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The Big Vitamin D Mistake

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

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Re: The Big Vitamin D Mistake

#51

Post by themodelplumber »

ravar wrote: post #15

Throwing in my two cents. I used to suffer from seasonal mood swings, since taking a daily multivitamin this has been the best winter of my life.

I've been tracking my depression for a few years now, and I'm amazed at the number of things that can trigger a depressive episode. I used to think I had a disease called depression, but it now appears that I had arrived at a collection of various life circumstances that made experiencing depression on any given day more likely for me.

Some of the main triggers have been:

- Attempting to proceed without a plan

- Pushing for more productivity when less is called for (New year's resolutions were a great example personally)

- Bad sleep (I now use the calculator at sleepyti.me and have had great results)

- Too much exercise without rest days

- Too much exposure to social experience

- Too few dopamine-injecting experiences (e.g. not enough achievement, not nibbling away at my problems and watching leverage build up)

Strikingly to me, some of these seem tied to my psychology and I would hesitate to tell others "hey not having a plan is bad for you" when I know some people for whom planning is a mental health liability. Personalized medicine can't get good enough, fast enough.

Re: The Big Vitamin D Mistake

#52

Post by timewarrior »

One point of caution:

Anyone who takes Vitamin D supplement, make sure you take 25-Hydroxy (Calcifediol) and not the active form - 1,25 dihydroxy (Calcitriol).

Active form has severe side effects and is not supposed to be used for supplementation unless in you have kidney problem which prevent metabolizing 25-Hydroxy.

Re: The Big Vitamin D Mistake

#53

Post by cellis »

Johnny555 wrote: post #33
pkaye wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because of impaired kidney function, I get my vitamin D levels monitored every month. Yes supplements can take 2-3 months to increase the levels. The sun actually works pretty good if you can stay outside 15 minutes in noon sun. But that's difficult in the winter months.

I've read varying reports of how much sun you need to generate a day's supply of vitamin D, but rarely do they mention how much skin needs to be exposed. Face only? Face and arms? Entire upper body? Entire body? Is there some online resource for this with time of year and latitude corrections? I imagine there's quite a difference between vitamin D production in noon sun in Fairbanks Alaska versus Miami Florida.

Depends on a lot of things as you mentioned, but also especially on your pigmentation/levels of sunburn. I'm very dark skinned, so I need a lot longer for UV rays to penetrate.

Re: The Big Vitamin D Mistake

#54

Post by BenjiWiebe »

_fq4v wrote: post #23

This supports my lived experience. Found to be incredibly low in vitamin D, and diagnosed with autoimmune thyroiditis. Doctor said to supplement with 2000 IU being the max per day. After seeing no improvement whatsoever in vitamin D levels, and after talking with others with the same issue, I self medicated to 10000 IU / day. Lo and behold my vitamin D levels went back up and my auto-antibodies went back down.

I've got a nice doctor. I was also incredibly low (getting muscle twitches) and he put me on 15000 IU a day. Did wonders. :)

Re: The Big Vitamin D Mistake

#55

Post by gmaillogin »

pkaye wrote: post #36
timewarrior wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Another big challenge in winter months is that people are so covered with warm clothes, that even going out in Sun doesn't help much.

I wonder if glass windows would block out the benefits?

It helps prevent ultraviolet rays from sunlight.https://www.hotmailsigninguide.com

Re: The Big Vitamin D Mistake

#56

Post by ianai »

YokoZar wrote: post #34
olympus wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Basically yes. I didn't read the paper, but the abstract says that our current recommendations were designed to get us past a threshold of 50 (nmol/L, but the units aren't that important). But they claim that we should be aiming to get above 75, and it would be best if we could get above 100. So drink more fortified milk. Edit: oops, looks like I read it wrong. 50 nmol/L isn't the threshold the current RDA gets us to…

You would need to drink over 4 gallons of fortified milk per day to get the recommended 8000 IU. Milk just isn't fortified enough, because the current daily recommendations are so low.

Leave some mushrooms out in the sun, gills up, and enjoy ;). Though you may want to calculate it out first. This research survey at least makes me more confident in taking larger doses of vitamin D.

Re: The Big Vitamin D Mistake

#57

Post by rollulus »

pkaye wrote: post #36
timewarrior wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Another big challenge in winter months is that people are so covered with warm clothes, that even going out in Sun doesn't help much.

I wonder if glass windows would block out the benefits?

Yes it does block [1]. Coincidentally I was discussing this with a co-worker last week.

[1]: http://www.sciencefocus.com/qa/can-you-absorb-vitamin-d-thro...

Re: The Big Vitamin D Mistake

#58

Post by zamalek »

noahdesu wrote: post #45

Has anyone had experience ordering blood work (e.g. the vitamin d 25 hydroxy test) without visiting a doctor? I've seen very few references to the set of sites that pop up first online [0, 1, 2, 3] when I've gone looking for reviews in the past. Any suggestions? I'm in CA. [0]: https://www.privatemdlabs.com [1]: http://www.directlabs.com/ [2]: https://www.walkinlab.com/ [3]: https://www.health-tests-direct.com/

Bloodwork is a core utility of naturopaths so one would probably know the best place to visit. You don't have to be incredibly lucky for your preventative plan to cover the visit.

Re: The Big Vitamin D Mistake

#59

Post by pfarnsworth »

arca_vorago wrote: post #29
timewarrior wrote: post #14

This article recommends around 100 nmol/L. Most people are between 20-30, because they don't get enough Sun and do not take supplements. It gets really really bad when the number gets below 10 and it takes months to recover. Another Vitamin whose deficiency cause irreversible damage is B12. Folks, get both of these checked.

I just want to say the b complexes are indeed super important, but recent studies indicate a potential link between overly high dosage and some types of cancers, particularly in men. So be wary of overdoing it with those 3000% dv supplements.

5-hr energy drinks have 8333% the recommended dosage!! When I saw this I threw mine away, that’s a scary amount, considering the cancer link as you said.

Re: The Big Vitamin D Mistake

#60

Post by astura »

Johnny555 wrote: post #33
pkaye wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because of impaired kidney function, I get my vitamin D levels monitored every month. Yes supplements can take 2-3 months to increase the levels. The sun actually works pretty good if you can stay outside 15 minutes in noon sun. But that's difficult in the winter months.

I've read varying reports of how much sun you need to generate a day's supply of vitamin D, but rarely do they mention how much skin needs to be exposed. Face only? Face and arms? Entire upper body? Entire body? Is there some online resource for this with time of year and latitude corrections? I imagine there's quite a difference between vitamin D production in noon sun in Fairbanks Alaska versus Miami Florida.

Would depend on how dark your skin is.
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