Moody, Anxious, Tired? I Didn't Realize I Was Until I Wasn't.

I want to share a little bit about my health in the hopes of reaching just one person.  I have six sisters. One of my sisters had Thyroid cancer when she was in high school.  She beat it and she's doing great, but at that point my mom had us get our thyroids checked.  I started taking thyroid medicine when I was 17 years old.

Basically once a year at a physical, I'd have a blood test to tell me if I was at the right dose of medicine.  This has been rote, routine, by the book, for many, many years.   About a year ago, I started working out at MARS (Martial Arts Research Systems).  This is where Ryan went to work after Gold's Gym and before Boston.  While at MARS, Toni the owner and I would get into discussions about thyroid.  She would ask, do they check your T3?  I always answered, "No, just the T4 and TSH - as I silently rolled my eyes at her."  Basically I heard her and said, blah, blah, blah. I mean come on, I've been taking the medicine for over 35 years.   After about the 10th time of her asking me AND her telling me that checking the T3 had become more popular lately, I asked my physician to check my T3.

Couldn't find a picture of Toni - but here's Jenna and I
at Kickboxing.  If the only reason I went there was to find out
about T3 it was worth it. (But there were plenty of other reasons too.)

Guess what?????  My T3 was virtually zero.  (Just another example of being in the right place at the right time.  Meeting Ryan was like that.  Talking to Toni was like that.)   My physician prescribed the proper medication to get T3 back into my body.  After about two weeks, my husband said to me - You have been so much happier since you started that new thyroid medicine.  I was like, I am?   Hmmmm, I am.  It's one of those things that you don't realize until you feel better, if that makes sense.

I decided then and there it was time to see an Endocrinologist.  I was seen July 18th and since then have been going back regularly as we try to get my thyroid within the correct levels.  My T3 is within range, but now that I am getting T3, my T4 meds can keep decreasing.  You have to stay at one dose for 6 weeks and then get rechecked via blood test.  Today, this was the gist of our discourse:

Nurse Practioner:  You've lost weight again, haven't you?
Me:  Yes, I've lost 12 pounds since I saw you 12 weeks ago.
Nurse Practioner: You know if you keep losing weight, we will need to keep reducing the dose of T4?
Me:  Sounds like a great problem to have.

Checkout girl:  Hey, can I have what Patty has?  I want to lose weight too.  :)

My Nurse Practioner is actually very happy I am losing weight.  It's just a sensitive matter to get the dose right, and that means blood work every 6 weeks.  But I told her I planned to lose weight for awhile and I am fine with checking it every 6 weeks.

My hopes in writing this post are only this.  If you deal with thyroid issues, have you ever had the T3 checked?  Just be aware that there is a T3 and a T4.  And apparently once my T3 came back to normal, I became nice and happy.  :)   Let me tell you that there is a retired endocrinologist that I swim with on occasion and she told me that there is no use whatsoever in checking the T3.  She told me this before I saw my current Endocrinologist.  So there is an "old school" that does not believe it's worth it.  But I just want to say from experience, correcting my T3 has changed my life.

I am not a doctor.  I am not giving medical advice.  I am only stating what someone tried over and over to tell me about a year ago.  Has your doctor checked your T3?