I have a feeling I iam ron deficient (exhibiting many of the signs of iron deficiency). I am taking dietary steps to help fix the problem, but i feel that may not be enough. I would like to get blood work done to get a more solid idea of my levels, but I am currently uninsured, so it will have to wait a few months (possibly until Oct or Nov) until i can get blood work done.
In the mean time, is there a safe level of iron supplementation (via pills) I can use? Or is this just a bad idea? Anything I should know about pills?
I was recently diagnosed with iron deficiency anemia. My symptoms included intense fatigue, depression, lethargy, lack of appetite, sleeping 12 hours and still feeling exhausted, and looking like death warmed over. I truly felt (and looked) like shit. Sound familiar?
I had a complete bloodwork done. Yes I have insurance. But I’m pretty sure they can run a ferritin or iron count and hematocrit test without too much expense. Talk to the doctor to see how much this costs. It is my understanding that you can damage your liver and kidneys with excessive iron supplementation.
For my anemia, I take iron pills, about 2x the normal dose until my next blood work.
Yes - except I am sleeping 14 hours and still feeling exhausted. I have cut back drastically on exercising (due to a new job, etc. and lack of time) and it seems to help a small amount, as does cooking with an iron skillet etc.
I am worried about the side effects, of course. I was wondering if someone would say “sure, supplement the RDA” and you should be fine until you can get the bloodwork done. In the meantime I am looking into the bloodwork issues. FYI I living on a small stipend for the summer until my teaching job starts up in Sept, so all the small expenses add up. Plus rent in NYC is not cheap!
Before my results were back, the doc recommended getting this liquid herb / vitamin crap from Germany call “Floradix” at the Coop.
It is “lite” iron supplementation that she said was safe until the diagosis was confirmed with the blood test. I immediately started drinking it (you put a shot in some OJ 2x a day), a voila, within 2 days, my energy came back and most of the symptoms disappeared. My bloodwork came back with next day, and she then gave me a script for iron pills to really get the levels back to normal.
NYC, you sooo crazy. Left that hell many years ago and will never go back.
I’d be very careful… Eat some lean steak, mix black strap molassass into milk/shake drink of choice, get some raisins. etc… and the Floradix as mentioned really does work. I had very similar experience, yet there were SEVERAL things wrong. My immune system attacked my thyroid, and I had high levels of epstein barr virus…some total was major chronic fatigue. The therapy ended up pretty much the same for all- loads of rest, hardly NO training, and stellar stellar nutrition, NO stress & yoga. Best to you.
Thanks for the heads up. FWIW i’m a vegetarian and i’ve been really focusing on getting lots of vegetarian (non-heme?) iron sources and it just doesn’t seem to do the trick. i picked up the Floradix and started using it a few hours ago. we’ll see how it goes.
i’m pretty sure it’s not just a vegetarian thing, though. my buddy told me his college xc team had blood work done, all meat eaters, and 75% of them were iron deficient. all guys too, i’m pretty sure the common assumption is that iron deficiency is a female / female runner issue, which apparently it is not, at least in their case.
hopefully, the drastic cutback in workout time i’m experiencing while i’m transition to a new job will help me recover.
it’s going to be interesting to see what some docs on this forum say. from what i’ve been told by some of those docs, it’s VERY hard to get the sort of iron absorption that you’d need as a triathlete.
as was alluded to in another post, there are things you do to both inhibit and increase the rate of absorption. i’m not sure, but i think i remember that acid (like OJ) increases absorption, and alcohol decreases it. but you’d have to check that.
for some reason, absorption via pills is difficult to achieve. red meat is by far better, for some reason i don’t understand. i’ve known certain athletes who’ve just had to give up being a strict vegetarian. you don’t need much red meat. like 6oz once or twice a week. but without it, things get pretty tough.
as i said, tho, i’d be happier of some nutritionists or docs posted here, because i’m an uninformed, secondhand, messenger.
to quote:
“Researchers found that cooking in an iron skillet increases the iron content of many foods. Acidic foods that have higher moisture content, such as applesauce and spaghetti sauce, absorb the most iron. In fact, for 100 grams of each (about 3.5oz.), the applesauce increased in iron content from 0.35mg to 7.3mg, and the spaghetti sauce jumped from 0.6mg to 5.7mg of iron.”
i just hope that research wasn’t done by the iron skillet manufacturers associate.
fwiw, some famous IM succeeded on vegetarian diets. it’s a matter of proper planning for most people.
i saw one of them firsthand. my ex. 9:08 in canada, 9:21 in kona, and so on. but, very, very hard to keep iron levels up. like raising heaven and earth. it can be done, but it’s hard. you have to really pretty constantly stay on top of it.
I’m a little creeped out about all that iron leeching in your skillett.
No joke?
Your symptoms also sound a lot like basic protein deficiency. I am not a vegetarian but still have trouble getting enough protein in. Twice in the last 7 years I have crashed and burned due to improper diet.
Are you supplementing any protein?
The cost of a CBC workup is not all that much. I would estimate that it would be less than $200. Certainly worth spending the money to know what is really going on. Best not to skimp on this sort of stuff…
You know, I started taking the First Endurance Multi V and I feel stronger than I have in a couple years. Could be the vitamins, could be the iron (it’s the only supplemental form of Iron I’ve ever taken).
All I know is that I went from Cat 3 guy bashing his head against the wall to finish MOP all spring, to top 3 in my last 4 races after a couple weeks of Multi V supplementation (and enough points for my Cat 2 upgrade)
I’m generally skeptical as shit of supplements, and actually hesitated taking the Multi V because it contained Iron (it’s generally not recommended that men supplement Iron).
Ultimately I decided to belive in First Endurance because I think they have their shit together and that they make quality, real products. Glad I did.
I can understand philisophical reasons to be a vegan, however- the science doesn’t support it- particularly for an endurance triathlete. We were meant/built as omnivores. If you are not well and it is all diet, I would reconsider the food choices as opposed to skillets and pills. BTW, see a doc for good measure.
yes, vitamin c will improve absorption. helps keep the iron in the reduced (2+) state which is better absorbed.
supplements should be taken with a heme source (difficult if you’re a vegetarian i guess) as non-heme iron is absorbed better if it’s ingested along with heme iron.