplement that you hopefully did your home work on. I also recommend for them to take an additional  good quality Vitamin C supplement. Remember these recommendations are the bare minimal for general health purposes. If you’re serious about your supplements and you want to dial in on exactly what you need then you have to go a step further and have your blood tested for vitamin and mineral deficiencies. If you decide to do this be aware that your general practitioner might not have a clue on the specific testing protocol run to get these results. Another thing you should be aware of is that since this may be considered an elective procedure your insurance company may not cover the expense and these tests can be expensive.

Interesting, you want to improve your health but your insurance company who loves you when your healthy and consider you a burden when your sick is not willing to pay for the test which would in theory keep you healthier and away from the doctor so you can continue to pay your premium and they can continue to make a profit.

Regardless of cost and who pays or not this in my opinion is the way to go. Although it may be a bit expense up front you will save money in the end. You’ll save because you’ll only need to supplement what your deficient in and not piss away (literally) your hard earned cash on the latest, greatest, and must have supplement.

Anyway, I hope that you learned something and I didn’t confuse you too much. Be well, be healthy, and live long and prosper. I know I know the guy with the pointy ears said it first.