Timing of supplements: empty stomach or food? Combinations?

[hill dweller]

I haven't found this addressed in a single thread, so here goes: what is the most efficacious timing/combination for supplements? Which should be taken with food vs empty stomach? Which should not be combined?

I see that curcumin is best absorbed on an empty stomach, and the supplement I use combines curcumin with piperine, as recommended.

Others?

[Stavia]

I need to get my head around this too.
All I know is the fat soluble vitamins need fat to be absorbed. A D E and K.

[SusanJ]

All supplements are different. Curcumin is certainly best on an empty stomach. Acetyl L-Carnitine (ALCAR) is another.

You can start by following the recommendation on the bottle as to taking on empty stomach or not. If they really need to be taken on an empty stomach, the bottle will say so. If you are working with a functional medicine doctor, they can help you out, too.

That said, I take all my B vitamins by noon to avoid brain buzz at night. I also have found taking Vitamin D (with Vitamin K2) in the morning helps me for the same reason - for some reason it seems to be stimulating for me.

I take magnesium at night since it can help with sleeping.

Maybe others can comment on when they take certain supplements and why.

[hill dweller]

Reviving this thread with something I just learned.

Potassium and magnesium compete for uptake, and therefore should not be taken at the same time. When shopping for supplements, I found several brands that nonetheless combined potassium and magnesium, and indeed, my current brand of potassium uses magnesium stearate as a filler.

Calcium is another mineral that limits the absorption of others, and should not be taken in combination with potassium, magnesium, zinc. Yet calcium is a very common filler for other minerals.

This is making me re-thing the usefulness of a daily multi-vitamin, especially since my diet is heavy in greens and raw vegetables.

What do you guys think?

[Stavia]

I lookee it all up on examine.com and now take everything (b12 methyl foliate P5P Ovega Curcumin Magnesium Zinc D3 K2) with my evening meal except the alpha lipoic acid which I take fasting. My curcumin says with a meal but its one of the fancy ones. Life extension.
I intend to add ALCAR next in the morning.

I was very anti supplements 2 years ago but after multiple blood tests I realised I couldn't get enough in my diet and believe me I eat tons of veggies. My magnesium actually was good near top of range but I reckoned I may as well add it seeing as there were so many pills already.

[Harrison]

I also take everything with the evening meal. I have tried various combinations of all at lunch, split between lunch/dinner, and only at dinner, and the last option left me feeling the best while all at lunch had me feeling the worst.

[hill dweller]

Stavia,

Examine.com details the competition among minerals for the Mg transporters:

TRPM6 and TRPM7 also respond to other divalent cations such as Calcium, Zinc, Manganese, and Cobalt with Nickel being a substrate of both but preferring TRPM6

[SusanJ]

I use Longvida Curcumin and it's recommended on an empty stomach, so best to check the label or with the manufacturer. Probably associated with how they have packaged the Longvida version of curcumin for best delivery.

Hill, tough call on the multi. If you use cronometer or similar, it's probably the best way to tell what you might not be getting enough of and would want to supplement.

Personally I have enough mucked up variants when it comes to vitamin metabolism, I've opted for a multi with comparatively low mineral amounts, but also don't max out the recommended amount (I take half of what's recommended). I view it more as a boost because some of my dietary intake (one example is folate) just won't get converted to active forms very well with my particular gene variants. This strategy has helped me reduce the handful of supplements I used to take, down to a more manageable number.

[Tincup]

When Gundry had me start taking DHEA, I tried it at night. Did not help the sleep. I found that by taking it in the morning, I did not have that issue.

[GenePoole0304]

"Calcium is another mineral that limits the absorption of others, and should not be taken in combination with potassium, magnesium, zinc. Yet calcium is a very common filler for other minerals."

best to avoid any calcium as it removes magnesium and was recently shown to increase heart attacks. Also dairy has a 10:1 or more calcium to magnesium ratio not good at all.