Good Morning. Vitamin Roll Call

What kind of Iron are you taking?  Currently my labs are ok, but all I am taking is 2 gummy flinstones and Calcium chews (1000 mg).  My Dr said flinstones were ok, but to take 2.  I looked on the bottle and didn't see any iron in them. 

You can order Proferrin ES and perhaps Proferrin Forte online. Vitalady carries Proferrin ES. Colorado Labs is Proferrin's website. It's the least likely to cause constipation. You want to snap into 2 pieces and take it that way. 

I have plenty. But lately I've found that I'm not taking them much on the weekends. I'm not sure what that is about but I'm on a higher dose of Topamax so I've decided to blame it on that. I have Swiss Cheese brain.

Have you been spying on me?  I am just waiting on payday to send in my order (which is this Friday).  I am also seeing my PCP Thursday and I'm going to beg her to do some more labs on me.  My last set was 6 months ago and they don't like to them any more often then every year unless you are having problems.  I'm not having problems, yet, but I don't want to wait another six months to see if I do.  I can't afford to pay for the labs and the ironic thing is my insurance has always paid with no problem and I am sure they would this time, too, but for some reason whenever I want to get  labs done when I'm not having any problems they all act like it's coming out of their pocket.  Now if I have any problems they will run them but for a routine check up they are very reluctant.  And the fact that I might be concerned about certain levels which aren't out of range but are lower then the previous test doesn't sway them, either.  She only repeats tests on levels that were out of the range.  My last B12 was about 500.  I upped my dosage but in her eyes 500 is great. 

I hate that you have so much trouble with your docs out there.  : (

I'm doing well on vits.  I just got my 3 month labs done, and chatted with the Kaiser bariatric doctor.  I got a prescription for D, which amazed me.  1 pill per day at 50KIU. 

During the week, I am pretty good.  I take the bag to work and start working on it at 8am.  Keep popping all day long.  At nigh****ch TV and keep popping.  The weekends it all slips away from me.  I get them loaded, but the vits don't seem to be able to jump inside me on their own.  Frustrating.  For the money I shell out for them... you'd think they would be smarter than that.

Good note - Kaiser wants to do a full panel again 2 months from now.  I have not had to fight them on the labs.  That surprises me, and they have come up in my books.  My labs cost me 10 or 15 dollars.

They gave you a prescription for dry D3 and not the little green squeeshy pill? That's great!  50,000 IUs once a day, babeee!

I will have to check to make sure the D3 is really dry before I pick up that prescription. I read another post that mentioned getting a prescription for D3 in an oil base - so now I'm skeptical.

On an earlier post, you mentioned that our doctors should not be recommending ferrous sulfate iron to us. That is what the Kaiser bariatric doctor did. Why is this not a good source of iron?

Ferrous sulfate can really bind up some people's intestines and it's just not very bioavailable for us. Some of the RNYrs here may know the details of that. Most iron is absorbed in the duodenum and their's is bypassed and much of ours is too. So, Proferrin is good since it's more like an animal source of iron--like eating liver. Carbonyl and polysaccharide irons are good too. Check out Vitalady's website under iron and see what she carries. Those are the ones to look for, she's done the homework for us.

--g