Lets talk Vitamins

[OakLeaf]

Couple of examples that everyone is probably already familiar with but might not be relating, here - one from plant biology, one from human -

* Blossom end rot in tomatoes. Everyone knows how that works, right? The fruit doesn't form properly because of a calcium deficiency in the plant. But it's almost never because the plant isn't supplied with enough calcium. Rather, it's usually either because moisture management issues prevent the plant from taking up enough calcium from the soil, or because excess nitrogen makes the plant outgrow its calcium supply. Lesson: a laboratory deficiency of a nutrient in tissues doesn't mean that a supplement is the cure. Every home gardener knows this about their tomatoes - it's really not a jump at all to human biology.

* Excess calcium/magnesium in humans. You know when you take too much, you start getting those white spots in your nails, right? Which is a sign of zinc deficiency? Except that you aren't deficient in zinc in any "absolute" sense, it's that you aren't getting enough in balance with your calcium and magnesium. Same thing when you're taking calcium out of balance with magnesium and start getting eyelid tics. Or the well-known phenomenon that people who eat a lot of animal products need a lot more calcium because of their high phosphorus intake (the reason why dairy for calcium is a vicious cycle).

Sure, you could go the Adelle Davis route and add zinc, and then copper, and then iron, and keep going in an infinite spiral of just the nutrients you know how to manage, the ones that have even been identified and are available in supplement form, which are really a tiny minority of the literally millions of compounds in food that nourish our bodies. Or you could throttle it all back down to what your body actually needs. Get almost all of it from food and water and exercise and sunshine. I'm not above using supplements, as I said before, and I'm not criticizing anyone who does, but I just think you need to be really, really, really careful with them, and recognize that they are a crutch and a signpost pointing to where we should really improve our diet instead.