Thank you for the posts okaying my passing the inforamtion about rT3 to
others. It means a lot to me.
On Fri, 3 Aug 2001, Skipper Beers wrote:
If they knew in a 1940 excerpt from a medical textbook
> recently posted by Greg deGuzman that hypothyroidism not treated properly
> generally led to sleep apnea,
This is the kind of thing I'm having such a hard time with. It's all the
good knowledge that has been gained in the past that has just ben set
aside and ignored....while some of us have lost decades of our lives.
> an untreated or just as likely, and even sadder undertreated thyroid gland,
> because after all those years trying to find help, you had hope that you
> would be normal again, you had seen your doctor practically enough to be a
> best buddy, but he doesn't care that you need more synthroid, or synthroid
> doesn't work at all and Armour works for some, and that mention of Wilson's
> Syndrome with timed release T3, well a doctor ought to just give poison.
> (Maybe when they think that it's about how their bank accounts will be
> poisoned when the general population becomes educated to what they are doing.)
I'm not sure what to think right now about why doctors don't listen. I
know that I cherish both my internist and my psychiatrist....but neither
one of them would listen. I've been slowly putting the pieces together
....think I pretty much understand what's going on now and am trying to
be as calm as I can be about all of this....but it's hard.
Today, while looking for a file I wanted to send to a friend, I ran across
a message I had posted almost three years ago about an incident with my
psychiatrist....over Armour thyroid. At the time he had put me on
Levothroid.
I was first put on thyroid replacement in 1969 after a T3/T4 test revealed
low-normal numbers. I had a lot of problems with Cytomel, which I was
first put on....eventually put on Abbott thyroid....a natural dessicated
thyroid. I was very happy with it....it was the most emotionally stable
time of my life....but the numbers stayed in the low-normal range. My
then doctor put me on a med called Euthroid....a synthetic T3/T4 combo.
I couldn't handle the dose he first put me on.....it made me too hyper. He
had me split the dose....first twice a day, then three times...still
didn't get the numbers he wanted and I couldn't handle the med. One day he
accused me of not taking the medication properly....I told him that if I
took as much of it as he wanted me to, I would be bouncing off the wall.
He sent me to a world reknowned specialist....who did umpteen tests and
declared that I had a normal thyroid and should never have been placed on
medication. Took me off cold turkey. Told me I had an enlarged heart
because of the thyroid med.
That was 27 years ago. I then gained about 80 pounds and went into
chronic depression. I've asked numerous times about my thyroid....told it
was normal....TSH around 3.8 or 4.5....it fluctuated a lot. Didn't know
enough for many years to question the use of just TSH....then, when I
joined this list and did start asking my docs about T3....was ignored....
until about a month or so ago. Twenty seven years of my life tired and
obese and depressed. I wanted to do research in birth defects....didn't
have enough energy to take care of a family and get through school. Tried
and tried and tried. I lived for this....had a terrible time letting go of
that dream. Went back over and over....
I don't know how to describe what I'm feeling right now.
> No, using those same tones with doctors who we visit
> for the first time because we're too naive to use the phone before we spend
> the money so they can say, "you're in fine health, your thyroid is good, I
> don't know why you think anything is wrong, you just work too hard, that'll
> be $100 please." No those doctors don't like similar tones or treatment.
This is the reason why I have stopped seeking medical help several times
int the past. I have a lot of war stories....gall baldder attacks during
my first pregnancy that were treated with Gelusil, my first born who
didn't noticed sounds and, since I had suffered rubella at the end of my
first trimester, I asked again and again,"Could he be deaf?" and was told
probably not and that he couldn't be tested until he was two anyway....
then learned he was profoundly deaf, could have been fitted for hearing
aids at 9 months and that early language is very important to brain
development. My youngest, who weighed almost nine pounds at birth, so was
placed on skimmed milk....which I later learned is unhealthy for a baby
....they need the milkfat to develop a good nervous system....and he is
incredibly hypersensitive. And that's not even mentioning the medication
the OB put me on to keep the weight down while I was pregnant...can't
remember the name right now...but the speed-like med that was used in the
early 70's to keep women from gaining more than 20 pounds during
pregnancy....that is now known to permanently change a brain.
After a minor stroke in 1980 and a severe Meniere's attack in 1991....both
times I knew I needed medical care because of chronic hypertension, but
was so disgusted with doctors that I wouldn't seek help....I have been
trying to hang in there this time. It hasn't been easy for my doctors. In
all the instances I've mentioned, I never expressed any angry feelings to
the docs. If anything, I was over-compliant. The psychiatrist I've been
seeing had borne the brunt of all that long-suppressed anger. When I'm not
feeling the way I feel right now, I think he's almost a saint for putting
up with some of my behavior. There's still a part of me that just wants to
walk away from the whole entire medical profession. I know I shouldn't
feel this way....but it is how I feel.
It's very hard....I don't know what the answer is.
> Yes, a lot of us owe Doc Don some gratitude. I knew who to call when after 3
> years of going to the family doctor and specialists I pointed out to her in
> black and white the words of the Magic Foundation, a clinic specializing in
> children's growth problems. I pointed them out in black and white asked for
> treatment before he died or went into a coma, and fortunately I knew who to
> call when the doctor of 6 years turned me down. When she didn't care if my
> son died. I made the call in my mind before I left her office.
This is the kind of thing that I can't deal with....how could these
doctors watch your son's health decline and not be willing to at least
consider the information you brought to them? And, yet, I know that
doctors seem to be able to easily ignore whatever information we try to
bring to them. I have been telling both my internist and my psychiatrist
for three years about Armour....they just ignored me. Part of me realizes
that no matter how much I admire them....they obviously have had very
little respect for me.
> Or, on the really bad days such as the ones during which we couldn't make it
> out of our easy chair and practically cried over TV shows, we might have
> cried if we thought too much, but we're really good at ignoring things. Kind
> of like a shock victim, we can't face reality so we commonly are in a
> trans-like state.
Yes, what you have said here hits very close to home for me.
> Worse yet, many of us now know we can't trust most doctors either.
Yes, many people feel this way. I think this feeling has a lot to do with
why so many seek alternative health care. I don't think that all the
responsibility lies with the doctors....some of it is managed care and the
war zone that malpractice haas made of medical care....but I feel that
doctors need to address these issues if they want people to have any faith
in them at all.
> When my son was close to death and my doctor refused to treat,
> wasn't that an attack on my family the same way as someone threatening to
> push him off a cliff? It just appeared more civil.
It's hard for me to say this, but I see your point and I think it's a very
valid one.
I did when I
> found out they used to put fluoride in drinking water given to prisoners of
> war to make them docile and stupid, it will make it clear there really is a
> war I haven't know about to destroy the health and lives of millions, and
> again I would have to ask who wants us too tired to think or defend
> ourselves?
I'm going to steer away from this one for the time being....I'm already
having a lot of problems because of my thoughts about biosensitivity....
that solar/seismic activity may play a very big role in physical and
mental ills. It sounds far-out, but there's a lot of inforamtion coming
out that seems to help explain it....and some old info that I hope will
resurface....such as Felix Gad Sulman's work on positive ions and weather
sensitivity which can trigger adrenal exhaustion, serotonin stress
syndrome and a forme fruste hyperthyroidism. But I sure get into trouble
when I start talking about quakes and illness.
Thank you for your comments....I don't expect to get far with what I'm
trying to do....but at least hopefully take a few steps in the right
direction. The people with whom I wish to share the information about rT3
are members of an acute care council....I have found some of them to be
very caring people....I think at least a couple of them will listen. Then,
if they share the information with a couple more people , and on, and on
....maybe we can be like Johnny Appleseed.
My best thoughts and regards,
Nancy Hugo
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