Chronic foot pain

[mar51]

Does anybody else here suffer with chronic and debilitating foot pain? I'm 61 and was diagnosed a year ago as Hypo thyroid after much fighting with my GP I might add. The aching and pain in my feet has slowly got worse until it has reached almost unbearable levels and is impacting on my day to day life. My GP is unsympathetic and just suggested pain killers and anti inflammatories and he says it's not connected to my thyroid. It's really getting me down😞😞

[SlowDragon Administrator]

Extremely common when under medicated

How much levothyroxine are you currently taking

Do you always get same brand of levothyroxine

Request thyroid test

Always test as early as possible in morning before eating or drinking anything apart from water and last dose levothyroxine 24 hours before test

Essential to regularly retest vitamin D, folate, ferritin and B12 too

What vitamin supplements are you currently taking

Have you had thyroid antibodies tested

Approx 90% of primary hyperparathyroidism is caused by autoimmune thyroid disease also called hashimoto's, diagnosed by high thyroid antibodies

Low vitamin levels are especially common with hashimoto's

[SlowDragon Administrator]

Post from 6 months ago

You never replied to

healthunlocked.com/thyroidu....

[SlowDragon Administrator]

Guidelines on levothyroxine is that unless extremely petite likely to need very minimum of 100mcg per day

Guidelines are 1.6mcg per kilo of your weight

How much do you weigh in kilo approx

Dose levothyroxine should only be increased in 25mcg steps and blood retested 6-8 weeks after each dose increase

[humanbean]

There is a condition often mentioned on this forum which affects quite a few hypothyroid patients. It is called Plantar fasciitis.

Some hypothyroid patients have complained about this to doctors, and told them that it went away when their condition was adequately treated. Low nutrients can contribute as well, I think.

I had this problem when I was untreated. It went away when my T3 level improved. I also think improving my nutrients helped a lot too.

Note that some doctors laugh at the suggestion this problem is connected to hypothyroidism.

Also note that standard treatment for plantar fasciitis from the NHS is exercise and painkillers.

nhs.uk/conditions/plantar-f...

If you don't get well with NHS treatment I suspect you will be assumed to have been too lazy to exercise i.e. blame the patient.

[Steamruss in reply to humanbean]

I purchased Vionic shoes and my PF. (Policeman’s heel) as finally gone after 9 months.

[hackman]

I know it is hard to do but can you explain the pain? I ask because I have what I can only describe as Raynauds in my feet - but only when thyroid hormone is low and it is a really unbearable so I was just wondering if you could describe how it feels.

[SlowDragon Administrator]

I often recount on here ..how my (ex) GP nearly fell off his chair laughing when I explained my severe plantar fasciitis was due to thyroid and especially due to poor conversion of levothyroxine (Ft4) in to active hormone (ft3)

Like many hundreds of other members, I found plantar fasciitis completely resolved within weeks of starting on T3

Other posts mentioning plantar fasciitis

healthunlocked.com/search/p...

[FancyPants54]

Oh yes! This is me. My lower legs and feet hurt all the time when I stand or try to walk. Even my thighs ache. My ankle joints are stiff so steps are hard, and my feet are numb yet tingling at the toes and balls and then very over sensitive over the rest of the sole. The ache deep inside the heel gets worse towards evening, when I find it hard even to sit with my foot on the ground unless I have a slipper or shoe on. It's awful. I can't walk anymore. I used to walk miles.

I am under medicated.

[Kazzy18]

I have read this post with interest. I have Hashimoto’s and suffer with plantar fasciitis, I have done for years. I am a runner and have been told by my physio that I have a shortened calf muscle which originally caused it. I ended up having acupuncture which helped it heal, but I was also diagnosed with low vit D at the same time so I suspect supplementing was also key to it healing. So you could try either of those to help.

[brfran]

Interesting about the foot pain. I had something very similar in February this year. Thyroid levels slightly under what I need but not desperately low. As soon as the weather improved enough for me to spend more time outside things began to improve and by May I was fine. I'm thinking vitamin D may be involved in this. Worth a try, anyway.

[Lepidopteress]

Hi---was searching on thyroid and foot pain and ran across this. Short answer---absolutely, and as a hiker, I have learned that when it happens if I take a tiny dose--5 mcg---of liothyronine (T3 sublingually)---the problem goes away within a few minutes. I have discussed this with my primary physician.

Pre-covid, 3 friends and I walked 100k on the Camino in Spain. I am hypothyroid, and at the time was taking a combination of levothyroxine and liothyronine. Our days were long, and sometimes I missed 5 mcg of liothyronine in the afternoon. I experienced excruciating foot pain---kind of a combo of plantar and metatarsaliglia that felt like I was walking barefoot on sharp gravel, but with my socks all bunched up too. I swear I could feel every contour of every rock and pebble. Once I returned home, I had a podiatrist check me over, and he said that I was most likely undertreated for hypothyroidism to begin with ,and the physical stress of walking 12-15 miles every day with a pack put me over the edge.

Because my thyroid issues are actually most likely pituitary or hypothalamic based plus conversion issues, my TSH runs quite low, which causes docs to err on the side of undertreatment, which I have learned makes my life very difficult from simple annoying things like changes in skin, hair, and nails and weight gain, to more serious things such as sciatica, vision changes, erratic blood pressure, foot pain, bloating, carpal tunnel, and so on.

Finally saw an endo who bumped up the levo to 125 mcg based on the 1.6 mcg/kg plus 5 mcg liothyronine. At that, some things felt better, but carpal tunnel returned to the point of waking me up at night. Added in 5 more of lio, and it went away. I started to lose some weight even, but then I noticed my basal temp going down as low as 95.4 F, muscle weakness and cramping, and joint stiffness. My bloodwork showed reverse T3 going up, and free T3 dropping. I seems as though I have a "set point" at which my body starts converting to Rt3.

I see a new endo tomorrow, but in the meantime, am taking 25 mcg of liothyronine and no levothyroxine. Muscle and joint issues are gone, but feeling a bit underdosed.

My feet---when hiking, they start to get the bunched up sock super sensitive thing at about 5 k. I have been carrying extra liothyronine with me. I decided both this weekend and last to see what would happen if I took an extra 5 mcg when it happened, and for me, the result was pretty amazing. I put it under my tongue so as to get it into my system faster, and within 5 minutes, it felt as if I was just starting the hike--minimal foot pain again. It really did confirm what my podiatrist told me, which is that sometimes under physical stress, our bodies simply are not able to keep up with the amount of thyroid hormone needed to keep us going.

I need to say, I am diligent about checking my blood pressure, temperature, and lately even blood sugar (not diabetic, but getting to that age where it could happen, and I want to rule out low blood sugar as well when these things happen. I keep records like crazy, and have graphs of what happens with blood work and medication changes. I have discussed what I do with my primary as we have had to work together to try to sort it all out.

I wish you the best. I am convinced that there are many more types of thyroid illness out there besides that which can be detected by TSH alone, and that every system of our body and mind is impacted if we are running on either too little or too much.