Thoughts On Anemia

My iron has been pretty low. Two docs have said, it's not THAT bad. I agree. I am able to walk several miles at a good pace, go up and down stairs without fainting, and keep active.

However, when I see the reference ranges for normal blood iron and see how low mine are, all sorts new possibilities for enjoying physical activity come to mind.

(I will give the reference ranges below so you can see what I mean.)

The realization that I might walk faster, hike longer, hike higher, be more active - these are the enjoyable thoughts I've been having since yesterday.

Whereas walking the mailboxes in our neighborhood has a certain amount of appeal in that I feel I'm progressing when I go farther or faster, I believe it will pale to blah compared to being able to walk for a couple of hours on a trail in the Cascades. Or the length of Long Beach on Vancouver Island. Or down to the shore (and up again!) in a steep and rugged patch of coast.

My heart is normal, so I'm limited in activity only by my oxygen-carrying capacity. And that is fixable.

I was an outdoors kid. I rode my bike (hey, that's another thing I will be able to do better!) all over our part of town. I rode home for lunch from school. I explored on foot, too. I swam for hours at a time. I sailed and rowed. I clammed and fished. I love the outdoors!

This is what I want to transform myself into again, an active outdoors wind-burned red-cheeked vigorous grandma who joyously explores new terrain and walks 10 or 15 miles a day most days. Heaven knows Washington lends itself to the outdoor life year round and why would I want to hang back from all that? The geology alone is worth the move!

So I'm working on building up those iron stores to see how I feel and what I can do when I am 'normal'. (Don't worry - we're only talking about blood iron here. I'll still be me in all the other ways.)

So here are the reference ranges for 'normal' blood iron and my reading of last week:

Hemoglobin 11.5-16.0 g/dL mine: 10.6
Hematocrit 35.0-48.0 percent mine: 33.5
Iron 35-175 ug/dL mine: 21
TIBC 250-400 mine: 383 (ability to absorb)
Saturation 15-50 percent mine: 5
Ferritin 11-307 ng/mL mine: 8 (doc says 11 is not normal - normal is about 250)

So isn't that cool? So much room for improvement and being able to do more. I find this quite exciting.