Your Immune System Needs More Than Vitamin C
Real immune resilience starts weeks before the sniffles arrive.
Every October I watch the same thing happen in my Mukilteo practice. The season shifts, schedules fill back up, and within a few weeks people are fighting something off they cannot shake.
Most immune support advice is reactive. Vitamin C once you feel something coming on. Zinc lozenges after the fact. These things are not bad but they are not a prevention strategy.
Real immune resilience is built before flu season hits. As a functional medicine practitioner and chiropractor serving patients in Mukilteo and the greater Snohomish County area, here is what I actually recommend to my patients every fall.
Start with food
Before anything else, food. No supplement will outperform a poor diet.
Garlic and onions are powerful antimicrobial foods most people are not eating enough of.
Dark leafy greens are rich in vitamins A, C, and K which directly support immune function.
Fermented foods like sauerkraut, kimchi, and kefir feed your gut. Roughly 70 percent of your immune system lives there. Feed it well.
Bone broth is anti-inflammatory, gut supporting, and perfect for fall cooking.
Layer in sleep
I can’t say enough about the benefits of waking and sleeping at the same time day in and day out, even on weekends. Use a sound machine, earplugs, an eye mask, whatever it takes! Sleep is good medicine, especially when it comes to immunity.
Drop it like it’s hot
Stress, that is. Maybe you need to say no to taking on more. Maybe you need to let go of some of the tasks on your list that really CAN wait. Sometimes we can accomplish a lot more by taking on less.
The four Orthomolecular supplements worth taking seriously this fall
Vitamin D3 with K2 (K Force)
The Pacific Northwest does not get enough sunlight from October through March. Vitamin D deficiency is one of the most common nutrient deficiencies in the Mukilteo area and is directly linked to increased susceptibility to respiratory infections. Most adults benefit from 2000 to 5000 IU daily. Testing first is always better than guessing. Vitamin D helps us absorb calcium; K tells the body to put it in bones and teeth, not soft tissue.
Vitamin C (Buffered C)
At therapeutic Orthomolecular doses Vitamin C supports white blood cell function and helps shorten the duration and severity of illness. Choose a buffered form for better absorption. 1000 to 3000mg daily in divided doses is a good starting point for most adults.
Zinc (Reacted Zinc)
Essential for immune cell development and directly antiviral. The form matters. Zinc picolinate, citrate, or bisglycinate absorb far better than zinc oxide which is what you find in most over the counter products.
Quercetin (OrthoMune)
One of the most underrated immune support supplements available. Quercetin is antiviral, anti-inflammatory, stabilizes mast cells, and helps transport zinc into cells where it does its best work. Paired with zinc, NAC, and vitamins C and D, it is a powerful combination heading into flu season.
The thing most people overlook
You can take every supplement on this list and still get sick every month if you are chronically stressed, sleeping poorly, and eating a diet that inflames your gut. Immune health is whole-body health. This is the foundation of functional medicine, and it is the approach I take with every patient at Well Rooted Lifestyle.
If you have questions about any of the supplements mentioned here, want to know what is right for your specific body, or are ready to build a real immune support plan heading into winter, reach out to me. I would love to help.
Stay well out there. October is too beautiful a month to spend feeling awful.
Rooted in health,
Dr. Stephanie Ferris, DC, CFMC
Chiropractor and Certified Functional Medicine Clinician
Well Rooted Lifestyle · Mukilteo, WA · wellrootedlifestyle.com
Why I recommend Fullscript
Not all supplements are created equal and this is something I feel strongly about. The brands I offer through Fullscript are held to a higher standard of purity, potency, and manufacturing quality than what you will find on most store shelves. When I recommend a supplement to a patient I need to know that what is on the label is actually in the bottle, at the right dose, and in a form the body can actually use. Fullscript gives me that confidence. It is the same reason I carry only practitioner grade products at the practice. Your health deserves ingredients that actually do what they are supposed to do. This is what I take myself and give to my family.
