My previous post provides more information, but I thought I'd ask a more specific question.
I have hyper symptoms following one dose of Progesterone. I understand it can increase thyroid activity and I'm assuming this is what's happening.
I have been sleepless since taking it and cannot afford to continue with the progesterone with these effects as sleep is essential to my functionality.
Therefore, it seems necessary to lower levo before starting progesterone again.
Does anyone have tips on how to manage this situation? How much do I lower levo by?
Im on 87.5mg daily currently, which is a recent increase from 75mg due to thyroid levels dropping after double vax.
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Thanks so much for your input radd. Thankfully my GP isn't particularly scrupulous about my levo scripts so I have some freedom to play with things. Would you suggest continuing dosing with progesterone from now - knowing that might make me hyper for a bit - or wait until I level out on the 75mg first?
Yes, I had to reduce meds when I started O & P HRT. It is ironic because everyone thinks you have to increase meds with more oestrogen due to higher levels of binding proteins but I never did.
I also took my thyroid meds & HRT at the same time because my functional endo said these hormones are fine taken together.
If I were you I would keep using the progesterone cream but maybe reduce to half the amount for a week or two because your reaction could be caused by a big deficiency and should reduce as a wide gap narrows. Sex hormones and thyroid hormones are intricately connection and can influence hugely. What you don't want are high levels of unopposed oestrogen.
Progesterone helps drive TPO activity to make & process thyroid hormones and why our temperatures increase during the luteal phase. This could be a big part of why you're feeling a little over-medicated (even though there's a chance you are not), and even when we don't have a thyroid gland there is still enormous connections (not sure how) but I used to still get hot before my periods even after my gland was atrophied.
I have just read your previous post and you may even find that the elevated thyroid antibodies after your second Pfizer vaccine have caused some sort of immune activity after the application of progesterone. This is because the menstrual cycle is itself a cycle of immunity, being suppressed during ovulation to allow sperm to enter and kicking in to shed the lining of the uterus. A sort of evolutionary process to enable a potential embryo to implant.
Therefore, sex hormones involved in the the first half of our menstrual cycle support inflammatory process's and can trigger a stronger immune response than in the second part of our cycle . Additionally all can become magnified in the presence of Hashi.
That is why it is better to reduce both thyroid meds and progesterone and allow your body to become acclimatised to these changes, ie you haven’t just supplemented a bit of progesterone but have suffered big immune change involving elevated antibodies that the progesterone may have exacerbated but the body will quickly adapt.
If this were me I would not stop the progesterone because long term advantages will outweigh the disadvantages tenfold and everything will level out. What you can do is work towards reducing antibodies by following an anti - inflammatory diet, etc.
Yes, I remained on the lower dose of both thyroid hormones and HRT (which I have now come off) for about six years. I had an enforced switch of NDT that I found more T3 potent so reduce my dose & introduced some T4 to balance the ratios but my actual total is now more because I have a higher proportion of T4 in my meds total.
Hope this all makes sense. Otherwise I can find you some links if it's helpful as all so immensely complicated 😁
I absolutely appreciate your advice and personal experience. Makes a lot of sense to me. And it's funny, despite the sleeplessness im now starting to feel a sense of calm that is quite pleasant. I'm wondering if this is the progesterone.
I understand this info in a general way, tho Im not sure im grasping the finer details accurately. If you've got links easily available, I'd love to read more. I really like to understand this stuff.
ie you haven’t just supplemented a bit of progesterone but have suffered big immune change involving elevated antibodies that the progesterone may have exacerbated but the body will quickly adapt.
Why might progesterone exacerbate the antibodies? Because it's stimulating the immune system to kick into gear, as with its function in the cycle with shedding the lining?
Therefore, sex hormones involved in the the first half of our menstrual cycle support inflammatory process's and can trigger a stronger immune response than in the second part of our cycle
I'm confused by this. Isn't progesterone increasing in the leutal phase? I thought you were saying progesterone kicks the immune system into gear (to shed the lining), so why would the first half trigger a stronger immune response when progesterone is significantly less at that time?
Thanks so much for your time Radd, I really appreciate it!
Also, when you say to half the progesterone while I'm adjusting, in your opinion would it be ok to do one dose every second day, or better to halve the dose daily?I'm using a cream so it's kind of hard to accurately split the dose per se, because it's 'one pump'. One pump is equivalent to 33mg, I'm told.
Yes, sorry I didn’t write what I meant very clearly, and only answered conservatively because the subject is so huge. And you are right, progesterone (& androgens) is considered immunosuppressive (so promoting calm), whereas oestrogen’s are immune stimulatory and pathogenic in Hashimotos, but it’s more complicated than that.
If we reverse the thought, it is the luteal stage where most body infections occur because of that suppressed immunity, and it is during ovulation with elevated oestrogen that the highest inflammatory mediators are seen including that of cytokines TH-1 & TH-17 which are the T-helper cells (lymphocytes) associated with Hashimotos. But it is also what the rest of the immune system is doing that dictates how these hormones will perform, for instance progesterone influences prolactin that is also an immune modulator.
Most graphs show progesterone to flat line in-between raising once but it is variable much like oestrogen but on no where near that scale. After it has dropped from its greatest raise we get prostaglandins secreted from the endometrial cells which exacerbate any new symptoms as well as the usual headaches, disturbed digestion, fatigue, problems focussing and the god awful tummy cramps.
Prostaglandins are also known to regulate the immune response and fibrous tissue formation. They are further influenced by viruses and medicines which can lead to elevated auto-antibodies (the ones we don’t want) and stimulate Hashi symptoms.
If you think of the first half mainly in the ovaries and second half in the uterus, all connected by hormones going through the brain with multi-factoral influences, it can be difficult to know what is going on. I assume you are replacing a deficiency, trying to replicate your 28 day cycle and stopping during your period?
Re dosing, I myself would half the dose daily to get more accurate amounts even if it means wiping half a pumps worth away in a tissue because it's only for a short while until you can raise and accuracy is key.
Radd, thanks so much for going to all this effort to explain, so generous of you. My energy levels have had the better of me over the last day or so, so apologies for slow reply. I look forward to having a read of these links too, when my brain is a little clearer. Fingers crossed the P helps with that!!I have a curious experience with my cycle in that I feel my worst in week 2 of the follicular phase. For whatever reason I feel more energised and in a sense less symptomatic post ovulation, and increasingly towards my period.
My doctor has said to apply a pump daily. He hasn't mentioned skipping P while I'm bleeding - is that odd?
Yes, boosting low levels of P. Well, low end of normal on the chart. Although I'm low end of normal O and T too.
'My doctor has said to apply a pump daily. He hasn't mentioned skipping P while I'm bleeding - is that odd?'
Well, I wasn't sure because only knew about dosing so many days out of a 28 day cycle but have goggled it and it seems ok if the dose is low. If I have worried you (😁) just write a new post for other experiences because I've only taken Utrogestan.
When I first started progesterone 4 years ago the first thing I noticed was a higher pulse rate. It only lasted a few days and then it settled back then I wasn't on any thyroid medication. I'm post menopause now and stopped progesterone last August. Since then I've been taking pregnenolone which feels better and it's certainly easier and cheaper.
Thanks magsyh. Interesting that you experienced increased pulse - I wonder if that was related to increased thyroid activity. When you say you weren't on thyroid meds, do you mean you weren't hypothyroid at the time?
I was hypo but had always been refused treatment by NHS. I've had to go private. It was my gynecologist that told me all my troubles were related to low thyroid. I didn't go through menopause till I was 61 and the progesterone saw me through it. The NHS wanted me to have a hysterectomy but I went against their advice and used progesterone instead.
Ugh, how exhausting to be refused treatment.. so good you went against advise and found success with progesterone.Meanwhipe, menopause at 61 is rather incredible!May I ask why pregnenolone is easier for you? Has it had a different effect to progesterone at all?
I find pregnenolone much cheaper and easier to get. It has also done wonders for my low cortisol, progesterone made no difference. All my hormones were low so I'm having everything tested in a few weeks and hoping the results are good overall. I spent a fortune on progesterone over the years I wish I had known how good pregnenolone was. I've never had a hot flush or any menopausal symptoms.
That's really interesting, thanks for sharing. My hormones are all the low end of normal, which at 35 is low.DHEA is low too, and perhaps pregnenolone would assist with that as well as the sex hormones, given its a precursor to that as well.
When we have been undiagnosed/under-medicated for years & years the adrenal glands increase cortisol production to compensate for inadequate thyroid hormone. As cortisol levels higher, DHEA drops, until eventually cortisol drops too.
‘Prolonged exposure to stress will cause the over production of cortisol. Cortisol and DHEA-S compete for the same precursor, pregnenolone ‘(Anderson, 2008).
All hormones work together and when cortisol becomes low the adrenals may sequester progesterone to help make cortisol. This drop in progesterone may create a progesterone/oestrogen imbalance called oestrogen dominance.
Both cortisol and DHEA-S compete for the same precursor, pregnenolone. The extra used for cortisol leaves a shortfall for DHEA-S which is the precursor of oestrogen and testosterone, leaving them short and suddenly all sex hormones are well and truly messed up! 😬
In order to meet the demand it was thought that pregnenolone used in the making of sex hormones is ‘stolen’ so further cortisol can be made. However, there is now thought that pregnenolone conversion is thought to occur within the mitochondria of every adrenal cortex cell type, so should be able to supply all downstream hormones as long as the conversion conditions are met.
Although prenenolone is the mother hormone (underneath cholesterol) it splits into three regions within the adrenal cortex:
- Zona Glomerulosa makes mineralocorticoids (ie aldosterone)
- Zona Fasciculata makes glucorticoids (ie cortisol)
- Zona Reticular makes androgens (ie DHEA)
(And then the medulla which is separate makes catecholamines, ie adrenaline).
There are different cell-specific enzymes & concentrations to synthesis the varying steroid hormones & no known mechanism that could transfer pregnenolone between the mitochondria of one cell to another, and especially not between the different zones. Therefore according to this research supplementing pregnenolone will not help low DHEA.
I am skeptical and still researching as having being enforced off O & P HRT I would like to supplement pregnolone myself.
Again, thanks so much. Yes I'm familiar with some of this stuff.. although not in such brilliant detail. It's no surprise that my health decline to diagnosis (over many very stressful years) was marked by high cortisol and eventual low DHEA. It doesn't seem that I ever became oestrogen dominant tho. As mentioned earlier, im low end of normal for all sex hormones. I actually have low cholesterol as well which isn't ideal.Why were you forced off O and P HRT?
I recently suffered a stroke, no paralysis but some peripheral vision loss & hearing has gone weird in that it's sometimes difficult to place where sounds come from. But it's been 5 months, things are progressing and I am allowed to drive now although I haven't yet because am too scared 🤣. My husbands like 'Get behind that wheel" and I'm "Maybe next week'.
My goodness, that's a lot to go through radd, and what a pain to have to stop a treatment that was previously so effective for you. I'm really glad that you're recovering well.
Re driving - my intuition is to say take your time, do it at your own pace. But there's also something to be said for ripping the band aid off when we're dealing with fear. You know, to diffuse it. In any case, you'll do it when you're ready
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