Hello Everyone,

I am a new girl here, please forgive me for posting my question first and introduce myself later. I am extremely nervous right now and need some answers to ease my mind for the time being!

How to put my problem in a nutshell...
I've had 3 hyperemesis gravidarum pregnancies when I tried to take my vitamin supplements but it made me feel sicker therefore I skipped them for the most part.
I've had my 3rd baby 5 months ago and this is when my problems all started. Started to have some weird bradycardiac episodes with high blood pressure, then months later arrtyhmias and skipped heartbeats. I've had heart echo and countless EKG-s, blood tests - everything always came back fine and every doctor told me it's probably stress related.
They REFUSE to connect my other problems to my weird heart problems and honestly I didn't know what to think either..
For also these past 5 months I started to develop other kind of problems as well...First I've had tingling hands and feet, also they felt as if they were falling asleep non-stop. Then I developed extreme fatigue and malaise which was not relieved by any rest. I started to have twitching muscles all over my body, sometimes non-stop. Along with it came lots of muscle and joint pain. Then my most bothersome symptom popped up - first on my knees and elbows..as if someone touched a hot pot to it, it was burning for a few seconds without any reason. By now (in the past 2 months) it developed to a constant sunburnt skin sensation totally all over my body (for the past few days even the inside of my nose, ears, mouth, and also my sculp.)

I've been to numerous doctors of course and noone could ever figure out what's wrong with me. All blood tests kept coming back normal. In the meantime I felt as if something's attacking my body and shutting it down and I'm just dieing and noone can figure out why. I became stressed and upset about it - which led the doctors to believe that I have postpartum depression and they wanted to treat me with anti-depressants no matter where I went.

Until someone told me about severe B12 deficiency. Suddenly it all made sense...all my symptoms fit into the big picture. I asked my family practicioner to draw blood to check my b12 levels, which she refused, saying that none of my symptoms match it and I am not anemic therefore I don't need it. She suggested it's all only stress.
I then turned to my rheumatologist who is in the process of diagnosing me with fibromyalgia (while ruling everything else out). He ALSO refused to test me for b12 deficiency - saying that it's awfully rare, my other blood test results don't support it and that he needs to rule out more common diseases first.

So here I am, noone wanting to check my b12 levels out. Thank God though, DirectLabs exists, so we ordered my tests through them and going to the lab tomorrow to draw my blood. It shall help to figure out what's going on...

My BIG question is related to my heart though. Can my heart problems be related to b12 deficiency as well? I think I've read somewhere that it can cause heart failure. Now I am freaking out. How long does b12 deficiency have to go on before it happens? Is heart disease reversible at all? I don't think I have advanced heart disease since my summer heart echo which was normal but my arrythmias since then became very frequent. Is my heart going to be OK with b12 supplements? I know it's a silly question which can't be answered - but I am worried about heart failure or heart attack due to this and I don't know how realistic it is.
I am taking b12 supplements orally but it's the synthetic b12 and I read today that it's not that good. We've just ordered the natural b12 sublingual supplement....

I guess any insight or encouragement would be more than welcome..I am really worried and scared and just hoping that I am not too late with treating my problems..

Thank you..

Mercyhill

hello and welcome to neurotalk ... i don't have any answers about b12 deficiency and heart problems ... however i can relate to deficiencies and how different ones can and do cause symptoms which doctors have a hard time acknowledging .... personally i think its because they are looking for something bigger .... can't see the tree for the forest type of mentality ... anyway ... enough said ... here at NT you will find alot of friendly and supportive people ... here is a link to our fantastic forum on vitamins .... maybe there you will be able to find some answers ... http://neurotalk.psychcentral.com/forum49.html and again ...

Hello and welcome to NeuroTalk. Great to see you have come to be with us. Just let us know if we can be of any help. We are all here to assist each other as possible.

Again welcome, looking forward to seeing you around.

Darlene

Welcome to Neuro Talk, sorry for why you fopund us but glad you did. Follow that link and post to your hearts content folks here are really wonderful helpful and kind, again welcome to NT

I am not exactly sure about if heart problems related to B12 deficiencies are reversible, but I can say that you can have some symptoms of B12 deficiencies and not be anemic. It is rare to be deficient unless you are vegetarian or you lack an enzyme in your intestine needed to absorb B12. B12 is found in foods such as fish, shellfish, meat, and dairy products. Taking a multivitamin is always a good idea, and maybe increasing some of this foods (if your not a vegetarian) could help. Also, if your levels do come back low, then you may need to look at getting IM injections of B12. I hope that your problems are due to B12 deficiency because there is an easy fix for that. Good luck, and hopefully you can get some answers!