My latest plan through Dr P s guidance is to stop thyroxine for 10 days , introduce hydrocortisone in this time and then start on 1 grain of ndt with a hope that the supported adrenals will mean I can tolerate the ndt.
Has anyone else experience of this ?
I'm not over the moon about the hydrocortisone but maybe this will be the difference this time .
I've previously tried T4&T3 and T3 only but never been able to tolerate high enough doses for me to feel well again .
My last results on T4& T3 combo , 100 & 15 -20 T3 were:
FT4. 15. FT3. 4.9 TSH 0.06
Many thanks x
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Panda_26
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I haven't tried either of these as medicate on T4 & T3.
Looking at previous posts you were enquiring about cortisone several months back so I think you must know you need it. I presume you have tried various sups and glandulars and so now must have this extra support.
It is a brave step to start NDT and hydrocortisone together but one you have chosen and with Dr P's expert guidance and support ....you will be fine.
Dr P believes that as long as the adrenals aren't suppressed by a "physiological" dose (low ) for too long ....they will pick up and start producing the necessary cortisol for themselves. A physiological dose is of the same amount that the adrenals should be secreting naturally themselves and not a therapeutic dose that can bring about all the horrid side effects.
I have heard it needs to be taken several times a day and if you get the shakes in between...to divide amounts to more frequent intervals but I expect Dr P has given you a strict protocol to work with anyway. Also as your adrenals wake up...it can disrupt sleep patterns which get better over time.
Are you taking temps and BP every day?
Good luck Amanda.
Maybe other members with more experience will comment too.
No more than twice a day. Once when you get up, and once around lunchtime. But never after 1 pm. The adrenals have to have time to work for themselves if they're going to recover, they just need a bit of help in the morning when they're busiest.
That's interesting, thanks greygoose , I'm wondering if there's different schools of thought then as I've been told to take two largeish doses am ( before 1 pm ) and two smaller doses , at 4 pm and bedtime . This is according to the STTM protocol .
I must admit I do have reservations about resorting to this but know that with such low cortisol levels of my own I'll probably struggle to raise the NDT to any decent dose so I am proceeding with everything crossed !!
Well, I know this isn't a popular opinion, but I think one should take anything they read on STTM with a pinch of salt. I Don't think they're always right, but if you shout loud enough, everyone thinks you know what your talking about.
This is what I was taught by the famous Dr D in Paris : If you dose thoughout the day, the adrenals tend to shut down, so you can never come off the HC. If you just dose in the morning, when there's the most need for cortisol, it doesn't stress the adrenals so much, so they have time to gather their strength and recover.
Of course, we're talking about adrenal fatigue (or whatever one likes to call it) here, not Addison's. If you have Addison's, then of course you have to try and mimic the out-put of the glands. And I think sometimes doctors, if they know anything about it at all, tend to get muddled up.
Oh, and I should say that I did take HC and NDT for years, but NDT didn't suit me at all, HC or no HC. Now I'm on T3 only and HC, and that's just fine.
Well I guess we are all so different and just because something works for one person.... Etc,etc.
The difficulty for me now is having true faith in anything anymore whether it be book , doc , and especially endocrinologists ( the so called specialists !)
I just have to take one route and stick with it for a while .
its encouraging to hear you found a good combo for you in the end !
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