Health and Well-Being
Here’s Why and How to Fix Vitamin B12 Deficiency.
Severe vitamin B12 deficiency can lead to depression, paranoia, delusions, memory loss, anemia, and neurodegenerative diseases.
The Importance of Cobalamin for Health
Vitamin B12 (cobalamin) is close to my heart as its deficiency in my younger years when practicing plant-based diets solely caused me grief, especially from anemia.
In addition, a few family members and friends suffered the side effects of deficiency, particularly facing mental health issues, severe neurological problems, and blood diseases. Therefore, I feel obliged to create awareness of the importance of this critical vitamin for our fitness and physical and mental health.
This scientific paper points out that “although cobalamin (vitamin B12) deficiency was described over a century ago, it is still difficult to establish the correct diagnosis and prescribe the proper treatment.
Symptoms related to vitamin B12 deficiency may be diverse and vary from neurological to psychiatric. In clinical practice, many cases of vitamin B12 deficiency are overlooked or sometimes even misdiagnosed”.
This Harvard Medical School blog asserts that Vitamin B12 deficiency can be sneaky and harmful. The blog post quoting The New England Journal of Medicine points out that “a severe vitamin B12 deficiency can lead to deep depression, paranoia and delusions, memory loss, incontinence, loss of taste and smell, and more”.
Vitamin B12 is essential as our body cannot make it. Therefore, we need to get it from food or supplements. This vitamin is critical for our nervous system, DNA, and red blood cells.
Without vitamin B12, the body cannot create red blood cells impairing oxygen delivery. Therefore, I suffered from anemia when my intake was inadequate. I was not aware of supplementing in those days. But a hematologist identified the problem and helped me resolve it with appropriate supplementation.
Like vitamin D and magnesium, vitamin B12 was another critical supplement for me. However, I don’t need supplementation anymore as my diet provides the optimal amount of vitamin B12 detected in my regular blood tests.
Despite all, I am careful about this critical vitamin and pass along my knowledge and experience.
Over the last few decades, I reviewed many scientific papers on vitamin B12. If you check PubMed, you will see at least 25,000 scientific papers about vitamin B12.
However, without going into scientific details in this short article, I introduce practical points such as risk factors, deficiency symptoms, and standard treatment methods.
Risk Factors for Vitamin B12
From my review of the medical literature, observations, and personal experience, the critical risk factor is not consuming food, including vitamin B12.
This vitamin is mainly in animal products such as red meat, poultry, eggs, and dairy. Some plant sources, such as fortified grains, might have it in negligible amounts.
Biologically, plants don’t need vitamin B12. Contrary to some beliefs and misperceptions, fungi cannot create this vitamin. Only bacteria and microbes can.
Therefore, when I was not consuming animal products a few decades ago, I experienced severe deficiency, which was evident in my red blood counts found by a hematologist.
In addition, people using heartburn medication such as anti-acid tablets might be risky as vitamin B12 requires stomach acid to absorb. Using anti-acid medication was another big mistake when suffering from digestive issues such as a leaky gut.
I used to take anti-acid pills after each meal frequently. Unfortunately, they also caused me other problems, as mentioned in my previous articles.
With advice from a naturopath, adding a little apple cider vinegar to my drink during meal times temporarily resolved my stomach discomfort.
Another risk group is those who have surgery for weight loss and experiencing conditions such as Crohn’s disease and Celiac. As we get older, our stomach produces less acid. Therefore, aging people might also be in the risk group.
Deficiency Symptoms for Vitamin B12
The most common deficiency symptom for me was fatigue which was detected in my anemic situation by a hematologist. My family doctor did not get my vitamin B12 in regular yearly tests.
But when I notified extreme fatigue, he ordered blood tests. Besides, since fatigue is a general health condition indicating many health situations, doctors sometimes may neglect this critical test. It was the situation in my case.
Apart from fatigue and weakness, in the medical literature, are other symptoms such as numbness, unusual sensations, inflamed tongue, depressive feelings, yellow skin, paresthesia, memory loss, reasoning difficulty, lack of focus and attention, headache, lack of balance, having mobility difficulties, muscle cramps, vision disturbances, and even erectile dysfunction in men.
Some patients don’t notice symptoms immediately as they develop gradually. The critical problem is the deficiency issue might be confused due to other related conditions. For example, my family doctor did not suspect my deficiency until I asserted it adamantly.
I fixed my vitamin B12 deficiency with the keto-carnivore diet, as introduced in the attached story.
Treatment Methods for Vitamin B12 Deficiency
In my case, the immediate solution was a vitamin B12 injection ordered by the hematologist. Within a few weeks, symptoms disappeared. However, for the long-term solution, my dietician recommended I should consume animal products.
She pointed out that if I could not eat meat, eggs, and dairy, she wanted me to use sublingual vitamin B12 tablets in the methyl format (co-methylcobalamin). Supplementing in 1.2 mg helped me initially.
However, I decided to eat balanced and nutritious food for several other reasons, as mentioned in my previous articles. From my review of the medical literature, the most common treatment for severe cases of vitamin B12 deficiency is injection. As this medical resource points out, “parenteral or high-dose oral vitamin B12 is an effective therapy.”
Conclusions and Takeaways
As mentioned in my previous articles, vitamin B12 is an essential nutrient for the body, like vitamin D and magnesium for health and fitness. Let’s keep in mind that the body cannot produce it.
Thus we need to ingest it from food or supplements. The ramification of Vitamin B12 deficiency is severe. We cannot afford to neglect or overlook it.
As the symptoms show gradually, it is vital to get checked by our healthcare professionals. Blood tests can detect deficiency.
However, the situation needs to be analyzed by medical specialists as just blood tests are not sufficient to diagnose and create a treatment plan. Thus, we need to be assertive to get the necessary medical support.
As a lifestyle choice, if our diet does not give enough vitamin B12, the next option is supplementing it with advice from our doctors and dieticians.
As the side effects of vitamin B12 deficiency is critical for our physical and mental health, it is wise to proactively address the risks and mitigate them by taking necessary measures with the support of our healthcare professionals.
As I mentioned before, too little or too much of any nutrient can be harmful to the body. My point is there is a possibility of an overdose of vitamin B12 through supplementation.
The body sees too much vitamin B12 as toxic, so we need to be careful while supplementing and always get advice from qualified healthcare professionals. As this study concluded, “vitamin supplements should be used cautiously because adverse effects can occur.”
Thank you for reading my perspectives. I wish you a healthy and happy life.
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