Philosophical Vegan Forum

Hello, everyone

I became a vegan about a month ago. Prior to that, I had been a pescatarian/vegetarian for about seven years. I haven't been feeling well lately, so I plugged a day's worth of my food intake into Cronometer and discovered that I was not meeting many of my nutritional needs, namely omega-3, certain B vitamins, calcium, and so on. I have made dietary adjustments to try and meet these needs, but I am a (poor) graduate student and I'm looking for the most cost-effective way to consistently meet my nutritional needs on a vegan diet. So, I've started looking into multivitamins. I'm wondering what longtime vegans' recommendations would be for a daily multivitamin. I have found many multivitamins on iHerb.com, some with iron and some without, and I'm just not sure what would be best.

I would like to see a doctor, but unfortunately I just moved to a foreign country and I'm still in the process of getting health insurance. In the meantime, I need to take action as my symptoms have started to affect my day to day life.

Here is a link to screenshots of my food diary from October 4 if you think it would be helpful for your recommendations:
http://imgur.com/a/zoxXz
*Edit: I didn't specifically eat a few of these things, like tahini or the Trader Joe's cookies. I ate their Japanese counterparts and input those for convenience's sake.

Thank you for any help/support/etc. you can provide!

Becky

I hadn't supplemented for many years, but just started up with Deva multivitamins. I don't know if you can get it where you are. For omega 3, add in flax meal or flax oil. Crushed chia seeds will work as well. Also, nutritional yeast is a powerhouse when it comes to nutrients and will certainly boost your B vitamins.

RaspbeckyBeret wrote:but I am a (poor) graduate student and I'm looking for the most cost-effective way to consistently meet my nutritional needs on a vegan diet. So, I've started looking into multivitamins. I'm wondering what longtime vegans' recommendations would be for a daily multivitamin. I have found many multivitamins on iHerb.com, some with iron and some without, and I'm just not sure what would be best.

If you're a woman, you probably want one with Iron, particularly if you bleed a lot. If you're a man, it probably doesn't matter, but you might want more Zinc for similar reasons.
Deva makes a pretty good vegan multi.

For calcium, if you don't drink fortified plant-milks, and you don't eat many greens, you can find a generic calcium based antacid at any pharmacy, and take one of those a day. Not with the vitamin or a protein rich meal, since calcium neutralizes stomach acid and interferes with absorption.
You don't have to eat tahini (unless you like it). Tahini is very low in Omega 3 and high in Omega 6, as well as high in methionine. While delicious and a good source of calcium, I wouldn't call it a health food.

In terms of diet, make sure to eat a lot of beans and legumes, and nuts and seeds (many of which can be pretty cheap), and limit grains (particularly limit rice and corn, which are low in nutrition, choose oats and wheat instead). Make sure you eat enough calories.

RaspbeckyBeret wrote:I would like to see a doctor, but unfortunately I just moved to a foreign country and I'm still in the process of getting health insurance. In the meantime, I need to take action as my symptoms have started to affect my day to day life.

What are your symptoms?
If it's happened so fast, it's less likely to be caused by diet unless you aren't eating enough protein or fat, or just not enough calories. Issues with vitamins and minerals usually take longer to appear.

Make sure you're getting vitamin C. Sometimes a very cheap diet can be lacking.

RaspbeckyBeret wrote:Here is a link to screenshots of my food diary from October 4 if you think it would be helpful for your recommendations:
http://imgur.com/a/zoxXz
*Edit: I didn't specifically eat a few of these things, like tahini or the Trader Joe's cookies. I ate their Japanese counterparts and input those for convenience's sake.

You aren't getting enough protein. I know it says you are, but when you eat a lot of fiber (which is a good thing) absorption isn't as great, and that's really more of the bare minimum to not die. You should probably aim for 100 grams a day.

You should eat some canola oil (low erucic acid rapeseed oil) for Omega 3. That's the easiest way. Or Walnuts. That will also help you with vitamin E.
You can probably drop the avocado to save money.

What else on your list is the most expensive? I think we can save you a few dollars a day.
Since you're in Japan, take advantage of the fermented soy products like nattō that are cheap and readily available there.

Your multivitamin should have enough vitamin D if you get a little sun too. Otherwise, you might want to take a vitamin D2 as well, since it just barely has enough.

brimstoneSalad wrote:For calcium, if you don't drink fortified plant-milks, and you don't eat many greens, you can find a generic calcium based antacid at any pharmacy, and take one of those a day. Not with the vitamin or a protein rich meal, since calcium neutralizes stomach acid and interferes with absorption.
You don't have to eat tahini (unless you like it). Tahini is very low in Omega 3 and high in Omega 6, as well as high in methionine. While delicious and a good source of calcium, I wouldn't call it a health food.

Wow, I didn't know that I could take an antacid for calcium. Thanks so much for the tip! Very helpful. I actually am eating nerigoma, which is similar to tahini but not quite the same. I need to input its nutritional information into Cronometer. I'm just eating it because I like it, haha (^^;) I used to love Japanese sesame seed dressing but since it has milk in it, I've replaced it with nerigoma.

brimstoneSalad wrote:What are your symptoms?
If it's happened so fast, it's less likely to be caused by diet unless you aren't eating enough protein or fat, or just not enough calories. Issues with vitamins and minerals usually take longer to appear.

Make sure you're getting vitamin C. Sometimes a very cheap diet can be lacking.

Well, I feel short of breath and fatigued, my heart races, and I get headaches every day. I have trouble focusing and feel easily agitated, too. I think it's possible that I'm not getting enough quality sleep, too. I'm not sure. I just want to be as healthy as possible!

brimstoneSalad wrote:You aren't getting enough protein. I know it says you are, but when you eat a lot of fiber (which is a good thing) absorption isn't as great, and that's really more of the bare minimum to not die. You should probably aim for 100 grams a day.

You should eat some canola oil (low erucic acid rapeseed oil) for Omega 3. That's the easiest way. Or Walnuts. That will also help you with vitamin E.
You can probably drop the avocado to save money.

What else on your list is the most expensive? I think we can save you a few dollars a day.
Since you're in Japan, take advantage of the fermented soy products like nattō that are cheap and readily available there.

Your multivitamin should have enough vitamin D if you get a little sun too. Otherwise, you might want to take a vitamin D2 as well, since it just barely has enough.

I didn't know that about fiber and protein. Thank you for telling me! I will try to up my intake.

I wish I knew where to get walnuts inexpensively. I really love them but they're so expensive here in Japan. My cheapest options for nuts are peanuts and chestnuts.

Hmm... let's see... well, peanut butter is very expensive here, so if you know of somewhere online I could get cheap peanut butter, that would be a life saver for me. It's like my all time favorite food, so I'm not really willing to give it up, haha (^^;) I'd love some cheap snack ideas, too, because all I've been eating are peanuts and I'd like some variety. I do occasionally buy date bars and SoyJoy Crispy bars but both of those are seriously overpriced.

Thank you so, so much for your tips. SO very helpful to me!

Sapphire Lightning wrote:I hadn't supplemented for many years, but just started up with Deva multivitamins. I don't know if you can get it where you are. For omega 3, add in flax meal or flax oil. Crushed chia seeds will work as well. Also, nutritional yeast is a powerhouse when it comes to nutrients and will certainly boost your B vitamins.

Unfortunately, many of these things are not readily available in Japan If I could buy them online for a reasonable price, I certainly would!

You should be able to find rapeseed oil pretty easily.

You can make your own peanut butter from peanuts using a small blender (hand blender or bullet style). It won't be pure peanut butter (it will include a little water or oil to get it blending) but it will have the taste, and you can get it pretty thick. Kind of a creamy peanut sauce.

RaspbeckyBeret wrote:Well, I feel short of breath and fatigued, my heart races, and I get headaches every day. I have trouble focusing and feel easily agitated, too. I think it's possible that I'm not getting enough quality sleep, too. I'm not sure. I just want to be as healthy as possible!

Some of that may be inadequate sleep. You may be anemic too, you would have had to have already been borderline anemic before.
Make sure to eat plenty of lentils and other high iron foods, and eat them with vitamin C. Avoid tea or coffee (or calcium) when eating, since those can interfere with absorption. The iron in the multivitamin will probably help too.

brimstoneSalad wrote:Some of that may be inadequate sleep. You may be anemic too, you would have had to have already been borderline anemic before.
Make sure to eat plenty of lentils and other high iron foods, and eat them with vitamin C. Avoid tea or coffee (or calcium) when eating, since those can interfere with absorption. The iron in the multivitamin will probably help too.

Anemia is possible.
The multivitamin that I want to buy is out of stock until October 27th Darn! I guess I'll have to wait until then. I will try to up my iron intake in the meantime. Also, can rapeseed oil be bought at the average grocery store, or should I look in a specialty shop?

RaspbeckyBeret wrote: The multivitamin that I want to buy is out of stock until October 27th Darn!

Which is it?
You can probably just go to a pharmacy and pick up some vitamins. Bring your phone or something to translate. Most tablets aren't made with gelatin anymore, but capsules are.

RaspbeckyBeret wrote: Also, can rapeseed oil be bought at the average grocery store, or should I look in a specialty shop?

It's a common cooking oil. You might way to put it into Google translate and memorize the kanji. You can also look for the picture of the flowers, and then try to translate.

Probably this: 菜種油
or possibly: キャノーラ油

Pictures of the flower may be on the bottle.
http://www.canolacouncil.org/media/510010/flower150.jpg

If it's a Chinese import, you'd be looking for 菜籽油 (note the similarity)

brimstoneSalad wrote:Which is it?
You can probably just go to a pharmacy and pick up some vitamins. Bring your phone or something to translate. Most tablets aren't made with gelatin anymore, but capsules are.

It was one of the Deva multivitamins, but I'm happy to report that they restocked a different Deva multi and I purchased that I have to say, though, that I had a lot of difficulty when I was looking for alternate multivitamins. Almost all of them had gelatin, bee/honey products, or fish products in them