The Medications, Vitamins, Minerals and Supplements I Take

This page was updated on August 24, 2020.

This is where I will keep the list of medications, vitamins, minerals and supplements I take or have taken, what they are/were for and how they affect/affected me.  I will try to keep it as current as possible.  It is more for me than anything else, but it might give you an idea of where to start medication, vitamins, mineral and supplement-wise if you've recently been diagnosed.  Please remember, though, that what works for me might not work for you, and (if you're on medications, vitamins, minerals or supplements for other things) some of the things I take might interfere with something you're already on, so do your research!
  

Also, I am NOT a doctor, and I wouldn't recommend taking medication, vitamins, minerals or supplements without talking to one, so PLEASE don't just go out and buy products without talking to your doctor FIRST.  If he/she doesn't know what vitamins, minerals or supplements would benefit you AND gives you the ok to research it out and take them, then ask your pharmacist (or nutritionist if you have one) because chances are they will.   My pharmacist even told me what time of day would be best to take them to get maximum benefits from all my medication, vitamins, minerals and supplements.  Just make sure that you tell them what medications, vitamins, minerals and supplements you are already taking so they give you the best advice possible.  Bottom line: Keep an open line of communication between yourself, your doctor, your pharmacist and your nutritionist (if you have one).  It'll ensure you are able to be the healthiest you can be!

Medications:



Levothyroxine 88mcg Tablet

• Levothyroxine (88mcg): This is NOT a Fibro med.  I take it for Hashimoto's Thyroiditis.  I take this a least 1/2 an hour to an hour before I eat anything in the morning.  

Coreg 3.125mg Tablet

• Coreg (3.125mg): This is NOT a Fibro med.  It take 2 of these twice a day (so 4 pills total as of end of August 2020) with food/milk for a heart arrhythmia issue that includes tachycardia.  Note: I spoke with the cardiologist on June 1, 2020, and she did not note any dangerous arrhythmias.  She did note a few skipped beats, but again, didn't see anything dangerous.  She thinks what I'm feeling (palpitations, breathlessness, etc.) may be related to something hormonal and has advised me to see an endocrinologist, which I will do after speaking with my primary.  She did not, however, tell me to stop taking the Coreg, and I will keep taking it as it does seem to be helping, until I am told to stop it in future by my primary or another doctor.

Vitamins, Minerals and Supplements:

Flaxseed Oil Tablet 1,000mg

 

• Flaxseed Oil Tablet (1,000mg): I decided to add this back into my diet in August of 2017.  I take one of these daily at lunch time, later if I forget to take it with lunch.  I take this to help reduce my stiffness and inflammation and increase mobility.  It also has Omega-3 which was good for my heart, and Flaxseed Oil is rumored to help with high cholesterol and blood pressure, and it is even said to aid in weight loss and digestion according to some researchers.  I had stopped taking it in April of 2017 to see how I would do off of it since I made such improvements with my diet and health, but decided that I should try adding it back in due to my cholesterol levels being higher than we'd like and due to my blood pressure being up higher (but not high by any stretch) since going off of it, and because I want to see if it helps with my weight loss journey and my overall health.  I do feel better back on it, and I do feel like I am getting around a little better again (i.e. less stiffness, though that wasn't bad without it).  If I have any easier bruising/more petechiae due to adding it back in, however, I will have to remove it again.  Sometimes my dosage is more than 1000mg.  I have taken as much as 1500mg.
  
  
• Baby Aspirin (81mg): This is NOT a Fibro med.  I have added this back into my daily routine as of May 2020 after a possible TIA to help prevent blood clots because I am positive for 1 copy of the Factor V Leiden mutation and for heart health.  I take it about lunch time daily.  I had stopped taking it in June of 2017 when a hematologist recommended I stop taking it until I needed it for other issues (i.e. developed a blood clot, had a heart attack, was in my 60s) as he concluded it was adding to my easy bruising, was possibly making my petechiae worse, and because I have not had a blood clot in my past.  Obviously, the time is now for me to start taking it again unless the situation changes.
  

One of my favorite herbal teas

• Tea (all herbal types - though I try to avoid ones that say "natural flavors" on them):  As of May 2020, I have stopped drinking all caffeine containing beverages, and I have not even had decaffeinated beverages.  Instead, I drink mainly water, but I do have several herbal teas that I enjoy from time to time, and I use them for different reasons.  As a general rule, as mentioned above, I avoid teas that contain "natural flavors", and opt for ones that clearly label each ingredient they contain.  For more about some of the teas I drink or have drunk in the past but cannot any longer (that applies to anything containing caffeine), and what I drink them for, check out this page. 

Probiotic Acidophilus (0.5mg/100+ million active cultures)

• Probiotic Acidophilus (0.5mg/100+ million active cultures): This is something I added in April of 2014 to help with overall health/digestion.  I take it at lunch time, later if I forget to take it with lunch.  I have found that if I don't take it, I definitely notice more digestion issues (anything from diarrhea to indigestion to heartburn and more), so I definitely plan on keeping it in my diet.
    
• Saline Spray: I also use saline spray to help with nasal dryness.  I can use it as many times a day as I feel necessary (an allergist told me I could use it every hour of every day if I wanted), but generally use it twice a day (when I wake up and before bed).  I find that saline spray also helps clean out the nose and helps with my overall health, especially during seasonal allergy season and cold/flu season.  I definitely have less cases/shorter durations of colds and seasonal allergy flare-ups when I use the saline spray at least twice a day, and I also find that I have less sinus infections (I went from about two a year requiring an antibiotic to generally less than 1 a year requiring an antibiotic).

I buy my vitamins (when possible) from Puritan's Pride.  They have a lot of vitamins that are allergy-friendly (including the probiotic I take), so I highly recommend them!  Their prices and sales are great, too!  In fact, I can't find a probiotic cheaper anywhere else.  Definitely worth looking into!

Recently Removed Medications, Vitamins, Minerals and Supplements 

• Norvasc: This is NOT a Fibro med.  I took this for arrhythmia.  After discussing this medication with the doctor and the feeling that it may be lowering my blood pressure too much (I was having some dizzy-type spells), we decided to remove it for now and do an event monitor to see if we can capture the arrhythmia issue and determine if it's an irregular heart beat of some type or something else.  It is possible it is something totally harmless and that taking a medication for it could be doing more harm than good, so we shall see.  I'll let you all know.  For now, I have been off of it since 3-23-13 and the dizziness has not happened.  I am hopeful that we found the cause of those episodes and that the event monitor will be able to tell us more about what is going on with my heart, if anything (I don't have the monitor yet - I'm waiting on the referral).  Update 4-16-13: I will NOT be doing the event monitor for now since all of the problems I was having with dizziness and racing heart are GONE since stopping the Norvasc and since the insurance will not cover the event monitor.  If I start to have issues in the future, I am most likely going to have the testing done, but for now we are just grateful that stopping the medication seems to have fixed the issues I was having.    

• Green Tea Extract (315mg): I took one of these daily at lunch time, later if I forgot to take it with lunch.  I took it because of its great anti-oxidant properties and to help improve my overall health.  On April 24, 2016 I removed it from my regimen because I felt it was no longer needed.  I had no change in my condition/health after removing it.
    
• Multivitamin: I took 1 adult multivitamin daily at lunch time, later if I forgot to take it with lunch.  I stopped taking it in June of 2016 as I was having trouble finding one without soy in it, and soy really messes with my system.  If I find that I'm feeling too blah without it, I will search for a soy-free one again and take that, but so far I've only noticed that I feel better, so I believe removing it was a good thing for me. 
     
• Vitamin D-3 (1000IU): I took one of these daily at lunch time, later if I forgot to take it with lunch.  It was to help with my overall health.  I stopped taking it on August 24, 2016 as we are suspecting that it is giving me a false high LDL level as all my other cholesterol levels are amazing.  So far, I am doing ok off of it, but may add it in again in future if it is needed and we determine that it is NOT causing a false high high LDL level.  Update: I did notice a decrease in my LDL level since removing this with no change in how I feel, so I am still not taking this.
    
• B-Complex and B-12: I took one of these daily at lunch time, later if I forget to take it with lunch.  This was to help with my energy level more than anything.  I stopped taking it in April of 2017 to see how I would do off of it since I made such improvements with my diet and health.  So far, so good, but I will add it back in future if needed.
    
• Magnesium (250mg): I took one of these daily at lunch time, later if I forget to take it with lunch.  This was to help with my general Fibromyalgia symptoms.  I stopped taking it in April of 2017 to see how I would do off of it since I made such improvements with my diet and health.  So far, so good, but I will add it back in future if needed.
    
• Turmeric (400mg): I took one of these daily at lunch time, later if I forget to take it with lunch.  This was to help with inflammation and (possibly) with any digestive issues and moodiness/depression.  I stopped taking it in April of 2017 to see how I would do off of it since I made such improvements with my diet and health.  So far, so good, but I will add it back in future if needed.
     
• Meloxicam (15mg): I took this once daily IF I need it for pain.  This medication could wipe me out sometimes, but it helped a lot with mobility and eased the pain quite nicely, though normally it was not 100% effective in removing joint pain, just muscle pain and/or headaches.  Because I have not taken this in several months, I have moved this medication to "removed", though I do still have the prescription for it.  I now take an ibuprofen for any headaches, body aches, etc. as needed (I may take an ibuprofen once every other month) for now.  If I start taking this on a once-a-month basis or more, I will move it back to my medication list.
     
• Caffeinated Coffee: I used to drink this for brain fog/trouble focusing, asthma/congestion and/or a headache as needed.  This did not work for me as a preventative measure, so I only drank coffee when I was dealing with symptoms.  I stopped drinking coffee in all forms in November of 2016, though occasionally I will drink a very small amount of decaf coffee (maybe once every few months).
     
• Hydrochlorothiazide (25 mg):  This is NOT a Fibro med.  I took it once a day as needed for water retention.  I had to remove this in May of 2018 due to a sunlight sensitivity that caused easy sunburning even when wearing sunblock and a petechial rash.  I may have to re-add this at a later time if my water retention issue begin again and I can't find another water pill to take.  I tried to add this again in October of 2018 only to not only have the same sunlight sensitivity, but also heat sensitivity that lead to a lot of itching and Restless Leg Syndrome, so I removed it from my rotation again.
    
• Spironolactone (half of a 25 mg pill): This is NOT a Fibro med.  I took it once a day as needed for water retention.  In July or August of 2018, I had to remove this after less than a week taking it due to severe, unpleasant side effects (heart palpitations where my rate got over 120, asthma-like symptoms, insomnia, and some other not-so-fun issues, too).
  
  
• Water Pill with Potassium: I started taking this herbal water pill in the beginning of August, 2019 to help with water retention and took it 3 times a day (at mealtimes).  I stopped taking it on August 31, 2019 due to some possible health issues that arose from it (the doctor and I believed it may have changed my urine acidity which caused some very unpleasant issues).  Though not 100% certain that the pill is to blame, the timing of the issues coincide with the addition of the pill and are too coincidental to be ignored.  These issues, coupled with the fact that it was not very effective, helped me to decide not to continue taking this particular pill anymore.
  
  
• Tart Cherry Juice: I used to drink between half a Cup to a Cup of this once a day in the afternoon.  I took it for insomnia, inflammation and overall health.  I added this into my daily routine in September of 2019, and removed it in May of 2020 because it seems to be too much sugar for me and brings out my arrhythmia.  I am going to be looking into a tablet version of this, and will replace the juice with it when I find a good one.
  
  
• Sparkling Water, Original and Unflavored.  I used to drink the 12 oz. (or larger) serving recommended of this once daily in the afternoon.  If I couldn't find the unflavored, I would get the flavored, but it has to be 0 calorie with no sweetener of any sort added to it (generally it will be lemon or lime flavored).  I drink it to help with water retention and digestion.  I added this into my daily routine in September of 2019.  {Note: The unflavored one works the best for me, so I try to get that one whenever possible, though I do like the taste of the lime one best.}  In May of 2020, I stopped drinking this on a regular basis.  I do still drink it from time to time, but rarely and not often enough to keep it on my list.
  
  
• Elderberry Sambucus, 1250mg equivalent.  I was taking 1 tablet daily of this in March of 2020 to help boost immunity.  Though I may take it again when there is illness in the house (so from when illness starts to about a week after it ends) or start taking it during flu season (like September to April), I am not taking it often enough to keep it on my list.
  
  
• Zinc, 50mg.  I took 1 tablet daily of this in March of 2020 to help boost immunity.  Though I may attempt to take it again (daily or every other day) when there is illness in the house (so from when illness starts to about a week after it ends) or during flu season (like September to April), I may not as it seemed a bit too much for my system to handle, and it may have been a contributing factor in my arrhythmia issues, though that seems less likely since the issues lasted long past when I stopped this supplement and long after I began it.  

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Note: If you are looking for more information on drug interactions with herbal supplements or if you are just looking for more information on vitamins, herbs, botanicals, etc. in general, I encourage you to take a look at this page from the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center.  You can type in the herb, vitamin, botanical, etc. that you want more information on, and it will give you lots of information from where it is found in food, what drugs it can interact with, possible side effects, etc.  It can really help you make an informed decision, and give you what you need to be able to talk with your doctor intelligently about natural supplement ideas for your treatment plan.