Today, back down to 150. Yesterday I was volunteering with a fundraiser and in the rush to collect stuff and get out the door, forgot to step on the scale. It's a relief to see 150 again, though.
Three weeks of obsessive dieting and tracking every calorie (and averaging slightly under 1,000 calories during the last 3 weeks, see My Calorie Diary at right -- you have to hit the back arrow on the date to get Saturday's date up in order to see weekly averages when you scroll down the page since each week starts fresh on Sundays), and I now weigh 5 pounds less. It could be worse.
Yesterday I had some time on my hands and read a considerable amount of the 2010 book, Why Do I Still Have Thyroid Symptoms? When My Lab Tests Are Normal, by Datis Kharrazian, DHSc, DC, MS. His forte, according to the preface, is in the field of nutritional management of autoimmune disease.
He makes a very strong case that most hypothyroid patients really suffer from an underlying autoimmune disease, and that without proper treatment of that condition, prescribing thyroid medication for hypothyroidism is just treating symptoms, not cause. He says a lot of stuff that appeals very much to me, including that some people with hypothyroid symptoms may be able to manage the autoimmune response that is attacking their thyroid with diet (for example, removing gluten from their diet, which is linked to Hashimoto's disease). He also makes the point that patients who present with anemia need to treat anemia FIRST before tackling hypothyroidism, which is interesting since I had not been addressing my iron deficiency during the last three weeks.
However, coincidentally yesterday I received my order of (Solgar Gentle Iron, 25 mg capsules) iron supplements, and I started taking it last night (I will be taking 50 mg daily). It will be interesting to see if this one change, addressing my iron deficiency, makes any change in my body's ability to metabolize fat (which is a point made by the author). That would certainly be nice...
So just to review the supplements, I now take:
Morning with breakfast: 2 chewable tablets of Caltrate Plus 600 (calcium + vitamin D), plus 2 chewable tables of Fiber Choice plus Antioxidants
Evening with dinner: 2 25 mg capsules of Solgar Gentle Iron (supposed to be vegetable based, non-constipating)
I continue to drink plenty of water, sometimes flavored with lemon juice, and I note that Kharrazian recommends the lemon addition because he says it "alkalinizes blood" (110).
In reflection, I think part of my previous weight drop was probably due to the fact that I was fighting off the flu and running a slight fever for many days; when I got better, the weight stopped coming off. Hopefully, I will resume a pattern of weight loss in the coming weeks.
Kharrazian has a website: http://www.thyroidbook.com/, which I have yet to check out. But I kept waiting for him to introduce the ideal diet for hypothyroid patients, and he falls short of doing exactly that. Instead, he recommends fasting for days and then re-introducing types of foods to see if food allergies become evident, and he recommends beaucoup types of supplements that are rather esoteric (I'm wondering if he sells them on his website, which will immediately make me question his entire premise, I'm afraid).
I too have recently been diagnosed with hypothyroidism and struggling with my weight. I am taking Armour thyroid 60 mg per day, for less than a month.
ReplyDeleteI'm going to try crushing the tabs, to see if that makes a different in these next 30 days. Knowing I'm not alone gives me inspiration. Keep up your blog and thanks.
I think those of us who want diet recommendations have to remember that Dr K is a doctor, not a dietician and as such gives us the recommendation and we can work from there.
ReplyDeletePersonally, I'm going with a strict no sugar, no flour or other white carbohydrate and no fruit for 6 days a week and allow some fruit and milk products on Saturdays.
I'm not much of one for elimination diets. I went through all that in the 1980s and ran out of food to eat. There was not one food I didn't react to and I even reacted to the water. It wasn't helpful. So I ended up focussing on eating good quality protein with no more than 30g by weight of carbohydrates at a meal. I also took heavy doses of vitamin B and did lots and lots of meditation. Over 6 weeks I got to be OK and started to slowly increase more veges, then fruit, then milk. That worked for me. Flour took a couple of months not to react to but I couldn't eat bread for 12 months or so.
I'm not as bad as I was in 1980 by a long way. I just want to be healthy and not put on weight
I think Dr. K is not exactly a doctor: he's a chiropractor. It's weird that lemon juice, an acid, "alkalinizes" blood. I think the body's homeostatic mechanisms prevent nutrients from causing changes in the blood's pH.
ReplyDeleteI hope everyone knows that some thyroid health problem can cause other health problems. Treating the cause is important and together with desiccated bovine thyroid health capsules , it can relieve a person of this disease.
ReplyDelete