Symptom free Hypothyroidism

I am a 26 year old stay at home mom of 2 step daughters and 1 biological daughter.  I was diagnosed with Hashmotos Hypothroidsim 6 months after my daughter was born in February 2013.  In May 2015 I finally started losing weight and I am hypothyroid symptom free.  I will be sharing some of the things that I have been doing and what I have done to become symptom free.  I have had an incredible journey to health and I would love to help anyone out there whose test results are coming back normal, but they still feel and are very sick.  I come offering you hope!!!!!!  You can do this!!!!!

[jacquelinegrone-blog]

Just got done working out with this little lady. She cracks me up! We did P90X "X Stretch" through beachbody on demand. Stella loves stretching with me. It is her favorite thing to do. I think I may have a yogi in the making. #stretch #stretching #workout #yogi #weightloss #consistency #dedication #hashimotos #hypothyroid #hypothyroidism #stella

[jacquelinegrone-blog]

Work out flow.

[jacquelinegrone-blog]

Hashimoto's Thyroiditis (Hypothyroidism)

I have Hashimoto's thyroiditis and I am currently symptom free.  We can all get symptom free.  You do not have to continue to suffer as you are.  I will share some of what I have done to get symptom free.  Am I still hypothyroid? Yes.  Do I still take my thyroid meds everyday? Yes, but hopefully soon I will not have Hashimoto's anymore.  We can heal our bodies from the inside out.  You can lose weight when you are hypothyroid even though it seems impossible.  You can do it.  So far I have lost 29lbs.  I started losing the weight in May 2015, but it took me almost 2 years before I was able to lose weight.  If you are interested, below is my story.

Back in February 2013, I gave birth to a beautiful little girl.  My pregnancy was not the greatest.  I only threw up twice, but I was nauseous all of the time.  I still ended up gaining 50lbs with my pregnancy.  I was tired all of the time and I had severe anxiety during my pregnancy.  I had never experienced panic attacks or anything like that prior to pregnancy.  I would have panic attacks at least once a week.  I thought that it was just all part of pregnancy.  Fast forward to after my daughter was born.  Right after she was born, I had tons of energy, the baby weight was coming off fast, I was happy again, and my anxiety was nearly gone.  I felt fantastic.  The euphoria of it all began to slowly disappear though as the anxiety, panic attacks, and depression set in.  Six months after my daughter was born I ended up going to the doctor.  I was severely depressed, having panic attacks everyday, gained 15lbs in 2 weeks, had acne covering my face, back, and chest, my hair was falling out in clumps, I was bloated and puffy, sleeping 10hrs at night, taking a nap during the day, and still had absolutely NO energy.  I was constantly cold to the point that I would be in long sleeves and socks on an 80 degree day, severely constipated (bowel movements maybe once a week), and so many other symptoms.  I originally went to my doctor because my wonderful husband started having heart palpitations around me because my moods were so bad.  I began effecting his mood and the rest of my families mood as well.  I needed help and fast.  I thought that I was experiencing post partum depression.  My doctor took one look at me when I walked into his office and ordered blood work.  He told me that generally post partum depression begins a few weeks to a month after birth.  He said that it can still begin happening six months out, but he wanted to test my thyroid just to make sure that everything was functioning properly.  He then prescribed me an antidepressant so that I could begin to gain control of my depression and anxiety.  I few days later I got the call that my thyroid tests were abnormal and that he wanted to have some more blood drawn just to be sure.  So I went back in for more blood work.  My tsh test came back at 12.56.  That is super low!  Normal tests should be between 0.02-3.0.  The higher the number, the lower the thyroid function.  TSH is the hormone that stimulates your thyroid to produce T3 and T4.  When your thyroid is not producing enough hormone then your TSH levels will rise.  My doctor started me on Levothroxine.  I started taking the pill once and day, in the morning before food and an hour before drinking any kind of caffeine.  Levothroxine is a synthetic T4 medication.  They continued to up my medication over the course of the year that I was diagnosed until my levels came back in the normal range at a 4.41.  My doctor used the old scale which is 0.03 to 5.0.  So according to that scale I should have been feeling better, but I totally wasn't.  I still had all of my symptoms.  I told my doctor that and so he raised my meds a little more.  I began really researching what I should do about my symptoms.  Through research I found that most hypothyroid patients feel much better on a naturally dissected thyroid pill such as Armour Thyroid.  This created through dissected pig thyroid so therefore it contains T1, T2, T3, and T4 hormone.  I asked my doctor if I could switch to this and he said yes and switched me right a way.  I began taking 60mg when I switched over.  Some of my symptoms got better and some stayed the same.  I went back to my doctor with this complaint and asked to see an endocrinologist.  I went to see the endocrinologist and had an awful experience.  I waited to be seen for 2 hours.  When I saw the doctor he rubbed on my throat and told me that he felt a goiter so I then had an ultrasound on my throat to check my thyroid.  The ultrasound showed nothing! Thank you Jesus! But I still had to pay a $150 ultrasound fee and a $50 copay to the endocrinologist.  He did up my meds from 60mg to 90mg though.  Now, when raising thyroid meds, you are supposed to go SLOW!!!!  You should start out cutting your meds in halves and quarters to equal a smaller amount.  I should have started by taking 70mg then 80mg and then the full 90mg.  The pills come in a 30mg jump though.  They do not make them in 15mg leaps unfortunately and I did not know to go slow, so when I started taking the much higher dose of meds my heart would start racing, I would get super hot, my blood pressure would shoot up and so on.  Thankfully those symptoms only lasted a week to a week and a half though.  After things normalized with my medication jump, I was still experiencing symptoms.  I went back to my regular PCP and asked him again if he could do anything with my medication.  He said that he would up me one more time and see where I fall.  This puts me at 120mg of armour thyroid daily.  I just had my thyroid function checked and my TSH is at 0.01.  I am symptom free.  My doctor told me that I am almost Hyperthyroid, but if I was feeling well and not having any hyper or hypo symptoms then I am perfectly fine to stay where I am right now.  He told me this back in May of 2015.  When he showed me my labs and we talked about how much better I was feeling, I had a renewed sense of HOPE! 

One symptom that really bothered me was how much weight that I had gained on this journey.  Before I got pregnant with my daughter I sat at 145lbs.  I am 5'5 and have quite a bit of muscle on me, so at 145lbs I wore a size medium shirt and size 5 or 7 jeans.  I am slightly on the thick side because I am super curvy, but I was not fat.  I gained 50lbs during my pregnancy putting me at close to 200lbs and after my daughter was born I was losing weight fairly quick.  I got down to 158lbs in 8 weeks after my daughter was born and I was starting to feel great.  Then I hit a plateau and I was not losing any more weight.  I felt that this was somewhat normal due to the fact that my body had changed.  I was not far from pre-pregnancy weight though, so I was not that worried about it.  A few months later I began gaining weight.  I gained 15lbs in 2 weeks without changing anything that I was doing and I was devastated.  I was working out daily.  Running on the treadmill, weight lifting, and so on and I was gaining FAT.  I hated begin told that muscle weighs more than fat.  Yes this is true, but it also takes up a lot less space!  So if I was gaining muscle then my body would look smaller and I would be wearing smaller clothes right?????  Well, this was not the case.  My body was getting softer and my clothes were getting MUCH tighter.  Also, gaining 15lbs of muscle is SUPER hard to do in 2 weeks!  I would have to be on a super high does of illegal steroids in order to do that and I would have to live at the gym lifting super heavy weights.  Actually, I probably wouldn't be able to gain that much muscle even then!!!  I got up to about 175lbs at one point.  When I switched to armour thyroid I did lose a little bit of weight.  I would get down to like 163lbs and then my weight would go right back up and then it would come down again.  I was never able to get under 163lbs.  When my doctor told me that my thyroid levels were almost Hyperthyroid, I got excited.  I decided to start making some changes.  I started an at home program called Insanity.  It is a beachbody program created by Shaun T who I absolutely love. You do HIIT training 6 days a week and the work outs are TOUGH but so amazing.  2 weeks into the program I still wasn't losing weight, so I decided to start changing the way I ate, not necessarily what I ate.  I began Intermittent Fasting.  Look it up!!! It is amazing.  No, I am not starving myself!  Intermittent Fasting is not a nutrition plan, but it is a meal timing plan.  I started out fasting 16 hours every day and my eating window was 8hrs long from 12pm to 8pm.  This is called a 16/8 fast.  16 hours fasted and 8 hours fed.  I know that all of our lives we are told that if you eat late at night or just before bed you will gain weight, but I lost 6lbs the first week of doing this.  I now Intermittent Fast (also known as IF for those not savvy to IF jargon) 20/4.  This is 20 hours of fasting everyday and then 4 hours of feeding everyday.  My eating window is from 4pm to 8pm daily.  I am still losing weight.  Of course it has slowed down.  The less fat that your body has to lose, the slower it will come off.  I only have about 15 more pounds to lose, so my weight loss has slowed to 1-2lbs a week.  In 90 days, I have lost 29lbs!!!!!!!  My waist has gone from 29in to 26in.  That is smaller than it was in High School.  My waist was 27in then.  My hips have gone from 41.5in to 38in. I work out in a fasted state.  Generally I work out at 12pm and break my fast at 4pm.  I have so much energy now to take on every day.  I sleep better and feel sooooo much better. 

You can do this too!!!!!  Do some research and try some different things.  Try going completely gluten free, try whole30 for 30 days, try IF for 2 weeks, try something!!!! Continue trying things until you find the diet and work out plan that works for you.  If you think that you have hypothyroidism but your doctor tells you that you don't and just wants to put a medical band aid on all of your symptoms go somewhere else.  FIRE your doctor!!! You do not have to be seen by that person.  They are there for you and they WORK FOR YOU.   If they are not listening to you then do something about it.  You are in control of you!  You have the power to feel better!!!  Do your research.  Have a full thyroid panel drawn  Get your TSH, T3, T4, free T3, free T4, reverse T3, TPO antibodies, and thyroglobulin antibodies checked.  This will give your doctor the whole picture on what is going on with your thyroid.  If you have any TPO antibodies or thyroglobulin antibodies present then you have an autoimmune disease and your body is attacking your thyroid.  Your doctor can tell you that your TSH is in the normal range, but if you have antibodies present and hypothyroid symptoms then you should begin thyroid medication.  Most with hypothyroidism feel best when their TSH levels are between 0.01 and 0.05.  If you are still having symptoms and your TSH levels are higher than this then ask to have your medication increased. GET A COPY OF YOUR THYROID TEST!!! This is your property.  Legally they have to give you a copy of any test the do on you.  It is yours!!!  Even if you do not understand all of the information on your test, do not be afraid to ask what it means and do not be afraid to Google it!  You can feel better!!!! You can do this!  You can lose weight and be symptom free.   You can get your energy back!!!!!  You can be the mom and wife that you have always wanted to be, or the husband and father you want to be for all of the men out there with hypothyroidism.  Please feel free to message me with any questions that you have regarding this.  I do research all of the time and I read a lot on health and wellness.  Also.... I will have to remember to talk about leaky gut in another post!  Look that up too while you are waiting for me to blog about it.  Thanks for your time and I hop that is post has given you the hope and strength that you need to fight another day.  You are not alone in this battle!!!  I pray for the strength and wisdom through Christ Jesus to cover you now. I pray that He will instill hope within you and that through Him and the knowledge that you have received through this post and your own research that He will heal you and make you whole. 

My people are destroyed from lack of knowledge. Hosea 4:6 NIV

[jacquelinegrone-blog]

My weight loss journey so far.  I started Intermittent Fasting and Working out with the at home beachbody Insanity work out program back in May 2015.  To date I have lost 29lbs.  I have about 15lbs more that I would like to lose.