Cutting out Bread and chocolate for lent.
Had milk for first time in a week. With porridge , felt bloated for first time in that wk. I'm wondering if I'm intolerant to milk or the oats?
Eating crackers as alternative to bread.
I do feel like whatever I do isn't going to lead to weight loss though.
Also bought these 2 books . I let ya know if find any good tips. Also in last post was asked if was a northern . Yep and yorkshire born and bred.😃
Yep (went from 60kg to 72kg and with calorie tracking and walking, I got back down to 60 and now maintain around 60-63kg). Just had to start slow and not do a massive calorie deficit. I aim to do 10K plus steps every day. I found walking to be the easiest to maintain “activity” without over doing it. I have ups and downs but I now run a fair bit (3-4/week) and hope to go back to lifting weights once we are allowed into gyms. I found weight lifting to also be good, burnt some calories without over exerting the body too much.
😀Cool !well Done u!!!It's good to know it is possible. Just seems so much harder with this knackered thyroid plus ending towards middle age ....
Very much so. My weight had been trickling up over the years and I just couldn’t handle runs or physical exercise. Getting a dog really helped as it forced me to walk daily.
Edit to add: going strictly GF has been so beneficial and actually helped with energy levels.
Well you need to get levothyroxine dose fine tuned and all four vitamins at GOOD levels
Looking at previous posts you need to get FULL thyroid and vitamin tested
For full Thyroid evaluation you need TSH, FT4 and FT3 plus both TPO and TG thyroid antibodies tested. Also EXTREMELY important to test vitamin D, folate, ferritin and B12
Low vitamin levels are extremely common, especially if you have autoimmune thyroid disease (Hashimoto's) diagnosed by raised Thyroid antibodies
Ask GP to test vitamin levels
Recommended on here that all thyroid blood tests should ideally be done as early as possible in morning and before eating or drinking anything other than water .
Last dose of Levothyroxine 24 hours prior to blood test. (taking delayed dose immediately after blood draw).
This gives highest TSH, lowest FT4 and most consistent results. (Patient to patient tip)
If/when also on T3, make sure to take last third or quarter of daily dose 8-12 hours prior to test, even if this means adjusting time or splitting of dose day before test
Is this how you do your tests?
Private tests are available as NHS currently rarely tests Ft3 or thyroid antibodies or all relevant vitamins
List of private testing options
thyroiduk.org/getting-a-dia...
Medichecks Thyroid plus antibodies and vitamins
medichecks.com/products/adv...
Thriva Thyroid plus antibodies and vitamins By DIY fingerpick test
Thriva also offer just vitamin testing
Blue Horizon Thyroid Premium Gold includes antibodies, cortisol and vitamins by DIY fingerprick test
bluehorizonbloodtests.co.uk...
If you can get GP to test vitamins and antibodies then cheapest option for just TSH, FT4 and FT3
£29 (via NHS private service ) and 10% off down to £26.10 if go on thyroid uk for code
thyroiduk.org/getting-a-dia...
NHS easy postal kit vitamin D test £29 via
vitamindtest.org.uk
Yeh that's like a battle too. As doc says in in range so no change in meds.
So you need to get full testing done yourself .....see where levels are
If vitamins are low you need to self supplement to improve
All four vitamins need to be at GOOD Levels
Vitamin D at least around 80nmol and around 100nmol maybe better
Folate and ferritin at least half way through range
Serum B12 at least over 500
Active B12 at least over 70
What vitamin supplements are you currently taking
Taking
High percentage of Hashimoto’s patients are lactose intolerant
Unusual to react to oats
Though if you’re on strictly gluten free diet yogurt need to get certified gluten free oats from Free from section of supermarket
Lactose intolerance is very common with Hashimoto's. Often improves after a year or two strictly gluten free
ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/240...
Lactose intolerance was diagnosed in 75.9 % of the patients with HT
If you are lactose intolerant, you need lactose free levothyroxine tablets and may need higher dose than typical
read.qxmd.com/read/24796930...
These findings show that lactose intolerance significantly increased the need for oral T4 in hypothyroid patients.
Lactose free levothyroxine brands
Teva, Aristo and Glenmark are the only lactose free tablets
Many people find Levothyroxine brands are not interchangeable.
Many patients do NOT get on well with Teva brand of Levothyroxine. Teva contains mannitol as a filler, which seems to be possible cause of problems. Teva is the only brand that makes 75mcg tablet. So if avoiding Teva for 75mcg dose ask for 25mcg to add to 50mcg or just extra 50mcg tablets to cut in half
But for some people (usually if lactose intolerant, Teva is by far the best option)
Most easily available (and often most easily tolerated) are Mercury Pharma or Accord
Accord is also boxed as Almus via Boots, and Northstar 50mcg and 100mcg via Lloyds ....but beware 25mcg Northstar is Teva
List of different brands available in U.K.
thyroiduk.org/medications-f...
Teva poll
healthunlocked.com/thyroidu...
Once you find a brand that suits you, best to make sure to only get that one at each prescription.
Watch out for brand change when dose is increased or at repeat prescription.
academic.oup.com/jcem/artic...
Physicians should: 1) alert patients that preparations may be switched at the pharmacy; 2) encourage patients to ask to remain on the same preparation at every pharmacy refill; and 3) make sure patients understand the need to have their TSH retested and the potential for dosing readjusted every time their LT4 preparation is switched (18).
Levothyroxine is an extremely fussy hormone and should always be taken on an empty stomach and then nothing apart from water for at least an hour after
Many people take Levothyroxine soon after waking, but it may be more convenient and perhaps more effective taken at bedtime
verywellhealth.com/best-tim...
No other medication or supplements at same as Levothyroxine, leave at least 2 hour gap.
Some like iron, calcium, magnesium, HRT, omeprazole or vitamin D should be four hours away
(Time gap doesn't apply to Vitamin D mouth spray)
If you normally take levothyroxine at bedtime/in night ...adjust timings as follows prior to blood test
If testing Monday morning, delay Saturday evening dose levothyroxine until Sunday morning. Delay Sunday evening dose levothyroxine until after blood test on Monday morning. Take Monday evening dose levothyroxine as per normal
Awe Thank you , very interesting as I think I may have hashimoto's too.This could be leading to this intolerance. Do they do bloodtest to check if intolerant to milk / oats?thank you. It's like we've got to be detectives and suss out are own probsx
You are better off just experimenting yourself . Try just almond milk with porridge for a few days . Then if you feel it might be oats that are problem stop them .
Keep food and mood diary . And symptoms
U will be surprised how food affects mood!!
Make sure crackers have no gluten
Even soya sauce has wheat ..
Yeh I have started writing down what i eat because I felt I was mindless snacking. And record mood already to do with hormones Pmdd.etc
You already know that you have Hashimoto’s
Lactose intolerance....you just have to try dairy free diet
Developing Gluten intolerance is extremely common with Hashimoto’s
So that’s avoiding all wheat, rye or barley
Oats are normally ok,, provided they are certified gluten free
Hashimoto's frequently affects the gut and leads to low stomach acid and then low vitamin levels
Low vitamin levels affect Thyroid hormone working
Poor gut function with Hashimoto’s can lead leaky gut (literally holes in gut wall) this can cause food intolerances. Most common by far is gluten. Dairy is second most common.
According to Izabella Wentz the Thyroid Pharmacist approx 5% with Hashimoto's are coeliac, but over 80% find gluten free diet helps, sometimes significantly. Either due to direct gluten intolerance (no test available) or due to leaky gut and gluten causing molecular mimicry (see Amy Myers link)
Changing to a strictly gluten free diet may help reduce symptoms, help gut heal and slowly lower TPO antibodies
While still eating high gluten diet ask GP for coeliac blood test first or buy test online for under £20, just to rule it out first
healthcheckshop.co.uk/store...?
Assuming test is negative you can immediately go on strictly gluten free diet
(If test is positive you will need to remain on high gluten diet until endoscopy, maximum 6 weeks wait officially)
Trying gluten free diet for 3-6 months. If no noticeable improvement then reintroduce gluten and see if symptoms get worse
chriskresser.com/the-gluten...
amymyersmd.com/2018/04/3-re...
thyroidpharmacist.com/artic...
drknews.com/changing-your-d...
restartmed.com/hashimotos-g...
Non Coeliac Gluten sensitivity (NCGS) and autoimmune disease
ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/296...
The predominance of Hashimoto thyroiditis represents an interesting finding, since it has been indirectly confirmed by an Italian study, showing that autoimmune thyroid disease is a risk factor for the evolution towards NCGS in a group of patients with minimal duodenal inflammation. On these bases, an autoimmune stigma in NCGS is strongly supported
ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/300...
The obtained results suggest that the gluten-free diet may bring clinical benefits to women with autoimmune thyroid disease
nuclmed.gr/wp/wp-content/up...
In summary, whereas it is not yet clear whether a gluten free diet can prevent autoimmune diseases, it is worth mentioning that HT patients with or without CD benefit from a diet low in gluten as far as the progression and the potential disease complications are concerned
restartmed.com/hashimotos-g...
Despite the fact that 5-10% of patients have Celiac disease, in my experience and in the experience of many other physicians, at least 80% + of patients with Hashimoto's who go gluten-free notice a reduction in their symptoms almost immediately.
So I have hashimoto's because my antibodies were slightly elevated? That means defo for hashimoto's?
Yes
You need actual results from both TPO and TG thyroid antibody tests
Link about thyroid blood tests
thyroiduk.org/getting-a-dia...
Link about Hashimoto’s
Hi Sleepy, burning calories is difficult when metabolism is low. Getting your Ft3 above the middle of the range helps. If you can find a way add T3 to your T4 if that is what you are onwill enable you to burn more calories. Avoiding inflammatory foods like gluten and dairy which are often the cause of inflammation and weight gain. Apple cider vinegar with meals
is very helpful . It can block starch, kill pathogens and add probiotics if you use the unfiltered vinegar. Be sure to get adequate protein and good fat (butter, coconut oil, olive oil and avoid vegetable oils which block mitochondria.
Crackers will still contain gluten if made with wheat.
A food sensitivity test can help identify which foods in particular should be avoided.
I became highly sensitive to lactose when my thyroid started going haywire but I never ever experienced issues with dairy before that. So I switched to oat milk, which I could enjoy with porridge as I struggled to digest bread at the time.
I've been on Levothyroxine for 5 months now and I've managed to get on with some lactose-free products (i.e. not oat, coconut or almond-based) recently so your situation could improve over time with the right dose and optimal vitamin levels, granted you are not lactose-intolerant to begin with.
I avoid soya-based lactose-free products as these used to give me awful IBS symptoms.
Definitely worth checking if you have lactose intolerance and coeliac. Both of these were ruled out in my case so it helps to know what other issues you have and don't have to help you navigate what works for you 😊
As for weight loss, yes I've lost quite a bit of water weight (approx a size) but I still struggle with bloats. I started supplementing with liquid iron last week and it is helping in getting my bloat down and bring my mood and energy levels up. I use the spatone brand that was recommended to me by another user on here and I bought it off boots.
I used to take two iron tablets from boots before that with little benefit. Worth checking if low iron could be preventing some weight loss so I strongly advise to check your iron levels before you supplement with liquid iron. I was deficient, but no longer and I'm feeling better for it 🙂
As I've said on other posts, I can only lose weight when free T4 and free T3 are both nice and high. I do the intermittent fasting thing (nearly 3 years now) where you eat all your calories within a restricted time window - in my case between midday and 7pm. You choose what your hours are. It's pretty easy to get used to. I just have hot water in the mornings - that first cuppa at midday is then deLISH!
I don't restrict what I eat at all and it keeps my weight stable (which is half the battle) - but have added a daily 4 - 5 mile walk in lock-down and lost a stone (back to my pre-hypo weight which is nice). Others have reported huge weight loss.
Beyond this, it's a question of eating real food - DON'T to the diet shakes which contain soy - and cut right back on the "empty" calories - fizzy drink, crisps, biscuits, booze you know the drill. But still allow yourself a couple of treats a week - or life will be miserable 
Good luck x
100% agree with the statement ref “real food”. Your body needs nutrients not a seemingly quick fix. It’s better to eat to feel good (often the way with hashis) and just try and increase activity. Even a small walk at night (if time constrained) can help clear the mind, promote better sleep and help with the endorphins.
If you are adequately medicated, you should lose weight OK. I hesitate to proffer an opinion on what adequately medicated is, exactly, as I am rapidly learning that it means something slightly different for different people! I also think that different people lose weight more easily in different ways... But having more muscle turns you into a proper calorie burning machine and therefore weightlifting - and a high protein diet, which helps to repair and build muscle - were the bomb for me! I didn’t lose weight - wasn’t trying - but I finally had the flat tummy which I hadn’t had for ages and I grew a bit of a bum and some thighs... personally, I thought the bigger bum and thighs looked awesome, but I am weird! I guess I’ve always joked that I have the sort of figure which looks like someone stuck two boobs on the front of a plank (I think the polite term is “athletic build”, or “willowy” or something?) so having curves in the right places and none in the wrong ones felt good!
I’ve only gone near the weights once since messing around with my dosage to introduce T3, but when I get the energy levels back I am looking forward to doing it again. It is seriously addictive being able to lift more and more and MORE! I would particularly recommend barbell squats if you are able - it’s a good full body workout and doesn’t have to take very long ! And you get to rest between sets, so you’re only actually doing about 8 minutes of exercise in the space of a 20 minute workout. What’s not to like?! And strangely it isn’t that exhausting.
I found that I wasn’t at all hungry on a high protein diet either. But... recalling the negative side of my experience (in my profile) I’d be inclined to consider testing fT3, fT4 and TSH (at least) privately before jumping in with both feet. At least there is plenty of time for that before the gyms open! In short, I started weightlifting to fix joint and muscular pain pain and it worked for half an hour after the session... mostly. And the issues I had, I put down to exercise crashing my fT3. And I finally got prescribed T3 as a result, which suggests to me that endo and GP saw some mileage in my view. I guess I’ll be able to say for sure when I get my dosage levels right again and get weightlifting again! I can say that the T3 has done a good job on the muscular and joint pain until this week, randomly and all of a sudden. Funny to think that I wouldn’t have discovered weightlifting if I’d been prescribed T3 sooner, as I tried it to get rid of the pain... the pain of being inadequately medicated, it turns out.
weight lifting is the best ( in my opinion)when i lifted weights 5 times a week i was eating loads and was slim but toned as you describe ( FYI i’m sure you did lose fat just not scale weight there’s such a difference)
recently i’ve started weight training 3 times a week- the scales gone up but i look slimmer- flatter belly, bigger bum and i’m loving it 
not everyone’s cup of tea but now i’m in peri menopause i want to be strong and retain muscle it’s good for hormones too
there are multiple factors to consideri’m a personal trainer and have a complex relationship with my weight
when i first went onto ndt after years of no meds/diagnosis i lost 3 stone. i then started weight training so scales went up due to muscle but i maintained good shape and strength so the scales had less relevance
then i hit 39 and peri menopause and found no diet seemed to help. but i’m working on it
my first piece of advice towards finding out if your thyroid issue is always to start with basics. get a cheap tracker fitbit or similar ( with heart rate monitor on it as this makes it as accurate as they can be). then monitor your calories burnt across a normal month. mine are around 2500 with 6 days per week exercising and walking a lot but i’m 11 stone and 5ft9.
then try to track calories out by using an app like my fitness pal. you can scan bar codes and upload recipes from internet so it’s easier than it looks
try to eat 500-700 calories less than you are expending and do this consistently for 6 weeks. weigh yourself weekly and measure your bust. waist, hips with a measuring tape. keep a record of weight in fitbit app.
if you do this and no weight loss then the likelihood is you’re burning less calories than the fitbit estimates, and my experience is this means your metabolism is slower than an average person ( the fitbit app works on an algorithm so estimated based on age gender activity heart rate etc). this is just my experience from years of dieting and reading around this stuff.
there is no way to tell your true basal metabolic rate except to look into the basics and work up from there
my experience is 1) your free t3 needs to be adequate for good metabolism but also 2) hormones and other factors sometimes affect things - in my experience i had 5 years on ndt when i kept my weight stable then hit peri menopause and that changed
there are some uneducated PT’s and nutritionist who think female hormones don’t affect weight loss, in my opinion the science is behind and they are wrong
good luck
Under active thyroid
Under active thyroid
Under active thyroid 
Under active thyroid
Under active thyroid
