For a variety of reasons, I saw a rheumatologist. I was feeling achy and tired, and I’ve had a weird arthritis thing going on with my hands for a while. So I basically went and said WTH?
She ordered blood work that necessitated literally 10 of those little tubes. I was literally lightheaded after the blood draw was complete.
Today I got a letter from her with a prescription for 50000 iu Vitamin D tablets! Apparently normal D levels are >30, and mine is 16. I should have rickets or something!
Seems kind of strange that I have this deficiency in the middle of summer. I spend a lot of time outdoors and to be honest, I’m terrible about remembering to use sunblock except on my face.
Anyway, has anyone else found out they were Vitamin D deficient?
Yeah, me, and about half the people I know. It’s pretty common. There are a bunch of risk factors - just because you spend time outside doesn’t necessarily mean you’ll get enough Vitamin D. For instance, sunscreen doesn’t just block UV rays, it blocks absorption of Vit D as well. Obese? You’ll absorb less. Live at a more northern latitude? You get less of what you need, even in the summer.
I live in S. Florida. Drive a convertible. I had low vitamin D levels. My doctor had me start with 1000IU/day, but it wasn’t enough. I’ve been on 2000IU/day for the past bunch of years. As of February, I tested at 44.8, with a normal of 30-100.
It does seem strange. Reality seems to be that way. We really have a lot more questions about vitamin D than answers.
Sun exposure turns out to be a major factor in vitamin D levels but far from the only one: genetic factors also play a major role.
What we know: there is an association between low vitamin D levels and a host of conditions, heart, immune, cancer, depression … the list goes on.
What we don’t know: is it that low vitamin D causes the conditions, that these conditions cause low vitamin D, or that some factor (including potentially lifestyle ones or genetic ones) predispose to both?
So far the evidence that treating lower risk populations with less than severe deficiency does any goods is extremely poor and screening low risk populations routinely while a trendy and popular thing to do is likely doing few any good whatsoever.
16 is damn low and no one would argue against your being on the standard approach for dealing with that. But still one wonders if the vitamin D is the consequence of what is causing your other medical issues (or of those issues) rather than the other way around.
My first test was below whatever the lowest number the test can detect. >4 maybe?
I’ve been taking 10,000iu every day since and I’m in the middle of normal in the 60’s when I’ve been tested since. About 5-6 years now, I think.
I work 2nd shift, and I kinda hate sunlight. I use an umbrella in the summer, I get rashy and bumpy even if I wear the highest SPF I can get my hands on when I can’t avoid the sun for some reason. I get depressed when it’s hot and sunny for too long. I tell people I’m allergic to sun so they don’t make me go out in it. So yeah, my vitamin D is pretty much zero without supplement.
Clocked in at 9.9 ng/mL five years ago. I do spend some time outdoors without sunscreen, but I also have dark skin and live at 39 degrees north latitude, so supplements are in order for me. If I take it consistently, 400 IU daily will keep me in normal range.
Hard to say since it takes weeks/months to change levels significantly. I am a little iron-deficient, and also prone to depression, so it can be difficult to tease out cause and effect with things like fatigue, which of course is a symptom of everything.
I first tested at a 12 in March. I’ve been taking 5,000 units more or less faithfully since then. A retest in July had me up to 28, I think it was. So lots more to go.
I feel a bit less achy than I did in the spring, but not noticeably less tired. FWIW I live in central Illinois and work inside all day. The nurse practitioner thought I would probably have to stay on the Vitamin D at least through next March - maybe always.
Back when I rebroke a bone in my foot I had some blood work done, and my D was bottomed out [below testable levels] and my blood calcium was high enough my doc was joking he could sharpen my nose and use me on a chalk board we started me off on a month of more or less mainlining D until I got more regularized. It was a balancing act until we yanked out a couple of frisky parathyroid glands [lower right and upper left] and everything went back to normal.
The issues with hypercalcemia and lack of D rendered me damn near a zombie - I couldn’t stay awake for shit. If I wasn’t mainlining red bull and coffee, I was asleep. It took me a 6 pack of red bull to make it through an afternoon at work. [without caffeine and suchlike, it was not uncommon to find me napping on my desk.] Once we regularized me, and everything was balanced out with a more normal level of D supplimentation [2k per day] and ibandronate sodium [boniva and other names] to shove the excess calcium back into my bones I went back to more or less normal. 3 months of boniva, and a change to chondrocalcinosis made me need another tweak to medicine, I could go off the boniva but still needed the D, and needed to tweak my other nutrients [more magnesium, potassium and zinc, less calcium and no iron among other things.]
I still try and sit outside in the sun for 10-15 minutes a day when it is nice out, but I do know that I really do not want that massive D deficiency every again!
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These are all interesting stories, thank you all for sharing. I feel less like a total freak.
The doctor did say that a lot of people here in New England have low D levels. And it could go some to explain why I feel like a zombie when we have the time change in the autumn and I get even LESS sun.
From what I’ve read online, some of my health issues might or might not play into the deficiency… Or it could be just correlation without any causation.
Since most of my family live in Florida, I’m hearing a lot of cracks about pasty northerners…
:: Sheepishly raises hand ::
And you know what’s worse? I live in the fricking tropics. I also used to make fun of pale people, of which there are none where I live, even Scandinavians eventually settle on a nice tan.
I asked my doctor about it, because it made no sense to me. She said that since we’re not walking around naked, and slather UV block on the parts that are exposed it is very hard to make any vitamin D from whatever postage stamp-sized patch of skin is exposed. People of color and mixed also have a harder time, so where I am pale is covered, and where’s not covered I am brown.
I find out about mine because of kidney stones, I am taking 2K a day, and will go for another test soon.
Mighty_Girl – I lived in Florida for thirty years, and don’t think I had a problem then. But I’m terrible at remembering sunblock on arms and legs, and I’m naturally pale (think strawberry blonde with blue eyes). But since leaving Florida I’ve hit perimenopause which is apparently also a contributing factor.
So an update – The pills prescribed are gigantic and I couldn’t swallow them, so I got the drops. I take 6.25 ml once a week to get the 50K IUs dose.
The drops, for reference, taste awful. So I mixed the soe with cranberry-pom juice in a shot glass.
I’ve been “low D” in my last three physicals, the only test result out of range. I don’t understand it either… I don’t work outside, but I do get sun. I’m no goth and I drive a convertible, for chrissake. Did the 50,000 IU thing a couple of times, now taking 2,000 per day. If it makes a difference, I can’t tell. My wife and mom had the same result. Is there really an epidemic of D deficiency or are we being played for suckers by Big Vitamin?
One of my brothers and I both have extremely low Vitamin D levels. He lives in WA and has MS. I live in TX, am allergic to practically everything, and have had leiomyosarcoma. Even being on 50k units a day, our vitamin D levels are only in the low normal range. I really think there must be some sort of genetic predisposition. My brother’s outdoors (without sunscreen) at least 20 hours a week once fishing season opens and I’m outside about 90 minutes every day. Our other brother has levels ranging from 50-80, depending on the season, which is apparently normal.
Holy shit, I don’t know what the hell brand you are taking, but the ones I had were a vivid dark green, and the size of a standard one-a-day type vitamin, as a gelcap. Not sure if this was the brand or not, but that is what it looked like. In this picture, it is the size of the little golden gelcap in the bottom center.
My doctor called in a prescription, so it’s some kind of generic. A little bigger than what your pics show, I think. I had the CVS pharmacist show me the pill and it’s a good-sized gelcap. Round and bigger than a Claritin-D.
I have an esophageal stricture (unrelated and being treated), so I have a hella time swallowing certain kinds of pills (round is bad, too large is bad). These were out of the range that I could swallow. “Gigantic” is in the eye of the beholder. Or swallower.
