get my anemia under control

We’ll see what the iron & iron binding capacity levels look like – and map out the next few months’ program.

1/15/09. We’ll see what the levels look like, and go from there.

My skin is absolutely gorgeous – icy blue pale and translucent – which is usually a pretty good indicator that I’m perilously low on iron. Add in the fact that I cannot sleep – even with medication – and am irritable and tired – which are all further symptoms of worse than normal levels of anemia. I need to hie myself to the hematologist.

I haven’t been since late August, which isn’t very good selfcare on my part. Yes, time flies, and yes, I’ve been busy – but it’s shameful that I’ve not taken more care in this area.

I am on hold with the doctor’s office right now.

The in-fed infusion has really made an enormous difference. My ferritin levels went from a TWO to 532 – absolutely astounding levels of improvement.

I don’t have to go back for testing for at least two to four weeks!!

Hot Diggity Dog, I’m happy about this.

The infusion last month really helped; my count went up 1.7 points to actually just touch the bottom edge of normal at 11.8.

Still waiting on the Ferritin numbers; that will determine if I get another round of infusions now, or if it should wait a couple of months.

Yay for progress!

GRRR. I rearranged my work schedule, packed up all my stuff, and drove to the scheduled infusion appointment this morning… only to learn that they’d cancelled the session without telling me.

Apparently, my insurance won’t pay for the iron that gets administered a bit at a time – so they gave me a super dose of some other stuff last week, without telling me of the change. That means – YAY – that I don’t have to go back until 8/20.

I’m happy about having fewer infusion sessions, but pretty annoyed that they didn’t tell me. Bloody inconvenient to have hauled out there for nothing.

Yay for getting my Fridays back, anyway. Maybe my arms will even heal up before the 20th.

Well, it took 3 tries for them to get the IV threaded correctly – I now have a lovely array of bruises on both arms. Happily, though, once they got the third one situated, it went smoothly. It’s probably just in my head, but I could swear I already feel a tiny bit warmer.

I brought a pillow, my laptop, some books and a bottle of water. Next time, I’m also bringing ear plugs, so I can nap better.

Well, we (Doc and I) can’t get my hematocrit up above a 10, nor my ferritin up anywhere near normal, so it’s time for more iron infusions.

I’ll be starting the series next Friday. I hate the process but I love the outcome – I just feel so much better when my iron levels are closer to normal ranges.

She doesn’t think I’ll have to do a full 18 week series of 3x a week this time; her guess is that 2 months of weekly sessions (4 hours per session) will probably get it done.

It’s annoying, how it just gradually erodes… it’s been tracking down .6 points on a quarterly basis. The infusions I got during surgery last fall helped, but weren’t enough to get me above the bare minimum for “normal” – and now they’re gone.

I couldn’t tolerate the prescription iron supplement, and of course, we’ve learned that for me, diet only slows the erosion – it can’t replace what isn’t there.

So, it’s back to the infusion series. I’m really looking forward to not being constantly cold and exhausted (see me trying to be positive about this?!).

I need to go stock up on some books to read while I sit in the chair…