My supplement stack, and why Friend of Dorothy made the cut

If you read my gym routine post, there's a hard line in there: no specific supplements I'd recommend universally, save your money. That's still my view for most readers, most of the time.

The natural follow-up question is what I personally take, given that I'm a working male performer with travel hours, late nights, and a job that demands recovery — and whether that "save your money" line meant "literally nothing." It doesn't. There's a small short list, and most of it comes from the same UK brand: Friend of Dorothy.

Below is what's actually on my shelf and why. This is not medical advice; supplements are not a substitute for a doctor, and your situation is not mine. Talk to your GP before adding anything new, especially if you're on prescriptions or have any chronic conditions. With that out of the way —

Disclosure. I pay for these myself. This post is not sponsored, no affiliate links, no kickback from FOD. If that ever changes I'll update this disclosure first. I'm writing about them because they're what's on my counter; if a better option comes along I'll switch and write about that instead.

Why Friend of Dorothy in the first place

I came across FOD through other UK creators and tried a single trial pack before committing to anything bigger. A few things made them stick:

• Ingredients are listed and the active doses are real, not the "fairy-dust dose" of clinical-sounding ingredients you find in cheaper brands.
• GMP-certified UK manufacturing. Supplement quality control is wildly inconsistent worldwide; UK GMP standards are at the higher end of what's available.
• Subscription pricing isn't a trap — you can cancel any time without the fight you usually get. I tested that on purpose before committing to a longer plan.
• Discreet packaging. Not a moral argument, just useful: I get packages in shared building lobbies and hate the shouting-from-the-box thing some wellness brands do.
• They publish doctor-led content alongside the products (a podcast with NHS GPs, registered nutritionists, fitness coaches) instead of pretending the products themselves are research papers. That posture is the right one.

That's the brand-level reason. The product-level reasons are below.

The four things I actually take

1. A daily multivitamin: BIG D ENERGY

A men's daily multivitamin with a greens blend (spirulina, spinach, centella) and adaptogens (lion's mane, reishi, ashwagandha) folded in. Cheeky name, sensible formula.

Why I take it: travel and shoot weeks wreck nutrition. I'd rather have a reliable floor of B-complex, vitamin D, and basic antioxidants every day than try to white-knuckle it from food on the road. The adaptogens are an extra; the lion's mane and ashwagandha specifically have decent sleep-and-stress evidence in the literature, which I care about more than any of the testosterone-adjacent claims.

If you only take one thing on this list, take a daily multi. This one is fine, but a generic men's multi from any reputable brand would also be fine. Consistency matters more than the bottle.

2. A volume + libido stack: Volume, Power & Endurance Trio XXL

This is the bundle: three formulas (zinc + magnesium + moringa for volume; black maca + ashwagandha for libido; seaweed + iodine for cardiovascular and prostate support). Two-month supply, vegetarian capsules.

Why I take it: my job has specific physical demands and the components here (zinc, magnesium, ashwagandha) are well-studied at clinically meaningful doses. Zinc and magnesium are the two minerals most performers I know test low for; bringing those back into normal range is not a "boost," it's just not running on empty. The maca and ashwagandha pieces have noticeable stress and recovery effects within a few weeks for me — I can't tell you what's placebo and what's real, and I don't pretend to.

I started with the trial-size Mini Gummies pack below to make sure I tolerated the formula before paying for the full XXL two-month supply. That's the order I'd recommend if you want to try it without overcommitting.

3. A fiber supplement: BOTTOM XXL

Psyllium husk + flaxseed powder + aloe vera. It's a fiber capsule. The positioning is gay-male-specific (the "less prep, more spontaneity" pitch), but the underlying mechanism is the same fiber-supplement mechanism every gastroenterologist on earth recommends if you're not hitting your fiber target from food.

Why I take it: most people don't get enough soluble fiber. I'm one of those people. Daily psyllium is one of the better-studied, lower-controversy supplements there is, and the digestive regularity it produces does double duty given the kind of work you can probably guess from the rest of this site. I'd rather take a clean capsule with a known ingredient list than the random store-brand fiber knock-off at the chemist.

If you're already eating 30g of fiber a day from oats, beans, and leafy veg, you don't need this. Most of us aren't.

4. The trial pack — Mini Gummies — Volume + Vitality Trial Pack

Not really a fourth supplement so much as the way I'd suggest starting with this brand. The trial pack is the gummy version of the same volume + vitality formula in the Trio above (zinc, rose hip, vitamin C). Two gummies a day, cheaper than a starter month of the capsules, runs out fast enough that you know whether you tolerated it before committing to a longer subscription.

If you've never tried any of this, start here. If you finish the trial and feel nothing, you've spent the price of a takeaway and you're done. That's the right way to vet any new supplement, FOD or otherwise.

What I don't take from FOD (or anywhere else)

For honesty's sake — there's a longer list of things I've tried and dropped:

• Pre-workouts. Caffeine is fine. The rest is noise, and most of the high-dose stim formulas hit my sleep harder than they help my lifts.
• Testosterone-boosting pills that aren't actually TRT. If your testosterone is low and a doctor says so, see the doctor. If it's normal, these don't move it. I don't take any.
• Erection-support stacks. I don't have an issue there and I don't recommend taking something for a problem you don't have. If you do, see a doctor — there are real prescription options that work and are studied, and a supplement is not a substitute for that conversation.
• Anything I can't find at least one independent published study on. This is the line for me. If the only "evidence" is the brand's own marketing copy, I pass.

A note on the gym-post line

The gym post says save your money. I still mean that for ~95% of the supplements that get marketed at men. The list above is a small exception, not a reversal — four products, all from one brand, that have earned their place in my routine over months of use. If any of them stopped working for me, or if I found a better option for less, I'd drop them. The brand isn't sacred; the function is.

The one-line version

If you want the entire post boiled down: take a daily multivitamin and get more fiber. Everything else is optional, individual, and worth testing on a trial pack before committing. Friend of Dorothy is the brand currently doing all four of those things well for me. That may not be true for you, and that's fine.

— Sly

This post mentions a third-party brand (Friend of Dorothy) that I personally use as a paying customer. As of publication I have no financial relationship with FOD beyond being a subscriber.