September 2025

Over The Counter

• Should You Use NSAIDs
• Antihistamines – Pros & Cons
• PPI – Use & Side Effects
• Are Supplements Worth The $$?

Over the counter medications and supplements are a multi-billion dollar industry exploiting the pain, weakness, and ignorance of people.

In September, I focus my content on these over the counter meds that are common in most medicine cabinets in America, the ones you reach out for without a second thought. I explain how they work, when using them can be beneficial, and when you want to consider other options.

Are Supplements Worth The Money?

You will find that the supplement aisle is the most crowded, more than the vegetable aisle or the meat and dairy refrigerators.

What you will find on the wellness aisle in your store

The leading dietary supplements are vitamins, minerals, proteins, essential fatty acids, probiotics, bodybuilding supplements, and natural products. 

Vitamins

Vitamins are micronutrients that are essential for many processes in the body, including metabolism and immunity. There are two types of vitamins: 

• Oil-based vitamins – Vitamins A, E, D, and K. If you decide to supplement with oil-based vitamins, you would want to use them with the main meal of the day, as they absorb better when taken with fats.
• Water-based vitamins – Vitamin C, B1, B2, B3, B6, B9, and B12. B vitamins are crucial for energy production in cells.

Minerals 

The body needs minerals to perform many functions, such as sodium, potassium, calcium, phosphorus, magnesium, iron, zinc, manganese, copper, iodine, chromium, molybdenum, selenium, and cobalt. You can find them all in the “Trace minerals” supplement bottle. I use trace minerals only in people who are very depleted after struggling with a chronic condition for a chronic time.

Proteins

Proteins are chains of amino acids that perform structural, metabolic, and regulatory functions in the body. People use protein to recover from illnesses and injuries, lose weight, and enhance memory and brain function.

Essential fatty acids

Essential fatty acids are fatty acids that the body cannot synthesize. Omega-3 fatty acid (alpha-linolenic acid) and omega-6 fatty acid (linoleic acid) are essential to humans, and your body counts on you to supply them in your diet. While omega-6 fatty acids are pro-inflammatory, omega-3 fatty acids are anti-inflammatory. I use omega-3 with many of my clients who struggle with inflammation. Fish oil and cod liver oil provide these essential fatty acids when taken as supplements. However, you can get omega-3 from eating cold-water fish.

Probiotics

Probiotics include the intestinal microbiota, which aids in the digestion and the health of the gastrointestinal tract. The microbes in probiotics don’t bind to the tissue; they just pass through, but by passing through, they lower the risk of constipation or diarrhea while improving immune health.

Bodybuilding supplements

Bodybuilding supplements are another dietary supplement that aid in bodybuilding, weightlifting, and athletics since they help increase lean muscle mass. Most bodybuilding supplements are high in protein.

Natural products

Natural products include  herbs, glucosamine, collagen, and resveratrol..

In the United States, the dietary supplement industry’s overall economic impact in 2016 was $122 billion, and it continues to grow. Much of this growth has been driven by increased consumer demand for health and wellness products. 

There is so much out there. I am confused; What should I take and how much?

The human body developed over six million years; the first supplements, though, were released in 1916, not so long ago. It is unclear if the body knows what to do with supplements we take without the context of food, and how much we do absorb and utilize.

The idea that food is good for you because of the substances it contains and that taking those substances as a supplement can replace deficiencies in the diet is very reductionist. 

A reductionist idea is when you describe a complex system as the sum of its parts. As an herbalist, understanding the body, food, and herbs as holistic entities is the foundation of my work. 

A holistic understanding of the body means that the body is a complex ecosystem that has developed in context with the environmental ecosystem. To read more about how the micro (body) and macro (cosmos) are connected, read my post from last month about the roots of holistic medicine – The Light Of Nature.

Micronutrients, like vitamins and minerals, have a much better chance of being absorbed and utilized by the body when ingested through food than if they are consumed as separate compounds. 

Why is that? 

In any living organism, be it your body or the food you eat, the sum is more than its parts. That happens because the different organs and compounds work together in synergy and balance each other. 

One of the reasons why pharmaceutical drugs or even natural drugs have so many side effects in comparison to whole plant preparations that herbalists use is that they use only what they discern to be the “active ingredient” in its natural or synthetic form, without the other thousands of compounds that are part of the plant. These compounds are essential for the absorption, utilization, and balance of these remedies within the body. 

Many of the foods that are now sold in supermarkets are fortified with vitamins and minerals. The reason is that many of the foods are highly processed, so they lose their nutritional value. For example, most white flours are fortified with B vitamins to replace those vitamins that are lost in the wheat germ processing. 

The idea that if you only add more vitamins, minerals, and so on to your daily intake, you will improve your health does not have any solid foundation to it. Most people who adopt a healthier lifestyle start by adding supplements to their daily intake. Yet, there is no evidence that it dramatically affects their health and well-being. 

One of the reasons we, as a society, are so enamored with supplements is because we hope that we can enjoy good health without making the challenging decisions that accompany a lifestyle change. Yet when you use supplements out of their context, you deprive your body of the roadmap it needs to use these vitamins and minerals. 

Another thing to consider is that when you take a supplement as a capsule, pill, or liquid, you do not experience the taste of the substance you ingest. Tastes are a language. They provide the body with the vital information necessary to use them. 

When are supplements necessary?

Supplements are not a replacement for a whole food, nutrient-dense diet, but they have their place for a limited amount of time if you are healing from a dis-ease and your body is depleted.

The exception to the rule:

Like with every rule, there are exceptions to the rule. There are two supplements that I suggest you consider adding to your daily intake. 

Vitamin D 

You get vitamin D by exposing your skin to the sun. The sun needs to be at 45 degrees to the Earth for your body to create vitamin D from the sun’s rays. You also need to have enough exposed skin and spend enough time outdoors in sunny weather. In all latitudes north of Atlanta, Georgia, you do not get enough sun exposure to produce a sufficient amount of your body’s needs for vitamin D year-round. I recommend adding 4000IU of vitamin D daily.

Magnesium

 Research that analyzed magnesium levels in different vegetables between the 70th and the 90th shows a dramatic drop in magnesium in vegetables. The decline of magnesium in vegetables has to do with industrialized agriculture. If you decide to add a daily dose of magnesium, start with 400 mg. You can grow up to 1000mg. You know that the magnesium you take is too much for your body if you get diarrhea. In that case, reduce your magnesium dosage intake. 

Food is medicine. There is no way to go around this fact. In the modern analytical mind, we can only perceive our body or nature as the sum of molecules or atoms. Life is much more than the sum of its parts. It’s an energy that comes from weaving all the parts into a greater whole. It is magical and mysterious, but also grounded and simple. Eat real food.