What Supplements Should I Be Taking?
Are supplements the foundation of my health?
When it comes to women’s health, supplements are not the foundation to our health and wellbeing. Instead, they are purely there to enhance what we are missing in our diets due to the modern world we live in and the stripped soil we plant in. I like to think of supplements like icing on a cupcake. Enhancing its flavor but overall serves no purpose if consumed apart from a healthy diet. When we think about the foundation of our health and wellness, I want to stress as a culture, we need begin paying more attention to our nervous system and digestive system rather than synthetic products we continue to place inside our bodies that can ultimately cause more harm than good. Why? Because, this truth remains the same… If we are not resting well, we are not digesting well and if we are not digesting well, we are not absorbing nutrients therefore nutrient deficient.
The two foundational pieces of our health and wellness are the two foundational pieces of the LWD Method.
The Liv Well Daily Five - Thrive
Helps women’s bodies thrive from the inside out by ensuring all macro and micro nutrients are present in each meal
Helps women build meals with mindfulness
Helps women make the most of each meal
Clean protein (plant or animal or both)
Complex carb
Healthy fat
Dietary fiber
Vibrant greens
The Liv Well Daily Rest and Digest Protocol
Activating our parasympathetic nervous system is key when it comes to digesting and absorbing nutrients we may be supplementing for
When we rest well, we digest well, and when we digest well, we absorb well
Step 1: Walk away from all distractions when you go to eat a meal or simply engage with the person you are sitting across from and get off the phone
Step 2: Pray by sending up praise to God for the food and the hands that prepared it
While you are doing this, your vagus nerve (main highway from brain to gut) initiates this nervous system response and allows the heart rate to slow down, belly expansion to occur as you take deep breaths, and prompts muscle fibers along your digestive tract to prepare the body to digest the food you are about to put in your mouth.
After applying this, now let’s move on to why God made products are better than man made
Real vitamins are made up of different compounds that work together to give your body nutrients, whereas synthetic vitamins can be hard for you body to digest as well as having unwanted side effects because of fillers, the capsule it’s held in, colors, and flavors. As a result, Holy Spirit has been convicting me to pay closer attention to what I allow in the tempe.
1 Corinthians 3:16-17
Do you not know that you are a temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you? If any man destroys the temple of God, God will destroy him, for the temple of God is holy, and that is what you are.
As I was walking around the grocery store earlier this month, I heard the Spirit say, “notice how the outer rim is the only part that is not produced in a lab.” When I went to buy beet chips, Holy Spirit came back and said “be disciplined and make them yourself.” Knowing I would not use refined canola oil but extra virgin olive oil and that my beets would be sourced locally and roasted, not fried with preservatives. Please hear me, I am not saying any of this to shame you, rather shine light on the convictions I have personally been feeling as Holy Spirit has been guiding me to live more disciplined like Daniel and for the Spirit rather than my flesh like Romans 8 describes.
The further we move from creation, the further we move from the Creator.
After being hit with this thought, Holy Spirit then said, “I need you to get all of your clients off of synthetic vitamins.” This was after I had a session with one of my postmenopausal clients who just received lab work showing newly diagnosed Hashimotos and low vitamin D levels after taking 10,000 IU of synthetic vitamin D a day. When I began praying for my client asking Holy Spirit for wisdom in coaching her, He said “it’s synthetic and not real.” I began to ask Holy Spirit, how to supplement for real vitamin D sources outside from being in direct sunlight?
As I was doing research later that day, I found myself reading about fermented cod liver oil and its benefits in regards to vitamin D and A. An answered prayer had arrived.
Genesis 1:11-12
Then God said, “Let the land sprout with vegetation—every sort of seed-bearing plant, and trees that grow seed-bearing fruit. These seeds will then produce the kinds of plants and trees from which they came.” And that is what happened. 12 The land produced vegetation—all sorts of seed-bearing plants, and trees with seed-bearing fruit. Their seeds produced plants and trees of the same kind. And God saw that it was good.
Supplements I recommend to support your healthy lifestyle in the modern world
When it comes to finding natural sources for supplements it can be pretty tricky as marketing is unfortunately very misleading. The products I now use are sourced from smaller companies or farmers in the United States, have no artificial preservatives, flavors, or coloring and are naturally occuring in our environment with no fillers or gelatin capsules. I will create a list to simplify this process with links that will take you to what I recommend and where you can purchase it. THIS IS NOT AN ADD! Purely a conviction I feel I need to share with what I am recommending to my clients, and what I personally take myself.
Vitamin D: Fermented Cod Liver Oil with Butter
Probiotic: Food For Gut 250 billion CFUs (not encapsulated with no fillers or preservatives)
Liver support and detox: Milk Thistle and Olive Leaf (3 days a week unless liver detoxing)
Multivitamin / prenatal: beef liver (I produce myself and put in my smoothies 3 days a week)
Why these specifically
Fermented cod liver oil has been used for generations to treat inflammation while also aiding in bone health, vitamin D and A levels, digestion, and brain health. It provides a natural balance of omega- 3 fatty acids and is easily digestible. The fermentation process helps preserve the natural form giving you most nutrient density from this product.
Here is an article of how fermented cod liver oil helped with low vitamin D levels and inflammatory issues. Also a natural osteoporosis treatment which is commonly seen in aging women who are losing their estrogen which aids in the health and protection of their bones.
I love this probiotic for many reasons. The firs is that it has no fillers, isn’t encapsulated, and has over 100 billion CFUs. This probiotic especially is great for women because of how readily I see candida overgrowth in correlation to estrogen dominance. This probiotic specifically helps target yeast overgrowth, bloating, IBS like symptoms, and constipation / diarrhea. Overall, it is a great general probiotic for women that I recommend they take daily.
Chlorella powder has amazing benefits like helping rid the body of heavy metals, lowering blood pressure, antiviral and antibacterial properties as well as its numerous nutrients like vitamin D and B12. Most women tend to have low B12 especially if on hormonal birth control or have had a history of taking hormonal brith control. Adding this naturally occurring plant to your smoothies may help energy, mood, and overall health and immunity.
When it comes to hormone balance, how we care for our livers in the modern world is crucial. They are under a heavy toxic load due to the endocrine system disruptors we place on our skin using synthetic skin care products, the pesticides and herbicides in our food, drugs and alcohol we consume regularly, 5G towers that interfere with cellular renewal, and unclean water sources high in mercury and prescription medications. After much reading, I have come to love milk thistle as a routinely taken herb to help with overall liver support and health for women as well as olive leaf that has amazing healing properties. Both are great in combination in keeping your liver supported and body strong.
Last but not least, I love using beef liver instead of taking a synthetic multivitamin or prenatal. Purchasing your beef liver is really important. Almost all beef can be labeled as “grass fed.” However, the quality of the grass is essential to the health and wellbeing of the cow as well as how much feed the cow receives outside of the grass it consumes. Finding a farmer you can trust is key! In middle Tennessee, we have accesss to green pastures making our grass more nutrient dense for our livestock versus cattle raised in the west. A farmer I love and personally use is Smoking Oaks. They are an organic farm located in middle Tennessee and have a great produce store located in the heart of Nashville. If you live in the area, I highly recommend going by and saying hello. This is the farm I purchase my liver from.
How I produce my liver is allowing it to unthaw then adding it to a high speed blender and blending it until liquid. I then transfer it to silicone ice cube trays and freeze. Once frozen, I then transfer the small liver cubes to a mason jar and keep them stored in the freezer. I add 1 - 2 cubes to one of my berry Five - Thrive smoothy recipes three times a week.
Red berry Five - Thrive smoothie recipe:
Clean protein: 1 scoop vanilla protein powder
Complex carb: 1/4 c frozen raspberries + 1/4 c frozen strawberries
Healthy fat: 1 heaping tbsp peanut butter
Dietary fiber: 1 tbsp ground flax seed
Vibrant greens: 1 heaping handful spinach
Boosts: 1-2 small cubes of beef liver
Small steps at a time
I do not recommend throwing everything out all at once. Instead, became curious and open your medicine cabinet and begin reading what it is you are actually allowing into the temple. Begin by reading your supplement ingredient label. Is there anything there you don’t understand? If so, research that ingredient and discover what it is and the associated side effects it has on the body. Then begin to look into what that company supports. Are there cultural beliefs the same as yours? Are they locally sourced? Are they naturally produced products from small farms? Do they support farms or big companies? Are they organic and highly researched? What do the reviews say? Become curious as you become disciplined to live in accordance with the Spirit and not the flesh. I feel this is crucial for this hour right now more than ever as we seek answers when it comes to living healthy.
Romans 8: 14-16 TPT
The mature children of God are those who are moved by the impulses of the Holy Spirit. 15And you did not receive the “spirit of religious duty,” leading you back into the fear of never being good enough. But you have received the “Spirit of full acceptance,” enfolding you into the family of God. And you will never feel orphaned, for as he rises up within us, our spirits join him in saying the words of tender affection, “Beloved Father!” 16For the Holy Spirit makes God’s fatherhood real to us as he whispers into our innermost being, “You are God’s beloved child!”