My Pillbox
I thought it might be of some interest to report what vitamins and supplements I take each day. I doubt what I am doing is fully optimal, but weighing in the costs of trouble and expense as well as expected benefits, it represents my attempt at optimizing for myself.
I’ll leave out what I take for my own specific medical conditions: nonallergic rhinitis and nosebleeds. I’ll also focus on what I take on days I am not fasting. For what I do when fasting, see my post “Fasting Tips.”
Here is the list:
Psyllium husks (Metamucil equivalent). Here, to avoid having to consume sugar or a nonsugar sweetener with my psyllium husks, I am moving to taking it in pill form.
Fish oil. Here I am trying to get up to the 4 grams per day of EPA that Peter Attia recommends. (I can see the amount of EPA on the detailed label breakdown.) That turns out to be 6 big fish oil pills of the type I am using. But I haven’t had any problem downing that many.
Schiff Digestive Advantage Probiotic. This is the only kind I know that has the Bacillus Coagulans which is better able to survive stomach acid.
5000 IU of Vitamin D3. On the amount of Vitamin D, see “Carola Binder—Why You Should Get More Vitamin D: The Recommended Daily Allowance for Vitamin D Was Underestimated Due to Statistical Illiteracy.” On the importance of Vitamin D, also see “Getting More Vitamin D May Help You Fight Off the New Coronavirus” and “Vitamin D Seems to Help If You Have Non-Alcoholic Liver Disease.”
Lutein and Zeaxanthin (brand name “Ocuvite”), which I think of as “sunscreen for the retinas.”
Multivitamin. I am not very choosy here.
Garlic and Turmeric. I am thinking of these as at least weak antivirals. See “Eating During the Coronavirus Lockdown.”
That’s it, except for one legacy supplement: Peter Attia has persuaded me that the evidence for good effects from resveratrol are quite weak, so I won’t buy any more, but I am using the rest of the resveratrol I already own.
For annotated links to other posts on diet and health, see: