Anemia
I pride myself on being active and not eating meat, yet there are negatives and positives for making these choices.
A recent visit to the blood donation center brought that home.
I have O- blood. To my simplistic understanding, it’s in high demand. So, I always schedule 2-3 donations throughout the year.
Besides, it doesn’t take much time or effort, and I figure society would be better off if everyone gave blood more often.
It also makes me feel like a Boy Scout, and I like that.
But, back to the donation center.
After filling out the questionnaire, doing a small interview with the volunteer doctor, and lying back into one of the donation chairs, my preliminary iron test showed a lower level than desired.
In medical terms, I was anemic.
The nurses wouldn’t take my blood that day and asked me back into the doctor’s office for a debriefing. The doctor ensured that I understood what the results meant, told me what they would do with the blood already sampled, and gave me a pamphlet showing what kinds of foods I should be eating.
Unfortunately, this was not the first time my iron was too low to give blood.
Since I’m an old hat, I knew that minor changes to my diet should take care of things in a few weeks.
I went home to read about anemia online and plan how to improve my diet.
It turns out that my habits and choices are a perfect storm for anemia.
There’s those frequent blood donations.
My running habit. According to Runners World: “Iron deficiency is extremely common among endurance athletes like runners, impacting up to 17 percent of male and 50 percent of female endurance athletes…”
The vegetarian diet. Even if vegetarians are sure to eat plenty of beans and greens, the iron from plants is not absorbed as well as that found in meat.
And last but not least, drinking coffee or tea with meals reduces the amount of iron your body can absorb, especially plant-based iron.
Now, I love my coffee, and I love tea too, but I may lean on these caffeinated drinks more than I should on account of my frequently changing work schedule. The summer months, our busy season, doesn’t help either, what with longer hours and more stress.
There’s no surprise that the anemia diagnosis should come at the end of the summer.
See this healthline article for a much more exhaustive list of articles about caffeinated beverages and iron absorption.
Have you ever had Anemia? Do you think the benefits of a vegetarian diet outway the potential for anemia? Are you a vegetarian with high iron levels?