How Do You Know If Your Thyroid is Unhappy?
It’s estimated that up to 60% of people with a thyroid disorder don’t know they have it. In preparation for my class in July on the Hidden Causes of Thyroid Disorders, I wanted to go over what you might notice in your body if your thyroid isn’t working optimally.
It’s helpful to think of the thyroid as the thermostat of the body. If the thermostat gets turned way down (known in medicine as HYPOthyroidism), you can expect to feel chilly, tired, and various body functions will slow down and dry out. The skin gets dry, the hair gets dry and coarse and falls out at a faster rate, the heart rate slows and digestion slows too, leading to constipation. Tissue healing slows, so wounds sometimes heal more slowly and you can wind up feeling achy and stiff in the muscles and joints. Mood can be low too, and cognition is sluggish. People become more prone to weight gain, and without enough thyroid hormone in circulation, fertility is reduced. A general lack of metabolic energy can lead to a sensation of muscular weakness. In some cases, the thyroid can swell, and some people notice a lump sensation in the throat, or hoarseness. Low thyroid function is more common with age and ten times more common in women.
On the other hand, if the thermostat gets turned up too high (known as HYPERthyroidism), body functions trend toward warmer, faster and more anxious. You might notice feeling jittery, antsy, anxious and irritable. Insomnia sets in and heart rate picks up. A lot of people experience a racing or flip-flopping sensation (palpitations) of the heart, and sometimes a sense of shortness of breath or a fine tremor in the hands. The body feels warm, often overheated with easy sweating, and sometimes the bowels get moving too fast leading to frequent bowel movements or loose stools. You might expect one would feel super energized with all that thyroid hormone racing around, but often people actually feel fatigued. In advanced stages of Grave’s disease, the most common cause of hyperthyroidism, the eyes start to bulge outwards.
If someone tells me they are experiencing multiple symptoms that point to a thyroid imbalance, I will recommend blood testing. In conventional medicine, testing is often restricted to TSH and free T4, but these tests miss a lot of thyroid imbalances.
Here is a list of the tests I recommend for a thorough baseline of thyroid function:
• Free T3
• Free T4
• TSH
• Reverse T3
• Anti-TPO antibodies*
• Anti-TG Antibodies*
• Thyroid stimulating immunoglobulin**
We’ll get into so much more detail on why thyroid imbalances happen at my class. Please join us and bring your questions!
*Antibodies that signal the presence of Hashimoto’s thyroiditis, the most common cause of low thyroid function in the US.
** Antibodies that signal the presence of Grave’s disease, a cause of excess thyroid function. This test would only be run on a person experiencing signs of excess thyroid function.
Dr. Jennea Wood is a naturopathic physician practicing with Tummy Temple in Greater Olympia/Lacey. Her goal with every patient is to identify and address root causes of disease. Her areas of specialty include helping people who are struggling with gastrointestinal diseases of all kinds, thyroid and adrenal dysfunction, anxiety and depression, atopic diseases including asthma, allergies and eczema and autoimmune conditions. You can learn more about her practice and the other offerings of Tummy Temple at: tummytemple. com/jennea-wood-nd/
