Last week I was really tired, but still couldn’t sleep (4-6 hr/night). This is rare for me, and I figured something was off. I tried some chicken, and ate more starches, but I still felt crappy. So I channeled my inner hypochondriac, and with the help of Google, self-diagnosed myself with a B-12 deficiency! (See what happens when you only eat 150g/week of meat?!) Unable to sleep in the wee hours, I planned to get a blood B-12 test, and a B-12 injection in the morning.

You can order a B-12 test online at Request-A-Test for $49. You draw the blood at a local clinic, and the next day you get results:

This 370 pg/mL was lower than my target, which should be > 500 pg/mL, according to European and Japanese standards. This NIH cites 200-900 as normal, but says older people can show symptoms of deficiency at < 500 pg/mL.

I felt great after my B-12 injection, and even did back-to-back spin classes this morning. I may do two more classes tomorrow.

I now take a B-12 pill every day. All vegans probably know this already.