Guest guest Posted July 30, 2008 Report Share Posted July 30, 2008 So as one of the lesser consequences of my recent encounter with multiple life-threatening insect-borne diseases, I've apparently developed anemia. Or so the blood tests and doctors tell me, and certainly I'm more tired than I used to be. Besides the obvious, namely eating as much rare or raw red meat and shellfish as I can afford (which is very little at present thanks to the economic consequences of contracting said insect-borne diseases) are there any obvious measures to take and/or good (and yet inexpensive) supplements to try? TIA, Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted July 31, 2008 Report Share Posted July 31, 2008 Right, the fatigue - bee pollen or better yet royal jelly is great for fatigue; it also contains lots of free amino acids and immune helpers. My brother-in-law had a problem with his pituitary, swollen and pushing on his optic nerves, made him incredibly tired and spacey - he tried some product that was a combination of bee propolis, royal jelly, and bee pollen and found it worked wonders for him. If you have lyme, you may find that your body cannot break down proteins, due to some malfunction of protease production or it getting used up - lymies can get symptoms of protein deficiency but if there is plenty of protein in their diets nobody looks much further to see if it is getting UTILIZED! But if you're into body-building maybe you're taking free amino acid supplements already. Hmm. That brings up an interesting point - could the iron deficiency be due to leaky gut causing blood to leak into the gut the way it does in kids with dairy intolerance - where it makes them iron deficient?? There are several trace mineral supplements that people find helpful too. Concentrace is minerals extracted from one of the Great Lakes, I think - but it makes a kind of nasty flavor when you add it to water. I've heard Water OZ is better. Probiotics are also very energizing, but you're probably already doing them - i.e. ferments. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted July 31, 2008 Report Share Posted July 31, 2008 Lana- > I find plain ferrous sulfate, in time release form, works wonders. You didn't find it caused any gastric complications? I've heard that in non-heme forms (and/or without adequate lactoferrin to bind and transport it) iron can cause major undesirable microbe growth. > Iron absorption is acid dependent. So if you've got low stomach > acid, you > need to fix it before you're going to absorb a decent amount of iron. I take HCl with every meal since an asthma medication knocked out my native acid production years ago, so I don't imagine that'd be a problem. - Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted July 31, 2008 Report Share Posted July 31, 2008 Renate- > Before you do, check out " Survival of the Sickest " - a book I forgot > the author. He says that low iron keeps diseases in check because > some need the iron to multiply. In Africa they gave iron to anemic > sick people and many of them died shortly therafter due to the > disease suddenly " blossoming " . So it may be a symptom rather than > the issue. Yeah, I am somewhat concerned about that. > If you want to go natural, Harrod Buhner has a protocol for > lyme based on symptoms using herbs and nutrients that many say works > very well. These weren't lyme, though; in fact, the anemia (and liver damage) were apparently from a viral infection, and everything, both viral and bacterial, may have come from a mosquito bite or something similar that I got in May. > My favorite iron supplement is blackstrap molasses. But still, I'd > say go carefully on that. You don't want to fight what your body is > trying to do. Inasmuch as that's full of sugar, it's not an option for me. > You may want to look into selenium, too. Some studies say it keeps > the lyme from being able to reproduce or something like that. Yeah, I take that already for thyroid purposes. - Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted July 31, 2008 Report Share Posted July 31, 2008 Except you can't know that for sure because doctors don't diagnose things they don't understand - they look for things they do understand instead. But then again, I've just started reading " Cure Unknown " about lyme and the many instances of MD's failing to diagnose accurately because they misunderstand the disease. (Not that I'm trying to talk you into blaming every ache and all on lyme, but just to keep an open mind, really, because I know too many people who have wasted time and gotten worse being led on a wild goose chase through wrong diagnoses!) --- In , Idol <paul.idol@...> wrote:> > These weren't lyme, though; in fact, the anemia (and liver damage) > were apparently from a viral infection, and everything, both viral and > bacterial, may have come from a mosquito bite or something similar > that I got in May. > - > > Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted July 31, 2008 Report Share Posted July 31, 2008 Well, for reasons that were never entirely explained to me (or if they were, I was too out of it at the time to record the memories properly) the liver damage and anemia were conclusively ascribed to a viral infection while the meningitis, encephalitis and nerve infections were bacterial and responded to high doses of doxycycline, and everything developed after I got an insect bite on my wrist, which fairly quickly became seriously infected (and disgusting) itself. - > Except you can't know that for sure because doctors don't diagnose > things they don't understand - they look for things they do understand > instead. But then again, I've just started reading " Cure Unknown " > about lyme and the many instances of MD's failing to diagnose > accurately because they misunderstand the disease. (Not that I'm > trying to talk you into blaming every ache and all on lyme, but just > to > keep an open mind, really, because I know too many people who have > wasted time and gotten worse being led on a wild goose chase through > wrong diagnoses!) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted July 31, 2008 Report Share Posted July 31, 2008 Kids with lyme have died of meningitis/encephalitis, indeed the first time I took doxcycline, which was then the drug of choice for lyme, I had these raging really awful headaches and would have believed my brain was swelling. I also became sensitive to light, noise, etc. very scary - at that time nobody told me about herx reactions and I thought it was a side-effect of the medication or unrelated, I can't remember. When I saw the list of symptoms on www.canlyme.com the next time I got a bull's eye rash, about a year later, I realized that I must have had lyme for at least 6 years and probably had a whopper of a herx that time I had the doxycycline. Funny thing, the first few days I felt great - stiff neck, swollen glands, sinus problems, etc. were improved dramatically. They all came back over the months after the treatment, tho. Sneaky little spirochetes! Have you heard of the MD who didn't believe in syphilis (another spirochete, very similar to lyme)? He has some interesting works, going on about how hard it was to definitively diagnose - some people tested positive and never got symptoms, while others had the symptoms but repeatedly got negative test results; meanwhile the treatments caused the worst of the symptoms - mercury was a popular antidote at the time. His idea was to have the people fast, which he said would cure new cases in short order (week or two, I believe). I think he had less success with " older " cases, but not sure on that one. Same debate is happening these days with lyme - how much of it is the spirochete - does having it mean you'll deteriorate or if you stay healthy will your body continue to keep it managable? I read a study on beagles (I'm anti-vivisection, but this one was very interesting) where a group of beagles was given lyme - some developed symptoms as expected while others didn't seem to - but on autopsy the " healty " ones had organ damage, in their hearts, kidneys, etc. that they were't showing symptoms of. --- In , Idol <paul.idol@...> wrote: > > Well, for reasons that were never entirely explained to me (or if they > were, I was too out of it at the time to record the memories properly) > the liver damage and anemia were conclusively ascribed to a viral > infection while the meningitis, encephalitis and nerve infections were > bacterial and responded to high doses of doxycycline, and everything > developed after I got an insect bite on my wrist, which fairly quickly > became seriously infected (and disgusting) itself. > > - > > > Except you can't know that for sure because doctors don't diagnose > > things they don't understand - they look for things they do understand > > instead. But then again, I've just started reading " Cure Unknown " > > about lyme and the many instances of MD's failing to diagnose > > accurately because they misunderstand the disease. (Not that I'm > > trying to talk you into blaming every ache and all on lyme, but just > > to > > keep an open mind, really, because I know too many people who have > > wasted time and gotten worse being led on a wild goose chase through > > wrong diagnoses!) > > > > Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted July 31, 2008 Report Share Posted July 31, 2008 I had that issue with several other forms of iron, but not the sulfate time release. It might have something to do with the time release? -Lana " There is nothing more useful than sun and salt. " - Latin proverb > I find plain ferrous sulfate, in time release form, works wonders. > > You didn't find it caused any gastric complications? I've heard that > in non-heme forms (and/or without adequate lactoferrin to bind and > transport it) iron can cause major undesirable microbe growth. > Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted August 1, 2008 Report Share Posted August 1, 2008 Hi I'm terribly anemic, 2 yrs ago my DRs put me on ferrous sulfate after about 6-8 months I was having heart problems and tests showed my iron levels did not come up that much. but my blood work showed that my red blood cells had enlarged and became very heavy, which explained the heart problems. so they took me off the ferrous sulfate right away. the heart got better and I was doing ok for awhile. this year the anemia is back., regular iron doesnt seem to do anything for me. am wondering if the ferrous sulfate in time release would have done better, or if I need to just go with iron rich foods only.? I'm celiac and allergic to wheat, and sensitive to preservatives. so have to be careful with foods also,. Lin Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted August 1, 2008 Report Share Posted August 1, 2008 It is my understanding that when RBCs enlarge, you're looking at a macrocytic anemia... " Mean corpuscular volume (MCV) is an indicator of RBC size and may discriminate between microcytic or macrocytic anemias (Abshire, 2001; Lesperance et al., 2002). Microcytosis, reflected in a low MCV, is due to defective hemoglobin production, either from ineffective heme or globin synthesis. For example, a low MCV, suggesting small RBCs (microcytosis), occurs in several childhood disorders including iron deficiency anemia, beta-thalassemia trait, lead poisoning, anemia from chronic illness, and rarely, in sideroblastic anemia (Hermiston & Mentzer, 2002). *High MCV, suggesting macrocytosis, occurs with other nutritional anemias such as vitamin B12 and folate deficiency (Cohen, 1996; Neufeld, 2002).* " ( http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/457482_10) If you're celiac, you likely have issues with B12. Have you had your B12 tested? Also, folate is another one that is hard to absorb with celiac - has that been tested as well? If either come up low (or on the low end of the range) you should consider finding a supplement that contains active forms of those vitamins - hydroxyB12 or adenyslB12 with the intrinsic factor (very important given you're celiac) and 5-MTHF or Folinic Acid for folate. -Lana " There is nothing more useful than sun and salt. " - Latin proverb On Fri, Aug 1, 2008 at 1:21 AM, Texas <texas_lin@...> wrote: > Hi > I'm terribly anemic, 2 yrs ago my DRs put me on ferrous sulfate > after about 6-8 months I was having heart problems and tests showed my iron > levels did not come up that much. > but my blood work showed that my red blood cells had enlarged and became > very heavy, which explained the heart problems. so they took me off the > ferrous sulfate right away. > the heart got better and I was doing ok for awhile. > this year the anemia is back., regular iron doesnt seem to do anything for > me. > am wondering if the ferrous sulfate in time release would have done better, > or if I need to just go with iron rich foods only.? I'm celiac and > allergic to wheat, and sensitive to preservatives. > so have to be careful with foods also,. > > Lin > Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted August 1, 2008 Report Share Posted August 1, 2008 In my studies to understand my anemia I came across a dopamine and iron interaction connection. http://www.plosone.org/article/info:doi%2F10.1371% 2Fjournal.pone.0000925 I did not mean to be abrupt in my previous post but I need to be judicious in my energy management and time. susan Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted August 2, 2008 Report Share Posted August 2, 2008 Yeah; taking vitamin C enhances the absorption of Iron; Vit. C in fruti Iron found in all greens such as spinahc; beet greens; mustard greesn--- In , Idol <paul.idol@...> wrote: > > So as one of the lesser consequences of my recent encounter with > multiple life-threatening insect-borne diseases, I've apparently > developed anemia. Or so the blood tests and doctors tell me, and > certainly I'm more tired than I used to be. Besides the obvious, > namely eating as much rare or raw red meat and shellfish as I can > afford (which is very little at present thanks to the economic > consequences of contracting said insect-borne diseases) are there any > obvious measures to take and/or good (and yet inexpensive) supplements > to try? > > TIA, > > > Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted August 5, 2008 Report Share Posted August 5, 2008 Hi , >> Well that's pretty vague. What type of " anemia " is this and what were >> the blood test results that were used as the basis for this diagnosis? > > Dunno and dunno. I was quite sick, and therefore not my normal > inquisitive self, when I was told, and then my treatment was abruptly > terminated for financial reasons a little while later. Well there are a number of causes of anemia, and iron deficiency is only one. So unless you know why you're anemic, it's pretty difficult to develop the right nutritional strategy. I suppose you'd have the best luck by maximizing clams, red meat, and liver, which hits a lot of the different nutrients. Chris Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You are posting as a guest. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.