Does everyone now have Thyroid issues?

So, I’ll preface this by saying I’ve been a Type 1 Diabetic for over 30 years and have had Hashimoto’s thyroiditis thyroid disease since my teens. A double-whammy of auto-immune issues. I was very young, ate well and wasn’t exposed to anything “bad” in my environment. My immune system decided to go haywire for some reason. I don’t over-dramatize it or “let it define me” as many Diabetics like to say…as they discuss their dramatic diagnosis story ad nauseam.

But all of a sudden everyone else on the interwebs has thyroid issues too! Maybe it’s the vein of my accounts that I follow that lead to a focus on healthy eating, growing your own food, food as medicine, homesteading dreams, etc. Very well could be. But now all the homesteaders have Thyroid and auto-immune issues. I’m casting a wide net here, so don’t be offended. They’re sharing everything about their lives, so health is one of them. But, I receommend speaking with a doctor and getting yourself tested before any self-diagnosis based upon your favorite YouTube or Instagram stars.

The attention is actually convenient for me right now as I recently had an ultrasound of my thyroid because my neck was literally feeling fat, I kid you not. I do have a slight goiter, but it was feeling tight. So they did an ultrasound in December and found three pesky little nodules on my thyroid, all three were large enough for them to want to do a fine needle aspiration to get some material to biopsy. Let me tell you, it’s not the most fun procedure in the world. They do numb your neck a little, but that does NOT help much, at least in my case—I had to have a second shot of lidocaine, which didn’t seem to help at all—because the Dr. doing the procedure literally takes a little hollow needle and repeatedly jabs it in and out of the same spot. I left with a bruised spot on my neck and a bandaid, so it’s not terribly invasive. And results were all benign, so I just have to have an ultrasound in a year or so.

Dealing with that has made me think twice about my thyroid and how I’m feeling in general. My levels are “fine,” albeit a little lower than they’ve been averaging over the years, but still within range. I take 112 mg of Levothyroxin and have been my whole life. It didn’t even change when I was pregnant. But, now I’m a bit older. I cannot for the life of me, lose weight. I don’t know if its now being over 40, but I have been working out and tracking my food (and macros,) drinking all the water, for a month and a half and have lost a total of 2 lbs. Just two. I’ve done all the calculations for my height/weight and what I should eat for calories. I do a mix of cardio, functional exercises and yoga. I have lessened my alcoholic consumption by a 100-fold it feels like, so I was expecting a nice loss just from less booze! Nope. Super frustrating.

So I’ve been reading. And that’s how I realized that the internet has thyroids on the mind! A couple things I read about were taking some supplements, specifically selenium and iodine, to support your thyroid function even if you’re on Levothyroxin. Another was diet, of course. Some of which was going gluten free, and also making sure to over-cook your cruciferous veggies. Which I find the thought of, just terrible. I’ll cook my veggies properly, thank you. The gluten thing I’ve done before, with no results of change. Currently I don’t eat a lot of gluten things anyways, so we’ll say I’m gluten-light right now. I will not give up my brussels sprouts.

I’m going to try the supplements; I probably don’t get enough iodine like many Americans, I don’t use table salt, I use the fancy stuff, which doesn’t have much iodine in it. Selenium is slated to help with thyroid hormone metabolism and with cancer prevention, which I guess is always a good thing.

I conveniently have an endocrinologist appointment Friday, so I’m going to talk with her about starting those and see what else I can possibly do to shed some lbs. I’m also waiting with bated breath on my lab results to see if things are better since I started my health journey (might as well call it what the cool kids call it) this year! Here’s hoping for some good ideas and suggestions!

I may just have to jump on the online-homesteader-social-media-personality bandwagon and start the carnivore diet. Just kidding, I think inflation is going to kill that diet fad real fast.