Fixing ones adrenals before supplemeting T3?

[FrankMa]

Hey,

I have read basically every post on Stop the Thyroid Madness™ - Hypothyroidism and thyroid mistreatment
They seem to have very good results with many hypothyroid patients.

They claim that one should fix his adrenals before or while supplementing thyroid ( no matter if taking T3 alone, T3/T4, or NDT )
since -so the claim- T3 needs the right ammount of cortisol to be active in the cell otherwise T3 pools in the blood
showing good free T3 but still having hypo symptoms.

They suggest some physiological tests to determine ones adrenal function like the one in which you
measure your temperature 3 hours after waking up, 3 hours later again and 3 hours later again.
Take the average of those 3 measures; repeat 4 more days.
If the daily average fluctuares more than 0.2F / 0.1C it is indicative of a sluggish adrenal function
( could be to high cortisol, too low cortisol or a mix of both ).
In that case take a 4 point saliva cortisol test to further find out about your adrenals;
- if cortisol is too high: take adaptogens like ashwaghanda
- if cortisol is too low take hydrocortisone??

One of the central point of Rays teaching is to keep cortisol as low as possible; at least I understood it that way.
Now those folks say to take exogenous cortisol under some circumstances; they seem to be successful with it.

Any thoughts"

 

[rooz7939]

I'm no expert but that fixing adrenals before taking thyroid supplements sounds like the right approach to me and here's why. In my experience if somebody is hypothyroid and adrenals that are not functioning properly it's because they have been under a prolonged period of high stress and most likely are not eating properly (for me it was because of low carb and as a result low calorie diet). Taking thyroid supplements in this state, especially if you're not increasing your calorie/nutritional intake, again in my experience, can do quite a bit of harm since it can ramp up your metabolism quickly without your body being fueled properly. The way I think about it is that your body is unstable when in that state and any external response can have an exaggerated affect and make your system even more unstable.

I would try to look for the root cause of any adrenal/thyroid issues before taking supplements and see if you have any improvements; see if you can reduce external stress, or eat more if you are not eating enough.

I think what Ray says should be taken in context, Cortisol, Estrogen, etc. are probably still required for proper bodily function, but in rather small amounts. Problem is, in most cases in our lives, there are a a lot of things that cause these hormones to increase and create an imbalance (everything from emotional stress to bad food to exogenous estrogen). I also think if you're under chronic stress your body will run out of resources to produce these hormones adequately so you might actually end up not producing enough cortisol (or maybe it's just a defensive response), anyway this is just my hypothesis, nothing to back it up except personal experience.

 

[steel_reserve]

My naturopath put me on a dessicated thyroid supplement that also had adrenal glands in it. I'm doing well on it for the last 3 months

 

[golder]

My naturopath put me on a dessicated thyroid supplement that also had adrenal glands in it. I'm doing well on it for the last 3 months

Very interesting, I've not seen a thyroid extract with adrenal complex within it. What brand is it, or do you have a picture? Glad to hear it's helping you!

 

[steel_reserve]

Very interesting, I've not seen a thyroid extract with adrenal complex within it. What brand is it, or do you have a picture? Glad to hear it's helping you!

Progressive professionals thyro complex

 

[FrankMa]

I'm no expert but that fixing adrenals before taking thyroid supplements sounds like the right approach to me and here's why. In my experience if somebody is hypothyroid and adrenals that are not functioning properly it's because they have been under a prolonged period of high stress and most likely are not eating properly (for me it was because of low carb and as a result low calorie diet). Taking thyroid supplements in this state, especially if you're not increasing your calorie/nutritional intake, again in my experience, can do quite a bit of harm since it can ramp up your metabolism quickly without your body being fueled properly. The way I think about it is that your body is unstable when in that state and any external response can have an exaggerated affect and make your system even more unstable.

I would try to look for the root cause of any adrenal/thyroid issues before taking supplements and see if you have any improvements; see if you can reduce external stress, or eat more if you are not eating enough.

I think what Ray says should be taken in context, Cortisol, Estrogen, etc. are probably still required for proper bodily function, but in rather small amounts. Problem is, in most cases in our lives, there are a a lot of things that cause these hormones to increase and create an imbalance (everything from emotional stress to bad food to exogenous estrogen). I also think if you're under chronic stress your body will run out of resources to produce these hormones adequately so you might actually end up not producing enough cortisol (or maybe it's just a defensive response), anyway this is just my hypothesis, nothing to back it up except personal experience.

Thanks for your input; very much appreciated.

I`m kind of afraid of taking cortisone; stopthethyroidmadness claims that OTC products like Thorne`s adrenal Cortex seldom do the job; so they propose Hydrocortisone which can shut down ones cortisol poduction; I don`t want to depend on Hydrocortisone....
Do you think that by frst eating right for a few month and optimizing stress and the environment one can spare taking cortisone?

 

[FrankMa]

Interesting.
Did you come off that product in the meantime?

 

[FrankMa]

Interesting.
Did you come off that product in the meantime?

 

[FrankMa]

Very interesting, I've not seen a thyroid extract with adrenal complex within it. What brand is it, or do you have a picture? Glad to hear it's helping you!

Thorne has one product which has only cortisol: Adrenal Cortex
and another which has cortisol and andrenal in it: Cortrex Adrenal Support

 

[rooz7939]

Thanks for your input; very much appreciated.

I`m kind of afraid of taking cortisone; stopthethyroidmadness claims that OTC products like Thorne`s adrenal Cortex seldom do the job; so they propose Hydrocortisone which can shut down ones cortisol poduction; I don`t want to depend on Hydrocortisone....
Do you think that by frst eating right for a few month and optimizing stress and the environment one can spare taking cortisone?

I don't know much about the supplements and products you've mentioned unfortunately. I try to not mess with these things to be honest (hormones, etc), in my experience you can sometimes mess something else up by taking a supplement you don't understand. I think this is especially true when the root cause is still not solved, sometimes you can take supplement that "masks" your other issues for a while and then things get worse (or at least the same) later.

That's why I think diet (and most likely just eating more) and trying to remove external stress as much as possible (and SLEEP) are going to do much more long term. If you'd like to try supplements, one suggestion I would make is taking glands as supplements, you could try desiccated adrenals from a trusted source. The reason I think glands can work is because they usually contain other nutrients/hormones that are needed for proper function of that particular gland (I just read some older posts and steele-reverse has already mentioned glands too, so more anecdotal evidence) - as opposed to isolated hormones that might increase/decrease other hormones.

 

[rooz7939]

I don't know much about the supplements and products you've mentioned unfortunately. I try to not mess with these things to be honest (hormones, etc), in my experience you can sometimes mess something else up by taking a supplement you don't understand. I think this is especially true when the root cause is still not solved, sometimes you can take supplement that "masks" your other issues for a while and then things get worse (or at least the same) later.

That's why I think diet (and most likely just eating more) and trying to remove external stress as much as possible (and SLEEP) are going to do much more long term. If you'd like to try supplements, one suggestion I would make is taking glands as supplements, you could try desiccated adrenals from a trusted source. The reason I think glands can work is because they usually contain other nutrients/hormones that are needed for proper function of that particular gland (I just read some older posts and steele-reverse has already mentioned glands too, so more anecdotal evidence) - as opposed to isolated hormones that might increase/decrease other hormones.

Also for what it's worth, for me things improved when I started eating more fruits (sugar in general I suppose) and calories in general, as well as salt (if you can try milk with maple syrup and some salt, it works great for me and it tastes pretty good). I'm much calmer now and can actually handle small amounts of stress - I used to get really shaky (not exaggerating here, my legs and hands actually started to shake!) whenever I got in a situation where I was even a bit nervous or stressed - still probably a bit more sensitive than the average person but much better than I was before.

Keep in mind this will require persistence and time in order for you to see improvements, so don't expect for everything to improve overnight.

 

[mgrabs]

My naturopath put me on a dessicated thyroid supplement that also had adrenal glands in it. I'm doing well on it for the last 3 months

Are you still taking it? & what NDT has adrenal in it?

 

[steel_reserve]

I would be but I ran out. Need to get back in with the doc.

Progressive professionals thyro complex