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Vitamin B12 and your Sex Drive

Fertility and Pregnancy, ,

Vitamin B12 and your Sex Drive: If your libido is low, then you may need for vitamin B12- it’s great for fertility and sustaining a healthy sex drive! Conversely, vitamin B12 deficiency can have the opposite effect, making it harder to conceive and carry a baby to full term.

Let’s talk about Vitamin B12

When you think about vitamin B12 deficiency, you normally link it with fatigue, memory loss, depression, and that annoying painful numbness in your hands, feet, arms, and legs.  These symptoms can be debilitating, and won’t go away until you replenish your vitamin B12 levels.

But few people realize that vitamin B12 also plays an important part in your reproductive system functioning. With so much focus on the importance of taking plenty of folic acid, another B vitamin, during pregnancy, much of the attention is taken away from the necessity to also get plenty of vitamin B12 before, during, and after pregnancy.

Vitamin B12 not only increases energy, revving up your sex drive, but it also promotes good fertility. In studies where women suffering from severe vitamin B12 anemia were trying to conceive, most saw positive results after supplementing with more vitamin B12.

In men, vitamin B12 deficiency can lower sperm count and impair erectile functioning.

Having babies

Scientists believe that vitamin B12, along with other essential B vitamins boost the sex drive by regulating sex hormones, keeping them in good balance to enable fertility.

Likewise, a deficiency in vitamin B12 can cause symptoms that negatively affect your ability to procreate, including low libido, impotence, difficulty conceiving a baby, depression, anxiety, miscarriages, premature births, and increased risk for birth defects and failure to thrive.

Get checked!

Before planning a family, it’s vitally important to make sure you don’t have vitamin B12 deficiency. If your blood test comes out positive or you experience some of the telltale signs of vitamin B12 deficiency, then increase your vitamin B12 uptake before trying to have a baby, and continue through the rest of your pregnancy and while breastfeeding.

Symptoms of vitamin B12 deficiency

Symptoms of vitamin B12 deficiency to look out for:

  • Depression
  • Poor sex drive, loss of interest
  • Anxiety
  • Brain fog
  • Memory loss
  • Poor concentration
  • Constant fatigue
  • Painful tingling and numbness, particularly in hands and feet
  • Sore, burning red tongue
  • Difficulty walking in a straight line
  • Muscle pain, spasms
  • Decreased muscular coordination
  • Frequent miscarriages
  • Fertility problems

More on B12 deficiency

Have you noticed any of the symptoms mentioned, but didn’t know what they mean? For many, a diagnosis of vitamin B12 deficiency comes as a shock.

That’s because many of us eat a healthy diet with lots of protein foods that supply vitamin B12. Yet, a rising number of people in the US suffer from vitamin B12 deficiency caused by vitamin B12 malabsorption- that means that regardless of how much meat, fish, or poultry you eat, you still are unable to maintain adequate amounts of vitamin B12 in your blood supply.

Many factors in American life contribute to this, including medications for diabetes and acid reflux, bariatric surgery, long-term pain medications, antidepressants and antibiotics, autoimmune disorders, and also old age.

Vitamin B12 Deficiency Caused by 33 Medications

To replenish vitamin B12 supplies when you are unable to absorb it through food, it’s necessary to take non-dietary forms of vitamin B12 that are absorbed through the skin and muscle tissues, bypassing the digestive system completely.

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Unexpected Symptoms of Vitamin B12 Deficiency

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Fatigue, memory loss, and painful numbness and tingling are some of the earliest symptoms of vitamin B12 deficiency. Yet many people with even moderate vitamin B12 deficiency or worse, pernicious anemia, are surprised to learn that a host of other underlying health problems can also be attributed to not having enough vitamin B12 in your blood supply. Listed are some startling symptoms associated with severely low vitamin B12 levels.

Unexpected Symptoms of Vitamin B12 Deficiency

 

Unexpected Symptoms of Vitamin B12 Deficiency

Vitamin B12 is such an important nutrient for survival; it should come as no surprise that a depletion of vitamin B12 should manifest itself in so many seemingly-unconnected ailments.

Scientists have seen where individuals may suffer for years from depression, heart palpitations, dizziness, or difficulty conceiving a baby without ever making the connection between that and vitamin B12 deficiency, where a few months of intense supplementation can reverse the symptoms.

Emotional difficulties, illness

Chronic depression, anxiety, and even paranoia are all listed as possible symptoms of vitamin B12 deficiency.  In patients diagnosed with mental disorders such as bipolar or schizophrenia, researchers have noted that an underlying vitamin B12 deficiency can worsen their symptoms even more so.

This is not to say that your anxieties or bouts of depression aren’t real. Rather, get your vitamin B12 levels checked, and see if supplementing with extra vitamin B12 has a positive effect on your emotional state- which it very likely will.

Never discontinue taking any antidepressants, antipsychotic or other medications without your doctor’s consent.

Infertility

Vitamin B12 deficiency is directly linked with many ailments that interfere with family planning. From the beginning, before trying to conceive, depletion in vitamin B12 can increase your risk for complications during pregnancy and nerve damage in utero.

Researchers have noted that mothers who have severe vitamin B12 deficiency before, during, or after pregnancy are more likely to suffer miscarriage, deliver prematurely, or give birth to a baby with neural tube defects and inability to thrive.

If you are at risk for vitamin B12 deficiency, then it’s a good idea to take vitamin B12 injections or other non-dietary vitamin B12 supplementations before getting pregnant, during your pregnancy, and afterwards while breastfeeding.

For more, read Vitamin B12 and your Sex Drive

Heart disease

Vitamin B12 deficiency doesn’t cause heart disease, but it can inhibit your ability to synthesize homocysteine properly. Vitamin B12 is essential for digesting the amino acid homocysteine, keeping it in check and preventing hyperhomocysteinemia- elevated homocysteine in the blood supply.

Excess homocysteine is attributed to increased risk for heart attack, stroke, and possibly Alzheimer’s disease. Signs may include heart palpitations, fatigue, chest pain, or shortness of breath.

To keep homocysteine levels under control, it’s important to also maintain vitamin B12 levels in your bloodstream.

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Please tell us

Have you noticed constant tiredness, sadness, or brain fog? These are common signs of vitamin B12 deficiency.

Do you have questions about symptoms of vitamin B12 deficiency? Please drop us a line below!

Vitamin B12 Anemia during Pregnancy- Don’t Ignore This

Fertility and Pregnancy, , , ,

Preventing anemia during pregnancy means more than just checking your iron levels. Vitamin B12 deficiency anemia can cause  many problems that can harm your baby, yet it’s often brushed under the rug. In fact, vitamin B12 blood testing doesn’t always detect the earliest signs of vitamin B12 anemia during pregnancy, or afterwards.

Vitamin B12 Anemia during Pregnancy- Don’t Ignore This

Family planning with vitamin B12 in mind.

Vitamin B12 is so important for so many stages of life- it helps your make plenty of healthy red blood cells needed for oxygen. Vitamin B12 also protects your nervous system. This important plant-based vitamin is excellent for metabolism, energy, memory, and good mood.

For family planning, vitamin B12 is crucial for fertility, development, and your child’s ability to thrive.

According to studies, women with vitamin B12 deficiency or pernicious anemia are more likely than others to experience infertility, multiple miscarriages, and spontaneous abortions.

Fertility

Among the many symptoms of vitamin B12 deficiency include problems that can interfere with family planning. Difficulty conceiving, low libido, impotence, and miscarriage are all impairments that occur with pernicious anemia or medium-range vitamin B12 deficiency.

Miscarriages

If you have too much homocysteine, then you are at risk for preeclampsia and miscarriage. Vitamin B12 helps to control homocysteine, so it’s important to keep taking your vitamin B12 supplements.

To prevent blood clotting, you should also keep folate levels in check, as well.

Neural tube defects

In a study by the National Institutes of Health, doctors saw that neural tube birth defects happen more often when the mother has vitamin B12 deficiency or pernicious anemia.

Even before getting pregnant, you should start taking extra vitamin B12.

Spina bifida, a development disorder that means “split spine,” is five times more likely to occur with pernicious anemia, even if couples are anemic before conceiving.

Prevent anemia during pregnancy

Vitamin B12 deficiency is treatable- and the symptoms can be prevented if caught on time. That means good health, both for you and your unborn child, when vitamin B12 anemia is detected before or during pregnancy.

Researchers noted that when vitamin B12 supplements are introduced in high doses, homocysteine levels decrease, resulting in a much better outcome for normal childbirth.

While there’s no upper limit for vitamin B12 (all amounts are perfectly safe), the standard dose is 1,000mic taken daily, weekly, bi-weekly, or as recommended by your physician.

If you had vitamin B12 deficiency anemia during pregnancy, did you take extra vitamin B12, in addition to your prenatal vitamins?

 Image by David Castillo Dominici