Dirty Supplements?

(Geoffrey) #1

How bad are they and does it really matter?
For those of us who attempt to keep our diets as clean as possible, we tend to scrutinize the ingredients list in everything we consume. I personally have found that food companies are constantly putting non-food items in our food. Sugar, seed oils, grains, etc. I want nothing but whole, nutritious foods entering my body.

With that in mind I started looking at the ingredient lists on my supplements and saw that many of them contain things that I would not normally allow in my diet. Many contain soy, rice flour or seed oils.

So my questions are, does this really affect our diets when we’re trying to stay clean?

Is there a source for clean supplements or is it just something we have to deal with?

What say you my keto/carni brain trust.

#2

What kind of supplements are they…?

I am not very familiar with supplements as I can’t bring to take them and anyway, I prefer getting everything from my food but whenever I had some, it was either pure stuff (vitamin C) or just some normal (whatever that means) pill filler (Mg). Definitely no sugar or sweetener or oil.
(I used to have fizzy pills containing other things but I wasn’t forced to it, I just wasn’t so choosy yet… And I very occasionally had a quarter of one… Amounts play a huge role in my decision making and I consider it right. Amounts matter a lot.)

I would search for pure supplements and only consume something worse if that would be the smaller bad. If you NEED it, you probably can handle a tiny bit of bad stuff. Not like many of us can avoid bad things in really tiny amounts, I suppose… Our body can handle that, we just shouldn’t eat them in bigger amounts or unnecessarily. I do have my almost totally no tolerance black list (added sugars, I am very much against them even though I know a little can’t pose a noticeable problem ever and it’s not like I don’t eat way more sugar from my normal food… still) and if I go against it, it may bother me a bit but if it would be very, very hard to avoid it, I still consider eating some (it’s often a really minuscule amount that I surely won’t feel) the better option. I tend to look at the pros and cons and decide what to do.

For me and for my body, a really tiny amount of nearly anything except toxins (and even some toxins. like booze) is way, way, way better than eating carby things on keto (like vegs or peanuts). And I do the latter too, sometimes but in small amounts.

And what is clean nowadays, anyway…? The meat I eat is surely not ideal but my body loves it enough and it’s my best option…
In most cases, I just don’t see that being perfect at it is even possible. So I don’t see the point of avoiding other tiny extras when there is a very good reason.

(Robin) #3

I think it depends on you and what type of ketoer you are.
I need to stay away from scrutinizing everything or I become obsessed. I never tested for ketosis, and I step on the scale mostly at the docs. I have to keep things simple. Maybe I’m just simple-minded???

BUT there are those who stay on track and motivated and enjoy the journey more by testing, examining things like supplement labels (makes sense by the way), keeping logs and charts, etc.
if it’s your bag, go for it.

I doubt the amount of those ingredients in your supposed will harm you. But if your goal is to be clean… again, you do you.

#4

Same. I decided the tiny amounts in supplements I take are negligible. I do avoid any processed foods though.

(You've tried everything else; why not try bacon?) #5

Can you find the supplements you need without the ingredients you don’t want? If so, buy them if you can afford them, to help market forces do their job.

However, if you need the supplement, but can’t find a version without any of these bad ingredients, consider just how much of them you are going to be ingesting. If you are only taking a pill or two, it can’t amount to a troublesome amount. However, if you are taking mega-doses, then the calculation becomes different.

In any case, if you count the amount of carbohydrate represented by these ingredients against your carb limit, then you ought to be fine.

#6

Words are subjective and have context, just because in cult level keto circles it’s popular to pretend that sugar or grains are like smoking 3 packs a day while drinking a formaldehyde smoothie, in real life that’s just as stupid as the people that claim cow farts are destroying the planet. Sugar makes things taste good, and people like things to taste good, the fact that chronically over consuming it is bad, is really irrelevant and just a way to change the context and bias it. Same for grains, no shortage of people including the healthy majority eat them while not abusing them and are completely healthy, have no diabetes or other negative health markers.

I’m for everybody doing whatever they want, but you don’t want to let yourself turn into the meat eating equivalent of a vegan either. I go for clean supplements, and food. But gotta be realistic at the same time.

Nope, without those things in there, stuff cakes up, can’t be capsulized, won’t mix, won’t blend etc. I’ve never seen a seed oil in a supplement, but nothing about a completely ignorable amount of Soy or rice flour is going to hurt anybody.

(Chuck) #7

Eat real food and stay away from processed foods. And be careful about getting foods from a grocery store, way too much of the meat has added chemicals to make them look better. That goes for so much more too. I am blessed to get most of my meat, produce, and dairy from the local Amish farmers. The Amish still hold to the old ways like my great grandfather, grandfather and dad did.

(Doug) #8

I agree - people can tend to ‘get religion’ about this stuff. There is arguing in principle, preaching to the choir, wanting to be a member of this ‘club’ or that ‘club,’ etc. But as individuals we’re complex and often very different - starting or existing in different places, desiring different things, etc.

I see a lot of “sliding scales” where we do more of this, less of that, and try to plot our own best individual course, not necessarily an easy or quick thing.

(B Creighton) #9

I eat much more whole unprocessed foods than I used to. However, I do use lots of supplements. Maybe I should do a thread on them. I use mostly Swansons, Now brand, and purebulk. Yes, they add a few things, but most I don’t mind. Magnesium stearate is actually probably a pretty good way to get some extra magnesium. Stearate is just a saturated fat, and these days I supplement magnesium anyway. Swanson’s bororganic boron gives me a little extra glycine for “free.” Glycine seems important for us older geezers. I have also found DIM and Indole 3 carbinol useful for keeping my estrogen low. I use quercetin and apigenin to help boost my NAD - don’t know if it really works though. Without these, I felt no difference from NMN though. I think it just got broken down in my liver. I use a variety of other herbs and minerals. When working out I add creatine, protein powders, extra collagen, GABA, HMB, etc

(Geoffrey) #10

Vitamin D3
CoQ10
Magnesium Citrate
Fadogia Agrestis w/ tongkat

I absolutely agree that sugar is totally out for me. I don’t even want any artificial sweeteners.

(Geoffrey) #11

Too late for me, I’m already obsessed. Lol!

Simple minded? I doubt that. You are always a voice of reason and wisdom and I appreciate you.

(Geoffrey) #12

When I bought my latest supplements I did a lot of research looking for the cleanest I could find. You talk about affordability, I found that the less junk in them the more they cost. Strange.
All of them that I take are just once a day and just one pill each so you are probably right that it doesn’t amount to much.

(Geoffrey) #13

Thank you for that voice of reason and yes I can see where one could go too far in the other range or spectrum.

(Geoffrey) #14

Absolutely Chuck, I’m already doing that and am very mindful of watching out for anything man made.
Most of my meat and eggs comes off of my own place so I definitely know it’s source.

(Geoffrey) #15

Good thing to guard against, thanks.

(Geoffrey) #16

Good to know, thank you.

(Polly) #17

I am intolerant of all grains. When choosing supplements, therefore, I avoid any which contain grains. If I inadvertently ingest grains my arthritis flairs within hours and the effects last several weeks. [Great incentive.]. I take a variety of supplements Vit D3, Vit K2, Magnesium Glycinate, regularly. If I feel a bit off colour I add in Vit C, zinc, kelp and occasionally goats milk kefir if I have had to take anti-biotics. I have not checked the ingredients list recently, but will do so later because I avoid industrial seed oils and sweeteners.

(Robin) #18

You ARE blessed. I would guess most of us don’t have that option or can’t afford it.

(Chuck) #19

Believe it or not it isn’t all that expensive

#20

But it is for many of us. Not everyone has an affordable great option nearby, I think Robin meant that. You are lucky you have one.

My own farm meat options aren’t more or much more expensive than the supermarket options, it’s the availabily is the real problem, very very little meat for the demand. The beef farm meat costs the same as supermarket beef (not affordable for me but I am poor) but they butcher a few animal per year and it’s sold in hours (except some less popular cuts but they get sold quickly enough too).

Others don’t have this limit but their options are more expensive, I have read it from several people and it makes sense. I have no idea how and why the beef farm does it, honestly… I am sure people would pay a bit more too… No matter how price sensitive Hungarians can be.