T3 Help Please

[marsaday]

Ok so thyroid intake won’t affect your results as you did the correct things before bloods.

Well I took progesterone 3 yrs ago in April and it changed my life.

It made the thyroid meds work properly.

I felt better within an hour of taking it.

I had blood tests coincidentally before I started using it and again about 4 weeks later.

Testosterone increased 20% and tsh went from suppressed to 0.3. So it shows the progesterone aided thyroid uptake. Prob due to improved cortisol production OR balance with dhea.

Google the steroid hormone cascade diagram to see how progesterone breaks down into the other useful hormones.

Being mid 40’s is about the time progesterone will be very useful for you. Prostate cancer is on the horizon for us men this age (I am 46 also) and if testosterone is low this is a warning sign for prostate cancer. Any in the family?

So prog will help protect against this.

Ray has some articles on progesterone.

Low dose is the key. I have only used 2 drops per day max for 3 yrs. so 6mg max. I now use one drop per day and it is important to miss a day or two every few weeks as the body can get used to it. So letting it clear the system helps it’s effectiveness.

I would try the prog and maybe see what 125 t4 is like and then get tested again.

If your testosterone is still low and you feel off you need to then look at direct testosterone usage. I don’t know much about this area so you will need a doc to help.

It is important to establish whether your low test is down to thyroid or if simple progesterone use could help. Longer term these solutions are cheaper and simpler than test replacement.

But if they don’t help this area then you need to explore testosterone more fully.

 

[marsaday]

@marsaday This is a really nice post, thanks for typing it out.

I am thinking forward in the event my docs are of minimal help.

Do you know of the potential issues with titrating a dose of thyroid either too little or too slowly?

And in your understanding would your use of prog likely have been similar if you used pregnenolone considering its pathway? I ask because im considering preg to titrate slowly with thyroid.

There are no issues with using low dose thyroid hormones. I think all humans would benefit from supplementation as they age. The addition of 25 or 50mcg t4 would be very useful for most people but you would need bloods before and after to understand how the body is using the hormones. There is the t3/t4 is due to consider as well. Some do better on t3 but it is always best to see how t4 works first as it is a pro hormone and this gives more choice to the body what it wants to do with it. Eg store it or use it.

If you suppress the tsh you will switch off conversion to some extent. So it is best to run with a tsh 0.5-1. When we go above 2 this is where we start to see health issues (Mental and physical). This info comes from dr mercado observations. I think that is his name.

So the aim of using thyroid hormones in a generally healthy person (not someone who is clearly showing bad thyroid symptoms) is to compliment your own production. Keeping it topped up.

Reg prog v preg

I have used both and they sit at the top of the steroid cascade under cholesterol.

Preg helped but the effects didn’t sustain. I think the issues are with the dose amount. I tried big and small doses but maybe not really small doses like 2-5 mcg.

Anyway preg just didn’t help like prog does. I have no need to rock the boat now because prog works for me and I think it is one of the super hormones next to thyroid that most humans would benefit from using.

I read younger men shouldn’t use prog but I think it is more to do with dose amount. So a 30 yo male should easily benefit from say using 3mg every other day. That is a really low and safe amount and will compliment your own hormone production. Blood testing needs to be used to understand what is happening behind the scenes.

 

[Steve]

Ok so thyroid intake won’t affect your results as you did the correct things before bloods.

Well I took progesterone 3 yrs ago in April and it changed my life.

It made the thyroid meds work properly.

I felt better within an hour of taking it.

I had blood tests coincidentally before I started using it and again about 4 weeks later.

Testosterone increased 20% and tsh went from suppressed to 0.3. So it shows the progesterone aided thyroid uptake. Prob due to improved cortisol production OR balance with dhea.

Google the steroid hormone cascade diagram to see how progesterone breaks down into the other useful hormones.

Being mid 40’s is about the time progesterone will be very useful for you. Prostate cancer is on the horizon for us men this age (I am 46 also) and if testosterone is low this is a warning sign for prostate cancer. Any in the family?

So prog will help protect against this.

Ray has some articles on progesterone.

Low dose is the key. I have only used 2 drops per day max for 3 yrs. so 6mg max. I now use one drop per day and it is important to miss a day or two every few weeks as the body can get used to it. So letting it clear the system helps it’s effectiveness.

I would try the prog and maybe see what 125 t4 is like and then get tested again.

If your testosterone is still low and you feel off you need to then look at direct testosterone usage. I don’t know much about this area so you will need a doc to help.

It is important to establish whether your low test is down to thyroid or if simple progesterone use could help. Longer term these solutions are cheaper and simpler than test replacement.

But if they don’t help this area then you need to explore testosterone more fully.

I checked out the steroid pathways again on google image, and it looks like pregnenolone, dhea, or progesterone could be used to increase testosterone. But since progesterone is working for you I think I'll try it. My girlfriend has a bottle of Progest_E, so maybe I'll borrow some.

I get stressed out anytime I see "prostate cancer" mentioned. It's like the boogey man. My dad had it (had treatment a few years ago & is ok now as far as I know); I think my uncles had it too. It's always weighing on my mind. I dread the thought of hearing I have it & then having to make the decision to do some crazy treatment procedure or to just let it go. What do you mean testosterone is a warning sign? Do you mean low T means you may already have it, or do you mean it may make you more susceptible to it?

 

[marsaday]

Excellent, you can get feedback straight away. Use a small drop, don't blurt it out. A ball point pen nib size.

LOW testosterone seems to be a cause of prostate cancer, not high. Feeding the body with testosterone in excess may have a bad effect as well, but prior to developing an issue you need to be addressing the low testosterone. Excess T converts to oestrogen and this is why we develop the cancers (breast, prostate). So supplementation needs to be careful because the body may shunt the T to become oestrogen. This is why progesterone use is excellent for men and women as it combats this issue.

You have low testosterone and i bet it runs in your family, hence the cancer.

You have plenty of time to address this issue, but now is the time to start.

http://www.natural-progesterone-adv...sterone-increase-the-risk-of-prostate-cancer/

Whether the progesterone and thyroid can lower the oestrogen and up the testosterone on there own, i don't know. But this is what you must try first and get tested.

After that you need to look into lower dose testosterone replacement. As i said i am not up on this area, but for me i would want to compliment my own production and not swamp it.

 

[DaveFoster]

"An effective way to use supplements is to take a combination T4-T3 dose, e.g., 40 mcg of T4 and 10 mcg of T3 once a day, and to use a few mcg of T3 at other times in the day. Keeping a 14-day chart of pulse rate and temperature allows you to see whether the dose is producing the desired response. If the figures aren't increasing at all after a few days, the dose can be increased, until a gradual daily increment can be seen, moving toward the goal at the rate of about 1/14 per day" - Peat

That quote implies a ~1:2-1:3 T3:T4 ratio.

 

[Steve]

That quote implies a ~1:2-1:3 T3:T4 ratio.

I tried that, but it still didn't help. Took up to 3 grains of NDT & my temp/pulse never budged & I didn't feel any better.
Then I tried adding more T3 & still nothing. One day I experimented & took 8 T3 pills & nothing happened, zero, zilch.
Then I read Ken Blanchard's book & tried his advice (T4 with just a very small amount of T3) & still no effect on temp/pulse, but I feel better.
Not sure if I feel better from the change in thyroid meds or because of something else like time going by & adrenals getting better.

 

[DaveFoster]

I tried that, but it still didn't help. Took up to 3 grains of NDT & my temp/pulse never budged & I didn't feel any better.
Then I tried adding more T3 & still nothing. One day I experimented & took 8 T3 pills & nothing happened, zero, zilch.
Then I read Ken Blanchard's book & tried his advice (T4 with just a very small amount of T3) & still no effect on temp/pulse, but I feel better.
Not sure if I feel better from the change in thyroid meds or because of something else like time going by & adrenals getting better.

Maybe you're in the small majority that does better on only T4.

 

[Antonello]

@marsaday The bedtime dose at what time is best? Do you also recommend progesterone before bed or first thing in the morning? (I'm trying to regular my circadian cortisol rhythm). Thank you

 

[ecstatichamster]

I do think that we often are too loaded down with PUFAs to get enough out of dessicated or T4. I recommend T3 along with. I had to do some Steve Richfield style resets and some PUFA depletion before my temps would budge with T3. Now they are very responsive.

 

[TeaRex14]

I do think that we often are too loaded down with PUFAs to get enough out of dessicated or T4. I recommend T3 along with. I had to do some Steve Richfield style resets and some PUFA depletion before my temps would budge with T3. Now they are very responsive.

What is your experiences with vitamin E? I do fine on a 2:1 ratio of T4/T3, but I get the same effects if not slightly better from good vitamin E. TocoVit makes me warm and downright hypermetabolic in some cases, I've blown temps as high as 99.3 from a generous serving of that stuff. Personally since I find E easier to dose than thyroid I just use E most of the time. I suspect quality matters though, isolated alpha-tocopherol doesn't have the same effect on me.

 

[mgrabs]

By the way my plan is to stop taking the thyroid pills after a while. Do you think that is even remotely possible?

I only started because I wanted to get out of the hypo state so that my body would stop producing TSI antibodies which showed up on my blood test & may be blocking my thyroid hormone.
Apparently being hypo encourages TSI antibody production.

I have a really strange case. I stupidly took a 6.25 mg Iodine supplement for 2 1/2 years thinking it was a good thing to do.
I read that was a bad idea, so I stopped. A week or 2 later I became severely hyper (possible Grave's Disease). That died down, & then I went hypo.
So there was nothing wrong with me until I played around with the iodine. My TSH was 1.5 when I was normal.

I was hoping to get things humming along back to normal with the thyroid meds & then just slowly back off & hope my body doesn't notice.

Steve, how are you doing today recovering from the iodine? Do you think the raised antibodies were from the iodine consumption? & that its working its way back down? Love to hear from you

 

[Steve]

Steve, how are you doing today recovering from the iodine? Do you think the raised antibodies were from the iodine consumption? & that its working its way back down? Love to hear from you

I feel better than I used to. Besides the iodine I was taking I was also extremely stressed out, so it's hard to pinpoint the exact cause.....probably a combination. I stopped testing the TSI antibodies, which I would guess were triggered by the iodine. They were stuck at the same level every time I got tested, so I figured there was no point to keep measuring them. Right now I take 125 mcg T4, 2.5-5 mcg T3. My energy level is better now than it used to be, but I don't think I ever got back to normal. Can't handle much stress without getting dizzy and depressed, but without stress I feel pretty normal. I do tend to get pretty tired later in the evening. It's been so long now, I'm not sure what is from the original insult, and what's from continued stress and older age.

They say to listen to your body, and I feel like if I could go live in the middle of the forest for a while and just relax for a bit, I'd feel even better. But that's probably not going to happen any time soon. But anyway, I am feeling better, so that's good! :)

 

[mgrabs]

I feel better than I used to. Besides the iodine I was taking I was also extremely stressed out, so it's hard to pinpoint the exact cause.....probably a combination. I stopped testing the TSI antibodies, which I would guess were triggered by the iodine. They were stuck at the same level every time I got tested, so I figured there was no point to keep measuring them. Right now I take 125 mcg T4, 2.5-5 mcg T3. My energy level is better now than it used to be, but I don't think I ever got back to normal. Can't handle much stress without getting dizzy and depressed, but without stress I feel pretty normal. I do tend to get pretty tired later in the evening. It's been so long now, I'm not sure what is from the original insult, and what's from continued stress and older age.

They say to listen to your body, and I feel like if I could go live in the middle of the forest for a while and just relax for a bit, I'd feel even better. But that's probably not going to happen any time soon. But anyway, I am feeling better, so that's good! :)

Glad to hear all of this.. how old are you? Im 28 male and tried 12mg iodine for 6 weeks sent me to hell & back. Cant tolerate thyroid meds. Tsh is 4.5 t4 is 1.1 and t3 is 3.2. No antibodies for hashis or graves but my TPI just said <89 and the reference is <140 ? Not sure what this even means if everything else is fine. Just dealing with anxiety and insomnia

 

[Steve]

Glad to hear all of this.. how old are you? Im 28 male and tried 12mg iodine for 6 weeks sent me to hell & back. Cant tolerate thyroid meds. Tsh is 4.5 t4 is 1.1 and t3 is 3.2. No antibodies for hashis or graves but my TPI just said <89 and the reference is <140 ? Not sure what this even means if everything else is fine. Just dealing with anxiety and insomnia

I'm 51. I never felt a thing when taking the iodine. I read one day that it was risky to take that much, so I stopped taking it. That's when all hell broke loose. I always wonder if I should have just kept taking it. I was too scared to try again after I stopped. I also don't feel anything when I take thyroid meds. I just figured I might as well keep my TSH below one and my Free T3/T4 in range, and hope something good is happening below the surface. I also have anxiety issues and don't sleep well.

Do you mean TPI or TSI?
If you take a TSI test I think it's better to check with the lab to see if it's an actual number or if it just says below a certain range.
I make sure I get the test that gives a number. Apparently normal people have a TSI less than 2% of activity. I think the range you referenced, <140, means that the lab expects hyperthyroid symptoms to occur at 140 or above. That doesn't mean you have a normal level if you are below that cutoff.

I tried everything to help myself when this happened. Finally, after nothing seeemed to have any affect, I just decided to try and be as healthy as possible overall and what happens, happens. So I eat healthy, excercise every single day (sometimes it's just an hour walk), sleep normal hours. My weakness is dealing with stress.....my job is absolutely horrible. I'm an introvert and get stressed easily in social situations, so I need to retire. The fastest way to do that is to keep working where I am because nobody else will pay me as much, so it's kind of a catch-22 situation.....golden handcuffs I guess (although I'm not sure I make enough to qualify for 'golden'.)