Hello, I've been back at work for about 8 weeks after 6 months sick leave post initial diagnosis. I should do 26 hrs a week but haven't yet managed that, what with an initial slow passed return, annual leave and a few sick leave days.
Most people in my company are working from home, including myself, but there will be a transition to get everyone back in the office at least some of the time from July onwards.
I'm trying to look at what I can do to make this more manageable for myself. I crashed out on the sofa for 3 hours this evening after a 7.5 hour day so can't really imagine a commute (I drive) right now.
So far I've considered:
Changing but not increasing hours. My youngest child will start full time school in Sept so I 'could' increase hours. I won't obviously. I currently do 3.5 days but would change to 5 shorter days.
Try the Access to Work scheme to help with taxi costs maybe. Has any body had any success with this?
Utilising the 'quiet room' for a proper rest over lunch. At least an hour. I've used this room before for expressing milk and I think the idea is it can be used for prayer and rest too. I seem to remember it has a sofa. Ideally I would lie down and closer my eyes.
Is there anything others have found useful?
Thank you!
Written by
RickGrimes
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I find work is like exercise- ie you have to work out what your tolerance is and work up to it and not over it. Maybe spread your working days like Mon, Wed, Fri, ensuring you rest in between.
I don’t know many with hashimoto’s or similar that hold down a ft job!
Thank you for your reply HashiFedUp . yes I can totally see it's like exercise. Which is something else I'm yet to tackle. I miss swimming and pilates :(If I did three spaced days they'd have to be longer and I think I'd definitely crash. But then I'd have a rest day the following day so maybe that would be ok. I guess I'm thinking shorter days is more consistent and less 'boom and bust'.
It's disheartening what you say about not knowing many others working ft. I think I still need to come to terms with how live changing this illness is.
Once you (with the help of your GP!) get to an optimum dose and your FT4 and FT3 are in the upper part of the ranges and TSH at 1 or lower, you may feel much better. It can be a slower journey, but worth it to feel 'normal' again.
I found the only way i could manage was to mix self employment and work as an employee. By spacing the employee work to just 2 or occasionally 3 days a week, for only about 5/6 hrs at a time.
To be honest i didn't find it made much difference if i tried to have longer breaks at work, i just didn't feel recovered unless i went to sleep for an hour , which is just not possible at work , and anything less than a 'proper rest' just seemed to prolong the agony !
I'd never work 2 'employed' days together, always have a day or two in between.
The self employed stuff was done in 2/3 hour stints usually at home with 'retiring to the sofa for an hour or so' in between.
I never really had weekends off, but working so few hours a day i didn't mind, just did the same on weekends as during the week.
I found that pattern sustainable and was a good mix of 'regular' money from employed hours, and more 'feast and famine' money generated from self employed adventures.
If i tried to push it to fit in with requests to do employed work on two or three days in a row i'd usually crash quite badly and then not be able to keep to deadlines for the self employed stuff. And the wheels would start to fall off.... So i leaned to say 'NO' and only worked for people who 'got it' ( An employer who suffers from Rheumatoid Arthritis was quite useful in that respect)
Having said that all my work was pretty physical, so it might have been easier to do longer employed hours if i didn't have a manual job.
Thank your for your experience tattybogle . Retreating to the sofa is what I do at present and so really hoping I can replicate this at work in this quiet room. Sitting on a hard chair in the staff kitchen for an hour ain't gonna cut it I agree!
My employer is pretty flexible for which I am greatful I'm many ways!
I recently took a reclining deck chair, blanket and hot water bottle with me to sit in my sister's garden. Raised a few eyebrows but made the time much more enjoyable.
Some of the best productivity (and most fun) i've had at work ,was while sitting in a field in an armchair under a purple blanket while my mates laugh at me and bring Gin ... (i'm fortunate in that my work legitimately involves drinking Gin in fields... it's called "networking" i believe )
Just because you're under a blanket ,doesn't make you a crap employee.... i'm sure you're still brilliant .
It's generally low T3 that gives these sort of symptoms - maybe you need a increase in your thyroid hormone replaement ?
Do you have any recent blood test results to include T3, T4, and the vitamins and minerals ?
Last post about 2 months ago and ferritin, folate and vitamin D were all too low to support optimal conversion of T4 into T3 :
P.S. Having looked back again it seems all your vitamins and minerals and T3 were at higher levels 3 months ago - eg: your T3 was at 6.50 and within a month dropped to 4.23 ?
Thank you for your reply pennyannie . You are correct, I am also confused about my last two sets of results. I think perhaps the higher levels were when I tested too soon. 6 weeks after a dose increase. And maybe my more recent levels were when things had stablised. Everything else was the same.
I continue to supplement and I'm really trying to get ferritin up. Now 64 ug/L(13 - 150)
I've also reduced my sertraline dose and increased levo v slightly to 100mcg and 125mcg every third day. I'm only 6 weeks post this tweak so holding off from testing for a bit longer.
Well I don't know much about much but just looking at this antidepressant i don't think it's helping with your symptoms and possibly compounding them.
Glad to see you are cutting back a bit, do you see yourself coming off this anytime sometime soon ?
I remember being prescribe an antidepressant when I felt awful, though told I was fine, ok, and good to go : and it just clouded the issues and I started believing that it all must simply be " just me ' ???
It is not and you deserve better care, and a fresh set of results and ranges to see what's going on :
I would ask for a Free T4 and Free T3 blood test when your next test is due or you can get a postal home private blood test.
The reason I advise these two is that you've been given an antidepressant and it could be maybe due that the two 'Frees' are too low. I'm not medically qualified, is that it would seem to me there's a possibility that both 'frees' may be low when they should be nearer the upper part of the ranges. These are rarely tested.
This is an excerpt from the following link:-
"The laboratory assays for assessment of thyroid function include thyroid stimulating hormone (TSH), total triiodothyronine (TT3), total thyroxine (TT4), FT3, and FT4. The measurement of FT3 and FT4 are the most clinically relevant for the evaluation of thyroid disorders, with total thyroid hormones being affected by variations in binding protein concentrations. It is essential that free thyroid hormone measurement accurately assess hormone concentration even in the presence of significant variation in the concentration of binding proteins that occur in a variety of physiological and disease states. "
You can get a private postal blood test if you wish and all blood drawn should be at the earliest possible, fasting (you can drink water) and allow a gap of 24 hours between last dose of thyroid hormones and the test and take it afterwards.
Thank you. Yep. Plan is to wean off completely. It was for anxiety which is controlled. Well I have some lingering minor physical symptoms but it could thyroid! I want to get them out of the equation. I'm just taking it v slow. Plan to come off over the summer.
I had this brain fog , I read in the article instant sugar to brain for hypothyroidism, create bair fog. As I was taking sweets. It was recommended to take fruits , or snacks when we are hungry . Glucose is not good for hypothyroidism. But carbohydrates as a slow release provide energy for the brain ( glucose ) or fruits with fructose like 🍌and apple 🍎, they have fructose, so we won't get foggy brain as we use chocolate, or sweets , or cakes. And for tiredness it might be your levethyroxin dose. Mine was low and u was processing slower, I could not even understand simple sentence, I was reacting and responding slow , sleeping a lot. 2 days work , 2 days asleep . One days work, one day and half asleep.
My consultant increased dose from 50 to 62.5 and I am okay now.
On the food front.. i also became well known for always having a packet of almonds to nibble on , or some carrots and a pot of hummous (and a pack of 'emergency figgy biscuits' )... doing that has saved the day on many an occasion. Try and stay away from the coffee. take a flask of homemade fresh lemon/ginger/honey instead... they will of course all think you're mad , but need's must
Very much dependant on how good your employer is around this sort of thing but it might be worth talking to them about reasonable adjustments given that this is a chronic/ongoing health condition.
I’ve found that working from home helps me to manage myself better health wise so will be continuing to do 2-3 days from home as the office opens up. I hadn’t realised how much of a difference it would make to get the little extra sleep in the mornings and have regular stretch or nap breaks. Even being able to make a decent lunch! And at the moment, flexible/remote working feels like an easier sell to employers because it’s evident that it can work.
Would you be able to split working from home and going into the office?
I have Hashi's and work full time (always have done, even with a TSH of 50). Some days it's been quite tough. Working from home for the last year has made a huge difference so I'm hoping to be able to only go in 1 - 2 days a week, especially as I'm not comfortable using public transport and will be driving.
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