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Thyroid issues?


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Hey all! I've been dealing with thyroid issues the last few years. First grave's disease (waaaay high), then radiation to get rid of the thyroid and now hypothyroidism (and a lovely 45lbs because of it). Being energetic and losing weight is seemingly impossible because of my thyroid even though it has been "balanced" for months at a time (add to all this a car accident that makes exercise hard and you can imagine my frustration). How have people with thyroid issues found this diet? Has it helped keep your levels balanced? Has it helped with weight loss and energy?

Thank you!!!

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Have you checked out Stop the Thyroid Madness?

I was only able to get my thyroid issues under control after finding that site and finding a doctor who was willing to work with me beyond TSH. There's a good chance that your thyroid is not "balanced" as you call it--or optimum for you.

The Paleo diet and Whole30 do seem to help support my thyroid and adrenals; I've cut back a bit on desiccated thyroid and been able to hang on to high energy levels. I can also lose weight pretty effortlessly with the Whole30.

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I have no thyroid (cancerous tumors, thyroid and lymph nodes all removed), so I have been taking synthetic for 9 years. I agree that getting your doctor to work beyond TSH is the key! You are probably not balanced. I am able to easily lose weight doing a Whole 30 and eating strict Paleo. Over a year ago, I lost 22 pounds and have kept it off. Energy levels are better than they have been and I Crossfit 5-6 times a week! Keep after your docs! Only you know when you are feeling right!

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The problem is with the ranges for what is right. There is a lot of trouble with the question of what range should be considered "right." Many people are still symptomatic although they are inside the range.

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You know, this short thread gives me some hope. I tried the Whole 30 twice, and was paleo for about 4 months with 3 months of Crossfit with no weight loss. Just some weight gain hopefully from muscle mass, but that was it. I became exhausted, constipated, my tongue swelled, I was retaining a ton of water, etc. I finally was diagosed hypothyroid a few weeks ago and I'm waiting for a prescription, and I was wondering what the heck I was going to do to lose all this flab. Maybe once my liver functioning is better I can try the Whole 30 again, though I am a little worried about the symptoms I was having. But if you are hypothyroid, have adrenal issues, and have energy doing paleo, maybe there's some hope for me.

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There is definitely hope for you! Be as active and involved in your care as possible; ultimately you are the person effected by your treatment. Learn as much as you can about hypothyroidism; check out Stop the Thyroid Madness and other thyroid patient advocate groups out there.

For me getting to a functional place was a multi-year process with many frustrating points... keep on going.

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  • 1 month later...

I had to post here because I have Hashimoto's Thyroiditis and was diagnosed last December. After my first babies' birthday, I noticed that I was just NOT losing ANY weight, super dippy/brain fog, moody, weird periods. I was counting cals and hitting the gym regularly, still nothing. I even started to GAIN weight. I went from 160lbs to 220lbs post-baby. Still the same weight I was when I gave birth. And I'm only 5'5"!

I started reading on stopthethyroidmadness.com and that's really helped BUT my doc was worried to prescribe anything other than levothyroxine. I'm on a very low dose-- it's been about a month now and not much difference with weight BUT I feel better, in general. I almost think it's not the levothyroxine, it's the primal/paleo diet. However, I'm staying on the meds until something changes. What else can I do?

I know Whole30 isn't about weight, it's a happy side-effect. I am good with that. I just want to see SOMETHING change with my body. I cannot stand being this overweight. I blame the thyroid...

Just started my whole30 on Monday and doing GREAT. Luckily, I've slowly been getting off grains, for a few weeks. Now I'm tackling sugar and dairy and BOY is it hard but I know it will be worth it in 30 days.

Tracey-- lets do this together...would you be willing to post here when you finish your Whole30? That'll keep me accountable and give me the support I need as well... it's a win-win!

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  • 3 weeks later...

I'm going to post my experiences:

Have had hypo symptoms since I can remember as a kid. In college, doctors started testing my TSH - was always perfect - in the 1-2 range. I always had symptoms, always got tested, and was always told it was fine. Oh, and my cholesterol started creeping higher and higher every year.

Fast forward to 2008/2009 - found out I had endometriosis and put my nose in as many books as I could find. Was convinced I was estrogen dominant so I found an awesome independent doc (MD with one food in alternative med) that eventually found all my hormones low across the board - cortisol, progesterone, testosterone, estrogen, etc. and we started supplementing with various things to see if we could get my levels to rise at all, normalize my cycles, and reduce the pain from endometriosis. Even ruled out a pituitary tumor as everything was just low across the board. Hit a sweet spot with bio-identical progesterone in terms of pain relief, but I still felt awful. Sluggish, tired, gained weight at the drop of a hat, just miserable. So, we finally realized we hadn't done a full thyroid panel and - of course - free T3 and free T4 were low as well, despite having a perfect TSH.

I tried synthroid - big fail. It brought my body to a halt even on the smallest dose. I was on it for a month and realized it was a chore to even bring my hand to my mouth to eat... It was really bad. I was in a huge fog and in slow motion. Then, we tried dessicated thyroid hormone. It didn't have an effect as extreme as synthroid so I tried it longer, but in the end, had the same result. I gained more weight than ever. Got my reverse T3 levels testing and had a super high ration of T3/RT3. I stopped the dessicated. I really, really, really wanted that to work, particularly after all I had read on STTM. It seems my body doesn't like to convert T4 into T3.

So... finally started on Cytomel. It's straight up T3 and bypasses the conversion from T4 to T3. I got my life back, to an extent. My cholesterol dropped by 50 points, though it's still high. I was able to drop about 10 pounds effortlessly, though that's tapered and I still have ways to go. Still felt a lot of adrenal issues and have started on the circadian T3 method - essentially waking up in the wee hours of the night to take my first dose of cytomel for the day so it'll kick in while my body is creating cortisol. I'm seeing changes but haven't hit the sweet spot.

Throughout all of this, I've been eating pretty clean (no gluten, dairy, caffeine, eggs, citrus, minimal sugar, minimal processed foods, etc.) but just started a Whole30 to see if I can get my body to work even better so I can take only the minimal amount of thyroid hormone needed in order to feel good.

My advice for those of you that are only given synthroid as an option - try it if you must, and if you're still not feeling well, track your symptoms so you can put them in front of your doctor as proof as to how you're doing, despite 'normal' labs. www.reliefinsite.com is a fab pain tracker but will also let you track multiple other symptoms, and lets you print out reports and even share access with your doc! It's hard to dismiss symptoms when you put a graph in front of them that shows your energy levels increasing/decreasing on a certain med... I'm lucky that my doctor is awesome and tells me to stop a drug as soon as I don't feel well on it (which is really common for me) and lets me try whatever I want, but I had to go through a few awful ones before I got to her. Be persistent or find a new doctor. It's your body - listen to it!

(Sorry for writing a book - I'm really passionate about undiagnosed or poorly treated thyroid issues - with good reason!)

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I will definitely have to read up on this. So much technical term for me lol.

I'm like you Tracey. I was hyper, did radioactive treatment and went hypo. Never have been balanced cause I lose, gain, lose, gain so my medication dosage is always up and down.

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Be persistent or find a new doctor. It's your body - listen to it!

I just wanted to underscore this... it is so important! It wasn't until I saw a fairly alternative doc (who didn't take health insurance) and who I personally clicked well with that I was able to begin progress towards healing. If one doc isn't working for you, change.

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