Timing of Nutrients vs Supplements

Timing of Nutrients vs Supplements

Dr. Sarah  0:00  

I think because you can just buy them because you just order them online and they arrive on your doorstep, because they’re in a grocery store, right? They’re like, I have to ask for someone behind us. We automatically see them as safe and good for us. Right? Exactly. And they’re not necessarily all right. Hit me with producer pots, magnesium for sleep, amino acids for workouts, and mega threes for focus at work. For those of us now following Nutri vor, and eating foods packed with these nutrients versus taking a supplement. Do we need to think about when we’re eating these foods in the same way we take supplements at specific times for specific reasons? Oh, that is such an interesting question. So if I think about the, the reason for timing those supplements, right, so magnesium, when we get that sort of bolus from a supplement that can have a calming effect, but you don’t actually have to take magnesium in the evening, you can take it at any time during the day, it’s just that if it’s going to have a calming effect, why not also enjoy that calming effect when we’re trying to sleep and there is a little bit of so magnesium and a couple of other nutrients. Zinc is also one, I can’t remember all of them. potentiate the effects of melatonin, which basically means melatonin works a little bit better. So they can help improve sleep, whether you take melatonin to help you sleep, or it’s just your body’s natural melatonin that it’s making. So, you know, if I’m going to take magnesium, why not take it in the evening so that I can benefit from it. If I’m going to take, you know, for supporting performance, we just want to be really making sure that we’re getting enough protein, but there is a slight benefit to muscle recovery. And, like the increase of muscle-like formation, when there are amino acids in our bloodstream, which is why so many pre and post workout supplements have individual amino acids that are important for making muscle protein synthesis. So for making bigger, stronger muscles, but it is a really small effect if the baseline is a protein sufficient diet. And with omega threes, really, we just want a good amount in our bodies, we want our cell membranes to have a good ratio of omega threes, compared to omega six fats. So omega tree is a supplement like if you took fish oil, for example, it doesn’t really need to be timed, it’s not really going to give you a boost of focus the way like a nootropic supplement word right. So there’s like mushroom extracts, for example, that can help you get more like cognitive focus. So that is more of a short term effect. Whereas taking an Omega three supplement, that benefit is more than just the fact that you’re taking it every day, and you’re getting enough like omega threes in the cell membranes of your brain cells. So translating all of that to food, because all of those are nutrients we can get from food, right? If we’re getting enough protein, we don’t really need the amino acids supplements unless you’re a professional athlete, in which case, that little small difference might be something that’s really meaningful for you. Most people don’t need a magnesium supplement. But magnesium is like 66% of Americans don’t get enough magnesium from their diets. And magnesium is one of the nutrients that impacts the stress response. So if you have a lot of stress, vitamin C and magnesium and omega threes are like the three nutrients that have been shown to help, like reduce the physiological response to psychological stress. So there’s always a time and a place for supplements is what I’m trying to say. Like, we can get all of these nutrients from food, that is the goal of future boards to get all the nutrients our bodies need from the foods we eat. We don’t need a supplement. In most cases, obviously, if your doctor has recommended it, that is a conversation to have with your doctor about whether or not you really eat it once you’ve made some diet changes to get more of that nutrient. But when we’re getting those nutrients from food, we’re not getting them in that concentrated form, right. So when we get magnesium from green vegetables, where we’re not getting the bolus, we’re not getting that big amount that is going to have a calming effect. We’re just going to get what our body needs throughout the day for all of the 300 different enzymatic reactions that require magnesium, right, so we’re just going to get what we need for all of our biological systems that need that nutrient. We’re not going to get that big, whopping dose that will have the calming effect. So, again, if you want both those things, that is a conversation to have with your doctor because you can, there’s no tolerable upper limit for magnesium from food. But it is from supplements and I believe it’s set to 350 milligrams. So just, you know, understanding the dose and how much magnesium you’re actually getting from your diet and having that conversation with a registered dietitian, licensed nutritionist or your doctor is a really great idea. So from food, we don’t just get that walking dose of this one nutrient. That means that we want to time it. The only exception for something that we really want to restrict to a certain time is caffeine, right. So for drinking coffee, tea, yerba mate, what else has caffeine in it. I believe there’s a couple of other plants that do produce caffeine. But if you’re consuming caffeine, obviously, that stimulant effect lasts a few hours, depending on how fast or slow the caffeine metabolizer you are, there was a study published just a couple of months ago that showed that if coffee was consumed within nine hours of sleep, that it disrupted sleep quality, so and tea was later, but she doesn’t have as much caffeine. So we just want to be cognizant of how we’re timing, caffeinated beverages or foods that contain coffee grounds. For example, if you had like, you know, coffee rubbed flank steak or something like that, right, like some kind of delicious coffee or something, we want to be cognizant of how caffeine is impacting our sleep and making sure that that is timed earlier on in the day. But there’s not a like, I’m gonna, I’m gonna have my magnesium rich foods at night. Yeah, I’m not gonna I’m not gonna save all my pumpkin seeds right before I go to bed. Like that’s not going to have the same effect as a supplement. And that’s okay. Like, the thing with supplements, again, there’s a time and a place for all of them. But most of them, if you read the bottle, it’ll say something like, these are not official health claims. Right? Like it’ll have some little FDA disclaimer saying, you know, we can’t we’re not actually saying we’re saying it supports sleep. Like we’re not really saying it supports sleep, right? No, like, no official claims. And it’s because those things aren’t tested, like the scientific literature showing that a magnesium supplement before bed improves sleep. I mean, it’s there. But it’s not comparing that magnesium to it’s comparing that magnesium to an average diet, not to a nutrient rich, yeah, nutrition board diet, not quite getting all of our nutrients from the foods. So it sounds like we’re coming from this mentality of taking supplements at specific times for specific reasons, we can just let that kind of go to the wayside with kind of like, I don’t know, the marketing of the supplement, right. And if we’re just giving our body all the nutrients it needs. We’re fine. sounds like you’re saying which is great. Okay, good. All right. And where and? Yeah, yeah. And I don’t want to disallow supplements. Right, right. By the way, same for those of us that have decided to, like really go in on this neutral. Vor and like, save our pennies and just like get our nutrients from foods. Like, I think we are hammered with marketing for supplements at all times. Yeah. And we seemed like there’s some, I think, because you can just buy them because you just ordered them online and they arrive on your doorstep, because they’re in a grocery store, right? They’re like, I have to ask for someone behind. We automatically see them as safe and good for us, right naturally, and they’re not necessarily drug interactions between supplements and medications between supplements and other supplements. There’s certain health conditions where certain supplements are contraindicated, like you don’t want to take this supplement with this health condition. And so we have this like, I think false sense of security with supplements. And yet we’re sort of drawn to them because of the marketing promises, right? We are we are marketed supplements hard and we’re often marketed supplements along with like, fear of food or

Dr. Sarah  9:40  

or like fear of inadequacy, right like there’s this thing wrong with you you need the supplement or right don’t eat this food, have this $300 A month supplement instead. So I think like with that as the the situation of with the marketing, I think it actually is a really good idea for or people to go through your your supplements stash and bring like, list everything and bring it to your doctor, I think a lot of people will go have their like, annual checkup and not even think to talk about supplements with their doctor, but bring it bring it to your doctor and say, These are the supplements I’m taking, what do you think I really need here? And chances are your doctor will be like, the vitamin D is a good one. Right? Like, you know, like, they’ll have like, one or two that they think is a great idea. And the rest will be like you don’t need that. Like Wait, you eat, you eat a mainly whole foods diet. Oh, you think YouTubers are a great idea? Because it is, you know, you don’t you don’t need these other things and think about the money that could save think about Yeah, just like, you know, taking that those funds, taking part of them towards, you know, a more whole foods based grocery haul, and put the rest towards something else savings or some other thing that brings you joy, like I think we there’s a lot of supplements that are taken unnecessarily and I think it is just a really good activity to do once every couple of years is to look at the supplements and go Why am I taking this one again? Was it my doctor? Or my dietician that recommended it? No. Do I actually notice a difference from this one? Do I actually notice a difference from this one hand, I think like we also just assume that we need it versus like taking the time to actually, especially if you’ve changed your diet, like taking the time to use one of those free trackers and actually see how much you’re actually getting from food? Because that might give you your answer right there. And you’re taking that tracking in with your list to your doctor at the same time. Right. So yeah. That’s great. That’s great. So where can we learn more about the specific nutrients that help with these specific health conditions and what foods have those nutrients? So I have two resources for you. One is my book neutral bar, the radical new science within the nutrients you need from the foods you eat. The second part of the book is entirely an examination of the link between like one specific nutrient and one common health complaint or goal. And so it’s really about understanding what nutrients do in the body and how they’re relevant to each one of us personally. And then there’s a table in the appendices that I mean many, many pages long, that lists every nutrient that is connected to 120 different diseases and symptoms. So a very comprehensive resource. But also, my website youtuber.com has really detailed articles of about like 60 nutrients now 60 Something I haven’t counted in a while, there’s not not very much, not very much to go like two or three that I want to complete and get on the site. So incredibly detailed resource and it will list like all of the different ways that nutrients impact our health and is related to various health conditions. But then also all of the best food sources. So all of the foods that have 50% or more of the daily value of that nutrient per serving so you can really understand what foods to focus on to make sure you’re getting enough of that nutrient that is connected with your particular health challenges.