18 Month Lab Results

My 18-month follow up appointment is next week at the surgeon's office. I had my labs drawn a week or so ago and just received the results in the past few days. Overall, they aren't too bad. But I have a couple issues that need some aggressive attention. VITAMIN D -- annoyingly, my D is tanking again. At my 1 year labs it was up to 62 but now it's back down in the 30's. I had suspected that the boost I saw at the 1 year mark was because of the Florida vacation and time on the beach that happened a week before the labs were drawn... now I know that's true. All along I've been doing about 4,000IU of Vitamin D3 per day except for the months when my PCP had me on the Rx version of 50,000IU of Vitamin D2 once per week (which did nothing). At this point I have increased my dry Vitamin D3 intake to 10,000IU until I can talk to the PA at next week's appointment. I wrote to Michelle at Vitalady and she suggested I do 50k every day for 30 days, then every other day for 60 days... then retest to see how my levels are. I'll run this plan by the surgeon's office next week -- but for now this is my plan as soon as I receive my shipment of 50's. (This advice is NOT for people with normal digestive systems or people with healthy Vitamin D levels... speak to your doctor before you even think about this.) FERRITIN -- last round of labs showed low iron levels (not low, out of range, but that it had dropped from previous tests). That number is back up after starting a supplement 6 months ago. However, my ferritin seems to be on the low end of the range. It's 36 and the normal range is 30-400. I don't have a plan for this yet, but will be discussing it at my appointment next week. COPPER -- it's low so I'll be boosting my supplements a bit. Again, will discuss at next week's appointment. VITAMIN B1 -- it's still well within the normal range, but it had shown a dramatic drop since the labs at one year. It went from 33 just six months ago to now being 16. B Vitamins are a common deficiency -- especially B1, B6 and B12. But I'm not sure why just B1 would drop and not the others. HDL Cholesterol -- This is the good cholesterol number that we want to be high. It's an indicator of overall healthy and physical activity. My number in November was 72 -- right after the half marathon and an extensive training season. And now after a long winter and slacking on exercise it's down to 57. Need to work hard to get that back up where I want it. I really find this stuff fascinating. Pouring over the reports, researching the results and understanding what's going on inside my body ... isn't it so cool?! And having all my results in a spreadsheet so I can see 18 months worth of labs all in once place, side-by-side really helps me get a clear picture of my overall health. Are you up to date on your labs? If not, here's the list of tests you should have done after RNY. ~Pam