I have no thyroid (it was surgically removed due to lumps in it) and am wondering what will happen to my body if I stop taking the medicine that replaces its function.
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As someone with hypothyroidism who had to go a month without medication because of being in between insurance policies, it was not good. I felt tired, fatigued, no energy to do what I enjoy, I had a hard time falling asleep and when I did it was tough to stay awake, I didn’t eat as much as I do. I did not feel like my usual self. It really felt like something was stopping me from doing what I wanted. My doctor wasn’t kidding when she told me the thyroid gland controls most functions in your body. Please take your medication as prescribed. Even if you forget, take it at the moment you remember.
Thyroid hormone is the “Go” button for nearly all cellular processes, no matter what the different organelles and proteins do individually.
Thyroid says, “Go”, and your body digests, uses energy, copies, fixes, transports, makes and repairs, cleans up, etc…metabolism.
Without thyroid hormones, your cells do only enough of that to maintain themselves, and less and less of what they ship out to the rest of rhe body.
So, yeah, you’ll get fatigued, feel gross, slow down, and nothing will work quite right. Connective tissues and epithelial layers sort of slowly fall apart. Your heart and brain start dragging ass, and the heart muscle can’t repair itself in the tiny moments of rest you get between heartbeats. You start to gain weight, get cold easily, have dry skin, poor hair quality, have constipation and poor digestion, joint andmuscle pain, depression, brittle fingernails and eventually brittle bones, balance problems, goiter, memory and mood trouble, infertility, and more.
As it goes on, especially with ZERO thyroid production, hoarseness, hair loss, loss of taste and small, mental fog, cognitive decline, puffy hands, feet, face and swollen legs, thickening of skin, low body temp, inability to keep warm, slow or irregular heart beat. Peripheral nerve damage an give you tingling, pain, or numbness in extremities. You will suffer immune problems, and recovery from injury, effort, or strain will be slow. You can get have slowed speech, mental health issues of many types, concentration and memory issues. Your body has trouble regulating blood sugar and cholesterol. The LACK of thyroid can interfere with the function of many other hormones like prolactin and cortisol.
If TOTALLY untreated long enough, myxedema occurs, and can result in hypothermia, coma, loss off consciousness, and eventually death.
You need thyroid.
You don’t NEED the thyroid gland to survive but it is like an administrator of sorts of many bodily functions so you will start experiencing signs and symptoms of the chaos induced by having no gland: loss of hair, nail and tissue fragility, dry skin, low energy, low libido, cold intolerance, slowdown, sleepiness, weight gain, depression, puffy face, carpal tunnel syndrome, etc.
Hey welcome to the no thyroid club! Ive had mine out for like 5 years. I find if I forget to take my synth for a day or 2 I just get really tired and sluggish, then my wife reminds me to go take my medicine. Good luck with recovery and further treatments, hope you don’t have to go through RAI or anything further
I have had a slow thyroid (TSH greater than 30) my entire life but was only relatively recently diagnosed in 2013 at age 23. I just can’t even begin to describe what the meds did for me. The overwhelming exhaustion being gone was huge. Now my TSH sits at a much better 6. I’ve experienced most symptoms that others have mentioned, but I still have my thyroid. It just is terrible at its job.
SPEAK TO YOUR DOCTOR FOR INFORMATION!
There are varying reasons people need to take thyroid hormone replacement… if your lumps were cancerous not only do you need THR to avoid hypothyroidism cause you no longer have a thyroid, but also TSH needs to be suppressed to avoid a recurrence, so take your meds!
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