Too soon to write off NDT??

[Aliyak2012]

Hi all! Looking for some advice based on experience... I've been hypothyroid since having my first baby five years ago. I've been on synthroid and levo (which lowered my TSH but did nothing for my symptoms) and have recently gotten my doc to finally prescribe Erfa. I was so confident that it would be the answer to my prayers, but alas, its giving me a whole new crop of bad symptoms. Most prominently, I'm having awful leg cramps while on it. We're talking, extremely painful muscle pain and weakness, especially in the evenings. I've tried skipping a few doses and sure enough, the cramps stopped. I'm so disillusioned that I considered discontinuing erfa entirely, but my most recent labs don't look great... I'm currently on 60mg of erfa. Should I reduce my dose?? Keep at it and hope that I adjust and the cramps go away?? Go back on levo?? Anyone have similar side effects that subsided eventually?

TSH 33.1 (0.32-4.00 mIU/L)

Free T4: 6 (9-19 pmol/L)

Free T3: 2.3 (3.1-6.2 pmol/L)

Any input would be greatly appreciated!!

[SlowDragon Administrator]

You need to add the ranges on these results

But a TSH of 33 is very hypothyroid

[Jazzw]

No, don’t reduce - increase! 60mg doesn’t appear to be enough!

How much levothyroxine were you on before?

[Aliyak2012 in reply to Jazzw]

Thanks for your reply, Jazzw! I was on 60mg of levo - but that was back a year or so when I was only mildly hypo (TSH 7-8). I had a brief period after having my second child that I went HYPER, so my doc took me off my thyroid meds entirely. Since then, it appears I've gone back to being BIG TIME hypo and he started me off at my original dosage (60mg) of NDT.

[Aliyak2012]

Thanks for your reply! I was on 60mg Synthroid, but that was a few years ago when I was only mildly hypo. As for the leg cramps, I feel like they're definitely related to the Erfa. When I reduce my dose, the leg cramps are better. When I'm not taking my pills, the leg cramps are gone. I've read on another thread that sometimes this could be a sign of an overabundance of T3 "pooling" in the muscles, but that's probably not applicable here, since my T3 seems to be quite low.... Perhaps a faulty batch is the culprit!