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Comment by wiggler00m | Hacker News Reader

Why supplement magnesium instead of getting it from dietary sources?

If you are self-experimenting to figure out if X nutrient makes a difference, supplements are vastly easier to work with. Dietary changes are far, far more complex and introduce many confounding factors.

If you establish that, yea, verily, magnesium helps, dietary changes to make sure you get enough magnesium can make sense.

I used to take about $300/month worth of supplements of various sorts. I no longer do so and haven't for years. I just note that "Based on x, I need more of thus and such." and tailor my diet to get what I need.

You didnt read the article. From the article:

> Magnesium has been largely removed from processed foods, especially refined grains, in the Western world,

"Dietary magnesium intake has steadily declined over the preceding century, due to...(b) making dietary choices low in magnesium-rich foods such as whole grains, rice and wheat bran, nuts, seeds, chocolate, peanuts, peanut butter and green leafy vegetables..."

If the root cause is insufficient dietary magnesium -- due to poor dietary choices -- eating foods that are rich in magnesium, and cutting out refined foods, might be a good start. It would have other benefits, too.

I don't like to see people taking tons of supplements whilst eating poorly.

You seem to be extrapolating that since refined grains do not contain Mg, no foods do. This is not the case. OP can eat other foods instead of processed grains to obtain Mg.

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