Excuses, Excuses

For the record, I just found out the reason that the half-marathon training was so difficult.  Apparently my iron levels are extremely low, and my body is only getting half the oxygen it should.  The doctor said, and I quote, "This made your training twice as hard as it would have been for a person with normal iron levels."  What?  You mean I wasn't just being lazy and whiny?  I guess it's strange to be relieved that I am iron-deficient, but it makes me feel better to know it wasn't all in my head. 

Now, the hard part is figuring out why my levels are so low because I eat just about every food on the "Foods High in Iron" list.  For females, the norm is about 12-14 and mine is 6.  I don't recommend googling what that means because this is what I found: "I once had a woman walk into the ER by some miracle with an iron count of 6. She was near death."  I'm not kidding.  For now, I'm going with my doctor's cool, calm, and collected response.  The good news is once I get this all figured out, I should have much more energy.  Maybe even enough to do crazy things like staying up past 10:00!

**Because one of the primary symptoms is fatigue, I would also like to note that this excuses all of those times I have been labeled "party pooper" for going to bed early.  While we're at it, lets also excuse those times I fell asleep on the couch while we had company.