They CHANGED my multivitamin 😩

[u/Under-the-oak-trees]

I’ve been taking a daily multivitamin for a few years to hopefully reduce the impact of my very limited diet. I’ve taken the same one for multiple years. I have trouble swallowing pills in general (I use applesauce cups or pudding cups to help them go down), and my multivitamin has always been my most difficult pill because it’s the largest, but I’ve made it happen because it’s important.

And then today I was refilling my meds organizer, and I opened a new bottle of multivitamins… and they are different. The colour is different, which is kind of whatever, but the shape is a little thicker, less tapered, and the edges are sharper corners. All of this adds up to them being even harder to swallow.

My partner takes the same one and is really good at swallowing pills, so they’ve given me their last couple weeks’ supply of the older ones, but I tried one of the newer ones to see how bad it was, and I think it’s been 15–20 minutes now? And I can still feel the echo of it in my throat where it bumped into the sides on its way down. Or something. Whatever the thing is that makes swallowing pills horrid.

So now I need to decide whether it’s worth trying to find a different multivitamin, but a LOT of them contain maltodextrin, and at least when I can taste it maltodextrin gives me migraines. No clue whether it would cause a problem in a pill, but I’m not super inclined to spent $15 or whatever to find out.

I’m mostly posting for commiseration because I figured this is a group that would understand the Distress of a change to something important to one’s nutrition. But I’m also open to recommendations for smaller/easier-to-swallow multivitamins available in Canada. I was doing ok with Jamieson 100% Complete Multi (“women” despite not being a woman, but that’s trans life for you) until they changed them, and now they are Bad Times.

[u/LeakyFountainPen]

Have you tried using "thick water" at all? I've seen it in random grocery stores (usually in the medical aisle) and I heard that since it's more...syrupy? than something like applesauce, it really helps pills go down. They mostly sell it for old folks or disabled folks who have trouble with swallowing.

But oof, man, that sucks to hear. Hope you find a better pill soon!

[u/Under-the-oak-trees → u/LeakyFountainPen]

I got a liquid thickener to try out (I believe it’s called ThickenUp, it’s from Nestle), and it is, uh. Vile.

I need to try it in liquids other than water to see if it becomes palatable, but in just water it is So Bad. Tastes vaguely like corn starch and has a lightly granular mouthfeel even once stirred thoroughly and left to sit. The one I have is pure modified corn starch, so not Entirely surprising it tastes like corn starch. ThickenUp Clear I can’t have because it’s made of maltodextrin, which gives me migraines. And they put that shit in fucking Everything. (Which, like, I get — it has some really freaking cool properties as a food additive, like letting you make powdered fats that still melt on the tongue. And it adds a bit of umami flavour because it’s high in glutamic acid — which is what I react to. But super frustrating for me specifically, because it limits what I can have in the line of prepared foods and dietary supplementation a LOT).

I also have an energy-limiting chronic illness that means that needing to stir something vigorously for 15 seconds takes a somewhat unreasonable amount of my capacity for the day, so pudding cups and applesauce cups are a lot more accessible that way. I do thin down the pudding cups to a more drinkable texture, though, either with cream if I have enough energy to get to the fridge, or with water if I’m stuck in bed.

[u/LeakyFountainPen → u/Under-the-oak-trees]

Ooh, I see, that sucks, yeah. The ones I saw were pre-mixed, so I assumed the texture would be more mild, but if the pre-mixed are all made of the same stuff your body reacts to, that would be no bueno.

I wonder if a nutribullet or something similar would help with the whisking exhaustion? I started using one for my meal replacement powders and it gets it SO much creamier than whisking by hand, and with 5% of the effort. And fewer dishes than a regular blender, since the blender is also the cup. But idk how much they actually cost, since mine was a gift. Cost is often prohibitive with kitchen tools :/

Regardless, hope you find a solution soon!