So many people go to their local grocery store or GNC to buy their vitamins, yet most people have no idea what the source is of those vitamins they are purchasing. In this post, I want to discuss the importance of making sure the vitamins you are buying are from a WHOLE FOOD ORGANIC SOURCE, and preferably USDA certified organic. Its probably safe to estimate that 99.9% of the vitamins on the market are synthetic forms of the vitamin and are chemically created in a pharmaceutical plant. Synthetic vitamins do not contain many of the cofactors and active enzymes that make that vitamin useful in the body. Any vitamin that only requires you to take one pill a day to get all the recommended daily values is simply not genetically compatible with your body and is a waste of money. The body only absorbs a very small percentage of those types of vitamins, which is why many people experience bright yellow urine after taking them.
Synthetic vitamins do a very good job of raising blood levels of that vitamin or mineral, but they do a terrible job of entering the cells of our body where they are utilized in biochemical processes. There are so many research articles out there claiming how well a vitamin is absorbed into the blood stream, but the studies never seem to examine or report how well the cells utilize the vitamin - which is the most important reason for taking vitamins in the first place.
Some people don’t think there is a difference between synthetic and whole food supplements. They’re wrong. That is like saying there is no difference between synthetic beef (made by a human in a test tube) and real beef. I’m pretty sure no one would want to eat synthetic beef, so why should our supplements be any different? The same goes for our food; USDA certified organic is by no means perfect but it is the best source of food that you will get in today’s society.
The research is clear: our body treats synthetic vitamins and minerals as foreign substances and excretes them from the body as waste. Make no mistake, the best supplement is no supplement… eating all the fruits and vegetables your body requires in their whole food form is the best thing you can do. But most people are not able to do this, and that’s where supplementation should come in. Every single person in the human species requires the same vitamins and minerals whether you have Rheumatoid arthritis or diabetes or are seemingly healthy. All of our genes require the same things in order to express health, this is why health care providers who give certain supplements to treat different conditions and try to separate each person with different needs are not helping their patients get any healthier. The expression of health in those genes once provided with the proper raw materials can be different in different people and that is where the term “biochemical individuality” comes into play.
If you’re interested in finding vitamins from organic whole food sources, the website I typically buy my supplements from is Innatechoice.com, which sells supplements for the most common nutritional deficiencies in today’s society. The other website I buy from is Mercola.com, which is also one of the greatest websites I have come across to find information and about true health and wellness. If anyone has any questions about supplements or anything else -- please don’t hesitate to ask.
