my vegan prenatal supplement protocol
this post is for all the (vegan) pregnant mamas out there. you are amazing & i’m here to share my fave vegan prenatal supplements with you so you can glow on in this awesome chapter of life!
(Head to the bottom of this post for all the supps in one spot!)
(Post majorly updated in July 2021).
Since announcing about our fam's changes that happened in October 2018 (and fast-forward to the future: you can read about home birth story for my son HERE!), I thought I would go into more detail on what my supplement protocol looked like as a pregnant vegan mama. I was completely vegan with my first pregnancy, but did things much differently this time around when it came to the supplement part (nutrition still much the same). So if you or someone you know is currently vegan + pregnant, I hope this post will come in handy for you!
Disclaimer:
I must first say that although I have my degree in nutrition, I am doing what works for my body & simply sharing my journey with you. Before making any changes and if you have concerns, please seek a healthcare professional (although I personally wouldn't consider heading to the doctor seeing as they only have about half a credit—if that!—in nutrition ;).
I've learnt a lot in the six year gap between pregnancies which has allowed me to come to a place of feeling awesome and confident about my day-to-day supplement practice, so let's get into it!
THE MAIN SUPPLEMENTs:
A GOOD COMBO PACK THAT COVERS ALL YOUR BASES
THE WINNER: THE sakara FOUNDATION PRENATAL
Sakara's The Foundation: Prenatal is the ‘one stop shop’ for all your prenatal needs. If you’re a glow mama like me, then you only want to be using the purest supplements & that’s what these are. Whole food ingredients, clean, plant-based, medical grade, and doctor formulated with each ingredient in its most bioavailable form.
These supps are rigorously tested for purity and potency, and the raw ingredients + finished supplements go through seven rounds of testing to ensure they are effective and free of common allergens and impurities.
Here’s a rundown of the standards + what each of the 7 supps are for:
As a bonus, you can get 20% off them if you’re a first time Sakara customer. Just click the button below and use this code at checkout: GLOWWITHCHARSAKARA
THE RUNNER-UP: doterra LIFELONG VITALITY
Lifelong Vitality (LLV, for short) is a great choice for your prenatal supplement protocol and let me tell you why... (Please note: LLV comes in a vegan & non-vegan version. I will only be talking about the vegan version here.)
These are doTERRA’s supplements and although they are an essential oil company (which you know I use + love!) this is actually their top-selling product!
I’m here to tell you why this system actually doubles as a beautiful prenatal + I'll go through the breakdown of their uses in the 3 different supps you get:
Vegan Microplex VMz: This is your balanced formula of essential vitamins and bioavailable minerals aka YOUR MULTIVITAMIN (read more on why bioavailability is important below!)
Alpha CRS+: Contain polyphenols to protect cells from free radicals that can damage cellular DNA aka YOUR NEW ENERGY + CELLULAR SUPPORT SUPPLEMENT! This is the supplement that people immediately notice changes with (from an energy standpoint⚡️)
vEO Mega (v stands for vegan): Your essential fatty acids to help support heart and circulatory health, brain health and immune function aka YOUR OMEGA BLEND. Delivered from plant-based algaes (microalgae astaxanthin) + others like flax seed oil, borage oil, DHA from algae, Incha Inchi, and more. Think: baby's developing brain!
How I like to take them: I split the doses up into 2; first half dose (6 pills—2 from each bottle) at breakfast or lunch and then second dose (6 pills, 2 from each bottle again) at lunch or dinner.
And are you ready for the BEST part in all of this?! The supplements contain a "tummy tamer" essential oil blend in them. Help with the queasiness that can come with supplementing. Plus, I love how unique it is for having essential oils in them.
Ok, I’m sure the question you are dying to know about these doTERRA supps before we move onto the next prenatal area is...
Do these supplements provide enough folate for growing babe (especially since they’re not labelled/identified as a ‘prenatal’)?
I'm quoting this directly from Essential Oils for Pregnancy, Birth & Babies by Stephanie Fritz (LM, CPM):
"Most supplements contain folic acid (synthetic) that needs to be converted to 5-methyltetrahydrofolate (F-MTHF, aka methyl folate) & the body can only metabolize so much - it plateaus at 400 mcg. If you're supplementing more than your body can process, you get un-metabolized, unusable folic acid floating around your body competing for transportation with the good stuff. LLV contains the perfect amount for your body & the body metabolizes 100% of the amount. Plus, using diet to fill in any gaps - there are a lot of foods fortified with folic acid, not to mention going right to the source for folate with dark leafy greens!"
This really helped me out, but take note of a folate option below if you're still unsure.
To learn more about LLV, check out this resource I put together on them + when you’re ready to purchase:
By getting these supps, then you’ll also have access to the purest essential oils + all other products at 25% off! To make sure you’re connected with me, here’s my wellness advocate #: 2843422.
Ok, I am done talking about this first vital step in the prenatal supplement process!
OTHER SUPPLEMENTS TO CONSIDER:
GENTLE IRON
Next up...iron. As a vegan, iron stores typically tend to be on the lower end (many years ago when I first went vegan, I got my blood work done and I was in the low end of the normal range, which is TOTALLY ok!), so supplementing here is never a bad idea, especially during pregnancy. One thing to note about iron though and why source/quality matters: when you increase your intake of iron, it can make you constipated. Hopefully you're eating a fiber-rich diet anyway, but just something to consider! That's why I decided on a supplement which is "non-constipating" (their words, not mine ;) by Solgar.
Side note: LLV provides 6mg of iron + this supplement of 25mg to get to 31mg. Consider doubling up on this supplement to get into a good pregnancy range, if worried!
Other side note: I had my blood work done on 03/28/18 (3 months into pregnancy) and my results came back in the healthy range for iron and that was with taking one of these pills along with LLV daily.
FOLATE (AN OPTIONAL SUPPLEMENT)
Folate is the one supplement you can choose to add in, but optional. Now I totally get if you need that extra insurance here… your body is changing and you want to make sure you're doing everything you can to help baby grow, which is why I opted to get a bottle of it (in 800mcg), but here's how I used it and also a change I would have made:
I would downsize from 800mcg to 400mcg (with the bioavailability of folate in Sakara & LLV, you do NOT need an additional 800mcg). You are already getting enough from your main supps, but if you feel like you need more, then 400mcg is more than enough. (The body only needs 600mcg during pregnancy.)
If you have the 800mcg bottle instead of the 400mcg one, you can take this pill every 2-3 days instead of everyday.
Solgar brand, yet again! See the trend?? ;)
DHA + EPA (OMEGA) OIL
Although there's an omega supplement in the main supplements above, I opted to add in additional omega oil—especially in the third trimester when baby's brain is developing at a rapid rate.
I love Dr. Furhman's DHA + EPA because it contains long-chain omega 3 fatty acids, and it's very palatable. I took it under my tongue, every other day, but again, upping daily in the third tri.
(Just a reminder: Our diets are normally overloaded with omega 6s vs. omega 3s. We need to consciously try to bring down our omega-6 intake to make it more balanced (plus, too much omega 6 is pro-inflammatory); it should be a 1:1 ratio. The misconception is to simply 'up' your omega-3 intake to then match the omega-6 intake, but this is false evidence. There's no showing that this is actually beneficial for the body & now you're just overloading on BOTH ends. Having said that... the reason for the increase in omega-3 consumption in this case is obviously for supporting the baby's growth, but the omega 3/6 debate is VERY much a hot topic these days that I wanted to make note on!)
BONUS: Pair your omega oil with vitamin B12 (which I cover next) - they seem to work better this way (not in a bioavailable way), but in synchronicity. Just some food for thought!
VITAMIN B12
Vitamin B12 is a requirement when vegan whether pregnant or not (I chat more about that in this post). This is the one vitamin that is VERY hard to get in a completely vegan diet but also in a regular diet—unless you're eating foods fortified in it—so it’s a great supplement for everyone to consider taking.
I more recently found Vimergy Vitamin B12 and although I didn’t get to use it during pregnancy, it’s the one I HIGHLY recommend now (and ps- it’s the only one we use today!)
Vimergy’s B12 is a unique blend of methylcobalamin and adenosylcobalamin. It's highly absorbable, alcohol free, and tastes good. You can take 2 droppers, 3-4x/week.
A runner up is taking this sublingual Vitamin B12 supplement. We've had tablets with as much as 1000mcg, but as I'm reading more (always researching the best for health!), I'm seeing that taking this daily is TOO much. You would only need this amount 2x a week and I took it more often than that. Plus, too much Vitamin B12 can trigger acne-like symptoms in some people, which I've experienced a bit of, but can't tell whether it was related to this or pregnancy hormones. Let's just blame the hormones—it's much easier that way ;)
(Solgar brand again and as you can see from the above picture, we scaled down to this version to take daily. Note: the 500mcg is NOT flavoured and not as palatable as the 1000mcg. Something I will definitely consider next time I purchase.)
PRE + PROBIOTIC
(Ignore this supplement if you decide to go with the Sakara prenatal or double down by adding in extra & read on to learn why.)
I don't think I understood the importance of probiotics in general back when I was pregnant with my daughter vs. my son’s pregnancy, but now I am a VERY regular probiotic consumer and here's why...
Gut health is much more important than we realize. Plus, if you've been on antibiotics lately or grew up on them, there's a chance that your gut flora could STILL be repopulating itself. Plus, we can't bank on (vegan) yogurt for our daily probiotics needs. We would need upward of 50 single-serving containers PER DAY to meet our requirements. So let's do our guts a favour and add in a little probiotic action ;)
The two probiotics above are doTERRA's PB Assist+ & Sakara’s Probiotic. BUT, if you caught the title about PREbiotics too, they are just as important as the PRObiotics and these supplements have you covered. Prebiotics are basically fuel for the probiotics, to help it get delivered fully intact to where it needs to go. Both of these supplements contain them!
I like to take one probiotic per day right before bed. Or up to 2-4 per day if you’re needing extra gut support (maybe you were on antibiotics recently or tested positive for Group B Strep during pregnancy—which I did!)
VITAMIN D3 (VEGAN)
So Vitamin D is a funny one and more personal, but I still wanted to include what I'm doing. When I got my first round of bloodwork done in my second pregnancy, it came back as deficient in D (ironic right...I live in FL☀️). However, looking at the values, I was just outside of the normal range. My midwife suggested I take 10,000IU everyday of D to help get back in the normal range, but I thought that was excessive. I also (at the time) did not realize that there was a vegan form of Vitamin D3 (from lichen); I thought the only vegan version was available in a D2 (but my midwife was recommending a D3 source). Luckily, I discovered mykind organic chewable vegan D3 and felt good with 2,000IU. Plus, this chewable is seriously like candy. It's a total treat to take! I took one daily as well as trying to get out in the sun for more natural exposure (ie: chest, arms and face uncovered with no sunscreen for at least 30 minutes).
For more on (vegan) vitamin D, check out this awesome PDF.
BONE NUTRIENT COMPLEX
And finally...as a female, AND aging, AND being pregnant, I only felt it right to add in a Bone Nutrient Complex. It contains calcium, magnesium, and vitamin D to promote healthy bones. It says on the bottle to take up to 4 capsules per day, but in all honestly, that would have put me at taking 20 pills a day, so instead, I would normally wake up, take 1-2 and call it a day. I wasn’t as consistent with this supplement (whoops!).
Side note: This one is a personal choice, but I don't see any harm in proactively taking care of the body as you get older and I truly do believe this is a good supplement option to be taking, especially as a female.
AND THAT’S IT!!!
Holy smokes—we did it! We made it to the end. This turned out to be a little more heavy than I originally thought, but hey, maybe you are completely at a loss on what to do with your vegan pregnancy, and this helped!
And like I said, I have had many, many years to brew over the information and research I've collected + the changes I've made within the past two years (mainly relating to the high-quality supplements I use) in hopes that it can also help someone else as much as it has helped me.
So if you are looking to switch out/get started with supplements, proceed on. Also, I am happy to answer ANY of your vegan supplement questions you may have. Just pop them below in the comments below or send me an email!
