All Is Grace

i have spent the past three years doing constant research. from the time Joe and i got married, i felt something change in my body. i was 39. when i started gaining weight that i couldn’t explain (because nothing changed–not my nutrition, not my workouts, not my stress level), people kept saying to me, “you’re just happy. this happens.” umm, no. gaining twenty pounds doesn’t just happen when you get happy and you’re still working out an hour a day and eating a completely Paleo diet. no. i started researching thyroid problems. early menopause. adrenal issues. gut health. i researched nutrition plans. symptoms. exercise programs to deal with specific problems. supplements. tests. types of doctors. after dealing with the extra pounds for 4 months, I finally made an appointment for the physical i’d put off for 10 years, and she ordered bloodwork. my thyroid numbers were just above the normal range, so she treated it with prescription meds for hypothyroid, and told me to take them. i took them. six weeks later, my numbers were up again, and she increased my dosage. six weeks later, they had leveled out so we left things alone. i kept taking the meds.

for a couple of months i woke up feeling like i’d gotten some sleep, then that ended again. i couldn’t drop an ounce of that extra 20 pounds, whether i upped my workout or toned it down, stuck with cardio or did straight resistance. i even dropped my calories to 1000 a day for a while, with double workouts. then i said screw it and ate whatever the heck i wanted to eat and only did yoga. i would lose 3 pounds, then gain back 5 in a matter of 2 weeks, with the same program. and i felt. like. crap. all the time. a year into my diagnosis, i went to another doctor who ran the same tests. my numbers were up again. we kept a food journal of every morsel that went in my mouth for a month, along with my workout calendar. she just looked at it and said, “i don’t know. it looks like you’re doing all the right things” she referred me to an endocrinologist who ran my numbers again, and i convinced her that we needed to check for hashimotos. sure enough, the tests reflected hashis, and she told me i needed to cut gluten completely, which i did. all signs pointed to an immune disorder, and she assured me that if i dealt with that, it would straighten itself out. i did an 8-week elimination diet and determined that i was, indeed, sensitive to dairy, brown rice, white potatoes, and sugar. i never reintroduced the gluten. she encouraged me to do only cardio, and a lot of it, to see if i could lose some weight from there. nope. i dropped 5 pounds, gained 6 back. dropped 4 pounds, gained 2 back. i went back to her in tears three months later, and begged her to give me weight loss meds. she did. after a two-month insurance run-around (it didn’t cover the meds), i did 10 weeks of weight loss meds. i lost 8 pounds. i had to stop taking the meds (they’re a narcotic–you can only do a 12-week cycle). i gained back six pounds within two weeks eating exactly the same way i ate on the meds (oh, and while i was taking them, i had numbness in my fingers and toes, blurred vision, dizziness upon standing, seriously short temper, headaches, and ringing in my ears. it was awesome.) that was February. it is now July. i weigh 141.8 pounds as of this morning (my happy weight is about 130…i was 126 when all of this started).

i just made another doctor’s appointment. but i made it realizing that it will make absolutely no difference in what happens with my thyroid or my weight whatsoever. i need a pap test to make sure i don’t die of cervical or ovarian cancer. otherwise, the doctor is worthless to me. i’m pretty sure my thyroid numbers are up again. they’ll want to increase my meds again.

i’m so over all this crap.

something is wrong. meds aren’t fixing it.

so. today i started Plexus. i drank the pink drink. tomorrow i will do that again, and Thursday, i’m going to start taking a probiotic and a cleanse that will help me heal my gut. i’m going to fix what’s wrong with my immune system, and then i’m going to figure out how to stop taking medicines that are only treating the symptoms. i’m going to deal with this in a way that will deal with the cause of the problems. today is my day 1. i’m paying attention to how i feel, taking my measurements, monitoring my sleep (yay, fitbit charge hr!!). we’ll see if the scale budges.

i’ll keep you posted.

and i’ll see what the doctor says on Friday.