Maybe My Vitamin D is Low...

If you're reading this, you most likely will be coming in for a visit with me in the near future. Some patients have a long history of mental health disorders and treatments, some have been diagnosed recently, and some have never been diagnosed or treated but they know something is wrong and are looking for advice to feel better. Certain actions you take will make this process easier for you: - If you have used medications for mental health management, please bring a list of names, dosages and how long you used each medications for. - If you have your past records available, please bring those along, too! - Lab work reports are always welcome, especially if done within the last year; that way you don't have to be poked twice! - Think about why you chose or why you were referred to our clinic; what is it about your mental health that worries you? How would you put the way you feel into words? Do you have specific examples to bring up that are troublesome to

Short answer, quite a bit. When I was a kid, I remember watching a TV show depicting daily adventures of a 40 year old dad. He had gray hair and a gray mustache. Perhaps he had a lot on his mind that turned his hair gray but I'm under the impression that our society looks younger and younger nowadays. We feel younger, too. But we're not younger on the inside. Our organs know exactly how old we are! Adults above the age of 60 have less muscle, less blood flow to the liver and less kidney mass. Why is this important? Because liver and the kidneys metabolize and get rid of the drugs we take! If you've been drinking coffee your whole life, all day long, and had no trouble falling asleep, it may change as you get older. Suddenly, maximum concentration of caffeine increases from 15 minutes in a 20 year old, to almost two hours in an elderly person, so you keep drinking more because you don't feel the effects right away, as you used to. It also takes much longer for your