Tag: Flat STTM

I, Janie, am not very political. I’m kinda private. I see myself as representing patients solely. And I don’t let my ego push me to play like I’m the only valuable thyroid patient advocate out there.

But…I can see the benefit in tooting the horn about Stop the Thyroid Madness! Because I think it inspires all of YOU to know what you are a part of when you use any groups associated with STTM, or the website, or the book.

1) The Stop the Thyroid Madness revolution began in spirit in in 2002. That was when I created the Yahoo group Natural Thyroid Hormones after my own life started to make a miraculous change. And we began talking…and talking…and talking. And from all the incredible things we were learning came the REAL Stop the Thyroid Madness, first appearing on the net in December 2005…and growing all the time to what you see right now.

2) The Stop the Thyroid Madness book has been sent to over 33 countries besides the United States since 2008 and in multiple amounts. That is from the publishing company stats from a year ago, and there’s probably more now. And that’s nothing to sneeze about and is satisfying that the message of successful patient experience is going far and wide. It’s also been the #1 rated thyroid book several times. And it’s now in German and Swedish with more translations coming.

3) The STTM website gets so many monthly hits (and has for a few years and keeps growing!!) that I am constantly forced to increase the hosting memory over and over to handle it all.  This is why you may occasionally go to this site and it’s down–huge amount of hits at the same time. I keep trying to tackle it by increasing memory. And if YOU appreciate the website, please considering contributing to the burgeoning monthly hosting fees here. 

4) Yahoo’s NTH (Natural Thyroid Hormones) group is now over 10,000 members and is the NUMBER ONE thyroid patient discussion group on Yahoo! It’s run by excellent moderators, ready and willing to give you excellent patient-to-patient experience information to consider.

6) Janie is also seeing more and more of the following:

• Emails from doctors.  Yes, I continue to get a steady stream of contacts from wonderful doctors who are more than willing to ask questions about patient experiences as laid out on STTM, and that is nothing but GOOD. They are listening, one by one, and we appreciate each of you for doing that. Sure, we still have to deal with other doctors who are narrow-minded, arrogant and just plain awful. But the growth of more open-minded doctors is impressive, and they will eventually crowd out the id-jits.
• T4-only folks going downhill after a certain time of doing well. I know this outcome is hard to see when a T4-only treated thyroid patient feels they are doing well enough not to consider NDT, as if treatment is oh-so-individual. But sadly, when the failure of T4 hits, it can hit bad, like the young mother who did well for seven years on Synthroid, then came to me via phone coaching with the sudden misery of low cortisol. It had been creeping up all along.  Or the 68 year old who also felt she did well for 21 years on T4, and now finds herself on three other meds (BP, statin and anti-depressant) and a lot of misery. She ignored for years what she saw coming…:(
• Other websites in support of better thyroid diagnosis and treatment thanks to STTM.  STTM’s content concerning successful patient experiences has clearly influenced the way certain things are written about on other websites and books, even if the authors of the content don’t give any credence to where it came from. But it’s clear where it came from! I’ve been doing this long enough to see the progression, and STTM’s content has clearly influenced a lot of what you see on other thyroid websites and groups.

Bottom line: I am proud, and I am excited. I’m excited how Stop the Thyroid Madness has been SO influential in educating patients, changing lives…and changing the way many doctors are practicing.

And I’m just as excited to see the ways others have been inspired to contribute their own websites and groups and energy to this worldwide thyroid patient revolution, especially those who recognize that WE ARE IN THIS TOGETHER. i.e. it’s not just about one advocate or one website or one group.  Someday, this entire thyroid patient movement…represented by many websites and groups….will be in history books as the most UNIQUE and INFLUENTIAL movement for change ever done.

Congratulations to ALL of us! Let’s continue to “Stop the Thyroid Madness” though all the variety of websites and groups!!

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* Send your BEFORE AND AFTER desiccated thyroid treatment photos here (or you before and after adrenal treatment, etc)

* Have fun with FLAT STTM!!