Iodine Overdose Caused Mysterious Chronic Illness

[freyasam]

@freyasam @sixers do you have mercury amalgams in the mouth? Have you checked for Hashimoto's?

No mercury amalgams. Yes I was checked and I didn't have abnormal thyroid antibodies.

 

[Jam]

Which brand of Lugol's was it?

 

[sixers]

@freyasam @sixers do you have mercury amalgams in the mouth? Have you checked for Hashimoto's?

I also don't have any mercury amalgams. I checked for Hashimoto's before taking iodine and I did not have it. My thyroid levels and antibodies were normal. I would doubt I have it now either.

I am not discussing people having very strong bad reactions to iodine, but that neck hurting is most probably because not taking selenomethionine. It is reported and I have experienced it. I have also experienced that pain without iodine, just by using red light therapy on the thyroid. Selenomethionine always made the pain go away, whether it was caused by iodine or RLT.

That's interesting, thanks for sharing that. I won't rule it out, but I tried eating a large number of brazil nuts when my neck was hurting and it did not help. My suspicion is that the neck hurting is thyroiditis and is basically just too much oxidative stress in the thyroid. This could have to do with low selenium, but also any other bottlenecks in the antioxidant system. Chris Masterjohn has a good video discussing this (You can start around 15:00)
My theory is that, in my case, copper was the issue because I also have other signs of kinda-low copper. For example, I have trouble with certain foods that seems like a subtle high histamine reaction which was somewhat resolved taking DAO, thus I feel my DAO levels are not adequate and therefore my copper is not adequate. It sounds a bit complicated, but I think my problem is low NAD+ -> poor vitamin A conversion -> poor copper bioavailability -> poor superoxide dismutase -> more susceptible to oxidative stress. This could be wrong so I'll keep an open mind. Regardless, I think the neck hurting is just a sign of oxidative stress and, as Chris Masterjohn discusses, it is impossible to pin it down to one cause for everyone.

Thank you sixers I am glad to hear someone that has experienced very similar things. It makes me feel much better that I can relate to someone.
A few points:
- I also experienced pain in the neck and the symptoms of hypothyroidism.
- My thyroid looks normal now but it just recently normalized after I started using T3 and some T4 2 months ago. Before that my TSH was above 2 and my T4 was always on the lower side and I bet my T3 would have been even lower due to poor liver function and thus impaired conversion from T4 to T3. If you are open to it, thyroid might not be a bad idea, however, like niacinamide, it might make you feel kinda "excited", and restless.
- I also couldn't tolerate anything with iodine in it including dairy, seafood, and even eggs, and had to avoid most of them for the first year.
- Okay so on the B3 - a few months ago when I took it, my neurological symptoms and anxiety got even worse, but now that my state is better, and I eat plenty of sugar and take thyroid, B3 is helpful. I am always short of breath, but I feel like I can almost breath deep again when I take B3 - I can definitely tell it increases my glucose oxidation and therefore CO2
- Maybe neither of us tolerated b3 well because it's almost like it did its job too well in lowering FFA and increasing glucose oxidation but we didn't have the necessary materials for it. -- it's like the iodine put us in a "hibernation" withdrawal state. I'm not sure about you but I could hardly handle any caffeine or nicotine so basically anything that increases glucose utilization makes things worse for me unless used super conservatively. I really am not sure - you might be on to something with the pyruvate dehydrogenase but that is out of my understanding level.
- Let me know how the lipoic acid goes
- Did you take copper as a single supplement or did you eat it from high-copper foods like oysters and liver? I think having it in food would make a difference.
- Another possibility of iodine damage susceptibility might be low selenium - I might butcher this and I have to look into it more but I think selenium combats the oxidative stress that occurs in the thyroid and I believe that's why Peaters recommend iodine taken with 200mcg selenium.
- The more I keep thinking back on my symptoms the more I see overlap with symptoms of a bad B1 deficiency - it would be depressing yet relieving if it were something that simple so I'm going to give it a try
- also would you say that some of your symptoms resembled serotonin syndrome? - my senses have been completely numb and they are just starting to come back. I completely forgot that life is supposed to be fun. My digestive issues were horrible too which could explain the high serotonin symptoms - functionally my GI tract is just completely different because I have to tiptoe around every food I eat and still get gas a bloating.

Thank you for the reply, and best of luck to you too! I hope we can both figure this out.

Ah, cool to hear the situation is actually even more similar than I thought! Yes, I tried thyroid and sadly I do get those excitation symptoms as you suggested. The main problem being I just can't sleep when taking it. It's good that you got b3 to benefit you. It makes me what to try thyroid again lol. It would be nice if I could better pin down why it doesn't work for me.

I tried eating high copper foods for a while: liver, bee pollen, ect. They did not give me any positive or negative effects. Then I tried supplementing copper, around 6mg/day for a week or two. I got a lot of negative symptoms from that: headaches, bruising/poor bruise healing. Most notably, I got paresthesia which is still here now, around 8 months later. I think there might be a viscous feedback loop where low copper -> low energy -> inability to absorb copper.

Yeah I can relate to the feeling of senses being numb/life not being fun. I feel very energetically muted lol. I think what you said about iodine leading to a hibernation withdrawal state seems really accurate. Are you aware of Brad Marshall from Fire In A Bottle? He has an interesting framework of torpor metabolism. He thinks that it is characterized by high NADH/NAD, lactate/pyruvate, and acetyl-CoA. I think I have reason to suspect I am high in all these things which makes me attracted to his framework. He primarily focuses on obesity and, like you, I have not gained weight and in fact my weight seems to have nothing to do with the number of calories I eat; however, I think his framework may still apply as he describes that not everyone gains weight in this torpor state. He was also an inspiration for me ordering alpha-lipoic acid.

I'm sure we'll all figure it out! Glad we got this going.

 

[geusterman]

I don’t think it’s been mentioned that some people, very few, can be allergic to iodine. If you lead read Dr. Brownstein’s books and others you’ll get a much bigger understanding of iodine supplemention and correction.

 

[Makrosky]

That's interesting, thanks for sharing that. I won't rule it out, but I tried eating a large number of brazil nuts when my neck was hurting and it did not help. My suspicion is that the neck hurting is thyroiditis and is basically just too much oxidative stress in the thyroid. This could have to do with low selenium, but also any other bottlenecks in the antioxidant system

In reality, the full "iodine protocol" includes 2 grams of vitamin C x day. Maybe because of this.

Brazil nuts is really not a good way to ingest the required selenium for iodine.

 

[Seb]

In 2014 I took 2 mg Lugol's iodine daily for 1-2 weeks. It threw me into a crisis state and I had to stop taking the Armour thyroid I was on. Suddenly I was unable to exert myself physically without post-exertional malaise. It pretty much pushed me into full-on ME/CFS that I've had since then. I don't think iodine was the only culprit as I already had health issues and a more mild chronic fatigue. But iodine was the straw that broke the camel's back. This was the first time I could hardly exercise at all without feeling totally exhausted or paralyzed after. Also tachycardia, feeling like my limbs were made of lead, etc.

Ever since I've had extreme difficulty tolerating thyroid. It took 6 years of experimenting with tiny doses to be able to tolerate cynoplus and cynomel. And I was able to take moderate doses of thyroid for two years, which helped symptoms, but did not cure the ME/CFS.

However, I recently have had thyroid intolerance return. I had to go off all thyroid for 2 weeks (and my weight has started to balloon because of it). Now I'm on 2 mcg of T3 per day (tiny dose) and I have a bad reaction to it. Overheating, feeling like my skin is on fire even while temp is normal. Anxiety, insomnia. I'm clearly hypothyroid but my body rejects thyroid supplementation for some mysterious reason. I never had this issue until that iodine disaster of 2014.

I'll watch this thread with interest to see if you figure anything out or if anyone has advice for me. Basically that iodine totally wrecked my metabolism and drastically reduced my quality of life, and 9 years later I'm still trying to climb out of the hole. I hope you have better luck than I did, OP. You likely will, since I was in my 30s and had significant health problems to begin with

Thank you for the response freyasam, I am sorry to hear about your struggles.
- I also lost the ability to exert myself physically and any weight lifting caused rapid heart rate, struggling for air, muscle twitching, and burning etc... Standing up for short periods of time caused irritability, tingling in the hands and feet, unsteady gait, and poor posture. It really is a terrible feeling and I'm sorry you are experiencing these things.
- I also had a history of health issues - in my case it has been undereating and and over exercising. I've always been skin and bones. I also think the iodine was the tip of the iceberg for me and it was really the poor healt, isolation and anxiety that I had growing up that made the iodine so damaging. I'm very lucky I got so sick early on in my life because I see how important health is now and I'll never make a mistake like this again.
- I know freyasam it feels so isolating and helpless because you know there's no doctor that's going to fix it and it's such a rare reaction
- I'm going to try is B1 because I'm realizing there's a connection between B1 deficiency and serotonin syndrome, and the symptoms I portrayed resembled serotonin syndrome. My symptoms also closely resemble B1 deficiency like chronic fatigue, neuropathy, poor mental function, etc... I'll let you know how it goes.

 

[Seb]

Ah you took Energin topically! I thought it’s for oral usage.
I‘d definitely up the B1 for a while.

I did not know it was for oral use. I'm sure either way is fine but the absorption is probably different. I took 50mg of this old B-1 I had in my cabinet and I felt noticeably better today. I'm going to keep using it and hopefully going to get a better quality and less old Thiamine supplement. Do you know of any good brands with a B-1?

 

[Seb]

This sounds very strange. But not the first time I read similar scary reactions (not very often either). I don't know what could have happened, if it is the iodine at all. Seems very strange. @Peater this is why I get quite angry when people blindly tell others to start ingesting massive doses of iodine without selenium, etc. it is all "it is safe" and laughs and everything... until something happens.

Anyway, possible causes:
- Simply coincidence. It is not such a high dose. Keep in mind for surgical interventions povidone is used in extensive areas of the body for days or weeks, and some of that iodine gets absorved.
- Lack of selenomethionine thus you damaged your thyroid. But some blood tests and an ultrasound image should rule out this.
- You completely depleted other nutrients. Iodine is like pressing the gas pedal, if you are already deficient in other minerals/vits... and you ingest a lot of sugar... bad things can happen.
- Do you have amalgams?

Thank you for the reply Makrosky. I do not have amalgams. So essentially it could be a selenomethionine deficiency?

 

[Seb]

Ah, cool to hear the situation is actually even more similar than I thought! Yes, I tried thyroid and sadly I do get those excitation symptoms as you suggested. The main problem being I just can't sleep when taking it. It's good that you got b3 to benefit you. It makes me what to try thyroid again lol. It would be nice if I could better pin down why it doesn't work for me.

I tried eating high copper foods for a while: liver, bee pollen, ect. They did not give me any positive or negative effects. Then I tried supplementing copper, around 6mg/day for a week or two. I got a lot of negative symptoms from that: headaches, bruising/poor bruise healing. Most notably, I got paresthesia which is still here now, around 8 months later. I think there might be a viscous feedback loop where low copper -> low energy -> inability to absorb copper.

Yeah I can relate to the feeling of senses being numb/life not being fun. I feel very energetically muted lol. I think what you said about iodine leading to a hibernation withdrawal state seems really accurate. Are you aware of Brad Marshall from Fire In A Bottle? He has an interesting framework of torpor metabolism. He thinks that it is characterized by high NADH/NAD, lactate/pyruvate, and acetyl-CoA. I think I have reason to suspect I am high in all these things which makes me attracted to his framework. He primarily focuses on obesity and, like you, I have not gained weight and in fact my weight seems to have nothing to do with the number of calories I eat; however, I think his framework may still apply as he describes that not everyone gains weight in this torpor state. He was also an inspiration for me ordering alpha-lipoic acid.

I'm sure we'll all figure it out! Glad we got this going.

Poor reaction to thyroid (adrenaline) can be caused by a nutritional deficiency or low cholesterol so it kind of fits the theory that the iodine caused some kind of nutritional deficiency. Did you use T4 and T3 or just T3? I am no expert but I just thought I should throw that out there.

I am unfamiliar with copper and its actions, but I also don't really feel anything when eating high-copper foods like liver and oysters so I don't think that's what the problem is for me. I am looking into B1 right now. I felt noticeably better taking 50mg of an old B1 supplement today -- my cognition, communication, and emotional state was better today. I felt like actually talking to people today almost. I'll continue with the B1 and let you know how it goes.

Thank you for the resource, I'll check out Brad Marshall. Mans looks wild. His theory makes sense and fits right in with the bioenergetic point of view on health. The primitive anaerobic way of producing ATP, glycolysis, is kind of the fallback way of producing energy when the body is deficient in resources. People associate hypothyroidism with obesity but being very skinny seems to be just as much an issue with hypothyroidism. Ray Peat himself ate huge amounts of calories while staying skinny and his weight didn't stabilize til he took thyroid.

I'm glad we got this going too and best of luck to you! I'll make updates on this thread with things that worked for me!

 

[Seb]

I don’t think it’s been mentioned that some people, very few, can be allergic to iodine. If you lead read Dr. Brownstein’s books and others you’ll get a much bigger understanding of iodine supplemention and correction.

Thank you for the resource geusterman. Seems like it could be an allergy hence why I still experience symptoms when eating high iodine foods.

 

[Seb]

Which brand of Lugol's was it?

JCrow's 2%

 

[bell]

Thank you Bell. I kinda ruled B1 deficiency out because I took full doses of Energin topically, but I'm starting to realize that 25mg of thiamine is not that high and I take it every once in a while so it wasn't enough to rule it out. I'm also realizing again how close my symptoms align with a B1 deficiency and the connection of thiamine deficiency with serotonin syndrome; I definitely exhibited signs of serotonin syndrome or very high serotonin. I'll give B1 a shot.

I hope you find some answers Seb! Personally, I take about 400 mg of Benfo + TTFD a day (TTFD crosses the BBB, benfo helps my body more) - and I've tried lowering many times, and it always goes wrong.

And a heads-up ... if you've been deficient, then adding thiamine can cause re-feeding syndrome, where you feel worse before better - I was exhausted for a good month - here's a good article on it: Refeeding Syndrome in the Context of Thiamine Deficiency - Hormones Matter .

And there are cofactors like magnesium and taurine, and even manganese or glutathione can get depleted. It's worth doing some reading, and/or starting slowly.

And last one - this talks about how sugar impacts thiamine. I'm not anti-sugar, but if we're going to eat it, it's worth reading this. The Sugar - Thiamine Connection in Adverse Reactions

I hope you get what you need and feel much better soon

 

[Makrosky]

Thank you for the reply Makrosky. I do not have amalgams. So essentially it could be a selenomethionine deficiency?

If the symptoms persist after 2 years, I don't think it is related to selenomethionine anymore. It probably was at that time, but not now. Or maybe another nutrient in the antioxidant chain, as @sixers said.

Anyway, trying 100mcg of selenomethionine x day for a week or two might be a good test.

 

[OSMOSE]

I also had JCrow's lugol for a few weeks according to the brown stain protocol (with all the supplements) as an attempt to cure fungal infection five years ago, reached my saturation threshold and ran into some serious crisis, took months to resolve and ended up with more or less chronic throat pain that comes with mild hypo symptoms ever since... about the most stupid thing I've ever done. Not sure whether it's actual damage or rather simply the memory of the stress/trauma like allergies and obsessing over the symptoms instead of relaxing and normalizing them... haven't defused it yet in any case and I never had a single issue before. The only health modality that has helped me revert it to some extent has been dry fasting. Thank you doctor!

 

[Seb]

I hope you find some answers Seb! Personally, I take about 400 mg of Benfo + TTFD a day (TTFD crosses the BBB, benfo helps my body more) - and I've tried lowering many times, and it always goes wrong.

And a heads-up ... if you've been deficient, then adding thiamine can cause re-feeding syndrome, where you feel worse before better - I was exhausted for a good month - here's a good article on it: Refeeding Syndrome in the Context of Thiamine Deficiency - Hormones Matter .

And there are cofactors like magnesium and taurine, and even manganese or glutathione can get depleted. It's worth doing some reading, and/or starting slowly.

And last one - this talks about how sugar impacts thiamine. I'm not anti-sugar, but if we're going to eat it, it's worth reading this. The Sugar - Thiamine Connection in Adverse Reactions

I hope you get what you need and feel much better soon

Wow, that is quite a large amount daily. I'm going to try HCL + Prosultiamine in Energin. Maybe 100mg + 10mg for a while and see what happens.

Thank you for the resources and knowledge I really appreciate it!

 

[Seb]

If the symptoms persist after 2 years, I don't think it is related to selenomethionine anymore. It probably was at that time, but not now. Or maybe another nutrient in the antioxidant chain, as @sixers said.

Anyway, trying 100mcg of selenomethionine x day for a week or two might be a good test.

Good idea, thank you.

 

[StephanF]

….

By the way @StephanF what are you into lately? Any interesting discoveries? New techniques/products/theories you are using? Please share! :)

I am working on plasma diagnostics for an experimental fusion device, partially in connection with a professor and his student from UNR. My background is atomic spectroscopy and since high school my hobby is electronics. I just finished developing a 16-channel transimpedance amplifier for a 16 channel photodiode array. Now I am trying to use the same design for a 32-channel photomultiplier array, from Hamamatsu. The cutest detector ever! Yes, they sponsor my hobby!! I also help the student with the interpretation of time-resolved EUV spectra from a McPherson Model 310 grazing incidence spectrometer that we attached to the fusion device. Lots of fun! Also continue with an electrical soil density gauge that I developed for a small company in Carson City.

Finally got a small mill, need to clean out the garage a bit more so I can buy and install a medium-sized lathe, then I can do almost anything.

Lately, I bought an RF meter together with a friend of mine and saw how much RF was in my house. Got rid of my wireless telephone and took 3 of 4 antennas off my WiFi router. My TV also puts out signals even when powered off. I think I am going to buy a few power strips with timers so there is no RF generated in my house during the night. But cellular RF still comes in of course plus stuff from the neighbors and the power meter. But it is probably a good idea to reduce it to the minimum.

My family is not vaccinated, we all had Omicron last July with two days of very mild symptoms, took the ‘horse dewormer’ LOL as prescribed by our homeopathic physician. Neighbors and friends that were vaccinated had symptoms from 2-4 weeks from Omicron. My wife’s older sister died one week after being vaccinated, she was not very healthy. A former UCSD student died on the escalator at the Las Vegas airport, on his way to an interview, he vomited and collapsed, they couldn’t resurrect him, he was 25 years old. His parents were of course devastated he had no prior health problems. Of course, all campuses in California required vaccination, he graduated last spring and died this January. So sad. I will never get any vaccine anymore, my last vaccination was in 1984, requirements to attend UNR for my Ph.D. I am reading ‘Turtles all the way down’.

Oh, and I almost forgot: I experimented with ozonizing organic raspberries I buy from Costco, they usually get dots of black mold over the course of one week. Not anymore! After one week, they still look fresh with no mold. Also the paper on the bottom is just white, no trace of mold. I am going to expand on that and treat all my veggies with it. I saw that you can buy small battery operated ozonizers for the refrigerator, I might try that. I have an ozonizer from Sota Instruments, a Canadian company. They make Dr. C. Beck devices.

What are you up to?

 

[youngsinatra]

I also had JCrow's lugol for a few weeks according to the brown stain protocol (with all the supplements) as an attempt to cure fungal infection five years ago, reached my saturation threshold and ran into some serious crisis, took months to resolve and ended up with more or less chronic throat pain that comes with mild hypo symptoms ever since... about the most stupid thing I've ever done. Not sure whether it's actual damage or rather simply the memory of the stress/trauma like allergies and obsessing over the symptoms instead of relaxing and normalizing them... haven't defused it yet in any case and I never had a single issue before. The only health modality that has helped me revert it to some extent has been dry fasting. Thank you doctor!

I think Danny Roddy also said that he used the Brownstein iodine method for a while with the urinary saturation tests (or something like that) and got recommended to take like 25 or 50mg (don’t remember exactly) via iodoral tablets per day and he said he never felt more hypothyroid in his whole life than during that period.

I only used like 1-2mg of nascent iodine at most and it crashed my thyroid and got me almost into clinical hypothermia.

 

[youngsinatra]

Just opened facebook and saw this. What a coincidence.

 

[OSMOSE]

@youngsinatra Yes, the worse is I had noticed some of these comments before I begun the protocol, but got super chuffed at how it cleared the fungal infection like nothing else and went all the way...

I'm going to try and be consistent with clay poultices, it's said to work wonders but it requires regularity...