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The Crossover between Hypothyroidism and CFS

frozenborderline

Senior Member
Messages
4,405
The problem I have with his article (that attempts to be scientific) is when I read sentences like this. Essentially he tries to lump CFS, IBS and depression (and probably everything else that doesn't have well established diagnostic markers) into one disease, which he claims is hypothyroidism. This is nothing much different from what the BPS crowd is doing at the moment, where they try to label all these diseases as MUS (medically unexplained symptoms). Or what homeopathy or many other bogus alternative treatments are claiming, that they essentially can treat any disease and every disease is due to "problem X". Just because a disease is not easy to objectively diagnose, it shouldn't be subject to quackery like lumping everything into one category.
I understand what you're saying and I don't think he's necessarily correct. But if you look at his reasoning, it's far more sound than homeopathy. CFS does tend to exist in clusters with other correlated diagnoses. And it is true that around the 70s , people stopped diagnosing thyroid issues based on basal metabolic rate and started diagnosing them based on blood tests only. And that was about when the first CFS cases started.

It's also true that there's a lot of overlap in symptoms. Overall I think it's too simplified, but there are links between purinergic signalling and the thyroid
 

echobravo

Keep searching, the answer is out there
Messages
137
Location
Norway
My experience that is when free T3 is raised to optimal, my SHBG increases (has been as high as 195). This then affects free testosterone adversely which makes me feel bad. My gut feeling is that my body wants me in hypo metabolic state for some reason and messing with these downstream hormones, for me at least, is counter productive.

Yep, this exact same thing happens to me as well, been on T3/T4 since 2005, and after that blood work has shown high SHBG and low free testosteron.

I have also been contemplating if we really should be intervening too much with our adrenal and thyroid hormones (trying to increase energy or improve allostatic response) - for the same reason that you mention - that our body at some point decided to downregulate our metabolism, maybe in the face of imminent damage (Naviaux & CDR comes to mind).
 
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ahmo

Senior Member
Messages
4,805
Location
Northcoast NSW, Australia
I couldn't manage to read most of the linked paper. I've been hypo-thyroid since adolescence. My downward spiral into ME began when I was 50, the final crash when I was 54. I discovered John Lowe's thyroid work about 7 years later. After 2 years working w/ GP and compounding chemist w/ various combinations of natural thyroid, T3, T4, it became clear that Lowe's suggestion of T3 only is what works for me. Clearly all the decades I was on thyroxine I was under-medicated.

But switching to T3 did not cure my ME. And a couple years later, when I discovered how gluten was poisoning me, I returned to Lowe's book and found not a single reference to gluten. Maybe it's got nothing to do w/ thyroid, but from what I experienced after eliminating gluten, it appeared to have huge impact on my body.

[I've had a sympathetic GP who told me initially he knows nothing about CFS, but was willing to order tests I suggested and work through the thyroid rx. I never asked about what my diagnosis was, as it might certainly have been just hypothyroid in his estimation. Recently I was seated so that I could see the computer screen at the office, and was pleased to see CFS as well as hypothyroid and MTHFR as my dx. He's also been amazed at my improvements after diet changes and methylation protocol.]
 

pattismith

Senior Member
Messages
3,930
My experience that is when free T3 is raised to optimal, my SHBG increases (has been as high as 195). This then affects free testosterone adversely which makes me feel bad. My gut feeling is that my body wants me in hypo metabolic state for some reason and messing with these downstream hormones, for me at least, is counter productive.

SHBG at 195 may indicate tissu thyrotoxicosis, or an estrogen supplementation

https://www.mayomedicallaboratories.com/test-catalog/Clinical+and+Interpretive/9285