Let's Talk Supplements

One of the reasons I was inspired to start low carb in earnest again was because of an awesome promotion Dr. Eades had for Metabosol posted on his blog: http://www.proteinpower.com/drmike/ - 2 free canisters +S/H for people to try it out because there was so little interest before. Well response was *overwhelming* (and I wasn't one of the lucky recipients) but I decided to take a look at the ingredients, and it also was an inspiration for me to hop back on the wagon again.

So the supplements I *have* been taking are as follows:
Glucosamine/chondroitin - for my joints
Fenugreek (2440mg/day) - to combat any Atkins "smell" - makes my sweat smell like maple syrup
Vitamin D3 (1000U) - it used to be vitD/K combo but I have recently run out and I've been taking a VitD/VitA combo
L-lysine (500mg) - antiviral, just in case.
Multivitamin - 'cuz everyone's supposed to take a multivite... right? Well that's the dogma at least.
Olive leaf extract (I'm just using this one up and will discontinue afterwards. This is a product of the family legacy. Can't just throw stuff away - have to *use it up* first, even if the consumption is meaningless. sigh.

Well tonight while procrastinating on a job application I decided to do research on how to make my own Metabosol. A one month supply goes for $90 and I am going to try to make a feeble attempt at matching the ingredients with stuff found on Luckyvitamin.com. Here's what I came up with:

Health Plus - Super Fat Burner with Garcinia Cambogia - 180 Caplets ($28.31)
   (this supplies half of the chromium, the garcinia, and the L-carnitine)
Advanced Research - Calcium Aspartate 350 mg. - 100 Tablets ($7.78)
   (this supplies the L-aspartic acid in the basic form - plus extra calcium to boot)
Solgar - Chromium Polynicotinate 200 ug. - 50 Vegetarian Capsules ($18.96)
   (this supplies the other half of the chromium - I don't know the reason for polynicotinate vs. picolinate, but I'm going to go on faith on this one)
NOW Foods - Biotin 1000 ug. - 100 Capsules ($3.47)
   (this is for the biotin in the mix. I checked my multivite and it supplies only 10% of the recommended biotin and nowhere near what is in Metabosol)
Good 'N Natural - B-2 (Riboflavin) 100 mg. - 100 Tablets ($3.40)
   (see note for biotin)

By the way, when it was all said and done, I spent an *obscene* amount of money on supplements in this order. Granted, I was buying a bunch of other things, and I tend to purchase stuff for at least 3 months at a time. There's no guilt on this end. But anyhow, the skinny of it is:

I costed this for a month supply of supplements and it is $29.40 per month for the equivalent of Metabosol. I'm sure it's not going to be nearly as convenient, it is a *ton* of pills, it isn't in powder form so there's the question of proper absorption, and if I were to order these things from any other site it would be more expensive than just buying the Metabosol (and lucky vitamin has questionable supply chain management) but for the time being, it should do the trick for a bit cheaper. When my pallet gets trucked in from Luckyvitamin the experiment will begin.