What Vitamins Do You Take?

Okay, how about some tips on how to fine tune the most important gadget you own - your body!

I've gotten myself back into decent shape - I can run 7 minutes miles, do over 50 push-ups, and jump rope for 9 minutes (try doing that sometime, it's hard as hell!). But, I also just turned 43, and what used to be a piece of cake 25 years ago now is now a physical challenge.

For me, the hardest thing is running. It's not too bad now, but I still feel mild pain in my shins, knee, and sometimes my ankle. I've been told that Glucosamine is supposed to be good for joint pain. Has anyone tried it? Does it help?

Right now, I don't take any vitamins. Does anybody take anything that really helped them out?

Oh, I do have some very good running shoes, and I'm not overweight (I'm 5'6" 148 lbs), so that's not the problem.

Bruise

I take 500 mg of Vitamin C and a multi-vitamin with minerals each day. I've been taking Vitamin C for over 35 years. I attended a lecture by Linus Pauling in Victoria, B.C. in 1964 and I was really impressed. Try doing a Google on him. He was awarded 2 Nobel prizes.

Sadly, while Pauling was a great chemist, he wasn't a very good biologist, and his theories on vitamin C have been discredited ever since. http://www.quackwatch.org/01QuackeryRelatedTopics/pauling.html

Yes, vitamins can make a difference, but don't expect any miracles unless you are severely malnurished (not many in the US are...)

I take a generic Walmart vitamin every few days, but mostly, I've switched to drinking water and eating healthier in the first place. There's many vitamins etc in fruits/vegetables you won't get by eating McDonalds and taking a vitamin.

Well, Pauling lived into his 90s, so he couldn't have been all that wrong. Plus, it's not like he was going to get rich off Vitamin C; it's almost as cheap as sugar to make. Excessive doses of Vitamin C can stress the kidneys and cause diarrhea, so I limit my dose to 500 mg. I haven't kept up with the literature, but on balance, I think that minimum to moderate doses are effective at improving your overall health and may (I say may) extend your lifespan. YMMV.

cod oil for my coat,

Bartell's brand multivitamin pills...one in the morning with my prescriptions, and one at night with my "nite-nite" pills.
The bottle reads that it is comparable to One-A-Day brand multivitamin pills.
I know for certain that I don't eat "right", so these vitamin teepz are better than nothing at all.

I drink a lot of Guinness /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif

Recently a daily multivitamine was recommended for everyone by (was it the FDA or AMA? I can't remember). I just take a normal multivitamine, specifically Centrum Silver. It's the one formulated for senior citizens. I am not a senior, but the formula is slightly better in it's omission of iron and increased beta carotene.

Many people take a complicated cocktail of vitamines, but I am not very good at staying motivated if it's too much trouble. A simple multivitamine is easy to take and far better than nothing. Also, a calcium supplement is a good idea for virtually everyone and there is not much calcium in multivitamines due to the bulk.

Dr. Andrew Weil advocates a more complicated approach focusing on anti-oxidant vitamines which I think is well-founded, but like I said, I like it simple.

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Well, Pauling lived into his 90s, so he couldn't have been all that wrong. Plus, it's not like he was going to get rich off Vitamin C; it's almost as cheap as sugar to make. Excessive doses of Vitamin C can stress the kidneys and cause diarrhea, so I limit my dose to 500 mg. I haven't kept up with the literature, but on balance, I think that minimum to moderate doses are effective at improving your overall health and may (I say may) extend your lifespan. YMMV.

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His motivations are irrelevant, the man was disproven through science and he had nothing to back his assertations with. Read the link I pasted above. Overdosing yourself on vitamin C also greatly accelerates the hardening of the arteries. It doesn't, however, do ANYTHING Pauling claimed it would.

Getting your RDA of vitamins is a good thing. But taking massive doses far exceeding that every day aren't. I'd especially watch vitamins A and C-- it's relatively easy to get way too much of either.

Centrum Performance. Expensive, but OK from CostCo.

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Getting your RDA of vitamins is a good thing. But taking massive doses far exceeding that every day aren't. I'd especially watch vitamins A and C-- it's relatively easy to get way too much of either.

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Health sciences advances - and there are always food/health fads - for example the current low carb/Atkins - yet it seems to conflict with the FDA's Food Pyramid recommendations of eating more grains......

At one time polyunsaturated fats were considered the healthiest fats to use - yet health studies found this was not so - and mono-saturated fats became the "best" - with Olive Oil being favored... not too long ago it was discovered olive oil is not that good for you either.

Vitamin A, C, E were held at one time as the "savior" anti-oxidants, but it was pretty well known not to take mega doses of vitamin A - but more recently studies have shown that regular overage of vitamin A can weaken bones in older adults...... so much so that major one a day multi-vitamin brands like Centrum have reduced their vitamin A content down to 70% RDA.

So there is no magic bullet, food, or secret formula to good health, even health studies can be flawed and advances in reasearch can reveal what used to the be "healthy" - might even be "harmful" to one's health.........

There have even been suggestions that the RDA's are deliberately low to keep the nation UNhealthy, or the opposite conspiracy of the RDA's being high to sell more vitamins......

Having said that, and fed everyone's paranoia /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif
FWIW - I take a cheap own brand (Kroger "Complete" or CVS "SpectraVite") multi-vitamin - a Centrum clone - 5 days a week as a sort of guarantee of getting the minimum of the RDA .......

My dad is 49 and will be 50 in three months, he can still run 8 miles, do 125 push ups and work for 48 hours non-stop. He keeps telling me he could do twice that before he got his phd, married and had to raise me. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/icon15.gif
Most people who know his age are amazed by how young he looks; not a single grey hair, good posture, bad jokes...
He never took a single vitamin pill; he doesn't even eat right but he drinks green tea and exercises in his spare time.
I, on the other hand, drink fresh water in the morning, have been taking a vitamin pill every day for the last month and still feel as unenergetic as ever and although I do a lot more exercise than him, I can't run half of what my dad does. I guess I got a recessive gene somewhere /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/poke2.gif

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He never took a single vitamin pill; he doesn't even eat right but he drinks green tea and exercises in his spare time.

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Speaking of that, have you seen the latest bowflex ad with the 50 year old grandmother? /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wow.gif

When I take a multivitamin in the morning I get a headache in the everning. I now just take C, E, B complex, Calcium, and fiber pills at luch when I can.

I only drink water at home, sometimes Tea when I go out to eat.

I weigh 175 lbs and the adult multivitamins are still way too much for my system. I might have the symptom same as Tree -- I'm prone to sinus headaches (from mold/mildew) and the adult multi's seemed to just feed that problem, so I can't take those. Among other reasons.

I just take whatever I give the kiddies (appropriate, right? Binky takes kiddie vitamins.) It used to be Sesame Street, now I can't find that so it's Scooby Doo or Marvel Comics for me. Lower dosage, includes iron. Yup, much better.

And FWIW I drink gobs of my town water, which is now potable since I installed a reverse osmosis water filter system. After putting that in I very very rarely get sick (I had been sick for essentially 7 months straight once so my doctor sent me to an oncologist) and when I have it's light and doesn't last more than a few days. (I vaguely recall we had a thread about water filters & quality & chlorination some time back.)

I take Cosamin DS. My girlfriend bought it from Costco. Cosamin DS cost about $63.00 a bottle. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/mecry.gifYou are supposed to take 3 daily for about a couple of months. Then you take 1 daily. I took 2 daily for about a month and one half. Now I take 1 daily. It helped my knee stiffness a lot. My right knee was very stiff. Now no more stiffness. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/happy14.gif

I've been a competitive bodybuilder since 93',so I know a little about nutrition.I always recommend a good mutli to fill in the gaps.The USRDA is the bare MINIMUM for an inactive person,which is why the sports multis are so much higher.There are VERY FEW if any single pill multis that are good because certain vits compete with each other for absorbption.That's why most good vits come with several different pills because they make them with different breakdown rates.Opti Packs by Super Nutrition are some of the best.BUT I would still take a "Centrum" type over nothing at all.Oh,and for me,glucosamine and chondroitin do NOTHING for me.I have to take prescription Bextra.

A horse pill sized multi and a low strength Ecotrin for PM.

Like Lurker, I take the Centrum Silver (I don't need the iron cause I'z like my meat), but only once every couple of days. If I feel a cold comming, I might pop some vitamin C for a few days. If I've been in the sun a lot I may pop a vitamin E. And once in a blue moon I take some calcium, but I think I drink enough milk as it is. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif

I take Homocysteine formula by Mason. It has Folic Acid, vitamin B-6 and B-12, a nurse at my heart clinic told me it can prevent heart attacks, and it is a lot cheaper than prescription drugs.