Is it possible to get my iron up through food only? How to accomplish this?

BlondeeBeauty

Hey everyone! I had started a thread before about iron and it got pushed back several pages. I’m iron deficient. Just low ferritin, 7. I’m not anemic, my hemoglobin and hematocrit are fine.

I REALLY want to avoid taking a supplement so I’m trying to increase it through food and ASAP. I eat or get close to 100% a day (18mg) but that’s not enough. That’s only what you need to maintain. So should I aim for 200%? 250%? I'm just not sure.

I want to try snacking on Total cereal throughout the day and it's 100% iron per serving size but it's also 100% of lots of other different vitamins and minerals, some of which I already get enough or too much of so I'm nervous to eat a whole entire serving of that a day. So I'm thinking maybe a half a serving which would be 50% but Idk if that's enough. There are some other vitamins I could benefit from that I'm low in right now like 100% B12 and D. But Vitamin A and C I'm worried about. I've read too much Vitamin A can cause blindness. Supposedly your body is supposed to get rid of extra vitamins through your urine but if you get way too much, it can't get rid of it all.

I was thinking half a serving size of that (50%) along with 2 servings of lima beans with dinner (16%) so it would be about 165% but I still don't know if that's enough. I'm gonna meet with a nutritionist but basically I need to get it up as quickly as possible using food only.

I know an iron cast skillet will help but it won't be enough alone. Does anyone have any suggestions? Or do you know how much I would need?

Also, is the iron absorbed better if you have it all at once? Like for example, if I were to have a half a serving size of Total in the morning and a half of serving size in the afternoon (50% each time), is that not going to absorb as well than if I were to eat both servings at once? (100%)

What would you do in my position if you could only get it up through food?

I am a picky eater so liver, clams, etc is out of the question.

Thanks everyone!