Vitamins?

I heard somewhere that "one a day" vitamins are almost useless, because you're body only needs so much of the said vitamin at that point in the day and will cycle the rest out, thus leaving you empty later in the day. So you are actually not getting you're full 100% daily value or whatever. I was just wondering what you guys have heard on this matter? I feel like I'm not getting all the vitamins that I need.

I don't know if that's true or not.. but either way it's still better than not taking anything.. [:

Well, it IS true that your body can only use so much of particular vitamins at a time and that the extra will "wash" out of your system. HOWEVER, you're getting some of your vitmins from foods, sunlight, etc. -- the amounts that you're lacking would technically be made up from the vitamin pills. So, say you got 75% of your Vitamin C for the day from your meals. If your multi contained 50% of your recommended daily value, your body would use 25% and the rest would wash out. The vit pill would go in there and fill in the "gaps."

Vitamins A, E, D, and K do NOT wash out. They are fat soluable and they are stored in your body. That's why it's possible to overdose on some of these.

BOTTOM LINE: You don't need the full 100% that the vitamin pill offers. (Of course, it doesn't even offer 100% of all vitamins/minerals.)

You can get vitamins from sunlight? WHOA

Your body can actually produce some of the vitamins it needs itself from other things you take in, and sunlight can be an important part of that process, specificly with vitamin D.  There's a lot of information available on it if you take a look online.

should you take the multivitamins in the morning or night?

That actually depends on the composition of your vitamin supplement. Some are better taken at one time or another, which complete multivitamins don't take into account. The most important thing though is to take them with a meal because the food helps you absorb them.  If you're supposed to take two a day, try breakfast and dinner to spread them out more evenly. If they're once a day, lunch isn't a bad time to take them, splits the difference really.  Mine's a once a day vitamin, but I split it in half so I can take it with breakfast and dinner.

Edit: Oh, I forgot to mention, if the label of the vitamins specifically says with or without food, or a certain time of day, then that's what you should follow. The manufacturer puts those instructions there for a reason. But what I said above is a general rule that you can easily follow on ones that don't specify.