>I believe I have one of her books but will check out the site this weekend.
>The doc who put me on Armour tested free T3 and T4. Unfortunately he now
>specializes in natural hormone therapy, has a club called Club Longevity,
>and charges an annual membership fee of $450. Add the $500 annual
dedcutible
>I pay for lab work, plus co-pays for visits, the hormones, etc. and it's
out
>of my price range. I already spent about $10,000 in the last 2 years on
>nutritionists, supplements, and other useless remedies.
>
>> Mary Shoman's site also has tons of info on how the TSH is useless for
all
>> but the extreme hypos and hypers.  I had pounds of hair falling out
>> with "normal" tsh --
>
>I still have minor hair loss as well, so maybe the Armour just needs to be
>adjusted along with some other tweaking. I definitely feel that I am

getting
>closer to finding a solution. We are going on a cruise end of November and
I
>do NOT want to deal with PMS during that time.
>
>Thank you again for all your help. The hardest part in figuring all this
out
>is finding the money to pay for the natural treatments and tests.
>Unfortunately insurance companies don't and proably never will cover what
>they should cover.


You can order your own BLOOD thyroid panel tests at Healthcheck USA -
prices are very reasonable.  HormoneDiva has a special in conjunction with
them, but I heard good things about HealthCheck prior to ever hearing of
Dr. Gillespie.  $50-$75 should get you all you need.  Check out the link
below for an idea of prices:
http://menopausediet.com/Store/healthcheck.htm

Regarding TSH, bear in mind that the "normal" range is way too broad.
Anything over 2.0 with symptoms is suspect.  You can read all about this on
the Mary Shoman site and I'm telling you from personal experience that this
was my case.  The normal range from my lab was .5-5.5   I was always around
2-3 so was declared fine despite a variety of weird symptoms (always worse
before period) and very distressing hair loss.  Who knows, perhaps bumping
up your Armour a tad could result in major relief.  But you must get an
accurate assessment of your levels first.  Armour is much cheaper than
synthetics.

One last thing, I realize that some suggestions whether from me or from
your further research may not be "natural".  But it's not exactly natural
to be walking around with one ovary and no uterus. Given that you have been
so meticulous regarding diet, exercise, you really deserve a better quality
of life and I think with your determination, you WILL find the answers you
seek.