General Maintenance Regimen

Summary: For maintenance, use a basic regimen which includes adequate vitamins, minerals, and essential fatty acids, limit intake of starches and sugars, eat plenty of fruits and vegetables, consume adequate protein and good oils, avoid hydrogenated oils, trans fats, and toxic chemicals, and drink plenty of water.

General Maintenance Supplements

WARNING: General Maintenance supplements may provide circulation stimulation, vasodilation, blood thinning, and other effects that can be dangerous if already on meds for these purposes. Before using any of them, check with your MD or, better yet, a medical professional knowledgeable on supplements and nutrition.

1. Multivitamin. Take multivitamins during the day. If they are taken too close to bed, they may interfere with sleep, mostly from the vitamin B12.

2. Multimineral (not necessary if the multivitamin contains adequate amounts of major minerals, especially magnesium.) Separate multiminerals are best taken at night before bed since they are better absorbed when the liver is active, which is at night (around 2:00 - 3:00 AM), plus they are relaxing and stimulate elimination.

3. Essential fatty acid supplement. Since most people do not get enough undamaged omega 6 and especially omega 3 oils, this can be just as important as the multivitamin and mineral.

Some multivitamin, multimineral, and EFA supplement examples are shown at right. The individual sections detail many more which are appropriate.

It is not necessary to follow a rigorous regimen for general health maintenance. If there is a disorder, though, it may be necessary. For example, it is usually only necessary to simply avoid excess sugars, starches, hydrogenated oils, and trans fats, and eat a reasonably good diet, but if there is a disorder, following The Zone and Eat Right 4 Your Type diets strictly may help one overcome it much more quickly. Drinking plenty of water is always helpful to maintain health, but if there is a disorder which requires good hydration and cleansing to overcome it, following The Water Cure strictly may be required. General Maintenance supplements can be helpful or even all that is needed to fight many nutritional deficiency disorders but others require additional vitamins, minerals, herbs, and other supplements. It is always a good idea to avoid absorbing or ingesting toxic chemicals, but strict Toxin Avoidance can be crucial for some disorders.

Multivitamins are typically taken during the day. The B vitamins they contain cause cause sleeplessness if taken too close to bed. Multiminerals relax and aid sleep so they are best taken before bed. Some people need to get adequate calcium and magnesium during the day for conditions like mental disorders, in which case a multivitamin with a good amount of these major minerals might be taken during the day, with a half serving size of the multimineral at night as a booster.

Essential fatty acids can be taken at any time, day or night. They do help mental focus, so some may prefer them during the day, but they are best absorbed at night when the liver is most active, so some might prefer them taken at night. The most often recommended EFA supplements are Jarrow Omega Balance or Enzymatic Therapy Eskimo-3. Again, these are discussed in the EFA Section, along with other supplements that may be more appropriate for some, such as flax seed oil or cod liver oil.

The General Maintenance Supplements page discusses supplements a bit more and gives example combinations of multivitamin, multiminerals, and EFA supplements.