When choosing a multivitamin, it’s important to understand the nuances between a wellness ritual that is an investment in your future or just an expensive habit with little to no effect.

Ritual has gone to great lengths to dream up a science-based daily multivitamin for women and their Essential for Women is the result. Ritual’s formula is designed to help fill the gaps in your diet with key nutrients in ideal forms. Their supply chain — like their packaging — has an emphasis on transparency.

We asked the Ritual team to break down some of the complexities behind vitamin forms and how they work, and what they shared is compelling. You may never look at the supplement aisle the same way again — and that’s a good thing…

4 Surprising Truths About Vitamin Absorption

THE TRUTH ABOUT CALCIUM | You may know that the majority of women age 19-50 are actually getting enough calcium through the diet. While calcium takes much of the credit, the science shows that other nutrients are also helpful when it comes to supporting bone health. To help support calcium metabolism, we need sufficient amounts of Vitamin D and Vitamin K. Ritual’s Essential for Women includes calcium-helper nutrients, including Vitamin D3, Vitamin K2, magnesium, and boron to help support bone health.

A B VITAMIN YOUR BODY CAN USE (FOLATE) | Sometimes your body can better use nutrients in the same molecular forms that are found in your cells and healthy foods. The B vitamin folate is an excellent example. You’ll often see folic acid (a synthetic form) in supplements instead of methyltetrahydrofolate (the nature-identical, active form). This can be problematic, as up to 40% of women aren’t able to fully utilize inactive folic acid to activated folate forms like methyltetrahydrofolate. Ritual doesn’t use folic acid; instead, they chose to use the bioavailable form, 6S-5-Methyltetrahydrofolate (5MTHF).

BORON: A HELPER NUTRIENT | This often ignored nutrient is a calcium-helper nutrient. The Institute of Medicine hasn’t set a daily value for boron, but research has shown that boron helps support bone health.

THE TRUTH ABOUT OMEGA-3 FATTY ACIDS | There are over 13,000 studies on Omega-3 intake and many in connection to brain health and heart health. But there are actually 3 types of Omega-3 fatty acids: ALA, EPA, and DHA — DHA research has been growing. Yes, vegetarian sources like flaxseed, soybean, and canola have omega-3 fatty acids, but they’re only rich in ALA. Your body can only convert a very small percentage (about 5%) of ALA to DHA and EPA. That’s why Ritual uses 330 mg Omega-3 with DHA in their Essential for Women.

THE FUTURE OF VITAMINS IS CLEAR.
For just $30 a month, Ritual is our go-to for a daily multivitamin our bodies actually know what to do with.