How to Find Your Optimal HCL & Digestive Support Doses

Betaine HCL, digestive enzymes, and bile support all get dialed in the same way: start low, work up slowly, and let how you feel tell you when to stop. There is no standard dose for any of them. The right amount is different for everyone. This guide walks you through finding yours, beginning with HCL since that's where most people start.

Short on time? There is a Quick Summary in Section 8 at the bottom of this guide.

1. Finding Your HCL Dose

You'll increase by one capsule per day until you feel something, then back off. Here's how that works:

Most people land somewhere between 1 and 3 capsules per meal. You can stay higher than 3 if your digestion genuinely feels better there. Never go higher than 5 capsules per meal unless Dr. J approves.

Day by day

What you're feeling for

The signals fall into two buckets. One set tells you the dose is helping and you're safe to keep climbing. The other tells you you've found your limit.

The "too much" signs usually show up within 30–60 minutes of the meal. Mild warmth is your early signal, so you don't need to wait for outright burning before backing off. If it's uncomfortable, ½ tsp of baking soda in 8 oz of water settles it quickly, then drop back one capsule starting the next day.

A few rules that matter

• Always start low and work your way up. If you overdo it from a low starting point, you simply back off and you know exactly where you stand. Start in the middle and have an issue, and you can't tell which direction to go. Starting low means the direction is always obvious.
  
• Get some food in your stomach first. A few bites in to about halfway through the meal is the sweet spot. A healthy stomach can handle HCL taken in the first bites, but when your gut lining is raw or inflamed, as it is for most people starting this protocol, acid that early sits right up against that lining and causes the burning. Food down first buffers it and gives the acid something to work on. Taking it late in the meal still works, just know the capsule is more likely to sit at the bottom of your esophagus or the top of your stomach.
  
• One capsule at a time. Jumping two or three at once makes it impossible to tell where your limit actually is.
  
• Your dose is one capsule below whatever caused symptoms, not the dose that caused them.
  
• Scale to the meal. Both the amount and the type of protein matter. The more protein on your plate and the darker it is, like steak or lamb, the more HCL you may need. Lighter proteins like white fish, and smaller portions, need less.
  
• Go easy on water at meals. More than a few ounces dilutes your stomach acid and works against you.
  

2. If You're Sensitive to HCL

Some people can't handle a full capsule, and that's worth knowing early rather than pushing through. You have room to work with: you can take a smaller amount of HCL Supreme, or move to a gentler product.

Digest Synergy carries less than half the HCL of HCL Supreme, along with digestive enzymes and bile support in the same capsule. Take 1–3 capsules per meal. This is the natural next step if a full capsule of HCL Supreme is too much.

Organic Bitters is the gentlest option. If Digest Synergy still doesn't sit right, use bitters before meals instead. Rather than adding acid, bitters prompt your stomach to make more of its own.

Microdosing HCL Supreme

Before stepping down, it's worth trying a smaller fraction of a capsule. You can open any capsule and mix the powder into your food.

A history of ulcers or GI bleeding

Start with enzymes alone and leave HCL out of the picture at first. Once you've gone several months with no bleeding, you can introduce HCL very gradually beginning at an eighth of a capsule mixed into food. Add GI Restore and TruCollagen for gut lining support while you do.

3. If You Have a Reaction

This applies to anything in your protocol, not just HCL.

1. Take ½ tsp baking soda in 8 oz of water to neutralize excess acid.
   
2. Pause whatever caused the reaction and add GI Restore to soothe things.
   
3. Most irritation clears in a day or two. If it hasn't improved by then, stop everything for 3–7 days until symptoms fully resolve.
   
4. Bring supplements back one at a time, one per day with meals, starting from the top of your protocol.
   
5. Restart lower than where you were, a quarter or eighth of a capsule if needed.
   
6. Once you've been stable about a week, start climbing again slowly.
   

4. Enzymes & Bile Support

Once your HCL is settled, these round out the protocol. Same approach: start at the low end and adjust to what your digestion tells you.

Enzyme Synergy

Start at 1–3 capsules per meal and go up to 4–5 if you need more. Best suited to larger, protein-heavy meals where you're also taking HCL.

Digest Synergy

1–3 capsules per meal. Lower-dose HCL with enzymes and bile support built in. Use it when HCL Supreme is too strong for you, for lighter solid meals like eggs, or as a maintenance option once your digestion has settled.

Liver Supreme

Start at 1–3 capsules per meal, up to 5 if digestion and stools improve. Your stools tell you how it's going. When bile support is working, stools sink, hold a normal brown color, need less wiping, and leave fewer streaks or skid marks in the bowl. Floating or greasy stools, streaks and skid marks, or blond, pale, or clay colored stools mean fat isn't breaking down yet, so increase one capsule at a time.

5. Stool Troubleshooting & Constipation

Loose stools or diarrhea

First, check your doses. Loose stools are often a sign of too much Oxy-Powder or too much Liver Supreme. Dial those back first and see if things firm up.

If loose stools are part of a die-off reaction, GI Binder can help: 1–2 capsules at bedtime.

One caution with binders: they can slow motility. Only add GI Binder once your bowels are moving regularly, and only if you're dealing with die-off symptoms. If you're constipated or your motility isn't stable yet, hold off on the binder and get things moving first.

If you get constipated

Keeping your bowels moving matters. It's how waste actually leaves your body, and constipation will undermine everything else you're doing digestively. The goal is to move about 12 inches of stool per day, whether that comes in one bowel movement or spread across two or three. If you're carnivore and not eating much fiber, your stools will naturally be smaller, so expect less volume. Work through these options in order.

Start with Oxy-Powder:

• Begin with 1–2 capsules at bedtime on an empty stomach.
  
• If you need more, add another 1–2 capsules when you wake up, also on an empty stomach.
  
• Adjust gradually to find the point between relief and stools that are too loose.
  
• As your motility improves over time, you should be able to taper back down.
  

Finding your lowest effective dose: twice-daily dosing, morning and night, usually works better than once a day, especially if you're sensitive.

• Keep halving as you improve: 1 capsule twice a day, then ½ and ½, then ¼ and ¼, then ⅛ and ⅛, or even just a pinch. You want just enough to move your bowels.
  
• Once your bowels are moving regularly, you can usually go lower still.
  
• If you've been constipated for a couple of days, you may need to go a little higher for a bit, then pull back down afterward.
  

Dropping the dose when it's too much: if you've overshot into loose stools, come down in small steps rather than big jumps. Cutting from 2 capsules twice a day straight down to 1 at night and ½ in the morning may be too big a drop. Use in-between doses instead, something like 1 at night and ¾ in the morning, reducing by an eighth to a quarter of a capsule each day until stools firm back up.

What to expect: most people have their stools dialed in within the first couple of weeks on Oxy-Powder alone. If you're having a hard time finding your dose, get your best Oxy-Powder dose in place first, then layer in a little Triphala, 1 capsule 30 minutes before each meal, to help things along. Most of the time it doesn't come to that.

If Oxy-Powder is too strong for you: keep tapering the dose down, as low as an eighth of a capsule twice a day, even down to a pinch if needed. From there, any of these can help:

• Organic Bitters work well here and help stimulate motility.
  
• Triphala is gentler and does more to soften hard, compacted stools. Take 1–3 capsules, 30 minutes before meals, three times a day. This is also the one to add if things are more severe and Oxy-Powder alone isn't enough.
  
• Sip ginger tea through the day. Juice the fresh ginger and sip on it gently. The recipe is in our die-off reaction handout.
  

Still backed up? Cook your foods more thoroughly. An Instant Pot works well here. Well-cooked foods are essentially predigested and move through your intestinal tract more easily.

6. Signs It's Working

Less burping, bloating, or gas after meals

Stools that are formed and sink

Less heaviness or fullness once you've finished eating

7. Supplement Reference

8. Quick Summary