So a few months ago I wrote a post all about iron. At the time, I had found out from one of my doctors that I was low in iron stores (not anemic). Initially, I planned to try to take care of my iron levels through diet alone. When that proved difficult, I reluctantly started taking ferrous sulfate supplements (elemental iron). Originally I was taking 3 caplets a day, but the nausea was so overwhelming at times that I cut down to twice a day. After a month or so I followed up with another set of labs. While my iron stores had improved, my doctor prescribed me six more months of iron supplements. Next up is my check-up in March. I’m really really hoping I get the green light to cut down even further or possibly even stop taking them. While I hate taking a lot of supplements, and iron seems to be hard on my stomach, I do want to make sure I protect my heart by getting enough iron.

Since you’re supposed to take iron with food, my next step, about a month or two ago, was to start researching which foods were considered iron inhibitors. As a vegetarian, I’m already sort of at risk for not getting enough iron, since I don’t have the meat or seafood sources. However, I was disheartened to learn that the majority of vegetarian sources of protein are actually iron inhibitors. Oh, that and TEA, which comprises probably 80% of my daily liquid intake. Ugh. Here is a list of iron inhibitors:

Dairy/ Calcium- while it is any calcium that inhibits iron, I like to get a lot of my protein from cottage cheese or greek yogurt. Dangit… moving on…

Eggs- Another affordable, easily accessible source of vegetarian protein. URGH.

Soy- uh, okay, running out of options here…

Whole Grains- Seriously, science?

Walnuts- Okay, so I could eat other nuts to get protein, I suppose, but walnuts are supposed to uniquely have the omega oils that I’m not getting from fish. DOUBLE URGH. Oh, and in case this isn’t frustrating enough, the main compound in walnuts that IS the iron inhibitor is also found in dried beans, lentils, and peas. Is nothing safe?!

Cocoa, Coffee, Tea- I could do without cocoa a lot of the time. I’ve even been cutting out coffee more or less for the past year. But I draw the freaking line at tea. COME ON!! Effing Oxalates!

My last little rant has to do with the supposed “upside” of all of this. Supposedly eating foods rich in vitamin C with iron is helpful in absorption. However, when I started to do some research, I found that a lot of foods I consider good sources of vitamin C (fruits like strawberries, blueberries, raspberries) actually have oxalates or phenolic acid, a few of the above mentioned offenders. ARHGH!

So at this point, I’m just sucking down the iron, trying to eat only oat or rice products and veggies rich in Vit C with my iron, and keeping other foods at least an hour or two from when I take the iron, but I’m nowhere near perfect with it. And this is pretty hard to do, obviously. At the end of the day, I’m more worried about my overall nutrition, and continuing to eat these whole foods and good sources of protein (and spinach, which is… dare I say… rich in iron but ALSO AN IRON INHIBITOR?!)

The moral of the story is- it seems sometimes with nutrition that you just can’t win. I’m sort of at a loss here. Like I said, I’m going to just keep trucking on with the supplements and see what happens next. I’ll keep you posted…

-Iron(seeking) Woman

Do you have any frustrations around nutrition advice and the contradictions that frequently come from this, or conflicting advice about health and nutrition?