A Toast to the Sun!

In my previous blog, I was waiting for the results of my blood test to find out why I was having trouble breathing.  I found out yesterday from my doctor that everything seemed normal except for one thing -- my Vitamin D levels were clearly below the expected values. Where a >30 ng/ml was the normal average, mine was at 10.6!  In other words, I had a Vitamin D deficiency, and this may be causing all these weird things I was feeling.  Guess how that comes about -- lack of sunlight!!!

I always wondered why Europeans like sitting out in the sun. I usually try to get away from the sun and under the shade.  Mostly it's because I know how disastrous the sun can be on one's sensitive skin -- causing all sorts of dark spots and skin cancer -- but maybe that's because in the Philippines, we practically have the sun out 365 days a year. 

One actually needs only 15 minutes of sun a day between 10:00 and 14:00 to get these normal Vitamin D levels I was talking about. That's 20,000 IE of Vitamin D. Seems easy, right? Not doable, not here, not now -- the sun is in pretty short supply in this part of the world at this time.  Okay then, Vitamin D supplements should not be too hard to find, right? Wrong again, to get the equivalent of those precious 15 minutes of sun, you would need to eat 400 grams of mackerel, 20 eggs, 4 kilos of pork schnitzel, 20 liters of full milk, 600 grams of avocado, or 1 kilogram of shiitake mushrooms. Obviously not possible, not in a day.  I would go for the 15 minutes of sun anytime.

So, I got to drink in -- the sun! To spike up my levels to the right values, my doctor gave me 150 minutes of sun in a 200,000 IE Vitamin D ampule.  Wow, I can feel that warmth radiating from within me, putting a smile in my face.

Is that why Filipinos are always so good-natured and happy? It's all about the sun, the precious, precious sun!!!

Equivalent to 2 and a half hours of sun!!!

You know I need sun...