Hypothyroidism, anyone?

[hyphenate]

Just another "abnormal" test result, and my doctor wants to run more tests for this. Having read the symptoms, damned does it sound familiar! I've been blaming the endless fatigue, cold intolerance, leg pain and intolerance to cold on the diabetic neuropathy or fibro, but hell, if it's something treatable, I'm going to be VERY happy!

People might say, "you'll be taking pills for it all your life!" and my answer to that is, I take enough pills already, and since I have thought it was related to the other illnesses, I thought I was just going to have to live with all that shit without every getting rid of the fatigue, pain and discomfort. If some of it can be alleviated, wow. Just wow. Some doctors (in the old day, anyhow) used to say it was all in my head. Well, it's nice to be vindicated--again.

[mopinko]

1. i am wondering

i will finally get in to see my pcp (that one i have to wait for. rheumie, neurosurgeon, no. :shrug:) in a couple of weeks.
my thyroid was seen on a ct scan, then they did an ultrasound. it is lumpy, asymmetrical, and oversized.
i am with you. if a pill a day will help me get a little more life out of my life, hoooorah.

[kdmorris]

8. If it's your thyroid and you get on the proper medication

it changes your life. All the joint pain, and dim-witted thinking and fatigue went away when I finally got put on Armour. I actually take more than 1 pill a day (I'm on 5 grains of Armour, which is currently being dispensed in 1 grain tablets, due to a shortage in the 2 grain tablets I used to take). But... I take 2 in the morning, 2 in the afternoon and 1 at night. And... man, I just didn't know how bad I felt until I felt better!! :bounce:

Taking thyroid hormones is NOT the same thing as taking a bunch of drugs, anyway. It's like taking insulin when you are a Type 1 Diabetic. You need the hormones to live and without them, your life will suck. Eventually, if it gets bad enough and you are deprived of thyroid hormones long enough, you can go into a coma.

[MorningGlow]

2. Congrats on getting diagnosed

It took me YEARS to get someone to take me seriously (a young-ish female who's gained weight? that means she's a...LIAR looking for a diet pill!) and BOY did it feel good when my holistic MD said I was hypo. (My TSH was "normal" but I had all the symptoms.) I actually cried in her office with relief; I had been through such hell and had been dismissed and ridiculed and all the rest.

Good for you, hyphenate! Trust me--when your symptoms start to ease up (fairly quickly, considering), you are going to be overjoyed! It's like getting a second chance at life.

I got the same thing about "taking pills for the rest of your life" and I say SO WHAT too. I was seeing an ayurvedic doctor who was very nice and made every attempt to help me, but he couldn't. I don't blame him in the least--ayurvedic medicine is hobbled in the U.S. because Murkins only want pills (we won't smear poultices on ourselves), and sometimes taking herbs in capsules isn't the best way. Anyway, he was the one who said I'd have to take pills the rest of my life.

Interestingly enough, my former best friend also exhibits all the signs of being hypo, and I begged her repeatedly to get checked, gave her my holistic MD's number, etc. But she's stubborn--if she feels that someone is trying to "tell her what to do", she'll do the opposite, even if what the person is recommending will help her. So she never went to my doctor. She's been seeing the same ayurvedic doctor as I did for many years, and guess what? She's still just as bad as she was ages ago--his treatments are not helping her hypo symptoms.

I feel bad that she's still suffering, but I did all I could and she just ended up resenting me for it. And now (because of this and other things) we are no longer friends. Too bad. I just wanted to see her get well.

Oh dear sorry to ramble about my own life. Never mind that--just get better quickly! (And if they give you Synthroid and you find that it's not helping, tell the doctor to change your meds!)

[kdmorris]

3. But these pills are hormone pills

It's like taking insulin. If your body isn't producing enough thyroid hormone, you need to get it somewhere else.

As the above poster said, congratulations on getting diagnosed. It took me YEARS, too, and I became increasingly sicker. My TSH was above the normal range, but all the idiot doctors said I wouldn't have symptoms at that level. They were more than willing to prescribe me cholesterol medication and anti-depressants, but no thyroid meds.

Eventually, I got put on Synthroid, which didn't really help me much at all, but made my TSH go back into the normal range. When I tried to tell my doctors that this wasn't working for me, they were very condescending about it.

Eventually, I found a holistic doctor who put me on Armour. I feel like a whole new person. He doses me based on my symptoms, with the blood tests Free T3 and Free T4 thrown in. He disregards my TSH completely. It's been suppressed at <.01 for years now. My doctor believes that this may be due to a pituitary insufficiency, or the fact that I take my medication spread out over the day (some in the morning, some in the afternoon, some more at bedtime so that I can get up in the morning). Since TSH is just your body's opinion on whether you need more thyroid hormone, it never thinks that and never makes it.

Hope that makes sense. I still need some coffee this morning :D

[MorningGlow]

4. OMG, KD, we're twins

We had the EXACT same experience! If you hadn't said your holistic MD was a male, I'd think we were sharing the same life in parallel dimensions.

1) Years with no help
2) Continually getting worse, physically
3) Normal TSH, so it was "impossible" to have thyroid symptoms
4) Anti-depressants (I had a doctor chase me around her office with a prescription for anti-depressants because I felt so bad and wasn't getting any relief, so I broke down in tears--the biggest no-no you can possibly commit when trying to be taken seriously for thyroid problems)
5) Holistic doctor
6) Armour throid meds

My TSH is happiest at 1.0; I felt crappy just above 2, and when it hit 2.5, I felt like I was going to die at any moment.

[kdmorris]

5. Indeed!

I was reading through your post before and thinking...wow... that could be me!!

I broke down crying with my 7th doctor (in a line of about 10) and he was such a shithead to me. Told me that my self-esteem was bad and that I was depressed and that depressed people ate too much, which was why I had gained 70 lbs in a year. Oh, and my cholesterol tests were indicative of my stuffing my face.

He said that to me AFTER I started crying... I was aghast!! All I could do is stare at him, sniffle a few times and then I said "Do you think it's proper to talk to an obviously distraught person as if they were stupid and lying to you?"

I didn't even take the prescription for Zoloft (I think that was the one he wanted me to have) or Lipitor from him. I just told the receptionist that I needed a copy of my blood work when I left.

I had the one good endocrinologist in South Florida, but he retired. My holistic doctor went to "regular" med school, and then went back and got his DO. I like that he doesn't treat me like an idiot and the fact that he talks to me like a human being. I told him once that I had anxiety (first time I've ever told a doctor that) and refused to take Xanax. He told me to drink a lot of green tea and (this sounds so cliche) think less negatively. It's working...to a point. I don't think I'll ever be completely over it, but as he says, it's only bad if it's debilitating. Some anxiety is good, or we would die out as a human race.

[MorningGlow]

6. You know what's sad about it?

That apparently this happens to women ALL THE TIME. That should NOT be. It's totally sexist and discriminatory--making assumptions about overweight women.

I went through a slew of doctors myself--seven, I think, between the GPs and the OB/GYNs and the endos. And a nutritionist in there somewhere, who told me to be sure to eat LOTS of soy--so I went for months doing the exact opposite of what I should have been doing, which only made matters worse. :eyes:

OMG the self esteem stuff! :banghead: That is SO wrong. The doctor who offended me the most (even worse than the one chasing me with an antidepressant scrip) was the idiot who said, "Well, you were fat as a child, so you should expect to be fat as an adult."
:wtf:

Yeah, I was fat as a child because my thyroid was acting up THEN and nobody did anything about it! UGH!

FWIW, I didn't accept the antidepressant scrip the other doctor tried to push on me. She kept insisting, "I know you like alternative medicines, and this one is natural and very mild!" Like that was going to convince me.

Did you ever get the urge to contact all your ex-doctors and just go :P at them?

Funny story: Mere months after I started taking Armour for my thyroid and Glucophage for my PCOS and high blood sugar, I lost about 15 lbs. and my fertility returned and I got pregnant. When I was five or six months pregnant, Mr. MG got a kidney stone, and although he hated our "expect to be fat" doctor, that's who was listed as his GP, so he had to go see him for it. He was so bad I had to drive him and I sat with him in the exam room, and the doctor never even acknowledged he knew me.

After we left, Mr. MG said, "Yeah, he was probably pretty smug, thinking you were still fat!" I had the distinct urge to turn around, go back into the office, and tell him the truth. Didn't though.

[kdmorris]

7. Your husband sounds like a winner!

That is so funny! I could see my husband and I saying the same thing.

I have had the urge to contact them and say "Told you so!!". But, truthfully, I don't think it would really sink in for them. And, of course, if they saw my TSH, they would tell me how I'm going to have a hard attack and my bones will all be brittle (I actually STOPPED having heart palpitations when I got on Armour. Go figure!!)

I never would have known how badly women are treated when it comes to this issue if it hadn't been for the internet. I started out on the about.com thyroid board and finally found out that I was not, in fact, crazy. I was starting to think that I must be, because all the doctors said there was nothing wrong with me and if I would just listen to them, I'd be all better.

I had 7 doctors who wouldn't treat me at all, then 3 more who wouldn't even think about letting me try Armour. I did lose a little weight when I was on Synthroid, but I was still so fatigued and "out of whack". I took naps for 3 hours a day and slept for 10 hours a night. And I was still tired and my cholesterol was still high and everything still hurt. The only thing that Synthroid did was allow me to lose a bit of weight.

The one thing that makes me so angry is that I think I could have avoided getting Diabetes (well, more than likely postponed it) if they had treated me then. Back in 1999, I had a fasting sugar test that was 128. And the doctor I had then never said anything to me. It wasn't until I got all of my blood tests that I found out that it had been high, even then. Oh, well, having Diabetes has forced me to eat well and exercise, so I guess it's OK.

What an ass... well, you have to expect to be fat as an adult since you were fat as a child... that reminds me of another doctor, who was overweight himself. He was lecturing me on the need to eat better and I tired to give him my food diary, showing all the foods I ate for the previous 2 weeks. He said "I don't need to see that. All women lie about what they eat". I couldn't even burst into tears, I was so angry. I bawled my eyes out when I got to the car, out of frustration, but all I could think of to say to him was "That's pretty far-fetched". Afterwards, I thought of all kinds of great things I SHOULD have said, but, as you know, hypothyroidism slows your brain down, too.

I'm so glad you are being treated better now. I cannot believe that doctors are allowed to continue doing this, that they never even listen to their patients (not all of them, obviously. I've found one that does listen to me)

[MorningGlow]

9. Me too! Me too!

About.com's and Delphi's thyroid boards saved my life. I had gotten a boost from my two friends who had hormone problems themselves--one had a thyroid problem and one had a pituitary problem, and when I told them what was happening to me, THEY knew what it was and urged me to get help. Then, once it dawned on me that it was going to be an uphill battle to get diagnosed by a medical professional, those discussion forums gave me strength to keep going.

Don't you just love overweight doctors lecturing patients about carrying extra pounds? OMG and the food diary--UNBELIEVABLE! I know what you mean about being in shock while meeting with the doctor and not having a good retort. Isn't that frustrating?

My asshat "expect to be fat" doctor treated me the same way! He told me to keep a food diary for two weeks; to prove my point, I kept it going for a month. On one day--ONE day--out of 30, I had a Wendy's five-piece chicken nugget meal for lunch. No wait, scratch that--just the five nuggets, nothing else. That was my whole lunch that day, with an unsweetened iced tea. (I learned later that I was making my situation worse by starving myself--my body pretty much shut down and hoarded every calorie because of it.) Anyway, he looked at my food diary, pointed to that ONE lunch, and said, "Ah hah! See? That's your problem!" I said, "Five chicken nuggets out of ONE MONTH?" "Yep!"

It was then that I realized I was dealing with a complete nincompoop. When he said I should "expect to be fat" a few minutes later, that sealed it. The very next day (after learning on the thyroid boards that your medical file belongs to you and you can request to see it or take it with you anytime you wish), I went back, took my file, and left for good.

[hyphenate]

10. I did okay when I was with my old doctors

(now about 12 years ago) because we would talk and discuss things, and make decisions together. Then I lost that insurance, and had nothing for the last three years I lived in L.A.

Back here in Massachusetts, I was able to get MassHealth, which has been a godsend. However, the doctors aren't exactly a godsend. The hospital I go to is a teaching hospital, so I've been mainly getting residents. My first resident wasn't too bad, but the schmuck that replaced her was an oaf. I was just getting more and more and more tired, and non-functioning, and all the ass could blame it on was the diabetes. My legs were getting weaker, I could no longer walk without falling, and one day I just went into his office and was crying because I was so tired I didn't even want to go on any further.

Right around that time, I had started seeing the psychotherapist, who was asking a lot of unnecessary questions which made me stop trusting him, and I clammed right up. So two idiotic males. I told the psychotherapist I was going to dump the resident, which I did--among my last words to him were "To me, diabetes is like the new 'fat.' You guys just want to blame everything wrong on it." I then called to secure a new primary care doc, and ended up with the one I've had for the past year, and I liked her, but too demanding of me. I just don't like doctors telling me what to do without my input. She has just left for a practice out west, but she is the one who ordered the TSH test. I dumped the therapist as well. At our last session he told me that I told him more in the last session than I had in more than a year of seeing him. Perhaps it was his attitude--I didn't feel I could completely trust him, and I sometimes felt he was too bossy. With another therapist I'd had in 2004 and 2005, I'd perked right up--we talked politics all the time--correct that: he listened to me talking about it all the time, and it was important to me so he just listened most of the time. Getting it off my chest was part of the catharsis I needed to move on. I've been in a clinical depression for years now, and I've blamed my mental state on that or the fibromyalgia. Interestingly enough, several of my prescriptions are multi-tasking--they work toward both the depression and the fibro, or the diabetic neuropathy, so they essentially hold me together. The fatigue though, for awhile now has been crippling, and I wasn't sure why. At least now I have a better idea of the whole shebang.

I don't know how "high" my test was comparatively, but the range mentioned on the results says .28-3.89 is the normal range, and mine was 5.08. I went in for the T3 and T4 tests, and I'll know later this week, I hope.

Some doctors think that because they have had so many years of education and stuff that they can demand things from a patient without the patient asking questions, blindly following directions. Never been like that for me--I worked in the medical field many many years ago with the intention of becoming a nurse until I realized I didn't have the temperament for it, and I've been a researcher on just about everything medical since then. I make a terrible patient, which comes from knowing what assholes some of the doctors and nurses I've worked with, and been treated by, have been.

Now with this potential diagnosis, it might mean a new lease on life for me, instead of just dragging me down further. For those doctors and nurses who have always blamed my many symptoms on my diabetes or something, I can finally breathe a little more normally and tell them that diabetes isn't the only freaking disease in the world, and I'm proof of how someone who listens is more likely to understand that.