book tags

Just as I was finishing up the post below about a short sum­mary on the Endoc­ri­no­logy Today web­site, I saw a link at the bot­tom of the page that inte­res­ted me.  It took me to a blog post on the same site from Decem­ber 10^th tit­led “Why can’t it be my thyroid?”.

And a slew of thy­roid patients around the world, as well as a gro­wing body of doc­tors,  would com­ple­tely disa­gree with this post.

Namely, a DO explains the pro­blem of patients arri­ving in doc­tors offi­ces with “innu­me­ra­ble pos­si­ble symp­toms of hypothy­roi­dism” inc­lu­ding “fati­gue, cold into­le­rance, dec­rea­sed energy, weight gain, depres­sion, hair loss, low libido, mens­trual irre­gu­la­rity and others.”

Yet, he bemoans, these patients have a “nor­mal TSH” which is “well within the nor­mal labo­ra­tory refe­rence range.” He also refers to their nor­mal free T3 and free T4, and sta­tes there is no his­tory to sug­gest pitui­tary dys­func­tion or that the TSH is unreliable.”

He then pro­ceeds to pat him­self on the back because he 1) will treat some patients with a high-normal TSH and other cli­ni­cal fea­tu­res,  2) he will treat to a low-normal TSH of less than 2.0, but like the good-boy-doctor, “still within the nor­mal labo­ra­tory refe­rence range” and 3) he will not induce iatro­ge­nic hyperthy­roi­dism, even if symp­toms per­sist. (yikes)

“Iatro­ge­nic hyperthy­roi­dism”??  Since “iatro­ge­ne­sis” refers to harm­ful medi­cal pro­ce­du­res, he’s pro­bably refe­rring to a TSH below the range, which in his mind, equa­tes to hyperthyroidism.

***Then comes the obser­va­tion that has made many thy­roid patients shi­ver, since so many doc­tors have said it: because he feels that adding T3 to T4 has more nega­tive results than posi­tive, he explains to his patients “that there may be cau­ses of their symp­toms besi­des the thyroid.”

THUD.

So here is my 6-point res­ponse to any doc­tor who might share these beliefs:

1) There’s hardly a thy­roid patient around who hasn’t had a so-called “nor­mal” TSH in spite of clear and obvious hypothy­roi­dism.  The TSH lab test fre­quently lags behind what is rea­lity in the body, and has been doing so since it’s crea­tion in the early 1970’s (see Chap­ter 4 in the Stop the Thy­roid Mad­ness book for his­tory).

2) Having a “nor­mal” free T3 and free T4 means nothing. It’s “where” the result falls in that range that means something. i.e. patients all around the world are noti­cing that having a free T3 mid-range or lower in the pre­sence of hypothy­roid symp­toms is usually a BINGO lab result poin­ting to hypothyroidism.

3) Exactly because doc­tors tend to dis­miss clear hypothy­roid symp­toms as “something else” thanks to a lousy TSH refe­rence range, a bur­geo­ning num­ber of thy­roid patients are falling into adre­nal fati­gue with its low cor­ti­sol, which ser­ves to mess them up even more.

4) A huge body of thy­roid patients who are on desic­ca­ted thy­roid hor­mo­nes (aka Armour, Natu­reth­roid, etc), and who finally have a com­plete remo­val of symp­toms with a nor­mal tem­pe­ra­ture and hear­trate, also have a sup­pres­sed TSH lab result, and not one iota of “iatro­ge­nic hyperthyroidism.”

5) When it appears that adding T3 to T4 is having nega­tive effects, the pro­blem is most likely adre­nal fati­gue that needs correc­tion, and/or low ferri­tin, NOT deci­ding that the symp­toms must be from another cause or T3 doesn’t work.

6) “Fati­gue, cold into­le­rance, dec­rea­sed energy, weight gain, depres­sion, hair loss, low libido, mens­trual irre­gu­la­rity and others” may be sha­red in other con­di­tions, but you are most likely mis­sing CLEAR symp­toms of hypothy­roi­dism, both in the undiag­no­sed patient with a so-called nor­mal TSH, or with a patient trea­ted with the lousy thy­ro­xine, which lea­ves most ever­yone with con­ti­nuing hypothy­roid symp­toms.

“I’m sorry. It IS your thy­roid” is exactly what patients need to hear.

Who, as a smo­ker, hasn’t heard how dele­te­rious tobacco smo­king is for your health. Not only will you acquire health pro­blems directly rela­ted to smo­king, but your life is shor­te­ned by 10 – 15 years ave­rage accor­ding to sta­tis­tics. My own father died at age 63 directly rela­ted to his smoking.

But in spite of strong rea­sons to quit, most smo­kers will tell you it’s NOT easy. Why? Because the nico­tine in tobacco is the addic­tive bogey­man. Nico­tine sti­mu­la­tes those plea­sure cen­ters in your brain, besi­des being a subs­tance which “gets you going” by relea­sing both blood sugar and adre­na­line. The Ame­ri­can Heart Asso­cia­tion sta­tes that “Nico­tine addic­tion has his­to­ri­cally been one of the har­dest addic­tions to break.“

But for hypothy­roid patients, tobacco smo­king pre­sents another whammy. Namely, it stres­ses your adre­nals over and over. And with adre­nal fati­gue being a com­mon side effect of trea­ting hypo with T4 meds like Synth­roid, Levoxyl, Eltro­xin, et all, as well as being dosed by the lousy TSH, you’ve got a third rea­son to fall into adre­nal fati­gue if you are a smoker.

Addi­tio­nally, another fac­tor in the dif­fi­culty of quit­ting is that cor­ti­sol dec­rea­ses when you try to quit. A 2006 research report found that the lowe­red cor­ti­sol after quit­ting is asso­cia­ted with smo­king relapse and with reports of inc­rea­sed with­dra­wal seve­rity and dis­tress. So, when you already have adre­nal fati­gue, and you quit smo­king – a dou­ble whammy against being successful.

What’s the solu­tion? If you don’t have adre­nal fati­gue and want to quit, it may be wise to have a good adre­nal sup­port on hand, such as Iso­cort or any qua­lity OTC adre­nal pro­duct at your health food store. If you DO have adre­nal fati­gue, sta­ying away from cigs may require adding addi­tio­nal cor­ti­sol to your daily amount. Chap­ters 5 and 6 in the STTM book have good infor­ma­tion to help you with cor­ti­sol support.

Are you a smo­ker with hypo? Don’t hesi­tate to res­pond to this post with your expe­rience. (Please note that replies are not for questions.)

READ DEBORAH’S STORY ABOUT HER ATTEMPT to STOP SMOKING.

Hardly a per­son hasn’t heard Aesop’s fable of the tor­toise and the all-too-confident hare, run­ning their I’ll-prove-to-you-who’s-boss race. The hare was FAST and cer­tain to win the run. But the ever-so-committed tor­toise, even if slow, slo­wer and slo­west…was steady…and won the race.

Until recently, I thought our thrust and deter­mi­na­tion to change the Big Pharma, zombie-doctoring medi­cal sys­tem in the treat­ment of hypothy­roid would be like the hare. We’d get the atten­tion of the mass media through our great deter­mi­na­tion, shout the mes­sage of a FAR bet­ter thy­roid treat­ment, and create huge change.

But I think I was wrong. Change has occu­rred, but we have been doing it like the tortoise…slow and steady.

Slowly but stea­dily, we are seeing more and more doc­tors star­ting to “get it”, even if they still have a way to go. Slowly but stea­dily, folks are fin­ding out why they have less sta­mina than others, or depres­sion, or rising cho­les­te­rol, or fibrom­yal­gia, or thin­ning hair in the face of the dog­ged “nor­mal” diagnosis…all due to an ina­de­quate medi­ca­tion called T4, aka Synth­roid, Levoxyl, Eltro­xin, et. al. and a lousy lab called the TSH.

Slowly but stea­dily, folks are fin­ding out about desic­ca­ted thy­roid to treat their hypothy­roid, and cor­ti­sol to treat their adre­nal fatigue.

Even the STTM book has been like the tor­toise. Lite­rary agents didn’t get it, nor did huge publishing com­pa­nies. I finally stop­ped coun­ting, but I bet I had over 200 rejec­tions. They all thought it was simply “another” thy­roid book. So the frui­tion of the STTM book came out of true sweat and tears, and a lot of cuss words as I squir­med through my frus­tra­tions. Yet, the STTM book – a PATIENT-TO-PATIENT book of which I was only the mes­sen­ger, is not only a steady seller like the tor­toise was steady, but sales keep gro­wing every month, reviews are exce­llent, and lives ARE chan­ging. How can you cri­ti­cize a mes­sage, whether the STTM site or the book, that is based on the posi­tive and cri­ti­cal expe­rience of thou­sands of patients around the world!!

Change IS hap­pe­ning! Like the tor­toise, we’re win­ning the race and crea­ting change, bit by bit, whether it’s via STTM, various inter­net thy­roid groups, other good books, or just word of mouth. We’re all a part of it. But we can’t be com­pla­cent, because it’s truly obvious by blogs and web­si­tes I read that there’s still a huge body of hypothy­roid patients still suf­fe­ring on T4 who need to find out what WE have found out. But it will hap­pen, bit by bit.

Star­ted with a new doc. He presc­ri­bes Armour and is rea­ding the STTM book. That lat­ter in itself is an eye-popping miracle.

And…as we were going over my exten­sive lab­work, which he does for new patients, and as I was lamen­ting the way too many doc­tors put their patients on the lousy sta­tins (when all they need to do is treat hypo CORRECTLY), he sta­ted, with a sigh of dis­may and humi­lity, something to the effect of: We doc­tors are simply too busy to keep up with the latest good infor­ma­tion that patients are fin­ding out far ahead of us.

I nearly fell off my chair!! He was honestly and hum­bling admit­ting that patients are fin­ding out good infor­ma­tion far ahead of doc­tors! i.e. he was NOT dis­sing the inter­net; he was NOT dis­sing that a patient could actually be more infor­med than him; he was not dis­sing infor­ma­tion that goes against the Big Pharma Con Job .

This doc is a keeper.

p.s. Think your doc is open-minded enough to read the STTM book?? You can have the publishing com­pany send one directly to your doc­tor. Click on the SEND A BOOK TO YOUR DOCTOR.

Look at my blog post below and you’ll see the latest duhhh entry – i.e Endoc­ri­no­lo­gists finally repor­ted that T3 was an effec­tive treat­ment in place of T4. Finally!! Of course, patients know that desic­ca­ted thy­roid is an even BETTER treat­ment, and that has been unders­co­red by those that tried T3 with their T4 (without having a reverse T3 issue), then switched to desic­ca­ted thy­roid like Armour, and noted they felt much bet­ter. But it’s still an announ­ce­ment in the right direction.

But we now have another duhhh entry: The Jour­nal of Cli­ni­cal Endoc­ri­no­logy & Meta­bo­lism has repor­ted that long-term levothy­ro­xine repla­ce­ment the­rapy in young adults is asso­cia­ted with car­dio­vas­cu­lar abnor­ma­li­ties. Another finally. We as patients have already known that for years! We’ve expe­rien­ced what Synth­roid, Levoxyl and all other T4-only medi­ca­tions have done to our hearts! I watched my own mother have to have an angio­plasty because of her long-term use of Synthroid…and we have NO heart disease or pro­blems like this in our family history!

So yes, you will see the announ­ce­ment that a new page is going to be crea­ted here on STTM which will high­light jour­nal entries and medi­cal announ­ce­ments which only sup­port what patients have been expe­rien­cing and trying to tell their doc­tors for a longgggg time. lol. And your con­tri­bu­tions to this new page will be welcomed.

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The new page is here: www.stopthethyroidmadness.com/medical-research Check this page often, either to send me new research which sup­ports what we already know, or to find meat to give your rigid doctor.

***You can order the STTM book here, which is a com­plete patient-to-patient book on far bet­ter thy­roid treat­ment. It’s YOUR book!