Skin imprints - is it from water retention? - a... - Thyroid UK

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Skin imprints - is it from water retention? - anyone else has this problem?

AnnaSo profile image
3 Replies

Hi everyone!

I’m wondering if anyone else has/had issues with skin imprints? Is it due to water retention? Is it a usual hypo symptom that could go away when optimal? Turned out I have been undermedicated for years as took my meds before each blood test so not on optimal dose yet.

Attached is the picture of how my body looks after night sleep. I have imprints from everything that touches my body, even for a couple of minutes and they take 10 to 20min to disappear. When I take my clothes off at the end of the day I have imprints of every gourmet I wore.

What is more my skin around bum and tights is discoloured, a bit of a purple shade and literally hurts when tapped or poked (upper thigh and bum the most). When pressed for few secs it goes really white but does not leave a pit. These symptoms increase throughout the day and my body also swells With feeling of my limbs being more chunky and more full of that makes sense- it’s much harder to pinch skin.

Recent results on 150 Levo for reference (have increased to 175 now with advice of our lovely peeps here :)):

TSH suppressed

T4 14 (10-22)

T3 2.9 (2.5-6.5)

Vitamins and rest optimal but D3 and Zinc which are bottom of the range.

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AnnaSo
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shaws profile image
shawsAdministrator

'Swelling'.puffiness is a clinical symptom of hypothyroidism and I think it is due to you having a low Free T3 too. (I am not medically qualified) but many, many members complain of weight gain. I think 'puffiness' of skin is descriptive.

I have just looked at your results and T3 is bottom of the range and should be nearer 6. T4 is also low and could be nearer 20.

I think you'd be wise to get a D102 blood test. If positive it means you cannot convert T4 (levo) to T3 (liothyronine) and should be given a combination of T4/T3 tablets.

I will also give you a link to give to GP but I believe there's only one place that do D102 test which you may have to get privately.

thyroiduk.org.uk/tuk/testin...

thyroiduk.org.uk/tuk/about_...

AnnaSo profile image
AnnaSo in reply toshaws

Hi shaws! Thanks for your reply.

Yes, T3 is really low, I’m trying to work on this with Levo increase as there is still scope for more.

I have Hashis and after a flare up in Nov last year my T4 jumped to 27 (10-22 range, I took meds in the morning though) and T3 to 5. So I’m hoping with more Levo this will happen again.

In fact, I was silly to be taking my meds before blood test for all these years and that always inflated my T4 readings so I thought I had conversion problem but turns out I was undermedicated for 10 years with true level at 14 (no meds) not 19/20 (with meds)🙁 I think the time my T4 shooter was probably a good level of T4 at that level with higher T3 too but my endo decided to reduce my dose which ended up horrifically bad for me. If you think I’m undermedicated at 150 imagine what happened when I dropped to 125 🙁

I think it’s worth testing for D102 anyway, just in case, but not sure how this works in Australia. Will investigate 🙂

shaws profile image
shawsAdministrator in reply toAnnaSo

Problems occur for patients when doctors or endocrinologists only look at the TSH results (as they seem not to understand that it should be FT4 and FT3 which are the indicators) to decide whether or not the patient needs an increase. They also think if TSH is 'somewhere' in the range we're on sufficient levo but the aim is a TSH of 1 or lower, not somewhere in the range as it seems that's what they believe.

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