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Hi
I'm exercising and counting calories. I wonder if there are any good vitamins one could take to keep energized? Should I take more B12? I'm a firm believer in counting cals and exercising. Some extra energy would be nice!! Thanks
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Hi
I'm exercising and counting calories. I wonder if there are any good vitamins one could take to keep energized? Should I take more B12? I'm a firm believer in counting cals and exercising. Some extra energy would be nice!! Thanks
My husband and I take Vitalert, which we both think is really good, and can be found on the web. I also take a stress B, and co-enzyme Q-10, which I think help me get through busy days with 4 kids.
I have lost 73 pounds by counting calories and exercising in about 9 months, so it does work! But the vitamin I have been taking that helps me is One a Day Weight Smart. It's not too expensive and it has really kept me healthy and energetic through my lifestyle change!
Hey Gemma - I was wondering if you had any trouble with the One-a-Day Weight Smart vitamins. I tried taking them for awhile, but they made me feel a little sick and once I actually threw up after taking them. My mom thought I might just need to break them in half and one half in the morning and one half at night. The regular Centrum vitamin has never given me any problems, though.
Well...from what I've read, vitamins aren't supposed to give you extra energy. If someone is selling vitamins with the promise of 'extra energy', then they're not telling the truth IMO.
Undoubtedly the BEST source of vitamins isn't from any pills or capsules (no matter how expensive and/or highly-touted they are) but from eating natural foods - fresh vegetables, fruits, lean meats and whole grains, etc.
Here's a little something from the IntelliHealth website (reviewed by Harvard Medical School):
Quote:
Who Needs Supplements
In general, all children and adults might benefit from one multiple vitamin per day. For a few pennies per day, a multivitamin provides added insurance that adequate intake of the daily necessary vitamins and micronutrients will be met for most individuals. To avoid indigestion, take the multivitamin with food.
Women may need extra calcium and iron. In addition to low fat dairy products, over the counter calcium preparations like calcium carbonate and calcium citrate are inexpensive and easy to take. Calcium supplements are best absorbed when taken with meals, at a dose of 500 mg one or two times per day. Women who bleed excessively during menstruation may need to take a multivitamin and mineral supplement that contains iron to meet the daily recommendation of 15 mg. Pregnant and lactating women have increased nutrient needs and are usually given supplements by their doctors.
Teenagers with irregular eating habits may not eat a balanced diet. A multivitamin with minerals can help fill in the nutritional gaps. Some teenage girls also need a daily calcium supplement.
Vegetarians who eat absolutely no animal products are advised to take a multivitamin with iron and other minerals each day. Iron and B12 deficiency occur frequently in strict vegetarians.
Dieters and people who avoid entire food groups are more likely to have vitamin and mineral deficiencies. A daily generic multivitamin with minerals should be considered.
People with deficiency diseases or absorption disorders may need therapeutic doses of nutrients (two to 10 times the RDA) prescribed by a physician. People who take prescription medications that interfere with nutrients or who abuse alcohol or other drugs may also need higher dose supplements.
Given the above, I would emphasize getting in as much of your vitamins from food as possible. Check this out:
Quote:
Your Mother Was Right, Eat your Veggies (and Fruits)
This is as good a time as any to emphasize a point that, at some level, you must already know: fruits and vegetables are a terribly important part of the diet, even aside from the benefits of the fiber they contain. Most of the vitamins and many of the minerals we need are found in these plants. Further, in recent years an impressive body of evidence has been amassed indicating that large amounts of some of these vitamins and minerasl, called antioxidants, appear to have powerful anticancer properties. Unfortunately, some people think they can get everything that fruits and vegetables provide by taking vitamin pills. Wrong. I take some antioxidant supplements myself, because there's some evidence that amounts of these antioxidants much greater than you can get from eating may be helpful. But not only do pills provide no fiber, they also don't provide myriad other chemicals (called phytochemicals) in foods that may also have benefits in protecting against cancer and other disease.
"That's why you need the food itself," says American Council on Science and Health Director of Nutrition Ruth Kava. "Trying to pack the benefits into a pill just isn't enough." New York nutritionist Josephine Connolly-Schoonen agrees: "We're just starting to understand the nutrients in food - how much we need and how they interact. The research isn't anywhere near the point where we can safely rely on [vitamin and mineral] pills."
It is a sad sign of the times that when medical researchers started to get through to the public that vitamin supplements weren't enough, pill companies started to actually grind up vegetables and pack them into capsules. So now, if you want the benefits of broccoli but feel toward it as former President George Bush does, you can just pop capsules. Lots of capsules and at a wicked cost. According to Kava, to get the equivalent amount of a half-cup of chopped frozen broccoli, you'd have to take 17 pills. That would be $2.04 in pills, while for the frozen vegetable it would be 32 cents. For spinach, it will cost you $2.28 to get a half-cup's worth from 19 pills. I'm sure even President Bush would agree these capsules are silly. In any case, if you want the benefits of vegetables and fruits, you have to eat vegetables and fruits.
Sadly, this prescription is not being followed, especially among children. A 1996 National Cancer Institute survey of food records from children between the ages of 2 and 18 found:
* Only one in 5 children eats 5 or more servings of fruits and vegetables a day, the dietary recommendation;
* One of the most common ways of getting a "serving" of fruit is actually drinking a glass of high-sugar, low-fiber fruit juice;
* Of the few vegetables children do eat, a fourth of these are French fries. Let's hope another fourth of the "vegetables" wasn't ketchup.
...Oh, I know that vegetables have gotten a bad rap in this country. Part of that is because we have this strange aspect of our culture that says we have to make fun of things we know are good for us. Part of it is because so many of us can't remember the last time we got within spitting distance of a cabbage or celery stalk. Part of it is because TV and billboard advertising is awash with commercials designed by people on Madison Avenue paid gazillions of bucks to make you crave burgers and chicken nuggets, not peas and carrots. But trust me on this, when you start giving your body good food and exercising it, your body will start dictating to you that it wants stuff that's good for it. And nothing's better for it than fruits and vegetables.
The quote above, BTW, was from Michael Fumento's book The Fat of the Land.
Hey Gemma - I was wondering if you had any trouble with the One-a-Day Weight Smart vitamins. I tried taking them for awhile, but they made me feel a little sick and once I actually threw up after taking them. My mom thought I might just need to break them in half and one half in the morning and one half at night. The regular Centrum vitamin has never given me any problems, though.
I did have trouble with these at first! Now I make sure to take these on a full stomach, preferably right after I eat. It took me awhile to learn that though. My sister tried them and they also made her sick. I feel like all multi-vitamins are about the same for you, health wise. So take something that makes you feel good, not sick!
Gemma
Any Good Vitamins out there???
