Rough Recovery – Ups and downs?

[Vitaman71]

After 11 weeks of treatment (50,000 IU of D3 once a week), I would have thought I would be well on my way to recovery by now. However, I feel like I am worse. If I stand for any length of time, it feels like the muscles above my knees can barely hold my weight. Ironically, my right leg weakness is much worse than my left leg. (I hold my right leg in position while driving car, thus flinching my knee muscles). I also have weakness behind both elbows, with the left being a little worse than the right. (I use my left arm often to prop myself up in a chair, thus flinching my left arm muscles). I have also some weakness\tenderness in both rib cage areas. My leg and arm muscles seem tender as well. Seems a little difficult to arise from a chair again.

As I read through older messages on this board, I saw some of the older really struggling in despair. I catch myself stating the same things they stated:
Why am I not better by now? How could I get worse while I am supplementing? Why did I get better and then get worse? Could this really be caused by Vitamin D or is something else going on? Am I getting too much Vitamin D? Am I getting too little Vitamin D? Should I try to exercise or just rest?  

I assume most of these older posters have recovered and have no need to currently post on this board. However, I am curious if any of the current posters are 3 – 6 months out and not recovered? Anyone here still struggling after being on Vit D supplementation?  Anyone still struggling with symptoms?

[Zombiefood41]

I’m a recovering addict with a dual diagnosis. I take 50,000 units of vitamin D once a week. I haven’t noticed anything as far as feeling better from it. I know this is vitamin d related so I won’t bring up any other vitamins or supplements I found helped me or helps me, but I just want to say please get blood work done by your doctor or whomever ( as extensive as possible ) I was abusing a medication Modafinil. I took it thinking I wouldn’t. Then the insanity kicked in and I relapsed. Feeling horrible my blood work showed low hemoglobin as well. I was prescribed iron pills. So it’s mandatory. So is good nutrition, diet as well as being productive and making a pattern ( just my opinion ) but I’m preaching to the choir right now as I probably drank less then 8 oz of water today. Be safe and good luck.

[busymom54]

Vitamin D deficiency usually starts getting better in a few weeks of Vitamin D.  My mom had it and her improves in about 6 to 8 weeks.  I do not know if you are on any cholesterol meds but this will give you pain like you are describing.  I had to stop all my cholesterol meds and now I am trying to eat better.

[JerseyPhil2]

Are you taking a statin drug? They can cause muscle weakness and pain, too. And they may also suppress Vitamin D levels (from what I read).

[deksman2]

Its not just about consuming Vitamin D.
It works in combination with other minerals so the body can properly utilize it.
Magnesium being one such mineral.
But also, it has been suggested that Zinc is important when it came to Vitamin D production in the body.

The only viable form of Zinc supplementation which demonstrated raised levels in the body after longer usage was Zinc Picolinate.
While the RDA recommendations for minerals are more or less close to the needed values, it has been observed that supplementing with 50 mg of Zinc daily is not dangerous on a long term basis.
However, if a person is supplementing with larger Zinc dosages, it was recommended to supplement every 15mg of Zinc with 2mg of Copper as well (or in this case, Copper Sebacate seems to be the only viable supplemental form which showed higher levels in the body after long term use).

Its possible that being deficient in Vitamin D will take a while for the levels to stabilize... but this also depends on other mineral status in the body.
So at times, supplementing with certain vitamins can leech other minerals because the body is now working harder to properly use them.

Supplementation is a tricky thing.
You need to do research on proper Vitamin and mineral forms which the body can actually absorb and make most use from... otherwise, you are probably not getting the necessary amount from supplementation.

Also... it might be possible that Vitamin D supplementation could cause some other factors... such as maybe fighting an infection more efficiently (which you might be experiencing as muscle spasms or general weakness).
All kinds of problems after all were observed to accompany Vitamin D deficiency... but as mentioned before, its not the only factor to take into account.

Have yo measured your Vitamin D levels now that 11 weeks have passed?
If not, I would suggest you do so to ascertain what your current levels are.

The Vitamin D council recommends about 50 to 60 ng/ml for 'good health'... and between 80 and 100 ng/ml for 'excellent health'.

Though, some of those figures can be considered conservative since it was observed that higher numbers did not correlate with toxicity.