thinning hair tags

I was infor­med today that a very popu­lar and well-liked doc­tor in Texas, who treats many hypothy­roid patients, was dis­ci­pli­ned recently.  And for what?  Under the column tit­led NONTHERAPEUTIC PRESCRIBING, it sta­tes:  The action was based on Dr. Lau­nius’ presc­ri­bing Adi­pex, Adde­ral and Armour Thy­roid to patients when such medi­ca­tions were not indi­ca­ted. www.tmb.state.tx.us/news/press/2008/101608a.php

Adi­pex and Adde­rol are both cen­tral ner­vous sys­tem sti­mu­lants, and I can’t com­ment one way or the other. But the men­tion of Armour thy­roid as “not indi­ca­ted” is poten­tially worri­some, espe­cially with simi­lar dis­ci­pli­nary actions brought upon well-liked and wise doc­tors like Peat­field and Skin­ner of the UK, Derry of Canada, and  Sprin­ger in the US – all who dared to make obvious symp­toms more impor­tant than ink spots on a piece of paper.

Take Kymm, a 45 year old woman.  She has mani­fes­ted hypothy­roid symp­toms for 15 years since the birth of her daugh­ter.  Yet during those entire 15 years, her TSH lab result has been com­ple­tely “normal”…i.e. hypothy­roi­dism has never been “indi­ca­ted” based on the typi­cal and wides­pread gold stan­dard of diag­no­sis: the TSH.  But she has never, ever been nor­mal with 15 years of easy weight gain, chro­nic depres­sion, thin­ning hair, rising cho­les­te­rol, and other clear hypothy­roid symp­toms. And she has in fact star­ted on Armour…and is soaring.

Kymm is not an oddity.  Thy­roid patients on inter­net groups report going years with a nor­mal TSH, no diag­no­sis, yet clear symp­toms which are igno­red by their TSH-obsessed doc­tors.   So their doc­tors may have avoi­ded dis­ci­pli­nary action, but did they truly prac­tise the art and science of healing??

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.

Because so many of you asked.…you can now order a THYROID ADVOCACY T-SHIRT. And let me tell you – it works!! I did a test run. Wore it to seve­ral pla­ces over seve­ral days to see what reac­tion I would get. And reac­tions I got. Sure, it was a per­son here or a per­son there. But you are plan­ting seeds in each per­son who asks. And they will carry those seeds into their own bet­ter health…and tell others.

And if you think that because you are on a large thy­roid forum or group, it means the word is get­ting out – it is! But we’ve only scratched the sur­face. There are still millions out there who don’t know why they gain weight so easily, feel tired, have rising cho­les­te­rol, hair is thin­ning, or have depres­sion. They need to hear about this.

We have to change the current LOUSY thy­roid treat­ment pro­to­col from the bot­tom up by sprea­ding the word. It’s WE who will go to our doc­tors offi­ces and demand change! It’s WE who will stop put­ting money into the poc­kets of those doc­tors who won’t lis­ten to what patients have lear­ned and go to those who WILL.

Enjoy the shirt! And feel proud for the part YOU can play gar­ne­ring atten­tion and sprea­ding the word! p.s. Right now, orders are from the US only. As soon as Bid­pay upda­tes their chec­kout, I’ll add Inter­na­tio­nal. STTM is not just MY web­site: it is YOURS.

ALSO REMEMBER: if you use Bid­pay, you’ll need to use the CONTACT ME form at the bot­tom of the page to let me know which size. The Bid­pay func­tion has no place to desig­nate size.