Yes, no telling where you were. Although many people show signs of anemia, others (me included, unfortunately) show absolutely no sign of anemia even after longterm serious damage has occurred. I would have been dead within months, and my labs were smack in the middle of normal, so no one prior to the neurologist who diagnosed me bothered to check B12 and it took a ferritin to show I was low in iron.

And, of course, even without acid-reducing drugs many people simply lose the ability to produce sufficient stomach acid to absorb iron well or absorb B12 at all from food.

Do be alert to the other possibilities, but I hope you never stop B12, and you might check into betaine for stomach acid replacement, since stomach acid is protective in other ways.

rose