I feel my t3 is too high for me. I think it is making my joint pain worse.
I would like to raise t4.
By dropping my t3 dose a bit I am thinking my t4 would raise without increasing my levo dose currently at 125mcg. Would this sound like a plan? Or should I drop t3 a bit and increase levo?
Any advice appreciated.
Yeswithasmile
Or should I drop t3 a bit and increase levo?
How much T3 were you taking at the time of that test?
I'm OK with my FT3 at 6 but the FT4 would be too low, I need them both fairly well balanced at around 70%ish through range (I take Levo and T3) and it's taken me years to find the right balance to feel optimally medicated (and my key nutrients have been optimal for a long time apart from ferritin which is rather stubborn).
You can't do both at once, so maybe reduce the T3 by a small amount to start with then leave it 6-8 weeks and retest before deciding on your next step. Even when only adjusting dose of T3 I find I still need a good few weeks for all hormone levels to stabilise, I tend to test at 8 weeks but still feel a difference at 10 weeks.
Vit D is slightly low. Often see here that it is recommended to be 100.You don't say what dose of T3 you are on. If it is a low dose such as 10mcg drop by 2.5mcg but if the dose is higher then drop by 5mcg - please not these are just suggestions of what I would do from my own experience.
When I dropped my T3 from 15mcg to 10mcg my ft4 rose by 0.5 so you may not get as high a rise as you wish.
Still you need to wait 6-8 weeks and then do bloods before you change anything else so once bloods are done you could add in 12.5mcg or 25mcg levo.
As SeasideSusie says it can take years of small changes until we get there! It has taken me 2 years. The only way to go is low and slow - small changes of 1 thing then 6 - 8 weeks waiting then bloods. It is the only way.
Sorry Lalatoot, I have just reread this… after you lowered your t3 and got a measly .5 increase in your t4 did you then start increasing your levo by 25mcg and if so was it enough? Or did you have to go again? Also do you think the amount you ended on seems a lot? It’s just that I wonder what sort of dosage people do take? I realise it’s individual but I concerned that I’m already on 125mcg and I’m concerned about taking much more.
Thank you 😊
I did not increase my levo as this was not what I was needing to do.I wished to reduce my FT3. I could do this in 2 ways - either reduce T3 dose or reduce levo dose. I did not want Ft4 going any lower than previous blood results so I chose to reduce Ft3 by reducing T3. And I got the bonus of a slight increase in FT4 as a result which was fine.
The knock on effects of one small change is why we need to only alter 1 thing at a time and then have patience to see what the outcome will be.
As for dosage, if we need the hormones, we need the hormones. Our ft4 and ft3 results and the ranges will tell us when we are on too much.
Oh I’m with you now. Thank you so much for the reply. It totally made sense.
Thank you SeasideSusie and Lalatoot
I was taking 25mcg lio until Sunday. I have now dropped to 18.75mcg so 3/4 of a tab instead of whole one. Split twice a day.
I don’t expect my t4 to raise much if at all which is why I wondered about adding levo as well as dropping levo but I will take SeasideSusie’s advice here and test again in 6 -8 weeks. Tempting as it is I don’t want to rush things and blow it now.
I admit sometimes I can relate to some posts I’ve read where people stop taking it completely. There are times when I think I feel worse than I did on 75mcg levo BUT I’m keeping the faith!
As for the vit d… that is taking 10,000 ui daily most of this year! I’m pleased it’s increased but did think it would be much higher. Vitamin b12 too. Ferritin is 25 (13-150) so also an improvement but not great although I do appear to be going in the right direction.
I am grateful for you casting experienced eyes over my results and for your thoughts and basically help so far, it’s so much more than I have ever received elsewhere x.
I am so jealous you can get your T3 that high. Never had mine as high as that!! Good luck with the advice above. Just stopped by to be in awe. Haha.
Lol Don’t be jealous. All that’s happened is it’s shown me I can actually put up with a fair old amount of uncomfortable! Fine for 5 - 6 weeks and then bam 💥 palps, tremors, really up and down. And the joint pain! Why the weight doesn’t shift and all those other hypo things don’t disappear 🤷♀️🤷♀️🤷♀️ .
Sorry you can’t manage to raise your level. That must be very frustrating for you although I must say that I wonder if the bloods really do represent what’s in the cells? I felt like my results should have been higher 🤣
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