Multi Vitamins – What to Watch Out For

Posted by Nikki Young

May 24, 2008

Are you currently taking a vitamin or mineral supplement, or a multi-vitamin? Or know of someone who is?

Well, check out this picture:

This is an x-ray of a mans lower GI tract, filled with fragmented capsules and tablets stuck together, giving him complete intestinal obstruction.

You may be wondering how could this have happened, why weren’t these tablets broken down in the body, and why weren’t the vitamins and minerals digested and used to aid the body like we have been told they do?

Well, to start off with, the majority of vitamin and mineral supplements are coated with shellac (or something similar) which is near impossible for the body to break down. In regards to these vitamin and mineral tablets in the picture, the body couldn’t break down the outer layer of the tablet to get into the middle.

If the body successfully breaks down a multi vitamin tablet, what you are left with is an isolated, fragmented vitamin or mineral.

In one apple alone, they have found over 10,000 nutrients, including; calcium, iron, magnesium, phosphorus, potassium, sodium, zinc, copper, manganese, selenium, thiamine, riboflavin, niacin, pantothenic acid, lecithin, linolenic acid, vitamin B-6, vitamin A, vitamin E, folic acid and folate, obviously to name only name a few.

Check out a multi-vitamin container, you might be looking at around 14 vitamins and minerals listed as being in each tablet, remember, I just named 21 nutrients alive in one single apple! Now this might not sound so bad, you’re just getting more of one vitamin/mineral in the tablet, right? Well, yes and no… Unless you are deficient in a certain vitamin or mineral (eg, Vitamin C) your body is more than likely going to discard the synthetically made Vitamin C supplement and pass it through the body (Synthetic = chemicals. Chemicals in the body = increased free radical damage). When you are deficient in a certain vitamin or mineral, your body will start to recognise similarities with the Vitamin C in the supplement to that of what Vitamin C looks like in a fruit or vegetable (the shape is different, but similarities can be found if the body is in desperate need for it).

So, supplementation in this manner does have its place. But unless your doctor has told you that you are deficient in a certain area and need to take something for it, more than likely your body isn’t going to need such high doses of any one nutrient and your body will only end up working hard to remove it before it does too much damage.

If you are currently taking a supplement of this nature, it’s a sign that you are on the right track, because you are acknowledging that you are aware that you aren’t getting enough vitamins and minerals in your diet or, you want to increase the nutritional intensity of your diet for good health.

However, if you read above, you might be wondering what a better alternative form of supplementation is over a multi vitamin. My recommendation is a whole food supplement, which collect the nutrients from vine ripened fruits and vegetables and places them in an airtight convenient capsule. This form of supplementation will provide the body with nutrients from whole food sources the body is familiar with, it won’t have a sugar, water, sodium or excess fibre content and will be in a bio-available form.

Stroke, heart disease, cancer, arthritis and alzheimers, to name only a few diseases, have all been linked to poor nutrition and a lack of fruits and vegetables in the diet, not from the lack of a multi-vitamin in the diet. If you want to protect yourself against disease at a cellular level inside and out and strengthen your immune system by providing your body with the vitamins, minerals, phyto-nutrients, enzymes and antioxidants you need every day, through vine ripened, organically grown, fresh raw fruits and vegetables (not synthetic isolated vitamins), look into a whole food supplement, such as JuicePlus+ or Greens Plus.

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