Vitamin D Deficiency

Hi everyone.. I just came across this site a couple hours ago. I have been reading all the posts and decided to join. I was recently diagnoised with a vitamin D deficiency. I was amazed to see how many people out there have the same symptoms as I do. My heart goes out to each and everyone of you, because I know what it is like. I can not find a doctor that will listen to me either. I have gotten to the point that when I switch doctors I only tell them a few symptoms at a time because I have convinced myself that if I tell them everything at one time they will treat me the same way that other doctors in the past have. Let me give you some background. I am 39 years old and live in the Southeastern Part of the U.S.A. I have chronic asthma that is controlled by oral meds, and steroid inhalers daily. I also suffer from extreme allergies to dust, animals, mold, grass, and trees. For this I take an O.T.C. allergy med and a nasal steroid daily. Several years ago I injured my lower back and from time to time I take pain meds for that. I try really hard not to take pain meds unless I know I am going to be a home for a long time and I am in extreme pain. I have also experienced chronic fatigue for over 2 decades. It is so bad at times I will take to my bed for 48 hours at a time and still feel tired when I do wake up. After my back injury I started having other pains that do not seem to be related to this injury. I have muscle spasms in my hands, feet, lower legs, and eyelids. I have really bad cramps in my lower legs, and feet. This happens mostly when I try to sleep. The pain that I have seems to jump from one body part to another. My hips, legs, and hands seem to be the worse. At times my pinky fingers and little toes cramp and actually pull away from the rest of my hand or foot. When this happens I can not write or do anything that requires the use of my hands until the cramp is over. Sometimes I can pull it back into place and the cramp stops other times it will start right back up. I also experience severe stomach cramps followed by diarrhea. This can happen at anytime so I have to stay close to a bathroom. All of this has impacted my life in ways that I can't even explain. I have missed my children's entire lives. They are grown now and I have never been able to be involved in school activities or anything that required any type of committment on my part, because I never know how I will feel next week, or tomorrow or even in an hour. My children's school teachers actually thought their grandmother was their mother for a long time because they never saw me. I have been to multiple doctors some who try to figure it out at first, others that only want to treat only certain symptoms, and still others that just wrote me off as being crazy. My co-workers all laugh at me and say I am a hypocondriac because I get sick three times more often than they do. I am very careful not to take many days off maybe one or two per year. I come to work no matter how bad I feel. I just started my Vitamin D 50000 IU 1 per week today. Has anyone with Vitamin D deficiencies suffered from this type of symptoms, and did Vitamin D help?

[FurballsMom]

My experience with severe vitamin D deficiency suggests to me that the one megadose you're taking is NOT enough.  Both my primary care provider AND my naturopath had me taking my weekly megadose vitamin D2, the one you're taking, PLUS 2,000 iu natural vitamin D3 everyday in order to raise and maintain my vitamin D levels.  My levels were so low that they were almost non-existent when I first had mine tested.

I still take high doses of vitamin D and will have my levels tested again in December.  You MUST get your vitamin D levels tested on a regular basis--at least once every six months.  There is little danger of the levels getting too high, but that is still a possibility.  They also need to be sure that you are actually raising your vitamin D levels.  Your optimal vitamin D levels should be between 50 and 80.  You can read such information on mercola.com (just use his search engine and use the key words "vitamin D") and on the Vitamin D Council's website.  In fact, it was Dr. Mercola who suggested that people sign up for the newsletters from the Vitamin D Council.  Through these newsletters I learned that we MUST take magnesium in order for the body to fully synthesize the vitamin D.