I am heartbroken…and burned I suppose. I was, and still am a huge proponent of the benefits of fish oil supplementation — recently, however, I have been enduring massive acid reflux attacks. I couldn’t figure it out for the longest time. I would get acid reflux regardless of what or when I would eat. I tried avoiding the typical heartburn trigger foods, and stopped eating anything within a few hours of bed. Yet, I still kept getting heartburn.

Then one day, shortly after taking my fish oil pills on an empty stomach, I had a massive reflux attack. I was perplexed, thinking heartburn had to be caused by food or drink, but decided to do a little research. Sure enough, fish oil is notorious for causing heartburn. So much so in fact that they offer “heartburn” free fish oil options. Evidently, they incorporate an emulsifying agent (like vitamin c) in order to nullify the reflux inducing lipids. However, I was not able to find research on the improved or impeded effectiveness of these alternative fish oil options. In the short term, I have resorted to eliminating the pills from my daily routine.

Has anyone tried these heart burn free options? Success? Do you find that they provide the same benefits?

(As a side note, I also find that my fingernails grow far quicker when I’m supplementing with fish oil. Just another interesting finding.)

(I take fish oil predominantly to alleviate joint pain that I feel from multiple knee surgeries — with a fair amount of success.)