Welcome to Ask Whole9 Canada, where Summer Innanen and Sarah Ramsden answer all of your health and nutrition questions. In this week’s episode, Angie from Edmonton asks us, “I try to eat a varied diet as possible, and prefer to get all my nutrients from food rather than supplements. I keep hearing that I need to take a vitamin D supplement. What do you ladies think??”
Vitamin D is a fat-soluble vitamin that we obtain mainly from sunlight, and a much smaller degree from food. It plays an important role in our overall health, including strengthening your bones and teeth, modulating the immune system, and reducing the risk of diabetes (type 1 and type 2). The majority of naturally obtained vitamin D is synthesized on the skin when a form of cholesterol comes in contact with UV rays from the sun. It’s then sent to the liver and kidneys to be converted into the active form the body uses called 125-dihydroxycholecalciferol, or D3. The ideal way to get it is from sun exposure (without sunscreen). However given our latitude in Canada, from about October onwards, we cannot get the sun exposure we need to produce sufficient vitamin D. It’s one of the supplements that you find in both of our daily routines through the cooler months, as well as Dallas and Melissa’s.
Should you supplement? If so, how much should you take and what brand? In this episode, we talk about the different ways we can get vitamin D from sunlight, food, and through supplementation. We talk about how to get your vitamin D levels tested in Canada and recommend a general dosage and brands that we like.
Here are the links to the brands we recommend and that you can find at good health food stores in Canada:
Thorne Liquid Vitamin D
D-Mulsion 1000 by Genestra
Natural Factors D3 Drops
CanPrev Vitamin D3
Got a question for Whole9 Canada? Send your questions about health, nutrition or where to find Whole30 approved sources of food (that you don’t need to import!) to asksummerandsarah@gmail.com and we’ll feature you in an upcoming episode.
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My vitiaminD3 is from Quantum Nutrition Labs in liquid drops(1,000IU) per drop from a rich live source No toxic tagalongs, other ingredients: Extra virgin olive oil, D-Alpha Tocopherol. Is this a good on? And what about vitamin K along with the D3?
Thanks for the info! I was wondering if it’s possible to overdose, or if it’s with getting your vitamin D levels tested after you’ve started supplementing? I take the Now brand vitamin D-3 5,000IU, but not every day, maybe 3 or 4 times a week.
My doctor recommended I take 8000IU of vitamin D3. He also recommended I take calcium but he wasn’t specific on the amount of calcium. I had shattered my shoulder and upper arm and now have a plate in the arm. Can you give me some guidelines on calcium since the Whole30 book It Starts with Food does not address calcium. Thank you in advance for any suggestions you can give.
Vitamin are very important for our body and for improvement of our health it is very important to take vitamins time to time. Thanks for sharing your thoughts with us.
Vitamin supplements like Vitamin D can be very effective. Here is some recent research on this supplement http://www.mynutritionalsolutions.com/nutritional-supplement-blog/vitamin-d-super-nutrient-latest-scientific-findings/
Good article! When supplementing with D3 comes up, I was recommend a liquid, micellized form. When vitamin D, a fat soluble vitamin, is introduced into the gut it can have a tough being absorbed. This is where the micellized form comes in handy, as it essentially is now water soluble and is much more easily absorbed by the gut.