graves relapse

[nooneimportant]

I’m definitely relapsing 😞 my heart rate initially went back down after the endo appointment but has jumped up 4bpm (usually about 65 on average now 69), no hand tremors, no digestive issues, sleeping well but that heart rate and the stress building up to the appointment … something isn’t right so will likely have to up meds again and feel worse. Right now I feel I’m never going into remission, really deflated, never taking another appointment from an endo - the stress being caused isn’t worth it and I manage everything myself anyway 🤷‍♀️

[pennyannie]

Just cut yourself some slack - things may well settle in a couple of days :

[nooneimportant in reply to pennyannie]

It doesn’t feel right 😞 almost like I’m coming down with something … I really think I’m relapsing 😭

[pennyannie in reply to nooneimportant]

Well coming down with something - and relapsing can be very different things -

You know your body best -

[pennyannie in reply to pennyannie]

I'm wondering if it might help you to monitor your blood pressure, pulse and body temperature - just twice a day - AM and PM -

just so you get an understanding of your ' normal's ' - which will fluctuate -

but it would seem by doing part of this you are more stressed seeing any differential with this then kick starting the overthinking - which is exhausting and debilitating.

[nooneimportant in reply to pennyannie]

It’s a fine balance with the mental health and what I believe to be ADHD 😕 I’ll give it some consideration though🙂

[pennyannie in reply to nooneimportant]

Sometimes its just a question of having someone else to talk you through/down these unsettling feelings - or switching to doing something else that demands a level of concentration and distraction.

[Calceolaria in reply to nooneimportant]

Check for covid? There’s a lot about of the new strains.

[Buddy195 Administrator]

pennyannie has given you some good advice; having suffered with high anxiety in the past, I definitely think it’s good to stick to a regime when monitoring health symptoms. I ditched my FitBit as I was constantly looking at my heart rate. I now only check it when relaxed (eg on waking or after a meditation practice).

A recent GP visit caused my blood pressure to soar BUT when relaxed at home it was normal again….medical appointments can cause adverse symptoms for many of us. What you perceive as a relapse may simply be a slight dip in your mental/ physical health.

It’s easy to say try to ‘worry less’, as I know this is unhelpful when you experience a sense of ‘panic’. Instead, do try to do more of what you enjoy and consider spending additional time outdoors.

I’m sure it’s been related before, but remember you ARE important… perhaps a new user name would act as a positive affirmation for you? 🦋

[nooneimportant in reply to Buddy195]

I have a sore throat … scratchy throat like you get just before tonsillitis?! I’ve had mild TED too ie eye starts twitching or itching a bit sometimes and that’s started over the last few days which is making me think I going hyper again … I have been eyeballing my Fitbit too much I guess - will have to stop looking at it 😞

[Buddy195 Administrator in reply to nooneimportant]

I would take a selenium supplement if you suspect TED, 200ug for up to 6 months is shown to be beneficial in mild/ moderate TED. Use preservative free drops if you experience any dryness.

However, your eye twitch/ itching may simply be stress related.

[nooneimportant in reply to Buddy195]

I’ve been taking selenium pretty much since diagnosis and I feel it definitely helps 🙂 that’s more thought too re stress 😖

[humanbean]

jumped up 4bpm (usually about 65 on average now 69)

I don't know if you are aware of this but doctors consider a normal resting heart rate to be somewhere between 60 and 100 beats per minute. So yours is low in that range. A change of 4 bpm is very slight and probably not significant.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heart...

People who are hypOthyroid and under-medicated have too low a level of thyroid hormones. Many hypo patients suffer bradycardia which is defined as a resting heart rate of under 60 beats per minute.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brady...

But there are some patients with hypothyroidism who can suffer with tachycardia :

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tachy...

In my own case (I'm hypothyroid) I had tachycardia and now I take beta blockers to slow my heart rate down. I reduced my heart rate before I took beta blockers by doing my best to optimise my iron and ferritin. Low iron/ferritin raises the heart rate.

In someone with hypERthyroidism doctors would expect a patient to have a heart rate which was high in the normal range or over the normal range.

It is possible that the way you are feeling now is not related to your thyroid hormone levels or your heart rate but is caused by your cortisol levels (cortisol is one of the main stress hormones, adrenaline is the other).

I've never known anyone to have their adrenaline levels measured, but cortisol can be measured in blood, saliva, and urine. I'm most familiar with measuring in saliva, but doctors usually use blood.

[nooneimportant]

my son believes I am stressed and have an viral something or other - my resting heart rate didn’t peak above 80s when in midst/height of graves only when exercising ie running does it peak at 140bpm. I’ve always been an odd ball hence why I nearly died from preeclampsia when having my son, I had every symptom going ie swelled from from 8st to 16st, full of fluid, flashing lights in vision, breathless, headaches, chronically depressed and protein in waters, was literally dying and midwife kept saying but your blood pressure isn’t high - it was only a consultant that finely looked backwards from an early scan where thy just happened to check blood pressure and saw how low it was and I was admitted immediately and scheduled for a c section (my son came in the night before they got chance to operate 🙂). it was high for me as it’d been on the floor for many years I had all the symptoms of high blood pressure without it being high as it was still in ‘normal’ range.

The GP ordered my pharmacy to do a blood pressure check earlier this year prior to handing over medication - I didn’t know I was having it checked, I’d just marched there on a belly full of caffeine (I’ve since cut down) was stressed thinking they’d messed my meds up again and they insisted so I sat down for a couple of minutes whilst she checked “both arms?” “Oh ok not what I was expecting!” It wasn’t remotely high apparently - it’s in normal ranges these days but the expectation is it’ll be high. Hospital gave my gran meds without checking it as she had diabetes etc and it was ‘standard procedure’ they were banging her chest later that day to get her back and pumping her with stuff to bring it all up again - it was never high?!

Years before graves I remember sitting and watching my heart drop into the high 30s and I’d feel fine my husband at the time would often joke I was a zombie with no pulse 🤷‍♀️😂