Where to go from here?

[vtmommy]

I'm at the point where I've had 2 rheumy's, a geneticist and a gastro (sounds like the beginning of a "walk into a bar joke") tell me they don't believe my issues are rheumatological in nature and are more related to IBS.  My iron has come back low as well as my vitamin D, so I'm trying to be open-minded that those problems would explain a lot of my issues, including the dry mouth/eyes, joint/muscle pain, etc.  The only symptom that I can think of offhand that isn't explained by those issues are the periodic lymph node swelling (usually in my neck underneath my jaw, or sometimes in front of my ears, but also in my chest and armpits) for the last 16 months and the recent onset of Raynaud's phenomenon. 

I don't know very much about blood work.  I assume they don't really care if it's out of range only a little, but will do something if it's very high/low. Kind of defeats the purpose of having a range in the first place, but that's just my opinion I guess. 

I'd love to get some opinions on where to go from here.  My thought was to start taking vitamin D and iron (with vit C for absorption), but I wasn't sure if I should see another specialist for anything else.  One other odd thing was that my symptoms seem to "evolve" when I take antibiotics.  When I'm on the antibiotics, besides having the gastro issues from those, I actually feel pretty good fatigue/pain wise.  When I finish up the antibiotics and they're out of my system, then I'll either get new symptoms or lose some.  After my latest round of antibiotics in April, my symptom flares have gotten a lot farther apart, but I never feel normal or anything...I just don't have as much pain/fatigue.

I've had a ton of recent blood work and have listed a small portion of it below:

Recent lab results:

Glucose (non-fasting):  100 (range 60-99) - high
Iron,serum:  47 (range 50-170) - low
Transferrin,serum:  296 (range 200-400)
Tot Iron binding cap:  370 (range 250-450)
%Saturation:  13 (range 20-55) - low
Ferritin:  22 (range 13-150)
Cholesterol:  173 (range 0-200)
Triglycerides:  162 (range 0-150) - high
total CHOL/HDL Ratio:  3.2
vitamin D:  24 (range 32-100) - low
C3:  155 (range 79-152) - high
C4:  22 (range 12-42)

CBC:

White blood cell cnt:  10840 (range 4500:11000)
Red blood cell cnt:  4.4 (range 4-5.2)
Neutrophil num (ANC):  8100 (range 1500-7800) - high
Mean platelet volume:  9.7 (range 9.2-12.7)

Urinalysis:

WBC count:  6
White Blood cells:  33 (range 0-27) - high
Bacteria:  none
CA Oxalate crystals:  occasional
CRP-high sensitivity:  0.9
CYC Citrulline Pepab:  2

ANA:  positive 1:40, homogeneous speckled
SSA, SSB, anti-DNA, RNP, smith - negative

[Piebird]

It is so frustrating when doc's work to diagnose (and pass you to someone else) instead of helping you deal with the symptoms.

I agree about the range levels. My B12 is just below normal or at the bottom of normal. Doc's would just skim over that and say it is "good enough". I insisted in trying B 12 shots. My doc said I would just pee it out but try if I want and for me it makes a huge difference.

We need to be in charge of our own care. This is hard since we dont have the medical back ground. But I know my own body and for me I had intuition about what was going on.

What do you think? Try another Rhumy? Do you think it is IBS or a combination of the 2?