poppadr3w
13-07-17, 13:07
I just turned 29, but this issue has been brought to light a year or two ago.
I go to a doctor for Testosterone Replacement Therapy, so they do bloodwork every few months. They do not only check for Testosterone levels, but whatever they feel may be necessary and whatever I ask.
This issue came to light early last year, actually. I remember getting bloodwork done and some of my liver enzymes came back quite elevated. Awesome, I know. So they referred me to a Gastoenterologist (who was amazing). He did some bloodwork on his own and by then my enzymes dropped in levels a bit, but my Ferritin levels were abysmally low.
Generally low Ferritin is found in women who are menstruating (blood loss = low iron, so it makes sense). I am a male (always have been, the TRT is for Hypogonadism, not due to a sex change or anything like that). Other than that, reasons may be some sort of disease or bleeding.
The GI ran his tests to look for internal bleeding: Endoscopy, Colonoscopy, Stool Test, bloodwork and such. All came back clear, so he was stumped. He wanted to do a Capsule Endoscopy, but I never got a chance to get it done because his office is quite far, and for that I'd have to go twice in one day (once to affix a monitor and take the capsule, then to go back later that day to have it removed). More bloodwork was ran later and it went up slightly, so nothing was ever done, even though it was low.
Late June 2017 I had more routine bloodwork done and I told the PA that they were my General Physicians basically, so I asked to do routine bloodwork. She agreed and ran a whole slew of bloodwork on top of the general Testosterone labwork. My Ferritin came back incredibly low once again - the lowest she had ever seen in anyone. She suggested seeing a Hemotologist and taking an iron supplement in the mean time.
So now I have an appointment with the Hemotologist tomorrow and am freaking out a little bit. I have been quite good with health anxiety overall lately, but when you call the line and you hear it's a cancer center... it shakes you to your core a little bit. I don't think I have cancer, and even the PA herself said that if it was truly problematic that I would have shown more issues by now since it has been over a year.
To top it all off, the Iron supplement SUCKS. The first night I took a full tablet and I was on the bathroom floor with intense nausea. It caused acid reflux on top of it, or exacerbated the rare acid reflux I had by making it more intense and frequent. I decided to try taking a half of a tablet and it went over easier overall, but still caused issues. Yesterday when I took it before I had a client I felt off while training them. Late into the session I started to feel nausea onset pretty heavily, I felt anxious, out of it, sick, fatigued, etc. I ended up laying down for 15 minutes afterwards. I then forced myself to mow the lawn and skipped the gym altogether. I was totally wiped from the lawn... Which is unusual, because I work out relatively frequently, the lawn isn't usually a problem, it's a self push mower, and our lawns in total are not huge. It takes, in totality, like 20-30 minutes to complete all of the lawn mowing.
I go to a doctor for Testosterone Replacement Therapy, so they do bloodwork every few months. They do not only check for Testosterone levels, but whatever they feel may be necessary and whatever I ask.
This issue came to light early last year, actually. I remember getting bloodwork done and some of my liver enzymes came back quite elevated. Awesome, I know. So they referred me to a Gastoenterologist (who was amazing). He did some bloodwork on his own and by then my enzymes dropped in levels a bit, but my Ferritin levels were abysmally low.
Generally low Ferritin is found in women who are menstruating (blood loss = low iron, so it makes sense). I am a male (always have been, the TRT is for Hypogonadism, not due to a sex change or anything like that). Other than that, reasons may be some sort of disease or bleeding.
The GI ran his tests to look for internal bleeding: Endoscopy, Colonoscopy, Stool Test, bloodwork and such. All came back clear, so he was stumped. He wanted to do a Capsule Endoscopy, but I never got a chance to get it done because his office is quite far, and for that I'd have to go twice in one day (once to affix a monitor and take the capsule, then to go back later that day to have it removed). More bloodwork was ran later and it went up slightly, so nothing was ever done, even though it was low.
Late June 2017 I had more routine bloodwork done and I told the PA that they were my General Physicians basically, so I asked to do routine bloodwork. She agreed and ran a whole slew of bloodwork on top of the general Testosterone labwork. My Ferritin came back incredibly low once again - the lowest she had ever seen in anyone. She suggested seeing a Hemotologist and taking an iron supplement in the mean time.
So now I have an appointment with the Hemotologist tomorrow and am freaking out a little bit. I have been quite good with health anxiety overall lately, but when you call the line and you hear it's a cancer center... it shakes you to your core a little bit. I don't think I have cancer, and even the PA herself said that if it was truly problematic that I would have shown more issues by now since it has been over a year.
To top it all off, the Iron supplement SUCKS. The first night I took a full tablet and I was on the bathroom floor with intense nausea. It caused acid reflux on top of it, or exacerbated the rare acid reflux I had by making it more intense and frequent. I decided to try taking a half of a tablet and it went over easier overall, but still caused issues. Yesterday when I took it before I had a client I felt off while training them. Late into the session I started to feel nausea onset pretty heavily, I felt anxious, out of it, sick, fatigued, etc. I ended up laying down for 15 minutes afterwards. I then forced myself to mow the lawn and skipped the gym altogether. I was totally wiped from the lawn... Which is unusual, because I work out relatively frequently, the lawn isn't usually a problem, it's a self push mower, and our lawns in total are not huge. It takes, in totality, like 20-30 minutes to complete all of the lawn mowing.