Health, and Other Adventures after 40

This story begins on March 17.

But no, I've already gotten something wrong, because it really starts a week earlier, on March 10.

On that day, Jeff was scheduled to donate blood, so he took himself to the donation center and proceeded to stretch out his arm and give the gift of life to someone like he does every eight weeks.  Only, this time, he was rejected.

The reason was simple: to be accepted, the donor's pulse needs to be 100 or less.  Jeff's was 102.

That's not that far over the limit, but rules are rules, so Jeff came home with all his blood still inside him and told us what had happened.

We wondered what had caused the fast pulse, something that had never been an issue for him before.  He started paying attention to his blood pressure and realized that was running on the high side.  And about that same time, Benjamin's asthma was acting up, so we got his nebulizer out of the box and proceeded to give him some breathing treatments; and in the process, we found our pulse oximeter in the same box.

Well, that was just too much fun.  ;-)  We all, kids and adults, started using it to see our pulse and oxygen saturation; and lo and behold, Jeff and I both discovered that our heart rates were fast--abnormally so, we thought.

To jump ahead in Jeff's story before I return to my own, this seemed to trigger a wake-up call in Jeff; and he began to pay more attention to his health.  He has the most determination of anyone I know when it comes to losing weight when it's his decision and he's not being coerced into it, and he immediately changed his eating habits and made some radical sacrifices to get healthier.  So far, he's already dropped to 10 pounds lower than he was at his heaviest, and he was able to return to the donation center and give blood two weeks after he was denied.  And that time, his pulse and blood pressure were fantastic.  I'm incredibly proud of him.

But back to March 17...

That was the date of my appointment to give blood for the first time in a very long time--maybe even a decade?  I used to give regularly, but life got busy, I spent a considerable amount of time pregnant or nursing or having little ones at home that made it difficult for me to slip away to give blood, and that particular act of service fell by the wayside for me.  I was very much looking forward to getting back to it.

I felt cautious, however.  Knowing that Jeff was rejected for a fast heart rate, I kept tabs on mine during the week between his appointment and mine; and I realized it was continuing to run fast.  I also had my blood pressure checked and discovered it was high--something that wasn't really even an issue during my pregnancies when high blood pressure can pop up in women that didn't previously struggle with that.  I decided to give up drinking soda and coffee, in an effort to give my heart a break and lower and steady its rate.  I was really hoping and praying that I would be able to have a successful blood donation on the 17th, so I made sure I ate something healthy that day, drank water to bleed faster (I was a notorious slow bleeder back in the day), planned my trip to get to the donation center early so I would have time to just sit and relax--all in an effort to make sure my pulse and blood pressure were low enough to give.

I guess those things worked, because when I got signed in and they checked my heart and blood pressure, they were fine!  Great news!  But then the nurse stuck my finger to check my iron.

"Hmmm," she said.  "Your iron needs to be 12.5 in order to give, but yours is 9.1.  I'm going to have another nurse come in and stick a finger on your other hand and test that."

Which is exactly what happened; and as the new nurse pricked my finger, I asked her if the numbers usually came back the same (I assumed they would!).  "No," she replied, "they are often a little different."

In my head, I thought that was good; and I assumed my next number would surely be higher than 9.1.  

It wasn't.

"8.9," the nurse announced. And then in a concerned tone, she began to ask me about my health and express her thoughts about my anemia.  I had to laugh a little when she queried, "Have you been feeling tired recently?  And sluggish?  And maybe a little dizzy?"

"Well, yes," I told her, "but I thought that was just because I'm a mom of six kids!"  :) 

And then she basically told me that even though she couldn't really tell me that I had to see a doctor, I really needed to see a doctor. 

So out the door I went, wondering what in the world was going on, and eager to talk to my favorite doctor--my dad, of course!

After I had explained the situation to him, he agreed with the second nurse and urged me to be checked out by a doctor, including a thorough blood test.  "We really need to figure out why your iron is so low," was his verdict. And so, I made an appointment for the following Tuesday, March 23, with one of the midwives at the women's health center that has been such a huge part of my physical care ever since 2006.  But to tell you the truth, the only time I've been consistent with doctor's appointments is when I'm pregnant or having a 6-week postpartum visit.  Other than that, I basically avoid the doctor--not an unusual situation for women, since many of us put the needs of our children above our own health needs.  I was convinced though that it was time to start paying attention to my own health, starting with that appointment with the midwife for an annual (cough, cough...not exactly annual in my case) exam, blood work, and my very first mammogram.

I survived the appointment ;-) and eagerly awaited the results, especially of the blood work.  Meanwhile, before I heard anything back from the office, Jeff went in to give blood, two weeks after his initial rejection.  He was relieved when his pulse and blood pressure were great, but shocked when he was told that his iron was too low to give!  That doesn't normally happen with men.  Fortunately, one of the personnel decided to retest his blood, using a different machine, and that time, it came back perfectly fine for iron, leading the staff at the donation center to realize that the first machine was malfunctioning--and had been doing so for quite some time!  He overheard the nurses expressing their frustration that so many people had been tired away for low iron, when in reality, it was an error of the machine!

When he told us that, of course we were excited, thinking that perhaps my iron level was not low at all!  And so my eagerness to hear the results of the blood test grew, along with my expectation of good news.

I got the call on Thursday afternoon, March 25.  A friendly, competent nurse (who rattled off numbers a little more quickly than I could jot them down, so I had to ask her to repeat herself sometimes) told me that the results of the blood test showed that I was very deficient in vitamin D ("30 is good," she said, "but 50 is better; that's what we like to see. Yours is 16.3.") and very anemic ("Your hemoglobin is 7.8; 11 or above is ok. Your hematocrit is 28.4; 34 or above is ok.")  She told me she'd call in a prescription for me for a high dosage of vitamin D, and she told me how much iron I should start taking.  "Great!" I thought, "I'll start taking these supplements, and then start feeling better in no time!"

But then she said that I should wait for a referral from our hospital system for an appointment with a hematologist.  "Ok, no problem," my brain said.

When the referral came the next day, it was for an appointment within our local oncology center; and let me tell you, it is a little disconcerting to see "oncology" mentioned in connection with this!!  My brain says, "It's no big deal; that's just where the hematologist happens to have his (or her...I'm not sure) office, so quit worrying."  :)  But another part of my brain can't ignore the fact that when I did a quick Google search about "causes of anemia," words like "leukemia" showed up then.

That's not to say that I have cancer--not at all.  There are any number of other reasons for anemia, and from what I've heard, some people discover a cause, and some never do, but live with it anyway (as they try to combat it with supplements, etc.).  But like my dad said, "We need to figure out the underlying cause," and the nurse said, "Hematology will help you figure out the underlying cause," so now I'm waiting for the magical appointment on April 27 that will--oh, I hope!--help me figure out the underlying cause.

I go back in my thoughts to the questions of the nurse at the blood donation center.  "Have you been feeling tired? Sluggish? Dizzy?"  Of course, I have!  But I thought the underlying causes were as follows:

~ I'm getting older.

~ I'm out of shape.

~ I'm carrying around more weight than I should.

~ I have a busy life.

~ I don't get enough sleep.

~ And as far as the dizziness, I remember my mother getting dizzy spells as she got older.  She kept a cute little tin of high-powered ginger drops in her desk drawer and would, if I remember correctly, put one of those under her tongue when she was feeling dizzy.  I don't have any ginger drops, but when I feel dizzy, I just stay still for a moment or two until it passes; and, most of all, I'm not shocked by the dizziness.  If it happened to my mom, there's a pretty good chance it will happen to me, too, right?  ;-)

Now that I know I'm anemic and have an appointment coming up to try to determine why that is the case, I find the battle is two-fold: first, not giving in to worry about all the "what-ifs," of which there are an infinite number of troubling possibilities that my mind can imagine if I let it.  And second, fighting the mental battle between the part of me that says, "You're tired. There's a reason for it. It's called anemia and vitamin D deficiency. You should rest. Just stop what you're doing.  Go lie down. You don't need to work so hard. You're exhausted, after all." and the other part that says, "Mind over matter. You're just as capable of accomplishing as much as you used to before you knew about this. Don't let anemia be an excuse! You come from a line of strong women who didn't give in to physical hardships. Be tough. Stay on your feet. Get going." Frankly, I don't know which side to listen to!

Meanwhile, I got the results from my mammogram, and they were excellent (my dad wasn't worried about that because as he reminds me, I breastfed six children, and the incidence of breast cancer goes down in women who breastfeed).  I'm choking down iron pills, taking a once-a-week high-dose vitamin D supplement, eating more spinach and red meat and raisins (preferably with chocolate covering them) ;-), trying to carve out more time to be out in the sun, going to bed earlier at night (well, not tonight, but other nights I have been!), and waiting.

Waiting on April 27, and whatever the next chapter in this health-after-40 adventure will be!