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RichardKennaway comments on Yet More "Stupid" Questions - Less Wrong Discussion
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If I happen to have a deficiency or excess of some nutrient, how would I tell? That is, what experienced symptoms should suggest to me a change to my diet?
Symptoms of vitamin C deficiency: Slow healing of injuries, small mouth sores that don't heal, malaise, lethargy.
Symptoms of vitamin D deficiency: Fragile bones, muscle weakness or twitching.
Symptoms of iron deficiency: Anemia, weakness, sometimes pica (a desire to eat ice cubes, clay, or some other non-food item). They test for this when you donate blood, so you don't have to involve a doctor to find out if you're deficient in iron.
Other deficiencies are much less common (at least I don't know anyone who's had them).
Slight tangent, does "malaise" have a more specific meaning in this context? Google gives me "generalized feeling of discomfort, illness, or lack of well-being." which is unhelpful.
It means exactly that. It's not a good diagnostic symptom since (a) it may come on slowly and not be noticed as a change and (b) there are a huge number of things that could cause it. But if I noticed small mouth sores and then realized I had been feeling vaguely bad for weeks I would be more concerned about a vitamin deficiency than if only the first symptom were present. (Otherwise, well, maybe I have picked up a habit of biting my lips in my sleep.)
The symptoms of vitamin D deficiency I found are even less useful. Neither of the people I know who've had it had mentioned muscle weakness or twitching in particular, and you really want to find out you're deficient before your bones are breaking all the time. Luckily, unless you sunburn very easily, or have dark skin and live in a temperate or higher latitude, you can synthesize plenty of this one yourself without worrying about diet.
If you think that you might have an issue get blood testing. Afterwards you know if you lack some nutrient that the test investigates.
I recommend privatemdlabs. Much cheaper for many people than going through the song and dance of getting a referral from a GP and then wheedling the raw results out of them (GP's don't like to share info IME).