Hello community,
Taking Armour thyroid for a week at his lowest dosage, 15mg. Insomnia, heart palpitations, difficulty breathing. Anyone related. My doctor put me first at 30mg but felt so drugged up that she lowered the dosage. The plan was for me to take 15mg/day for a month then to do labs. Not sure I should keep taking it. Just contacted my doctor for advice but wanted to check with community as well. I was at 62,5mg of Synthroid / day for 20 years. Thank you
I was dx hypo back in the nineties and doc put me on Synthroid. That lasted a year while I just got more depressed, more pain, more dry skin, brain fog, lousy short term memory etc.... Convinced doc to try me on NDT and even tho my tsh was still 16.+, after a week or two, I felt fantastic. It was like a miracle.
My sis (she is a year younger) had been dx hypo and with hashimotos back in the eighties. I was so impressed with my results with NDT that, tho she was doing fine on Synthroid, I convinced her to try NDT. Well.... after only a few days, she started having symptoms like you are having.... erratic heart beats, anxiety, just felt awful. She went back on her Synthroid and is still doing fine. The only difference between us is that she has hashis and I do not.
I went into all this detail so that you would know that NDT isn't the be-all, cure-all for everybody. And you might get your antibodies tested to see if you have hashimotos by chance. Some speculate that even as the body attacks the thyroid gland when one has hashimotos, the body may attack the NDT also. Not a common condition but a possibility. I think it was Chris Kessler (spelling) that pointed out this small sub-group of hypo folks who do much better on synthroid or levo.
Thank you so much for your message. I was so happy to start on NDT. Went back on Synthroid. And you're right, we have to find what's best for each of us.
Ahhh... found the article. This is the excerpt... "However, in some cases patients do feel better with synthetic hormones. One reason for this is that a small subset of people with Hashimoto’s produce antibodies not only to their thyroid tissue (TPO and TG), but also to their own thyroid hormones (T4 and T3). These patients do worse with bio-identical sources because they increased the source of the autoimmune attack." chriskresser.com/3-steps-to...
Thank you for this very informative article. 👍
This can happen if your iron and adrenals are not optimal. Have you had them tested? NDT should really only be introduced if Iron is above 70 and cortisol stable.
Hi AnnaSo This is a statement I have not heard before. NDT should really only be introduced if Iron is above 70 and cortisol stable. Where did you get this? I would like to know more. My Iron is good but my cortisol is way high. Could explain some of the problems I am having. I will start a new thread but thought I would ask direct anyway. thanks
Hi credgrave! There is plenty of coverage online if you google it (sorry, I am on holiday so don’t have much time to be looking the articles up now ☺️). The issue here is that without adequate iron (ferritin) your T4 gets converted into RT3 instead of T3. The same goes for when cortisol is high. With low iron you can also end up pooling the T3 in your blood without it getting into your cells. So you’d never get the benefits of the T3 unless you have these two sorted. I am the same as you. I needed two IV to get my iron back in place but still waiting for high cortisol to subside until I try NDT. Also a bunch of other nutrients are required for the conversion: mainly zinc and selenium so check these are in place too! I started to supplement selenium without testing first and once I eventually tested 3 months later it turned out I was way above the range so needed to stop as it can be toxic! So always check first and supplement only those necessary ☺️
Not sure. Will check out. Thank you
Under-active thyroid
Armour thyroid... 3grain
Testing with Armour Thyroid
Adjusting to new Armour thyroid dose
Too much thyroid medicine. 
