It's a long road

[Mellachcat]

Hi I'm Jan I'm soon to be 70 years old and so I consider myself a vetran with an underactive throid . I was diagnosed at 12 years old. It's been a long road for me. Not all of it has been easy, as I'm sure a lot of you can relate to.

As i introduce myself to you I'll try not to go into to much detail about the many things that my underactive thyroid has brought about to surprise me. Not always in a good way, I'm glad to say though I haven't lost my sence of humour.

Some of the hardest things in all of this for me has been the brain fog and overwhelming exgaustion. The flue like symptoms that you sometimes feel surprised that you survived. It wasn't the flue though was it? it was your thyroid.

The frustration of it can be overwhelming. I've lost jobs, a husband and numerous friends along the way who just lost patience. I should be angry but I kind of understand why they left. I've had to cancel so many things, over time it must have been exgshusting for them too.

Moving on, I felt so desperate and unwell by the age of 60, it had been a long time, I finally realised I had to do something to help myself. I felt so let down. I started to research for myself.

What I discovered just amazed me and I'm so thankful because I have never felt better in my life. I read most everything that I could on the subject. I really went in depth. It took me about 3 years. I tried so many things, which on reflection i think you have to because we're all so different and no one thing fits all. In my opinion although medication did help, in my case it wasn't the whole answer.

I found it hard to accept it when the doctor told me "Your test results are showing normal range" despite this I still felt like a member of the living dead.

I believe that you have to try to wade through all the information you can, because the answers are there.

The frustrating thing is thyroid disorder is so complex and so are we. What might work for me might not work for you.

I have to say at this point I'm a firm believer that the answers we are looking for are food related and that is where I wish, in my young years, I would have started researching.

If you are searching please don't give up. At one point i had tried so many things and they hadn't worked that i began to think I would not find anything that would help me to feel well again.

My desperation was the only thing that kept me going. . It is hard and frustrating and you need a will of steel to keep going but its worth all the trouble in the end. A lot of us forget or never ever know the joy of that feeling of consecutive days of feeling well.

I feel within myself today that I am as near to healthy as as a person can be. How can that be ???

Cruciferous Vegetables make me ill and are responsible for my thyroid symptoms. I found this out in my research. I decided to cut them out of my diet completely. Dispite reading on many occasions that if you cook them for enough time you shouldn't get the symptons . That did not work for me so I just cut them completely and it worked and I felt 1 million times better. Don't get me wrong i do have the odd day where I have what I call a thyroid day or week. It's horrible but It's because I ate something that contained some cruciferous vegetable. Those days are less though. I read my labels now.

So for me it was so simple it made me cry, why? Because a lifetime ago I could have saved myself a whole lot of pain and suffering and it was caused by such a simple thing.

I can't eat cruciferous vegetables no matter how well cooked they are.

I was brought up in a family where we ate three meals a day 1 at least containing numerous vegetables or salad and as an adult i ate this way every day. It tasted great but it was like eating poison to me. Like having a nut allergy and eating nuts, except nuts to someone with a nut allergy can kill them. Those vegetables wouldn't kill me but they sure ruined my life. I hate to say this, but at times I sometimes wished they had. That's an awful thing to admit but to be honest I had felt so unwell and i had lost so much.

What was so healthy for most people wasn't for me and I found that hard to accept. I still love veggies to this day

but I'm more choosy about the ones i eat now.

I'm so glad that I listened to that feeling of desperation and began to actively help myself.

I'm airing on the side of caution here in saying that I'm not going to, or would I stop my thyroxine. I would be tooooo frightened to, because everything is working really well for me at the moment.

If you were to ask me my advice I would say you need both medication and the need to research for yourself. Its important to realise that this condition is very complex. It is why it has so many symptoms and it's difficult to stabilise if it gets out of controll.

Good luck to you. Trust yourself in your research if you undertake the same path that i have. Just be aware of one thing and this is important. We are all uniquely different from each other inside and out. Please consider this. No matter how healthy an advocate may tell you a food is. It could be a super food but it may not be a super food for you.

Love to you all jan xx

Feel free to ask any questions.

[greygoose]

Hi Mellachcat, welcome to the forum.

Glad to hear that you've done your research and have found what works for you. That's what we all have to do, unfortunately because doctors won't do it. They stay stuck in a one-size-fits-all mentality and watch people suffer.

But, I have to disagree with you on one point - and this is not about everyone being different, it's about fact. Cruciferous vegetables. They may disagree with you, they disagree with a lot of people, but they are not responsible for your hypo symptoms, nor the faillure of your thyroid.

Obviously I don't know what you've been reading, nor what you know or don't know, so forgive me if I'm telling you things you already know.

The cruciferous vegetable/thyroid link idea is based on the fact that they contain substances called goitrogens. What goitrogens do is impede the uptake of iodine by the thyroid, causing the thyroid to expand its surface area in order to trap as much iodine as possible. This is called a goitre - hence the name 'goitrogen'. All this is fact. But, there are some things that most articles on the subject neglect to tell you:

- you would have to consume one hell of a lot of goitrogens in order for it to have that effect - like cabbage soup three times a day for years and years. The average person, even if they eat a few Brussels sprouts every day, will never come near the level of goitrogen intake necessary to affect iodine uptake

- and it's not just cruciferous vegetables that contain goitrogens, but plenty of things you'd never thing were a problem, like walnuts, peas and beens, onions and garlic, strawberries and pears, etc. etc. etc. things that people tend to eat every day with no ill effect.

- and, if you are taking thyroid hormone replacement, you'll be getting your iodine from that, anyway. 1 molecule of T4 contains 4 atoms of iodine. So, 100 mcg levo gives you about 65 mcg iodine which is recycled in the body. And not much of which your body will use, anyway, because your thyroid isn't making thyroid hormone anymore. So, goitrogens cannot affect your thyroid when on thyroid hormone replacement.

This is a subject that is often discussed on here, and something that I fully researched at the beginning of my journey because I was convinced I had found the answer, too. But it just isn't true. Goitrogens cannot possibly cause hypo symptoms. What causes hypo symptoms is low T3, so if someone continues to have hypo symptoms when medicated they are more than likely either under-medicated or poor converters of T4 to T3.

But that's not to say that goitrogenic food - like any other food - can't disagree with you. I went through a long period when I reacted badly to strawberries and pears, although I'd eaten them all my life previously. Then it went away and now I can eat them again. But I'm pretty sure that had nothing to do with my thyroid.

[Mellachcat in reply to greygoose]

Hi greygooseI'm si sorry that you disagree. I did look at all goitergens believe me I looked at everything. I feel that a person can have a sensitivity to any food. I know that if I eat these things they heighten my thyroid symptoms and I become sick for weeks.

The things I read about goitergens are usually based on studies probably like most people do.

I have lived with an underactive thyroid for 58 years and I know when I'm having symptoms relating to my underactive thyroid. My sensitivity to these Vegetables is so bad a single serving makes me react and im sick for weeks.

I have tried and tested it on myself.

I am not suggesting that this is the answer for all people who suffer from underactive thyroids.

Our sensitivities being thyroid sufferers are not measured in these studies. I offered my opinion to help others and I hope that it does.

Regards Jan

[greygoose in reply to Mellachcat]

Of course people can have sensitivity to any food, I didn't say they couldn't. But that doesn't mean things are affecting your thyroid, and given that hypo symptoms are all non-specific and could be caused by many other things, the fact that what you believe to be hypo symptoms getting worse when you eat cruciferous vegetables doesn't mean it has anything to do with your thyroid. Have you done any blood tests when having one of these sick periods that show your thyroid hormone levels have dropped? Or how did you try and test it on yourself?

There are studies and there are studies, and to be frank, you can prove whatever you want - whatever suits your agenda - with a study. There have been many, many false, erroneous studies on all subjects.

healthunlocked.com/thyroidu...

I'm not just nitpicking but you made a bold statement that cruciferous vegetables made you hypo and cause your symptoms. That could encourage people who are new to all this to stop eating them believing that it's going to cure their hypo. It isn't. If your thyroid is failing it will continue to fail no mater what you eat or don't eat. And cutting out various food groups for no reason, leaving a very limited diet, can have a detrimental effect on your nutrient levels and is not a good idea.

[Pandora777]

Hi. Mellachat, That is interesting I don’t eat loads of veg but this time of the year we do have red cabbage and sprouts. Would you advise me to avoid them?

Lora

[greygoose in reply to Pandora777]

I wouldn't.

[Pandora777 in reply to greygoose]

It is once a year 😀

We are already having a gluten and dairy free Christmas

[greygoose in reply to Pandora777]

Eat and enjoy.

[Pandora777 in reply to greygoose]

I will reduce the amount. We always have such a restricted diet so Christmas is hard

What will you be eating for your Christmas dinner in France?

[greygoose in reply to Pandora777]

Oh, smoked salmon for starters, beuf en croute with mashed potatoes and gravy, and a raspberry gateau for dessert.

But did you read my reply to Mellachat? Because I explain exactly why you don't need to cut cruciferous vegetables out of your diet, they are not the problem.

[Pandora777 in reply to greygoose]

Yes I did but we have so many allergies in our family I am paranoid

Your meal sounds tasty!😋

[greygoose in reply to Pandora777]

It will be tasty!

Allergies have nothing to do with goitrogens.

[Pandora777 in reply to greygoose]

I know

[Pandora777 in reply to greygoose]

I have had a reaction to strawberries in the past and came out in a rash

[serenfach in reply to greygoose]

Room for one more? I can nip over on my broomstick! All my favourite things!

[greygoose in reply to serenfach]

We have room for a football team! lol We just don't know any football teams...

[Mellachcat in reply to Pandora777]

Hi LoraI can only be honest about my experience. These vegetables do affect me and my symptoms. I stopped them and my Symptoms have stopped. I would say to you, you could give it a try but im not a medical person so i can't advise you to. This is what I did: Stopped for a month.

Results : Felt so much better so noticeably that I never wanted to go back on them.

Next: I ate them again one time with my tea. I was ill for almost a week.

I don't think stopping for a month will hurt you. I suggest that if you stop it might be a good idea to wait until after Christmas as it might be a bit of a challange. If you do stop read all of the ingredients on any thing like a shop bought roll or sandwich aslo coleslaw is added to a lot if salads.

I wish you good luck and I hope it works for you.

Some people say you have to eat a ton of these veggies to get thst reaction. I'm saying that if your sensitive to these veggies that's not necceseraly so.

What I'm suggesting is truly my experience and it won't cost you anything to try. Please let me know if you try and what happens.

Google a list of cruciferous Vegetables as you need to know all of them. There are lots of non cruciferous veggies that you will be able to eat so hopefully your vitamin intake won't suffer.

Best wishes Jan xx

[Tina_Maria in reply to Mellachcat]

Cruciferous vegetables such as broccoli and brussels sprouts contain a lot of soluble and insoluble fibres, which can cause digestive problems in sensitive people - a reaction to the higher amounts of fibre. Our modern diets contain little fibre and most people do not eat enough, hence when they eat a good portion of broccoli or sprouts, the digestive tract gets overwhelmed and reacts with bloating and gas (fermentation from the fibre).

You do not need to avoid these vegetables, you just need to prepare them accordingly and not just boil them in water. Adding a bit of lemon juice, garlic or ginger will make them more digestible. Eat smaller portions that are easier to digest, chew well and you can still enjoy the benefits of an enriched and healthy diet.

Agreed, there is a lot of conflicting and wrong information out there, which is not helpful. However, people are sometimes too quick and just eliminate foods unnecessarily from their diets, instead of trying to find a solution to make things work for them.

[Mellachcat in reply to Pandora777]

Sorry Laura I forgot to add to get a list of all cruciferous veggies, nuts, and fruit. It sounds like a lot but its not as there are so many other fruits, vege, and nuts to enjoy. Luckily the cruciferous items are few compared to the non cruciferous items.

Jan xx

[Pandora777]

Thank you for sharing with us what works for you

However I won’t be cutting certain vegetables from my diet. I am looking forward to eating sprouts and red cabbage with my Christmas dinner. Happy Christmas to you 🎄