Colostrum Supplement Benefits for Adults

If you’ve ever wondered what colostrum supplement benefits for adults are, we’ll cover it in our guide below.

Colostrum supplements are quickly growing in popularity, so understandably, you might have questions about how they work and why you’d add them to your routine.

What is Colostrum?

Colostrum is the first breast milk released by mammary glands after birth.

Colostrum is nutrient-dense, high in antioxidants, and also full of antibodies.

In humans, the colostrum helps build the immune system of a newborn baby.

• The colostrum changes into breast milk two to four days after the birth of a baby.
• Colostrum is thicker and has a more yellow color than breastmilk.
• Along with humans producing colostrum, cows and other mammals do as well.
• Supplements usually come from cows, known as bovine colostrum to make colostrum.
• Bovine colostrum has a lot of similarities to human colostrum, being rich in vitamins, fats, disease-fighting proteins, digestive enzymes, and growth hormones.
• To make colostrum supplements, it’s usually taken from cows, pasteurized, and dried into powders or pills.

So why are adults quickly catching onto the benefits of colostrum supplements?

Colostrum Supplement Benefits for Adults

The following are some of the health benefits of taking a colostrum supplement.

Nutrition

Bovine colostrum has a much more impressive nutrition profile than regular milk, and it’s high in vitamins A, C, and E, as well as B vitamins, magnesium, protein, fat, and carbs.

Essentially, you can get minerals, vitamins, and macronutrients from colostrum.

Particular protein compounds in bovine colostrum may be especially beneficial.

• One is lactoferrin, which plays a role in your immune response to infections from bacteria and viruses.
• Bovine colostrum supplements contain growth factors, which are hormones stimulating growth. Bovine colostrum has especially high insulin-like growth factors 1 and 2.
• Antibodies in bovine colostrum, known as immunoglobulins, are used to fight bacteria and viruses by your immune system. Bovine colostrum has antibodies, including IgA, IgG, and IgM.
• Because of the nutrients in bovine colostrum, benefits include boosting immunity and helping your body combat infections.

Gut Health

Bovine colostrum has so far shown promising results in research for helping with a broad range of gastrointestinal disorders and diseases. 

There are properties of bovine colostrum that allow helping promote mucosal healing of the lining of the gut and improve inflammatory conditions.

• Colostrum can potentially restore a leaky gut, and it helps with the development of healthy microbiota.
• Bovine colostrum can repair damage caused by NSAIDs to the gut lining, and colostrum enemas are an effective treatment for distal colitis.
• In animal and human studies, bovine colostrum stimulates the growth of intestinal cells, strengthening the gut wall and healing leaky gut.
• In one study of adults taking traditional medicines, adding a bovine colostrum enema to their routine reduced their symptoms more than just taking medication alone.

Mental Health

Colostrum has dozens of compounds that work together to promote the regeneration of all the cells in our body, including our brain cells.

Colostrum can help balance hormones through the thymus gland, which can, in turn, improve your mood, energy levels, and outlook.

There’s also something in colostrum called Lactalbumin that helps stimulate your brain to release dopamine and serotonin, support a positive mood, and reduce stress and anxiety.

Colostrum supplementation can also increase your resistance to fatigue, improving your mental health and sense of well-being.

In animal studies, researchers have found colostrum can activate the serotonin system in the brain.

Preventing and Treating Diarrhea

There are compounds in bovine colostrum supplements that can help prevent diarrhea associated with viral and bacterial infections.

These compounds, in particular, include the protein lactoferrin and antibodies.

Inflammation

Inflammation is the underlying cause of many health issues people face daily.

For example, inflammation is the root of autoimmune conditions, sleep problems, bloating, brain fog, and much more.

Bovine colostrum has shown promising results in reducing inflammation in animal and human studies.

The proline-rich polypeptides in colostrum seem primarily responsible for their ability to reduce inflammation and balance the immune response. These PRPs can alleviate inflammation by counteracting an overactive immune response, like the overproduction of lymphocytes and T-cells.

PRPs stop the immune response that characterizes conditions like fibromyalgia and rheumatoid arthritis and can help alleviate pain.

Anti-Aging and Skin Benefits

Colostrum is packed with what are called growth factors.

These growth factors promote the growth of new cells and help repair and regenerate other cells, including the cells making up the bone, skin, muscles, and cartilage.

The most prominent growth factors in bovine colostrum are insulin-like growth factor-1 (IGF-1) and transforming growth factor alpha and beta (TGF0a and TGF-B). These growth factors can help your skin grow and repair itself, and they can help reverse sun damage and other blemishes.

The growth factors in bovine colostrum also help produce collagen, which is the foundation of your skin.

Along with the direct benefits of colostrum on the health of your skin, the fact that it promotes better gut health also plays a role in why it can make your skin look better.

For example, taking bovine colostrum helps balance the bacteria in your gut and reduce inflammation. Inflammation and poor gut health can show up on your skin as dryness, acne, eczema, or psoriasis.

Muscle Recovery

Colostrum can help improve athletic performance and promote the building of lean muscle mass.

Studies show that bovine colostrum can also help your muscles recover quicker after you work out, and it can help you as you build lean muscle tissue to become stronger.

Are There Risks or Side Effects?

Based on current research, bovine colostrum appears to be safe for most people.

People with milk allergies shouldn’t take bovine colostrum.

You also have to make sure you’re choosing a high-quality colostrum supplement because you don’t want the cows to have been exposed to pesticides, antibiotics, or synthetic hormones.

The primary downside of a bovine colostrum supplement for most people is the price, and these supplements are expensive.

What’s the Best Bovine Colostrum Supplement?

My absolute favorite bovine colostrum supplement is from Ancestral Supplements.

The company has an excellent reputation, going out of its way to ethically source the cows used to make these supplements.

Ancestral Supplements grass-fed beef colostrum contains powerful immune factors like proline-rich polypeptides and antibodies to fight diseases and infections. It has growth factors to help heal, build and repair cells, tissues, and organs and contains essential vitamins, enzymes, minerals, and amino acids.

The Ancestral Supplements colostrum is from cows pasture-raised in New Zealand and Australia.

It’s grass-fed and finished, third-party tested for purity, and has no fillers.

The supplement is a pesticide, GMO, and hormone-free and is 100% freeze-dried. The colostrum capsules are made from the first milk of new mother cows, and you ideally take three to six capsules on an empty stomach.

Ancestral Supplements follow the like-supports-like model of nutrition, working to replace in our diets what modern life has taken out.

If you want to strengthen your immune system and have the peace of mind of knowing you’re taking an excellent colostrum supplement, this one’s a great one, and I’m linking it below.