Crazy hormones!

[Jojozo]

Hi everyone, I've posted on here a couple of times before and people have been so amazingly helpful I'm back for more! To cut a long story short my doctor cut down my thyroxine twice in six weeks (from 175mg to 125mg) and I had been feeling horrendous ever since (I also have Hashimoto's, which they are currently not treating for some reason).

My question is (and I think I may know the answer to this one judging by how I'm feeling) is this likely to interfere with every aspect of my hormones? My cycle has done crazy and I'm having periods every two to three weeks now (always great when you suffer from horrendous PMT). I'm wondering if it's likely to be down to the reduction in my medication or I should look into other things?

Also, I've been told a paleo diet is the best way to go to lose weight with Hashimoto's/an underachieve thyroid, and certainly cutting out gluten. Has anyone had any weight loss success with this? I'm slightly at the end of my tether with it all. Thanks so much! Jo

[shaws Administrator]

if you can get a copy of your blood test results with the ranges and post so that members can comment.

On the day of your blood test did you fast and leave about 24 hours between taking levo and the test? Was the appointment as early as pos.

Doctors shouldn't reduce levo on the TSH only, that's why you have a recurrance of symptoms. Some doctors keep our TSH within range when for us we need a TSH of around 1 or lower.

[Jojozo in reply to shaws]

Thank you. I've already posted my results in a separate post and had some great advice back, but this is more about my horrible hormones and if the dosage change could have affected them. My TSH is currently 0.1.

[shaws Administrator in reply to Jojozo]

Maybe this will throw more light on adjusting by the TSH alone and read the answer on the question dated January 2, 2002

web.archive.org/web/2010103...

[shaws Administrator]

This is an excerpt from the link below and the date is January 2, 2002:

What’s most important to realize is this: The variation in how different patients respond to the same TSH or T3 level makes the reference ranges (formerly called the "ranges of normal") for the T3, TSH, or any other hormone totally without value in finding the dose of thyroid hormone that’s safe and effective for individual patients.[1,p.1217]

In my experience, most conventional endocrinologists, seemingly unaware of the bell-curve phenomenon, make a trouble-causing presumption: that researchers have scientifically established the safe and effective dose of thyroid hormone for all human beings. That dose, they presume, is one that keeps the TSH and thyroid hormone levels within their reference ranges. This, however, is a false and scientifically unjustified presumption.

Many patients know the presumption is false; they know it’s false because they, like you, become and remain ill when their doctors adjust their thyroid hormone dose according to the TSH level.

I know the presumption is false for three reasons: (1) I've studied the research literature which shows that the presumption hasn't been established. (2) I've objectively assessed the tissue metabolic status of patients whose thyroid hormone doses were regulated by TSH levels and found the tissues understimulated. And (3), I've seen hundreds of such patients—formerly kept ill by TSH-adjusted thyroid hormone doses—fully recover their health when my cotreating doctors and I treated them in violation of the guidelines of the conventional endocrinology specialty.

web.archive.org/web/2010103...