Thyroid Disorder & Adrenal Fatigue: Personal Struggles
An estimated 1 in 8 women will develop an issue with their thyroid in their lifetime, and about 20 million Americans are affected by a thyroid disease or disorder. (1) This pretty much means that either you or someone you know currently is dealing with or has dealt with some form of thyroid problem.
My thyroid problem wasn’t diagnosed by my general practitioner, and honestly the symptoms I presented with the doctor just looked at me weird. You know the look where you can just feel them thinking, “I haven’t a clue what you’re talking about. Are you sure it isn’t all in your head?” I was dealing with extreme muscle soreness that came on after a 2 week family vacation to Florida.
Let me take you back a bit so you can understand a little about me and where I was at this time in my life. I had reached my weight loss goal in 2010 and had lost 65lbs. A couple years later I detoxed off of anti-depressants I was on for 18 years of my life. I controlled my depression symptoms with multiple tools but nutrition and exercise were two of them. I was easily in the best shape of my life, I thought. While my cardio health, and muscle strength were on point other things were brewing under the surface.
During the trip we were visiting the theme parks most days. This meant I was getting up early to get my workout in, which was a high intensity interval cardio program. I was walking 10-12 miles everyday. Was eating outside of my normal nutrition adding in more breads and desserts. Every night we would get home late. I would stay up prepping food for my youngest son who couldn’t eat from the parks and most restaurants due to food sensitivities. So I wasn’t getting more than 5-6 hours of sleep a night. I wasn’t allowing my body sufficient time to rest and repair from all I was putting it through.
While visiting my chiropractor he noticed that my lymphatic system had completely bogged down and wasn’t moving. This explained the extreme muscle soreness, as the lymph system is one of the key ways the body removes toxins. Each time I would use my muscles and break them down, like you do in more intense workouts with strength training, the lactic acid was remaining in my muscles creating pain. While it took 3 weeks to completely recover I didn’t exercise. I increased my water intake to at least a gallon a day, did lymphatic breathing, and visited my chiropractor weekly. The lengthy recovery period along with the initial problem was what lead to determining that my thyroid wasn’t fully functioning. When the thyroid isn’t doing it’s job many systems in our bodies struggle to perform their tasks.
Soon after recovering from the extreme muscle soreness I began to deal with brain fog, where I’d have problems carrying on a conversation. Intelligent or not I couldn’t follow. I had fatigue that I struggled to do even daily tasks. I managed to stay awake on hour long drives but it was a challenge. Any activity like a walk around the neighborhood would make me so tired I’d fall asleep afterwards. Most days I would take a nap at some point. Which up until then I rarely would take a nap. I also became more moody, and would snap easily at little things that frustrated me. This was also due to my adrenal fatigue. My adrenals had been helping me continue to function, and adapt to my regular way of life while my thyroid had stopped functioning at full force for too long. The adrenals couldn’t do it anymore.
Since then I’ve also dealt with periods being irregular, frequency and intensity. I’m cold the majority of the time, hands and feet pretty much always cold. Also I’ve dealt with longer recovery times for pulled muscles or other injuries.
Over the last year and a half I have incorporated a lot of different tools to gain energy, fight the brain fog and heal my body naturally. Throughout this series of blogs I will be sharing what nutrition changes I have made, where I am with exercise, dealing with stress, sleep, the doctors I see regularly, and some of the supplements I use.
I realize every person is different which means their symptoms will vary, especially depending on the type of thyroid disorder they are dealing with. Also what works for one person will not always work for another, but I didn’t know until I tried myself. The natural healing process isn’t as cut and dry as take two pills and call me in the morning. It takes time and patience. Something that I wear thin on plenty. However I have seen major improvements over the year and a half, and I look forward to sharing it with you.
Thank you for reading Thyroid Disorder & Adrenal Fatigue: Personal Struggles blog. If you have any questions please feel free to send me a message here.
To read the rest of the blogs in this series check out the links below:
