Vitamin A Suggestions And My Current State Of Thyroid

[matisvijs]

Stay away from beta-carotene, Ray has talked about it's anti-thyroid, anti-metabolic effects on many podcasts. I would also be wary buying regular vit. A that's extracted from cod liver oil - recently ordered some and the whole bottle smelled like rancid fish oil, so I assume there is still some oxidized n-3 fats in there.

 

[BigChad]

Stay away from beta-carotene, Ray has talked about it's anti-thyroid, anti-metabolic effects on many podcasts. I would also be wary buying regular vit. A that's extracted from cod liver oil - recently ordered some and the whole bottle smelled like rancid fish oil, so I assume there is still some oxidized n-3 fats in there.

Would vitamin e be a way to counter any beta carotene from a multivitamin or foods?
Also what about retinyl palmitate/retinyl acetate in dry tablet form. Those should be safe other than any potential filler ingredients in the capsule?

 

[matisvijs]

Would vitamin e be a way to counter any beta carotene from a multivitamin or foods?
Also what about retinyl palmitate/retinyl acetate in dry tablet form. Those should be safe other than any potential filler ingredients in the capsule?

Beta carotene conversion to vitamin A depends on thyroid function and vitamin B12, so supplementing T3+vit.B12 are the more likely candidates for countering it. Haven't seen anything on vitamin E countering that, I don't think beta-carotene can be saturated by vit.E like PUFA can.
If the vitamin A capsules are made from gelatin, then they're fine, though a lot of times the vit.A in those capsules is extracted from cod liver oil, like I mentioned before.

 

[BigChad]

Beta carotene conversion to vitamin A depends on thyroid function and vitamin B12, so supplementing T3+vit.B12 are the more likely candidates for countering it. Haven't seen anything on vitamin E countering that, I don't think beta-carotene can be saturated by vit.E like PUFA can.
If the vitamin A capsules are made from gelatin, then they're fine, though a lot of times the vit.A in those capsules is extracted from cod liver oil, like I mentioned before.

I meant tablets like solgars retinyl palmitate dry tablets. They are composed of dicalcium phosphate and cellulose. The source may be synthetic, i thought most retinyl palmitate and acetate is synthetic?

Btw is 60mcg of methyl b12 enough to counter 125mcg beta carotene, 1mg lutein and 300mcg lycopene? Not sure how to counteract small amnts of lutein lycopene i read magnesium, zinc, iron and calcium reduce absorption of carotenes, carotenoids and lycopenes

 

[matisvijs]

I meant tablets like solgars retinyl palmitate dry tablets. They are composed of dicalcium phosphate and cellulose. The source may be synthetic, i thought most retinyl palmitate and acetate is synthetic?

All the tablets I've seen on the market generally have silica as one of the excipients. Here's a good clip of Ray Peat talking about toxicity of cellulose and silica in supplements:



So I'd personally wouldn't go for tablets over capsules for any supplement. Can't you just get an OTC retinyl palmitate in liquid form at your local pharmacy? Cost me under 2$ for a couple month supply, seems to be the best route to take when it comes to vit.A supplementation.

 

[BigChad]

All the tablets I've seen on the market generally have silica as one of the excipients. Here's a good clip of Ray Peat talking about toxicity of cellulose and silica in supplements:



So I'd personally wouldn't go for tablets over capsules for any supplement. Can't you just get an OTC retinyl palmitate in liquid form at your local pharmacy? Cost me under 2$ for a couple month supply, seems to be the best route to take when it comes to vit.A supplementation.

Do you drink it or topically apply? I was going to ingest the vitamins.

Btw do u mind checking my previous post again i added a few other things.
Thanks for the link and info

 

[matisvijs]

Do you drink it or topically apply? I was going to ingest the vitamins.

Btw do u mind checking my previous post again i added a few other things.
Thanks for the link and info

I don't think anyone could tell what amount of B12 supplementation would be able to counteract a specific amount of beta-carotene unless they were somehow able to precisely measure your thyroid status (which is difficult to do by today's methods) and knew your current B12 status (and absorption rate of supplemental B12), oral absorption of B12 supplements is really low, something below 2% if I recall correctly. Why do you need to injest the beta-carotene in the first place? I guess the best approach in this situation would be just to go by the colour of your palms - if they have an orange tint to them, that would be a sign that the beta-carotene is not being converted and is causing metabolic slow-down.

 

[BigChad]

I don't think anyone could tell what amount of B12 supplementation would be able to counteract a specific amount of beta-carotene unless they were somehow able to precisely measure your thyroid status (which is difficult to do by today's methods) and knew your current B12 status (and absorption rate of supplemental B12), oral absorption of B12 supplements is really low, something below 2% if I recall correctly. Why do you need to injest the beta-carotene in the first place? I guess the best approach in this situation would be just to go by the colour of your palms - if they have an orange tint to them, that would be a sign that the beta-carotene is not being converted and is causing metabolic slow-down.

Great. Do you know anything regarding green tea extract, lutein, NAC, and lycopene, if they are similar to beta carotene.
I use a life extension multivitamin, mainly for b vitamins and a small amount of chromium zinc. One capsule contains 30mg egcg, 1.2mg lutein, 250mcg lycopene, 125mcg beta carotene and 50mg nacetyl cysteine

 

[matisvijs]

Great. Do you know anything regarding green tea extract, lutein, NAC, and lycopene, if they are similar to beta carotene.
I use a life extension multivitamin, mainly for b vitamins and a small amount of chromium zinc. One capsule contains 30mg egcg, 1.2mg lutein, 250mcg lycopene, 125mcg beta carotene and 50mg nacetyl cysteine

Well I wouldn't worry about the carotene too much, 125mcg is a pretty small amount, a carrot contains something like 40x that. The cysteine is a negligible amount also, you'll get more in a piece of ham - most of these things are put into multivitamins to just make them appear more complete with very minimal added cost - in those dosages they have pretty much no effect. Don't know much about green tea extract or lutein (other than it should supposedly improve your vision). Remember reading studies on lycopene as a protective substance against prostate cancer but that was years ago, I think they used doses in miligrams.

 

[BigChad]

Well I wouldn't worry about the carotene too much, 125mcg is a pretty small amount, a carrot contains something like 40x that. The cysteine is a negligible amount also, you'll get more in a piece of ham - most of these things are put into multivitamins to just make them appear more complete with very minimal added cost - in those dosages they have pretty much no effect. Don't know much about green tea extract or lutein (other than it should supposedly improve your vision). Remember reading studies on lycopene as a protective substance against prostate cancer but that was years ago, I think they used doses in miligrams.

Lycopene and green tea EGCG are confirmed 5 alpha reductase inhibitors. Lycopene is in soms fruits and veggies, tomato watermelon.

30mg green tea extract from what I've read, is the amount in 1/4 or 1/2 cup green tea

 

[BigChad]

Why do you think vitamin A supplements are necessary for thyroid health? Peat stated for hypothyroid people 5,000 a day is plenty, and the RDA is 2,000.

Rda used to be 5000IU for many years but recently in 2019 was lowered to 3000IU from what ive seen. Theyve changed a lot of rda values in 2019, not sure of the reasonings. Iron remains at 18mg yet zinc lowered from 15 to 11mg, copper lowered from 2 to 0.9mg which makes no sense. Selenium lowered from 70 to 55mcg, chromium lowered from 120 to 35mcg, molybdenum from 75 to 45mcg.

 

[Sumbody]

Rda used to be 5000IU for many years but recently in 2019 was lowered to 3000IU from what ive seen. Theyve changed a lot of rda values in 2019, not sure of the reasonings. Iron remains at 18mg yet zinc lowered from 15 to 11mg, copper lowered from 2 to 0.9mg which makes no sense. Selenium lowered from 70 to 55mcg, chromium lowered from 120 to 35mcg, molybdenum from 75 to 45mcg.

I feel like most processed pre-packaged foods are fortified with a bunch of stuff these days, so maybe the thinking is that you need less because of all the vitamins and whatnot that are added to most of the foods that folks eat on the Standard American Diet.

I want to thank all of you for your replies. At the time I was experiencing a huge vitamin A deficiency which was due to a severe case of SIBO causing extreme dysbiosis. My eyes were not working properly at the time, and taking the large doses of vitamin A for roughly 3 weeks or so helped to resolve that issue.

I have since taken steps to improve that condition and am moving forward.

Thanks yall!

 

[BigChad]

Stay away from beta-carotene, Ray has talked about it's anti-thyroid, anti-metabolic effects on many podcasts. I would also be wary buying regular vit. A that's extracted from cod liver oil - recently ordered some and the whole bottle smelled like rancid fish oil, so I assume there is still some oxidized n-3 fats in there.

Weird ive bought entire bottles of omega 3 fish oil and never got the rancid smell even after 6 months? They did have natural mixed tocopherols listed as last ingredient in the list.

Isnt ray okay with beta carotene to some level since he promoted the raw carrot? I believe daily

Retinyl acetate or palmitate is good? These are synthetic made