One of the side effects of the seven years it took from onset to diagnosis of my Celiac Disease is permanent damage in my gut from eating gluten. This means my gut simply doesn't absorb most nutrients from food the way most guts do.
As a result, I am chronically anemic.
For years, even after diagnosis, the doctors would look at the lab numbers, see I had low iron levels and tell me to take iron supplements. I would comply, but my iron levels remained low. Eventually, the hematologist began IV iron to bypass the gut entirely. With experimentation we arrived at a treatment plan that seems to work quite well. I try to eat a lot of dark leafy greens (usually in smoothies), and taught myself to not gag at meat, particularly red meat. It would be really good if I could teach myself to tolerate liver. But, I'm not quite there yet.
I tracked when I would begin chewing ice like a mad dog as that, along with increasing fatigue, is a good indicator that my iron levels are dipping. We settled on a treatment plan of a round of IV iron every four months with each round consisting of four sessions, at least a day apart of 200ml. I will do this for the rest of my life.
This round was pretty good until the last session. The IV's are administered by Oncology Registered Nurses who are amazing. They start IV's all day, every day. Even though my veins are difficult, they really do a great job. Unfortunately, there are days when my body has had enough and refuses.
Six sticks, two blown veins and still only managed to get 100ml of the last session.
See me on the street and you might mistake me for an addict!
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