no problem....thyroid is the thermostat of the body....if thr thermostat goes out in you house, everything goes cold, the pipes freeze, then the pipes burst, and you have an incredible mess to clean up.
This is just some of what your body goes through...
fatigue
weight gain
muscle weakness
always feeling cold
dry skin
constipation
hair loss..breakage
depression
reduced heart rate
The symptoms worsen in direct proportion to how T3 and T4 deficient your body is.
The body can not live without thyroid hormone.
You should consider being completely candid with your physician. And be prepared for a long, very long road back to health.
We are a society that wants everything at warp speed...thyroid is ploddingly slow.
If I make a change in thyroid medication today, my blood will not show the full results of that change for 6 weeks. It is preferred to gradually increase every 6 weeks because if you overshoot optimum, the symptoms of hyper are going to be just as troubling as those of hypo are. In my case, once T4 and TSH were where my endocrinologist wanted them, she increased T3 only. Think radio station, you have reception... and static. So you fine tune the reception with T3 and lose the static.
Pertaining only to those patients on Levothyroxine-Synthroid (T4), about half of these patients will feel great improvement if their T3 is about 75% of normal range, for me that level is about 3.7.
T4 (Thyroxine), named for it's 4 iodine atoms, maintains a relatively stable blood level and is therefore termed long acting.
T3 (Triiodothyronine), named for it's 3 iodine atoms, fluctuates and is therefore termed short acting.
Let us ingest T4 (Thyroxine, brand name Levothyroxine-Synthroid ) Our body takes in T4 and converts the T4 into T3 (Triiodothyronine) through chemical reaction. In other words, our body takes the 4 iodine atoms and converts the 4 iodine atoms into a new compound with only 3 iodine atoms.
So from a strick biological & chemical viewpoint, many say if I can use one chemical compound (T4) to make the other chemical compound (T3) in the body, I only need to administer the T4.
BUT many studies have shown that about half of the patients on T4 feel better taking both T4 and T3.
The argument of Armour's Thyroid versus Synthroid...
One grain of ARMOUR'S THYROID is 60 mg.
Each 60 mg of ARMOUR'S THYROID contains .038 mg (or 38 mcg) of T4
AND each 60 mg of ARMOUR'S THYROID contains 9 mcg of T3 , plus unmeasured amounts of T2, T1 and calcitonin.
SYNTHROID is all T4
which explains why the addition of CYTOMEL (which is all T3) makes fifty percent or so of SYNTHROID users feel so much better.
Remember T3 is a short half life which is why T4 is prescribed as the backbone of treatment...some of us do not effectively metabolize T4 into T3. For these individuals, supplemental T3 should be considered.
This is a lot for you to digest....
just remember, your pituitary gland secrets TSH (thyroid stimulating hormone) which is the message for the thyroid to respond....if the thyroid doe not respond, the pituitary gland releases more TSH, calling on the thyroid to respond...the thyroid remains inactive so the pituitary gland releases even more TSH, screaming at the thyroid...
I have no thyroid, lost it to cancer.
My TSH is 0.01 and your TSH is 64.18...see how my pituitary gland is giving a wee whisper while your pituary gland is hoarse from screaming.
And no, you do not want my TSH. I am hyperthyroidic because that is how my endocrinologist must maintain me to avoid a recurrence of the cancer.
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