life after radioactive iodine

[yan_res]

Hi, I'm a 29 y/o male. I was diagnosed with graves' disease a few months ago and stupidly enough I went through the Radioactive iodne (10 meq) process instead of the antithyroid meds. It's not really my fault, the endo I had mislead me and told me some wrong things. He mainly told me that I have some sort of liver damage and that the meds doesn't really help and could hurt my liver even more.
But anyhow, now I'm on eltroxin (same as levothyroxine) for life. I'm still not balanced yet. My question is, how does peoples' lives look like living like this? do you feel good? has it made a difference in your life being basically without a thyroid? does it affect your relationships/sex life? ?
I feel like I have a low sex drive. does it get better when you get balanced?
and any advice on how do you deal with feeling like you've made a stupid mistake?

Thanks,
Yaniv

[LifewithNo_thyroid]

I had thyroid cancer in 09. Had whole thing removed. Was put on synthroid. I agree takes at least a year to get balanced. Your body makes 2 weeks, stores 2 weeks, uses 2 weeks. So what you are using now is what was made 6 weeks ago. At least that is what my endo doc at the time of surgery told me. After about 2 years it still wasn't working for me. My body couldn't convert t4 to t3. So i had to find a doctor who would try a desicated hormone (armour thyroid). Once on that turned around!! Won't ever go back to synthroid! Good luck to you! Give it time!

[prosyntax]

Any luck with finding a solution? I had no sex drive for about a year before being diagnosed with thyroid cancer. It has come back since starting desiccated thyroid medication. Many something to think about if you're on synthetic T4 medication.

[stella5349]

Here is a few things I learned after I had RAI.

The liver can become more toxified now and you have to make sure it can rejuevanate itself to help conversion

You may not be able to convert the T4 meds - only and most likely need to be balanced with a T3 med w/ T4 - or look at NDT combo meds

Iodine levels are inconsistant and since the thyroid bed is now dead - you may need to supplement with iodine to fully recover.

Magnesium and selenium levels are usually lowered now - should try supplementing.

A few months after RAI is nothing yet. Things mostly are not completely dead. Time is needed to know how much tissue will be ablated. It was nearly a year or more when I had known where I was truly at.

[yan_res]

Hey,

Thanks for trying to chear me up :)
I hope all goes well for you and that you'll find out it's not cancer and that you don't need the meds (I'll keep my fingers crossed for you). I'll be happy to hear how you're doing. I'll keep you updated on my balancing tryouts. It's all pretty new to me, only a couple of months and because of the endo I had I didn't get a heads up for it.
So anyhow I hope you'll be doing well.

Stay positive,
Yaniv

[TwistedHelix]

Hey yan,

Yes, I had surgery last Monday to remove a suspicious tumor from my thyroid.  I had the right lobe and isthmus removed.  I go tomorrow afternoon to have my stitches removed and find out if I have cancer.  If it is cancer, then I'll probably have the rest removed in a completion thyroidectomy, and then I will definitely be on meds.

I'm not on meds right now; my Endo wanted to wait several weeks after my partial thyroidectomy before testing levels because sometimes the remaining tissue can take up the slack and no meds are needed.  I feel okay right now.  Dealing more with the after-effects of surgery than anything else, but not feeling too bad, all things considered.  If I have cancer. . .well, I'll cry, for sure, but I'm trying not to borrow tomorrow's troubles for today, right?

I hope your levels are balanced really soon.  Okay, it's hearsay, but I have read several member's posts where they say it can be a bit of a rollercoaster ride until they get their levels right, but once that's done, they feel great.  Some even say better than they did before treatment.  Maybe it will be the same for you?  I hope it will, anyway.

Take it light,
Twisted Helix

[yan_res]

Hey, thanks for your reply. I know there's nothing to be done about past desicions. I'm just worried about how it's gonna effect my future. I saw in your profile that you underwent surgery (?), so are you now taking thyroid replacements meds as well? and are you balanced? and if so how do you feel in general?

Thanks for the reply, :)
Yaniv

[TwistedHelix]

Please don't beat yourself up about this decision; sometimes we must just base decisions on the information we have available.  Hindsight is 20/20 and all that.

I don't have Graves myself, but I've done extensive research because of my own thyroid problems.  My understanding from my research is that the anti-thyroid medications don't always work anyway, and many people wind up having to undergo radio-iodine ablation or surgery to resolve the problem.  And some of the anti-thyroid drugs (especially propylthiouracil) CAN cause serious liver damage.  See this article at the Mayo Clinic: http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/graves-disease/DS.

The point of most Graves treatment plans is to make you hypothyroid because it will solve the problem for the rest of your life.  It's the rare Graves bird that goes into remission without going hypo.  Properly treated hypothyroidism is seen as a much less serious problem than Graves.

You mention that you are yet balanced.  The low sex drive is a symptom of hypo--but then, you sound a little down, so the down mood could be affecting your sex drive, too.  And it could all be feeding into itself in a vicious cycle.  Be really assertive about getting your replacement therapy balanced, and try to come to terms with your decision, and I think once that's all good, you'll go back to your old self.

Good luck!
Twisted Helix