Why do I feel even more tired after t3?

[Rachel3101]

So I took 50mcg of t3 at 6 am and after 2 hours I crashed and had to lay down for 4 hours to feel a little bit better. I felt awful and my hands were shaking. I also didn’t eat until 12 am so maybe it had something to do with it..? I tried 20mcg the day before but felt no different than before. I took 150mcg of t4 only for 15 years and felt like a zombie so I tried t3 and even though I crashed this morning now I atleast feel a little clearer and not so clouded... any tips on how to avoid a crash tomorrow...

[NWA6]

Hi Rachel3101. So have you stopped taking T4? Did you wean of T4 whilst slowly introducing T3? Or did you just switch from one to the other on subsequent days? If you can give a bit more info on how you switched to T3 that would be helpful because at the moment it just seems like you’ve just added T3 to quick and given your body a bit of a shock

[Rachel3101 in reply to NWA6]

I switched from one to the other because I thought that I flooded my body with too much t4 over the years and I didn’t want to add more. I forgot to mention that I have been doing this for couple weeks and on some days I’m fine and others like today I crash...

[NWA6 in reply to Rachel3101]

Maybe you’ve been a bit to gun ho?

If you can tolerate t4 and don’t have conversion issues it’s best to stick to t4, perhaps adding t3 if you need a top up but I think it sounds like you’ve just not taken it slowly enough. T3 can be hard to Balance initially. Do you know the reason for your underactive thyriod? We’re you not well on T4? I’m not sure what you mean by ‘flooded’ what have been your most recent blood tests?

[Rachel3101 in reply to NWA6]

I have no thyroid and have been unwell all those years and now I kind of feel more alert

[SlowDragon Administrator]

Your lucky not to be seriously ill.

T3 has to be introduced EXTREMELY slowly,

First it's absolutely essential to get FULL Thyroid and vitamin testing to see where your FT4 and FT3 are. Plus if vitamins need improving FIRST

Depending on his high FT4 is within range, depends if you need to reduce Levothyroxine by 25mcg or not

Vitamin D, folate, B12 and ferritin all need to be at good levels

Have you had vitamins tested?

Add thyroid and vitamin results if you have them

Usual protocol is to add just 5mcg T3 in morning (alongside still taking Levothyroxine)

If no adverse reaction, add second 5mcg dose of T3 mid afternoon

Hold at this dose for 6-8 weeks and get FULL Thyroid testing again before considering adding any further T3

[Hidden]

The levo is probably not causing your symptoms, it has just not been effectively treating your hypothyroid symptoms. There can be lots of reasons for this. It sound slike you feel a little better on the T3 but 50 is a big dose and all things thyroid need to be done slowly. Sudden changes can make you ill. Please post you bloods and maybe try 5mcg with your levo as suggested.It is important to have your Vitamin D, folate, ferretin and B12 tested.Levo does not work if they are at a low level I can understand you getting frustrated and a bit impatient after years of being really ill and not getting the help you need but things need to be done carefully and unfortunately even when you are going in the right direction it can take a while to reach optimal health.

[Angel_of_the_North]

That was probably a huge overdose. It is usual to start T3 slowly 5mcg a day to start with, while reducing levo (if free T4 levels were high) by 15-25mcg. Many people need their T3 split into 3 or 4 doses a day.

[SilverAvocado]

50mcg is a pretty whopping dose of T3. This is a full replacement dose for someone who was doing roughly okay on 200mcg of Levo.

Many people have negative reactions to starting T3 and need to be very gentle with themselves. This is a powerful hormone. You've jumped up to a really large dose, and as others have mentioned, you're lucky not to have had a very bad reaction and had a trip to A&E.

The simplest way to change over from T4 (Levo) to T3 is to slowly add the T3, while reducing the T4 by an equivalent amount. T3 is roughly 4x more potent than T4, so when you add in 5 or 10mcg of T3, reduce the T4 by 20 or 40mcg to match.

Most people will feel best on T4 plus a smaller amount of T3. A few people will feel uncomfortable with any kind of T4, and need to go onto T3 only.

If you've got any thyroid blood tests you can share them on the forum and members will advise.