vitamin D?

I've been implementing Peat's ideas to my diet. Lately, it's been high in fruits, dairy (milk and cheese), rice, gelatin/bone broth, not too much meat, liver every other day or so, shellfish whenever I can get it (so far, once a week).

I have digestion issues milk that has vit A and D added, but I can tolerate milk with nothing added. I log food onto cronometer, and when the milk isn't fortified, vitamin D intake is way low. Is this a concern? Right now I drink UHT skim or low-fat milk.

I eat full-fat goat cheese right now, it's the only cheese I can get without enzymes.

Any advice would be appreciated.

The problem is that the Vitamin D is fat soluble and to a large extent removed with the milkfat. So you want to test your blood vit D level and supplement appropriately.

Best source of vitamin D is sunlight. RP recommends getting sunlight before 11
am and after 3 pm to avoid excess UV radiation. Here is a good article on
how to get vitamin D from sun
http://www.vitamindcouncil.org/about-vi ... ody-needs/
If your blood test shows low vitamin D3 you will need extra calcium to lower PTH.

Thanks for this. I live in tropical climate and can easily get plenty of sunlight. My concern was getting too much, as I've tanned quite a bit since moving here. I don't turn pink or burn even a few hours in the sun.

It is believed that there is an internal mechanism that prevents you from making
toxic level of vitamin D from sunlight.This does not happen with supplement.
Your only concern should be avoiding excess ultra violet rays.
The link i gave you is a good guide on vitamin D and sunlight.

Mittir said:

Best source of vitamin D is sunlight. RP recommends getting sunlight before 11
am and after 3 pm to avoid excess UV radiation. Here is a good article on
how to get vitamin D from sun
http://www.vitamindcouncil.org/about-vi ... ody-needs/
If your blood test shows low vitamin D3 you will need extra calcium to lower PTH.

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Good link Mittr!

So from the sounds of it, for winter in the UK there's no way I can make enough vitamin D even if I exposed my face/arms/legs to the light every day.

Does 5,000 IU per day sound reasonable for this location/season? I don't want any risk of toxicity, I'd rather go on the low side than high.

And if supplementing D, are there any essential supplements that must go with it to balance it out/stop depleting others (for example E, K, A, and how much)?

@Bluebell
RP recommends a vitamin D3 level in the middle of reference range.
Doctors are good at fixing D3 level. You have to start with measuring serum D3
then you find a dose that keeps that level within healthy range.

Here are some RP quotes

VITAMIN D
I use Carlson's, and I think most of the informed people are recommending about 2,000 units per day. John
Cannell's site, "the vitamin D council," has a newsletter, and is a good way to keep up with the vitamin D research

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If you don't get much sunlight, and during the winter, a
vitamin D supplement is necessary to use the calcium effectively

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In the winter I use vitamin D, but only on my skin in an oil.

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*2000 IU is based on oral dose. Absorption through skin is much lower.

Lol, this is the first time I hear Peat argue something based on what "most of the informed people" say. I guess this is the recommendation to be most skeptical about, although it may still be right.

According to ur skin color and degree of sun exposure you might need as much as 5000-8000iu a day for months to be able to increase your levels of D3 considerably , try and get a form already In OIL its much better and usually taken with a fatty meal . Be sure to eat leafy green to have a nice level of K2 to help D3 fix properly.

I just read an article from paul stamets whom I remember from a ted talk. The article is about creating vitamin D rich mushrooms using uvb. From the article it says that this process creates D2 "ergocalciferol". Is this kind of vitamin D useable in the body? I've read many articles in the past regarding the dangers of D2, but I'm pretty sure they were talking about the synthetic form patented by big pharma. There seems to be some posts on the forum linking d2 to hair loss, so would it be wise to just discard this article. Has Ray mentioned d2 vs d3 in any of his articles? I'm not thrilled about taking the d3 supplement every winter, and it would be nice to know there's a food aside from grass fed butter I could use if I'm in need of a vit d boost and don't have access to uvb wavelengths.

http://www.greenmedinfo.com/blog/place- ... -vitamin-d

My 25 OH D3 came back at 24 ng/mL, way low, despite drinking a quart and a half of raw milk per day for the last two years, so I've been reading up on it.

The Wiki page is fairly good. It suggests that very deficient people might need a loading dose and has a link to a good study about loading doses of D3. Large weekly or biweekly doses for several weeks were effective.

It also seems pretty easy to avoid overdosing. 40,000 IU/day for 12 weeks and 10,000 IU/day for 7 years may have been on the edge of OD. Those are huge doses, obviously.

The vitamin D council page says face and arms are not enough to get D from sunlight, you have to expose the torso for a proper amount of time. They also say it isn't possible to get enough D3 from food, it's either sunlight or supplements.

I was surprised and disappointed that my test came back so low, it was 40 a couple years ago and I thought my diet was giving me plenty. Not so. I'd say that anyone who doesn't work as a lifeguard or hasn't been taking supps could do 40,000 IU once a week for 6 weeks without any risk and then go to a daily maintenance dose.

What is most disappointing is that D3 is probably one of the easiest nutrients to get right. There is a contrarian view that one forum member has written about, but notwithstanding that we know the best form, it's cheap, dosing is straightforward, and serum levels reflect something meaningful.

24 ng/ml is a great value! Is there any particular reason why you would supplement vit. D, like high PTH? If it's just the number then more may not be better.

Just a few questions based on what you're saying:
- When it was 40 ng/ml couples years ago you were supplementing at the time?
- Why do you think D3 is probably one of the most nutrients to get right?
- What's the reason exposure to arms and face isn't sufficient? (link to a study maybe?)
- What meaningful would a vitamin D 25D test reflect?

Like our ancestors were living in full sun, weren't wearing any clothes, had a clean skin? I think they were living in forests mostly, were dirty most of the time, were wearing some protection and certainly not using supplements .

I hope you don't mind me butting in here but I've been wondering about something. I've given up on finding a suitable local d3 supp without silicon dioxide and I'm getting more sunlight which according to a few studies I looked up, at 26 degrees south, sunny climate, will be enough for vit d year round if you get about 20 minutes of sunlight at midday. But it seems that even the most supplement-averse on this forum still take a d3 supp. Is it because where they are, the latitude/climate makes it not possible to get enough vit d this way? Or am I missing something important and unlikely to succeed with this route? Thanks for reading

Suikerbuik, a normal range for 25 OH D of 32-100 ng/mL is broadly accepted and Peat has explicitly referenced that range and the vitamin D council. At this point I follow his recommendations because 1) everything he has said that I was skeptical about at first has turned out to be right and 2) I don't have the vocabulary or background to evaluate the validity of biochemical studies for myself so I have to rely on others' advice. Sorry, but in a Suikerbuik vs RP contest I am going with Ray.

Sueq, Dan's toxinless page has some recommendations for clean D3. I am using the Nature's Answer drops in olive oil, just because I found them at a local store and they are a fairly high dose.

Speaking for myself, I am not too keen on walking around outdoors half naked. There is also the issue of harmful UVA exposure at midday. If the vitamin D council is right and we cannot get enough D from food, supplements are the only alternative.

BinDing, I'd go for Peat too then . Still, recently I even saw Peat mentioning GcMaf in some thread (vitamin D binding protein). Suggesting he too is open for new understanding and treatments for 'chronic diseases'. Anyway I don't try to convince anyone else about what I am saying. Just try to make people thinking about the subject for themselves.

Sueq, questions are always welcome ofcourse.
What you’re saying is something I’ve been struggling with too. It is indeed peculiar that so many people have issues with their vitamin D.
I do think people can make enough vitamin D from sunlight at almost every latitude, except close to the poles. Nowadays people can be so bussy that spending time out in the sun isn’t an option, true. In that case I’d say, if you haven’t even got 30 minutes to enjoy some outdoor activity, why even bother about such thing? Luckily for most this isn’t the case, but unfortunately still suffer ‘vitamin D deficieny’.

What is also obvious is that even people supplementing (seemingly sufficient doses) can be deficient, or will very soon be deficiënt again after stopping supplementation. And that many people living at latitudes close to the equator (but living a western lifestyle??) also suffer vitamin D deficiency.

There’s a correlation between disease severity and vitamin D levels. There’s also a correlation between vitamin D and cancer survival/ severity. These things make people think that vitamin D will prevent such happenings. I don’t think so, the regulation behind Vit. D is complex, but this regulation determines your blood value, rather than insufficient intake from food or sun in most cases. Correlation is not necessarily causation.

Vitamin D is regulated mainly by cyp24A1 (24 hdyroxylase) and cyp27B1 (A1 hydroxylase). Cyp24A1 causes the break down of 1,25D and 25D, and Cyp27B1 converts 25D into 1,25D. These 2 enzymes including the vitamin D receptor (VDR) are regulated by various processes such as stress, oxidative stress (low thyroid, PUFA, etc.), hypoxia, inflammatory molecules, nutrients (calcium and phosphate mainly) and more. All these processes influence the blood’s vitamin D levels. Probably, after seeing what the vitamin D receptor is capable of, this is some kind of protective mechanism by the human body – this is even literally suggested by some studies.

25D ‘antagonizes’ 1,25D and the ratio often seen in low vitamin D states is abberant (high 1,25D to 25D). This, with a potential range of microbial substances capbale of antagonizing the VDR, interfering with the normal feedback mechanism leading to higher 1,25D. 1,25D likely has affinity for other hormone receptors that could be a factor in hormonal issues often seen in diseases. Along with preliminary but recent studies seeing very little benefit of vit. D suppletion. I would not supplement with it.

So when using vitamin D supplements you’re interfering with body’s processes in ways we don’t yet understand. It is even suggested that on the long run (chronic suppletion) it may even work against us and there’s yet, not even a single study, that admits it is factor in curing diseases while it’s being found low. So without decent follow up of the patient, without sufficient evidence and without checking the 1,25D, we’re on the edge of some easy nutrient in my opinion. Although it's cheap, more is not better.

Go after it yourself hypoxia, low thyroid, oxidatuve stress, inflammatory states all induce cancer and chronic disease. And all these factors cause a shift in the balance in vitamin D metabolism, so it’s not strange in chronic disease and cancer you’ll find a low vitamin D level. Fix the above and not the vitamin D deficiency with supplements, but do eat real Foods and get some sun exposure, this may even produce a soluble form of vitamin D (j. posted a link somewhere).

A note on PTH: When your PTH is high you induce cyp27B1 transcription, leading to more 1,25D that should increase your calcium uptake and repression of the PTH, via VDR. In such cases increasing calcium intake is advised and not vitamin D. When this doesn’t do anything, check out 1,25D, if it’s high, supplementing 25D is probably not going to help and in fact will intefere with other processes. There are studies showing that as low as 25 nmol/L (aprox. 10 ng/ml) is sufficient for enough calcium uptake, at least if your food contains enough. (Peat inspired diet with egg shells and milk should).

Edit: make the range 20-45 ng/ml. If I recall right above 50 ng/ml mortality rates increase.

Thank you for this. Many of those bad things eg hypoxia and inflammation are issues for me. I dont find it impossible to get more sun at various times of day and do feel better for it. I also love milk. I think I'm going to carry on with more sun and calcium and addressing the other underlying issues and see if that helps.

I'm not convinced that ingested vitamin D is a significant problem as there are many foods that contain it anyway. Not that dosage might not be important.

Also the idea you can't get too much vitamin D from sunlight seems a little bit shaky since life guards in hot climates get the type of kidneys stones associated with excessive vitamin D.

there are many foods that contain it anyway

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So if there's many foods that contain it (in NATURAL amounts) why supplement?

Also the idea you can't get too much vitamin D from sunlight seems a little bit shaky since life guards in hot climates get the type of kidneys stones associated with excessive vitamin D.

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Great, finally someone else convinced that vitamin D levels seen in lifeguards is NOT representing ideal health (and thus shouldn't be a target value). The idea is to just get 30 min to an hour of sun per day.
Preferably not between 12 A.M. and 15 A.M. in mid-summer (for most climates) - however it's difficult to provide specific information about this, since most people live in different climates.

I thought getting sun between 12 and 3 was for vitamin d? Other hours for red light but not "D"? Or are midday, mid summer rays too harmful?

When talking about mid-summer and a clear sky (high radition). Being out there for >20 min without any protection is not recommended (t-shirt is okay and offers quite some protection). Usually 10 minutes is sufficient to give you the necessary amount of vitamin D in these conditions.