Being a Vegetarian and the use of Armour
When someone chooses to be a Vegetarian, it means to forgo the dietary consumption of meat, fish, and poultry. The term Vegan refer to vegetarians who not only abstain from the meat of animals, but also any animal products, such as milk, cheese, eggs and related dairy products. Vegetarians and Vegans might also choose to avoid the use wool, silk, & leather in their clothes, shoes, or other products, as well as honey & down feathers.
Why does someone choose to be a vegetarian? A variety of reasons can propel one to choose to be either a vegetarian or a vegan: health, religious concerns, compassion for animals or anti-cruelty, a belief in non-violence, or even the dislike of meat. A smaller group might choose the Vegetarian route for economic reasons.
What about Armour being made from pig thyroid? Since desiccated thyroid products like Armour are made from the thyroid of pigs, the choice to use Armour may be difficult. An alternative is the use of synthetic T4 (Synthroid, Levoxyl, Levothyroxine, etc) along with synthetic T3 (Cytomel). Another product combines the two synthetics, called Thyrolar. It’s definitely a step up from the use of T4 alone. But patients who have tried both report they simply didn’t get the excellent results they got when they tried Armour, which contains exactly what your own thyroid would be producing: T4, T3, T2, T1 and calcitonin.
So how might I, as a vegetarian, look at this? Another alternative is to consider the stance taken by Serene Shick. Serene is a vegan and Messianic. She found herself with many symptoms of hypothyroid, and did a great deal of research. She concluded that Armour was her treatment of choice, in spite of her vegan choice:
All the evidence points to this being the superior medication for this illness, although most docs want to give the synthetics. Armour is all natural, which appeals to me in spite of the fact that it is derived from pigs. As you know, being vegan and Messianic, this doesn’t sit well, but I have come to believe that what makes my body/brain/temple perform optimally takes precedence over the desire to exclude all animal products from my diet as well as the mitzvah against pork. It is a very tiny amount and I am already feeling incredibly better: my thinking is clearer, I feel more in control of my emotions, and I am actually having frequent moments of real joy! So I am certain that YHVH has led me to this discovery. The above is quoted from here: www.supernaturalself.com/Hypothyroid.htm
BOTTOM LINE: there can be good reason to use dessicated thyroid, in spite of being a Vegetarian!
STORIES OF OTHER VEGETARIANS: Read A.M.’s story here, where even though being an ovo-lacto vegetarian since a child, she decided that Armour was her best choice, and especially for pregnancy.
And here’s L of UK’s story of having been a vegetarian for many years, and not taking the use of desiccated thyroid lightly.
To read about Jewish restrictions concerning the use of pork, and the use of desiccated thyroid, go here.
If you think this website is informative, wait til you see the book version, called STOP THE THYROID MADNESS: A Patient Revolution Against Decades of Inferior Thyroid Treatment.
It contains most everything you will find on this site, plus a whole lot more, including a chapter on T3, historical information on desiccated thyroid as well as T4, an entire chapter on the TSH (Thyroid Stimulating Hooey), how to interpret your cortisol labs, and more!
You can order the book from the publishing website here:
www.laughinggrapepublishing.com
