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The tortoise and the hare: the STTM movement is the tortoise, but we’re winning!!

Hardly a person hasn’t heard Aesop’s fable of the tortoise and the all-too-confident hare, running their I’ll-prove-to-you-who’s-boss race. The hare was FAST and certain to win the run. But the ever-so-committed tortoise, even if slow, slower and slowest…was steady…and won the race.

Until recently, I thought our thrust and determination to change the Big Pharma, zombie-doctoring medical system in the treatment of hypothyroid would be like the hare. We’d get the attention of the mass media through our great determination, shout the message of a FAR better thyroid treatment, and create huge change.

But I think I was wrong. Change has occurred, but we have been doing it like the tortoise…slow and steady.

Slowly but steadily, we are seeing more and more doctors starting to “get it”, even if they still have a way to go. Slowly but steadily, folks are finding out why they have less stamina than others, or depression, or rising cholesterol, or fibromyalgia, or thinning hair in the face of the dogged “normal” diagnosis…all due to an inadequate medication called T4, aka Synthroid, Levoxyl, Eltroxin, et. al. and a lousy lab called the TSH.

Slowly but steadily, folks are finding out about desiccated thyroid to treat their hypothyroid, and cortisol to treat their adrenal fatigue.

Even the STTM book has been like the tortoise. Literary agents didn’t get it, nor did huge publishing companies. I finally stopped counting, but I bet I had over 200 rejections. They all thought it was simply “another” thyroid book. So the fruition of the STTM book came out of true sweat and tears, and a lot of cuss words as I squirmed through my frustrations. Yet, the STTM book–a PATIENT-TO-PATIENT book of which I was only the messenger, is not only a steady seller like the tortoise was steady, but sales keep growing every month, reviews are excellent, and lives ARE changing. How can you criticize a message, whether the STTM site or the book, that is based on the positive and critical experience of thousands of patients around the world!!

Change IS happening! Like the tortoise, we’re winning the race and creating change, bit by bit, whether it’s via STTM, various internet thyroid groups, other good books, or just word of mouth. We’re all a part of it. But we can’t be complacent, because it’s truly obvious by blogs and websites I read that there’s still a huge body of hypothyroid patients still suffering on T4 who need to find out what WE have found out. But it will happen, bit by bit. 🙂

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Endocrine society says T3 can be substituted for T4–WHAT TOOK YOU SO LONG!!!

Shock and amazement.

At the 90th annual meeting of the Endocrine Society, it was announced that T3 can be an effective substitute for T4. And…the target TSH was .5 – 1.5.

DUHHHHHHH.

But it’s GOOD news.

OK, so…

1) it’s light years behind what patients had already figured out for a longgggg time
2) it’s not as effective as being on desiccated thyroid (which has exactly what your thyroid would be giving you: T4, T3, T2, T1 and calcitonin)
3) the TSH needs be even LOWER when you are adequately treated.
4) NO THYROID TREATMENT SHOULD BE BY THE LOUSY TSH AT ALL….

….but it’s a GOOD STEP in the right direction!!

http://www.endocrinetoday.com/view.aspx?rid=28931

p.s. Maybe if some of those Endo’s would open their minds to what PATIENTS HAVE LEARNED on this site and the book, they might finally make the next great step!! TAKE THIS INFORMATION INTO YOUR DOCTOR’S OFFICE!! It’s the power YOU have to change this mess!

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My cholesterol is 167…thanks to my more optimal thyroid treatment

STTM cholesterol is good

(This post was updated to the present day and time. Enjoy!)

I was lucky.

My cholesterol hadn’t started to raise yet when I was on Synthroid and later Levoxy for nearly 20 years. But the risk was strong that it was going to, because all-too-many on a T4-only medication report having a climbing cholesterol number, sooner or later, along with potential heart problems and/or elevated CRP (C-reactived protein–a measure of one’s inflammation levels). Yes, it’s individual, but it’s common.

And what do their doctors do next if any of the above occur? Put them on statins with all the lovely side effects: muscle aches & pains, memory loss, and peripheral neuropathy.

My mother is the classic example.

We have absolutely no heart problems in our family history that I know of. Yet, here was my mother who, in her 60’s, was suddenly in the hospital having a balloon procedure on her heart, called an Angioplasty, done to open up a clogged artery to her heart. Huh??

And years later….

It was only years later, when I become a thyroid patient activist, that I could look back and see why that happened to her. She had been on a T4-only medication for the majority of her adult life, aka Synthroid!

Today, as patients are switching to natural desiccated thyroid like Armour, Naturethroid and WP Thyroid and/or others, and as they are allowed by their informed doctors to raise NOT according to the TSH but by the complete elimination of symptoms as well as the free T3 and free T4…VOILA…. their once-high cholesterol….FALLS!!

But guess what else falls? Your CRP if it’s also caused by the rising cholesterol.

CRP stands for C-Reactive Protein, and it becomes elevated in response to certain forms of inflammation. With that elevation comes the heightened risk of heart attacks and strokes. And guess what: continued hypothyroid (as found with T4-only treatment) can result in an increased CRP level, we’ve noted before.

On an optimal amount of desiccated thyroid, which for me was 4 grains for years (3 1/2 grains after menopause), my CRP is 0.9. Ideal is less than one. Bingo.

***Have a story to share about your improved lipid or CRP levels since you became optimal on Natural Desiccated Thyroid? Let us know. Even adding T3 to your T4 is a huge step, thyroid friends!

JanieSignature SEIZE THE WISDOM

  • Proof in research! Check out this study done in 2007–the higher the TSH, the worse your lipids. Ironically, even a TSH IN RANGE does this, according to the experience of MILLIONS of patients!! Thanks Nita for bringing this to my attention!
  • Have you Liked the STTM Facebook page? It gives you daily inspiration and information!

 

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The mainstream media–monkey-see, monkey-do.

Have you ever had someone say something in JUST a way that it hits you between the eyes?? That’s what Diane did to me. She’s a thyroid and adrenal patient, and we were discussing the way a huge medical website still gives out backwards and harmful thyroid treatment information, telling patients to “raise their Synthroid” to counter their continuing hypothyroid symptoms (which doesn’t work), or pronouncing that because their TSH is “normal”, those symptoms are not related to hypothyroid (they are.) This huge website has kept patients sick for YEARS, and is one of the main reasons I created STTM!

And Diane said to me “Somehow the true message needs to get into the main stream.”

Boink! That just hit me squarely between the eyes! Sure, I’ve been saying the same in a different way for years–that our message needs to get out. But when Diane mentioned the “mainstream”, it hit me.

Here we are, victims of a medical scandal which has been going on for 50 years, and which has effected HUNDREDS OF MILLIONS all that time. Some of those victims are dead; and many more are still alive, with new victims happening DAILY. Yet, the “mainstream media” has never taken the time or interest to report on this. HUHHH??

Wikipedia defines the mainstream media as the section of the media specifically envisioned and designed to reach a very large audience, and that might include television, radio, newspapers and magazines. Yet, what do you see on any of those mediums? You see the regurgitation of the old-boy, Pollyanna methods of hypothyroid diagnosis and treatment–the use of the TSH and total T4, plus T4-only meds like Synthroid, Levoxyl, Levothyroxine, et al. And if there is mention of desiccated thyroid, it’s bare. YAWN.

Some pundants feel that there is a form of literary censorship going on in the main media…i.e. if it’s not sensational, forget it. Others will cite bias and manipulation by those that report, especially in the political arena.

But what I lean to believe is that there’s a monkey-see, monkey-do mentality in the media. Namely, the mainstream media lazily conforms itself to the loudest, longest or most financially-influential voice. And who’s had that voice in the thyroid treatment arena?? The money-grubbing pharmaceuticals, who thrust billions of dollars into medical schools, besides their bright-eyed reps, to eventually convince every doctor since the early 1960’s that the lousy T4-only medications (Synthroid, Levoxyl, et al), and the dubious TSH lab tests, are from God Almighty.

So, that lie keeps being repeated, ad nauseum, and the TRUTH, which comes from everyday patients all around the world, gets ignored by the mainstream media. Thus, millions out there still sit, miserable or compromised in their day-to-day lives, and on a myriad of other pills to counter the lingering symptoms…because their main contact with the world–the mainstream media–is deaf and dumb–and they have not yet found Stop the Thyroid Madness, and may not for years!

So….what can YOU do?? Contact the mainstream media. SCREAM at the mainstream media. DOG the mainstream media. I have worked hard to put YOUR truth up here and in the book. You can help by spreading that word, one by one, like the Lilliputians who moved the giant.

*To contact ABC, go here.
*To contact MSNBC, go here or email Health@MSNBC.com
*To contact CBS, go here. Use the drop down menu to click on a news program
*To contact Fox News, go here.
*To contact CNN, go here.
*The top 20 Women’s magazines are here.

Want to add more emails or website URL’s for contact? Just add a comment to this post below.

**Patients are reporting that the STTM book is even better than the website! Yeehaw! To order your copy, go to the publishing website here. There are also options to order one for your doctor, and one for Oprah!

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If this is normal, I’m not impressed!

Screen Shot 2015-09-03 at 2.06.02 PMThis page has been updated to the present day and time. Enjoy!

In 2008, I was getting to know a 40-something relative-in-law whom I hadn’t known long, but could tell we would click! She’s one of those people who could say things in a way that I’d be on the floor, laughing.

When she found out I had written the Stop the Thyroid Madness book, she got a copy and read it. And as she read, her eyes got bigger…and bigger…and bigger. The Thyroid Stimulating Hooey chapter was especially an eye-opener for her.

Turns out she has had fatigue problems for at least 14 years (while being told she was normal), starting right after her daughter was born. And that fatigue showed in her eyes and her demeanor (while being told she was normal). But that’s not all. She’s continually gained weight all these years (while being told she was normal), even though she eats like a bird (while being told she was normal), and has enough depression to warrant an anti-depressant (while being told she was normal). She was also getting worried about her cholesterol (but of course, she’s normal). And finally, she had low cortisol symptoms (while being told she was normal).

14 years of being pronounced “NORMAL” is as crazy-making as it get, don’t you think?

Why was she continually told she was normal? Because the TSH lab result said so. It always…always fell in that crazy-making “normal” range. And like so many doctors, her doctor believed ink spots on a piece of paper over all her very clear symptoms of NOT being “normal”. Talk about bringing her to tears.

I sent her to a MUCH better and hopeful doctor.

In 2006, the World Health Organization defined health as a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity. So…if you stuck “normal” in front of that definition of health, as misinformed, TSH-obsessed doctors so routinely tell us we are, it means that we have the symptoms expected of one who is in complete physical, mental and social well-being. Then why don’t we feel that way?????

Yessirree, somewhere along the medical perspective timeline, the ability to pay attention to the obvious clinical presentation of clear hypothyroid symptoms ran right down into the sewer. And with that loss has come hundreds of millions of hypothyroid patients worldwide with the schizophrenic diagnosis of “normal” along with raging symptoms thanks to ink spots on a piece of paper called the erroneous TSH range. And that is exactly why this website is necessary, as is the book and YOUR demands for better treatment.

I was schizophrenically “normal” for nearly 20 years while I had miserable and even debilitating symptoms. My relative had been for 14. How about YOU?

JanieSignature SEIZE THE WISDOM

** “Like” the STTM Facebook page for daily tips, wisdom, and/or humor.

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