Underactive thyroid sufferer for years

[Roxy1939]

Hi my name is Roxy1939 my thyroid meds not been right for years and years kept putting weight on tablets not really working dosage never correct I was on 100mg for a really long time then kept getting low blood pressure thinking a gunna faint 24/7 then also kept on getting heart palpitations thinking am gunna die breathless regularly haved sudden burst of anxiety when i never suffered with it in my entire life in October they uped dose to 125mg might still not be right starting worsening with freezing cold hands can't get warm at all in house i am sick and tired of taking levothyroxine i want an alternative something herbal i think might be more reliable and calm my anxiety could you offer me any advise?

[greygoose]

The best advice I can give you is: don't take something herbal! Herbs don't have thyroid hormones. The levo you are taking is thyroid hormone - T4 - thyroid hormone replacement making up for the hormone your thyroid can no-longer make enough of (for whatever reason). Herbs can't do that. Plus, some herbs can make thyroid problems worse. Or can adversely affect adrenals.

If levo isn't 'working' for you, it could be for one of many reasons:

- you're not taking enough

- your body cannot conver the T4 (levo) to the active hormone, T3 - T4 is basically a storage hormone that doesn't do much until it is converted into T3

- you have nutritional deficiencies that negatively affect how your body uses thyroid hormone

- you have high or low cortisol which affects how your body uses thyroid hormone

Do you get copies of your blood test results, with ranges? If not, that's the first step to getting well. You need to know exactly what was tested and exactly what the results were.

Your doctor is probably not doing all the right tests. Full thyroid testing includes:

TSH

FT4

FT3

TPO antibodies

Tg antibodies

vit D

vit B12

folate

ferritin

Until you've had all those tested, you will not know why levo doesn't 'work' for you.

[Roxy1939 in reply to greygoose]

Okay thanks for the great advise really helps 👍

[greygoose in reply to Roxy1939]

You're welcome.

[tahoetwilight in reply to greygoose]

I agree with goose stay away from OTC glandular garbage it will mess your thyroid up I'm still recovering from taking a OTC here in the US.

[Lalatoot]

Roxy that is not a good way to be . Many of us on here can sympathise as we are or have been the same. We are here to help.Nothing herbal can help someone who is hypothyroid. Our body needs thyroid hormones so we must take something with those hormones in it . Some folks find that levothyroxine works when they get on the right dose. Others need levo plus liothyronine t3. Others use natural dessicated thyroid NDT. And a smaller number take only liothyronine t3 only.

It is also important to have good levels of ferritin, folate, vit b12 and vit d as these are essential for the thyroid hormones to work efficiently.

So we can help you will need to tell us your thyroid blood results which you can get from your GP

If you read a few posts on this site you we'll see the sort of information that we discuss to help

[pennyannie]

Hello Roxy and welcome to the forum :

What was the reason for your hypothyroidism ?

Do you remember being told you had a thyroid auto immune disease - Hashimoto's ?

The first step we all need take is to get a full thyroid panel as already detailed above.

If your doctor is unable to run these blood tests for you there are a list of private companies who can on the Thyroid UK website which is the charity who supports this forum.

The full bloods are generally described aa ' full thyroid ' or an ' advanced thyroid ' blood test and includes inflammation and around 10 different blood analysis.

This is where we all start off, and simply start a new post with the results and ranges and you will be talked through what it all means and how you too can get back to better thyroid health.

thyroiduk.org