Should I taper t3 down?

[Fmljkl]

I've had a weird past few months and don't want to get into BUT my anxiety has been unbearable. During the most stressful part, my doc and I decreased my night t3 and my thyroid got inflamed so I felt like I couldn't breathe. We increased back to old dose and symptoms were gone in 2 days.

Since then, I've started having panic attacks. I just got lab work done and my endo wants to drop my night t3 dose again (I take 2.5mcg every 8 hours and 88mcg Tirosint at 10pm). She wants to see if it was a stress response or my thyroid. If it gets inflamed again, I will get an ultrasound done.

Here is recent (8/12) blood work:

TSH: 0.2 (0.4-4.5)

T3: 3.5 (2.3-4.2)

T4: 1.4 (0.8-1.8)

Should I try my best to taper night t3 dose down until it's cut out? I'm afraid the difficulty breathing was b/c I dropped it too fast last night but I don't know. I'm feeling really lost and scared of panic attacks.

Please help!

[Yeswithasmile]

How long after your medication did you have this blood test?

I am afraid I don’t know much about this yet, I’m still trying to work it out myself but the fact that you could breathe again when you upped your dose back says to me that it is sort of working for you. As for the anxiety, we’ll that must be awful but I would tend to think that you haven’t reached optimal yet if it’s a long standing symptom for you?

[shaws Administrator]

I take my T3 dose once daily when I get up (with one glass of water) and wait an hour before I eat.

I follow the advice of Dr John Lowe (deceased) who was an expert on T3 and he would never prescribe levothyroxine. He only prescribed NDTs (natural dessicated thyroid hormones) the very original thyroid hormone replacement from 1892 and no blood tests had been invented then or gave T3 for patients who were resistant to thyroid hormones.

He, himself, took his daily dose of 100mcg of T3 when he awoke in the middle of the night and stated that it had to saturate the T3 receptor cells and they would then 'send out waves' throughout the 24 hours.

Unfortunately in the UK, they've removed the original thyroid hormone replacements (called Natural dessicated thyroid hormones or NDTs. They are made from animals' thyroid glands so contain all of the hormones a healthy gland woud do).

This is the method when having a blood test. Get the very earliest appointment (even if made weeks ahead) and it is a fasting test (you can drink water). Do not take thyroid hormones before test but afterwards. This helps keep the TSH at its highest as that seems to be the only result doctors look at.

Always request a print-out of your results with the ranges for your own records and post if you have a query.

Also request B12, Vit D, iron, ferritin and folate to be checked too.

This is a previous post and it will be informative:-

healthunlocked.com/thyroidu...

dropbox.com/s/w7cjut689r1w1...

[DippyDame]

You may find that stress and anxiety reduces T3 levels and symptoms appear.....stress "eats up" T3!Reducing your T3, therefore, is likely to be counterproductive.

Have you had thyroid antibodies tested for Hashimoto's? This could be causing the inflammation. If positive going gluten free helps many people.

Your night time dose appears to be helpful so in your shoes I wouldn't attempt to cut it out I need a large dose of T3 and take it in a single dose at bedtime.

Splitting the dose didn't work for me no matter how I titrated the dose.

The correct dose is what you need to make you feel better..and currently your endo appears to be flying by the seat of her pants!! Clinical evaluation is important but is often sidelined in favour of lab results. Your labs look reasonable (FT3 63% through ref range and FT4 60%) but that is not translated into how you feel so something needs to change.

The problem is that we are all diferent with different needs and trial and error is often the way to go

In your shoes I would test for thyroid antibodies, ensure vit D, vit B12, folate and ferritin are optimal, these are essential for good thyroid health, and I would also try taking the T3 in a single dose at bedtime.

Good luck

DD