I want to apologize for not posting anymore after my first two posts. I actually forgot all about this. I mean it totally disappeared form my mind. I only remembered about it when I was trying to start a blog about something else and realized, I already had one started here. Oh yeah, the blog. That's right. But here I am two years later. I just want to say that treatment for thyroid cancer was totally awful, don't ever let someone tell you that thyroid cancer is the good cancer. But it actually worked out in my favor because since it also was discovered that I had other thyroid disorders as well, removing the thyroid alleviated the suffering I had experienced for years as a result of fluctuating hormones. I am now stable on thyroid replacement medication and doing well. If you are struggling with emotional ups and downs from a thyroid disorder, please feel free to post any questions you may have regarding how to advocate for the best treatment possible. I'm here as a resource to guide you on the path of well-being and health. In the future I may post links to studies that explain the connection between autoimmune disorders, stress, sleep deprivation, PTSD, depression, anxiety and metabolic disorders all related to thyroid dysregulation. If you have a specific question, I would be happy to send you on the path to finding the answers you're looking for.
I may post things from time to time about the thyroid but I am going to shift the focus of my blogging to another topic which will be about childhood brain disorders such as ADHD/ADD, autism, anxiety, bi-polar, selective mutism, etc. I think there may be a link between metabolic disorders/endocrine disorders and mental illness, specifically, childhood mental illness. I may be barking up the wrong tree on this one but I at least want to explore the possibility because this is what I believe happened to me. I won't post crap that I read on the internet unless it is from a vetted source. Most of the research I refer to comes mainly from peer reviewed articles from professional journals. This topic is interesting to me because in my family, we have a strong history of metabolic disorders, autoimmune disorders and mental illness. It could all be coincidence or not. We won't know if we do not explore the question.
I may be witnessing the process of the development of Hashimoto's in my youngest daughter right now as we speak. I will be observing her to see how that plays out. I know there are many new agey health folks out there who think they have the cure for Hashimoto's but I don't know how scientifically sound any of that is. I am certainly trying to modify the diet and do what I can by limiting fluoride, endocrine disruptors, goitrogens and all, but I don't think it will make a difference in my daughter. Hashimoto's is prevalent in the family and, at least in our case, may be completely unavoidable and unpreventable. But we will try anyway. Maybe she doesn't have Hashimoto's, but that would mean that she is experiencing extreme fluctuations in thyroid function with no known cause. She also suffers from a pretty severe anxiety disorder called Selective Mutism. I have read several articles now that show the connection between thyroid disorder and bipolar disorder. One study actually cited a connection between emotional dysregulation and thyroid fluctuations even within the range of normal thyroid function. Hyperthyroidism is associated with anxiety and rapid cycling in bi-polar patients. I believe that this is what had been happening to me. So this is a question I will be pursuing an answer to.
In the past, I would read articles just for the personal information without putting any thought in to saving citations and what not. So I have all this knowledge in my brain but I can't necessarily point you toward where exactly I found it. I am going to be changing that. I plan to start keeping a complete list of articles I have viewed and the goal is to post the citations so that others can verify what I am learning and also add input. This is a learning process for me so I don't claim to have all the answers, just some really relevant questions. As I ask the questions and seek the answers, I will share what I have learned.
If you would like to do research on your own, it is a little known fact that you can have access to medical journal databases for free if you access them from on-campus at a
public university library, at least in California. I don't know how things work in other states but it should be the same. A public university is a place of learning for the
PUBLIC!!! You don't have to be a student. You already paid for it with your taxes. So please take advantage of this free resource. If this is something you are interested in but don't know how to do it, ask and I will try to guide you through it. Also, ask a librarian!!! Librarians are God's gift to the world. Their whole purpose in life is to help you find information. Isn't it so amazing that we live in a country where we have access to all the world's knowledge for free? This is what it means to live in a democracy. You just have to learn to access it. I am happy to hold your hand through the process if it seems intimidating. It really isn't as hard as it seems.
Please forgive any minor misspellings or grammatical errors. I do my best but I also write these fast without the opportunity to really proof the work. Remember, I also have young children and my first priority is to their care and not to writing the perfectly perfect blog. Thank you for your time. And remember, visit the sponsors.
