It's official. And the winner is...Grave's Disease

[tnelson]

I'm so sorry to hear about how difficult this has been and is still being. I hope you have fully recognized, which I didn't for a while, that the emotional roller coaster is very much part of the illness. Insomnia is also something that really was a problem for me and I'm sure you know it's one of the effects of hyperthyroidism. And isn't it ironic, that just when you should be eating more because you're probably losing weight, the appetite just disappears. I felt like I had a mountain of food in front of me and no desire to eat it. Also, I had burning and tearing in my eyes, which turned out just to be irritation and dry eye.

The Paleo diet is very important for me, because I really can't eat any grains without terrible digestive reactions. I am very excited about being able to make cookies using ground pumpkin seeds for flour. You mentioned that you are considering staying on the Paleo diet. I certainly would always advise staying away from foods that upset your digestion. However I don't commit myself to any particular diet. If a food likes me I like it! The Paleo diet is right now the best fit for my digestion. I also believe that since I am gluten intolerant the safest course of action is to stay away from gluten because there are a lot of warnings that reacting to gluten brings on additional autoimmune diseases. And who needs that!?

I didn't have thyroid surgery because the hyperthyroidism responded to methimazole and I wasn't allergic to the medicine. I have considered the surgery (and even interviewed surgeons) however because with medicine you have to monitor, and monitor… And monitor some more… I decided I wasn't interested in RAI ablation, but lots of people do well with it. I'll be interested to know how you do. I did talk to a friend who had surgery, and she said that it was absolutely fine and that she is on synthetic thyroid hormone now, feeling great and having no problems at all from her thyroid.

Good luck with the surgery next week. I really hope it goes well so that you can get off this medicine that is causing you so many problems.