iThei mdcdaelcinfd o c elllllrllll ThofthThseWhile some may wish to obtain these supplements from natural whole-food
sources due to gut issues, people with Hashimoto’s usually have an impaired
ability to extract vitamins and minerals from food. I recommend taking a
supplement in the beginning and continuing until gut function is restored.
Supplements are not created equally, and many multivitamin tablets have
questionable absorption profiles. I don’t like recommending one-a-day–
type vitamins because they don’t consider how the vitamins interact with
one another. For example, vitamin C taken with iron improves the ab-
sorption of iron, while iron taken with zinc decreases the absorption of
zinc. Thus, providing just the RDA of zinc when only 50 percent of it
will be absorbed is not effective in overcoming a severe zinc deficiency.
Some vitamins and minerals need to be taken with food to promote ab-
sorption, others on an empty stomach.
Supporting Hormone Production
Adaptogenic Herbs
Adaptogenic herbs comprise many natural herb products that supple-
ment the body’s ability to deal with stressors. In the 1940s, Dr. Nikolai
Lazarev defined adaptogen as “an agent that raises the body’s ability to
resist stress by countering undesired stressors, whether physical, chemi-
cal, emotional, or biological.”
Most adaptogens have been used for thousands of years in Eastern medical
practices such as Ayurveda and traditional Chinese medicine (TCM).
A variety of herbs can be used as adaptogens and can be formulated by
herbalists for specific patients based on the symptoms.
To be considered an adaptogen, an herb must possess several qualities.
First, it must be nontoxic to the patient at normal doses. Second, the
herb should help the entire body cope with stress. Third, it should help
the body to return to “normal,” regardless of how stress is currently affect-
ing the person’s functioning. In other words, an adaptogenic herb needs
to be able to both tone down overactive systems and boost underactive
systems in the body. Adaptogens are thought to normalize the hypotha-
lamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis.
Adaptogenic herbs include ashwagandha, astragalus, reishi mushroom,
dang shen, eleuthero, ginseng, jiaogulan, licorice, maca, schizandra, spike-
nard, and suma. These are examples of herbs that may increase the body’s
ability to resist stress, and they have been helpful in relieving adrenal dys-
function when used in combination with vitamins and minerals.