🏷️ health

I tried to give blood last week but the blood donor center wouldn’t take it. They said my iron, and some other thing identified by 3 letters that I didn’t know what it was, were too low. Can anyone tell me how far in advanced of giving blood I have to stock up on iron-rich foods to get it high enough for them to take? When I was a teen/young adult I had some problems with borderline anemia, but not so much in the past 10 years, at least not that I’m aware of. I was giving blood regularly about 5 years ago but stopped after about a year because I got a tattoo (no - not a midlife crisis - kind of a tribute to my husband). Anyway, I didn’t have any iron problems at that time. After a tattoo, they don’t want you to donate for a year, and I just sort of got out of the habit. So, I made a conscious effort to go back and then, go figure, my blood is too weak. Anyway, I want to try again but need to get my iron up. I can’t take vitamins with iron as they make me sick to my stomach, so I guess it’ll have to be the good old-fashioned red meat and spinach way. I just don’t know how long I have to do that before my levels are any good.