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The Concealed Causes of "Thyroid Resistance"

drob31

Senior Member
Messages
1,487
Just to update this thread, I'm pretty sure my "hypothyroidism" is caused by high cortisol. Not only does high cortisol make the cells resistance to thyroid hormones. It makes the cells resistance to every hormone, including cortisol. This may be why high cortisol can feel like low cortisol.
 

picante

Senior Member
Messages
829
Location
Helena, MT USA
Chiming in with my own thyroid "mysteries". @ahmo, I can't believe there is someone else in the world who bought John Lowe's big, fat textbook. I used to haul it along to the doctor's office, :lol: hoping they would have time to take a look.

My metabolism crashed when I had EBV, but it took 11 years before I got the "hypothyroid" diagnosis, due to lack of health insurance and lack of "abnormal" TSH levels. Being skinny didn't help.

With a TSH result of 7.5, my ND put me on NDT and it had no effect. Still plagued with hypo symptoms, I asked for antibody tests: TPO was over 500. My ND said "take selenium"!

Eventually I ran across Stop the Thyroid Madness (the book -- this was before the website existed), so asked for RT3 and FT3 tests, then calculated my ratio, which was 14. At the time, the T3 forum on Yahoo was saying it should be 20. So I went on Cytomel. The antibodies came down to 80-95.

Cytomel reduced my myofascial pain to a tolerable level (my arms & feet could function again!) and gave me a bit of energy. It also resolved my gut problem, which was that every time I ate, I would get a rather painful bloat going while eating and felt like I might explode. (Unable to eat much, I had become officially "gaunt" at 108 lbs.)

I've been hassled by a number of mainstream docs about having "high" T3 levels. I always ask them whether the labs are ever going to establish a range for people taking T3.

Meanwhile I read Dr. Abraham and Dr. Brownstein on iodine. A couple searches online told me they were right about iodine being OK for Hashi's patients as long as we take selenium, too. I started taking Lugol's. I didn't know what it was doing, really, until I stopped it for a while. It had gotten me to menopause (finally) at age 56. When I stopped Lugol's, I started spotting. When I went back on it, just after I turned 57, I stopped. :balloons:

Next post: T3 & arthritis, plus wild temperature fluctuations on methylB12 last summer. Enough for now. Thanks for reading, dear friends.
 

ahmo

Senior Member
Messages
4,805
Location
Northcoast NSW, Australia
I used to haul it along to the doctor's office, :lol: hoping they would have time to take a look.
Ha ha. I left the book with the one specialist in Fibro that I saw, who knew less than me. Later I retrieved it, and gave it to my GP once I uncovered the gluten issue.:D

I might ask for antibody tests from my GP next week..then again, I'm doing ok by treating by symptoms...:whistle:
 
Last edited:
Messages
47
Reading through some of Andy Cutler's stuff recently, I found he said that getting NAET to 'clear' calcium has helped some people respond better to physiological doses of thyroid. http://onibasu.com/archives/amc/1898.html

I don't actually know what NAET is, other than I've heard it's expensive and apparently not all practitioners are effective. Seems kind of wacky, but who knows...
 

ahmo

Senior Member
Messages
4,805
Location
Northcoast NSW, Australia
@Unim My only knowledge of NAET is from a member of a GAPS forum, who's found it effective for many things, and recommends it often, especially for kids. well, it's mostly a forum of mums with kids. Interesting that Cutler's found it effective.
 

Sporty

Senior Member
Messages
161
Location
Essex, UK
I think I'm thyroid resistant too. I've been taking thyroid meds for years, but they never seem to work for me....
 

picante

Senior Member
Messages
829
Location
Helena, MT USA
I think I'm thyroid resistant too. I've been taking thyroid meds for years, but they never seem to work for me....
Is your calcitriol (1,25 D) high? I've been looking into this, because mine is. I found this:

Case in point: thyroid receptor
1,25-D has a very high affinity for the alpha thyroid nuclear receptor (ThRa) having a Kd value of 8.41. Normally levels of the endogenous ligand for ThRa known as T3 (which has a Kd 7.20 for ThRa) keep 1,25-D out of the binding pocket, but as 1,25-D rises due to VDR dysregulation it starts to proportionately displace T3 and block transcription by ThRa. The same thing should happen with thyroid beta – 1,25-D has a Kd of 8.44 for that receptor.

When 1,25-D displaces T3, the genes with ThRa promoters are no longer transcribed, resulting in the phenomenon known as thyroid hormone resistance. Since related nuclear receptors work as a group, when transcription by ThRa is dysregulated, system wide gene transcription is also affected.
http://mpkb.org/home/pathogenesis/vitamind/metabolism#case_in_pointthyroid_receptor
 

picante

Senior Member
Messages
829
Location
Helena, MT USA
Hi, well I have no idea if it's high. I know the vit D they tested on the Nhs was nicely in range. I believe there's two types of Vit D though isn't there....?
Yes, that's 25 OH D. Calcitriol can be high for many of us, while 25-OH-D is low or mid-range.
 

xks201

Senior Member
Messages
740
And why shouldn't one take b vitamins with thyroid?
The first thing that impacted on my then unlabelled illness, after my collapse w/ ME, was getting off the synthroid I'd been taking for decades. I asked a number of MDs for an alternative in that first year, and stayed w/ the GP who agreed. Then there were 5 years working w/ GP and compounding chemist trying various combinations of natural thyroid, T3, T4. When it was finally evident that none of these would work, rT3 levels significant, I began my own research and found John Lowe and his T3 protocol. T3 was, and remains, the thing that works for me.

I tried super physiological doses of T3 in 2010-11, following John Lowe's protocol. I'd spent many hours reading his info, even purchased his textbook, not wanting to miss any crucial point. And yet, he missed a crucial point. As I understood his protocol, I could expect to experience a relaxation of my nervous system, and if my symptoms did not abate, I should continue raising doses. However, it was only after I eliminated gluten that I got any relief. And there was zero mention of gluten in his huge book.:thumbdown:

My current experience is that there is a very delicate balance between my adrenals and thyroid. Well, not my thyroid gland, but thyroid medication. My gland is pretty much non-functioning. I had a major detox event in May which quite clearly centered on adrenals. At this point I was on 30mcg T3. As I listened to speakers in the Thyroid Summit, I tried to increase my T3. Didn't work: insomnia, adrenal pain. I took heart in someone in that forum emphasizing to not worry about getting temperature's up. Even when I was on about 120mcg years earlier, I never got up to normal temps.

Now, 4 months later, things are different. 1) Eliminating gluten cross-reactive and auto-immune stimulating foods. 2) 3 months on low dose naltrexone. 3) No iodine, including no celtic sea salt. (Datis Kharrazian confirms this as necessary for many) 4) Ongoing attention to adrenals through coffee enemas (detox liver to relieve adrenals. Best solution I've found). Since my detox event in May I've no longer needed the adrenal glandulars that I relied on for 2 years.

I began experiencing weight gain and fluid retention, so began to increase T3. I'm now at 70mcg, and have had normal temps, tho not daily. I'll continue bumping this up, at 10-11 day intervals, per Rudy Dragone, one of the best of the Thyroid Summit speakers. I'll increase until it seems to be the right dose: no hyper or hypo sx. I also just learned to take thyroid rx away from B vits. I'd been taking them together, have only rectified this during this past week. (Datis Kharrazian)

I'm now, for the first time in my life, not ingesting anything to stimulate antibody reactions. I only learned from Dragone that there was cornstarch in my T3 rx,:bang-head: and switched to compounded. I gave up relying on blood tests for anything following John Lowe's counsel. My GP doesn't even suggest them anymore. But I will request one at my next appt, as I'd like to see what they show.
 

xks201

Senior Member
Messages
740
I don't believe anything unless I see evidence. But I would be interested to know his reasoning.
 

picante

Senior Member
Messages
829
Location
Helena, MT USA
I don't believe anything unless I see evidence. But I would be interested to know his reasoning.
So would I, and it's hard to find that info with a Google search (I tried).

The problem with waiting for evidence is you'll wait forever:
  • Is it studies you're wanting? Most scientific studies are highly biased toward the wrong questions for our purposes. And they don't provide a very complete picture -- just itty-bitty pieces of a gazillion-piece jigsaw puzzle. A few are useful.
  • Is it evidence from other people's experience you're wanting? I find it helpful. Here on PR I keep seeing that people's response to supplements is variable, and then we discuss what might be influencing those responses.
  • Is it evidence from your own body you're wanting? It can be hard to interpret, but it's valid. Personal experimentation gives me more clues than anything else.
 

drob31

Senior Member
Messages
1,487
I'm not sure about anything anymore, I'm sort of back to the drawing board.

One thing that has been a HUGE help is pregnenolone, so maybe that's a clue. I started out wiIh 50 mg and it helped a ton with working memory, word recall and libido, however it didn't fix everything. At 50 mg, I felt like it was too low, so I went to 100 mg and that was a pretty good dose. I've been on that for 5 weeks now.

My last saliva test showed a more normal cortisol rythm, but I still feel it's very sensitive and could change from day to day.

I still have weird temperature sensitivities, cold fingers usually in morning, feeling warmer at night. I have diffuse hair shedding. The folicles get extremely itchy and fall out where the itchy feeling occurs. My energy levels are so lower but better overall. I have much more focus and mental ability with pregnenolone.

I did test positive for the cyrex autoimmune pannel for antiphospholipid anitbodies, but subsequent test showed them to be negative, so it's either a false negative, or perhaps a red herring. I have red that pregnenolone helps people with lupus and similar autoimmune issues. But it would also help with "Adrenal issues." I've been taking 40 mcg of PQQ for the last 6 weeks as well, and 1-2 grams of tumeric a day.
 

Gondwanaland

Senior Member
Messages
5,092
I started preg yesterday at 1.25mg based on Ray Sahelian's advice.
My toxic FM and gouty (?) arthritis subsided slightly, but at the same time I started Boswellia at higher doses which is clearly helping with pain.

Tomorrow will take 2.5 mg preg, and am trying to decide if I will take it continuously or a few days on /off.
http://www.raysahelian.com/pregnenolone.html

In addition to adrenal support, I need to increase all hormones. Serum estradiol came out indetectable.
 

picante

Senior Member
Messages
829
Location
Helena, MT USA
@Gondwanaland, I just ran across this on Chris Kresser's website:

Estrogen fluctuations can trigger the gene expression of Hashimoto’s in the presence of inflammation and genetic susceptibility. In addition to turning on the genes associated with Hashimoto’s, estrogen surges have been shown to exacerbate the autoimmune attack on the thyroid. This may explain why the expression of Hashimoto’s is so common during pregnancy and perimenopause – both times when estrogen may be fluctuating wildly.

Is this true? If so, I'll bet your estrogen levels are not always low!
 

Gondwanaland

Senior Member
Messages
5,092
Is this true? If so, I'll bet your estrogen levels are not always low!
They have probably been quite high some times, but now everything is messed up, at least since 2013 when I started the progesterone cream that suppressed both my estrogen and testosterone.
 

drob31

Senior Member
Messages
1,487
Pregnenelone at a dose of 100 mg has increased my estradiol, however I have been doing allot better lately with every symptom.

I added DIM and my libido immediately shot back up again. It seems that you must dial pregnenolone in.