On Tuesday (2-19-13) I received a phone call from a nurse from the hospital telling me to call back regarding my lab results. I called back over my lunch. No nurse was available, so I insisted they find one, I would likely not talk to them otherwise. A nurse comes on the phone and tells me my OB/GYN wanted me to know that my TSH came back very low, <0.02 uU/mL (0.4-5.5), which means I have hyperthyroidism. Whoa. My prolactin came back normal and I wasn't pregnant. The nurse said the doc recommended I see an endocrinologist as soon as possible. Shit... I went back to lunch and had a mini meltdown. Luckily a great person I work with sat and talked with me and calmed me down. She had actually had this condition and gave me information. We decided it could be worse, at least I don't have cancer, and this can be treated. OK, I can do this...
That night I left a message at the endocrinology office of a doc that my insurance covered and he came recommended. The next day, Wednesday, I didn't take lunch until 3PM. The office had called back and I called them back. They had a cancellation and I could get in at 8:30AM tomorrow. We had to move around my schedule at work, but we made it kinda happen.
Thursday AM I met the endocrinologist. By then I had done some research (stuck to the Mayo websites). They had used leftover serum from my last blood draw and ran a T3 and T4. I was hoping they'd somehow be normal (subclinical disease). Nope. My T3 was 239 ng/dL (60-181) and fT4 was 2.62 ng/dL (0.9-1.7). Confirmed hyperthyroid. Damn. OK, how long have I had this? We discussed symptoms that I felt I had and how long I'd noticed. I admitted I was a scrawny thing most of my life, but I had gained weight in the last couple years. I did feel like my appetite has been crazy for the past several months, which made me think that's why I gained weight and couldn't get it off. I've always been a nervous and anxious person, sometimes it's OK, other times it's really bad. My hands have had tremors for at least a couple years now. I held out my hands and on cue they showed tremors for the doctor. I've always been sensitive to heat. Ever since I was a kid I could pass out if exposed to heat. I also can have anywhere from 2-4 bowel movements in a day, and they're normal. Depending on the day I can feel fatigued, but I figure it's the nature of my work. Lately I've been getting to sleep fine, but I do have periods where it's really hard to fall asleep. And my largest complaint was the lack of menstral cycle. So how long have I had this? All he could really say is he guessed at least months. Well, how did I get this? He did his exam, which overall wasn't too exciting other than slight thyroid enlargement. Most common causes are Graves' disease, adenomas, and thyroiditis. He was most suspecting Graves' disease. I didn't have the dermopathy, where you have skin lesions on your shins and feet, or the exophthalmos (bulging eyes), which is fine by me if I do have Graves'.
Well, what do we do now? Options were to do another blood test that specifically looks for Graves' disease (TSI?), a special radioactive iodine uptake scan, or just wait. Thyroiditis can come and go, so you can wait. Screw that. Luckily he recommended the blood test. Now when it came to treatment he said surgery probably wouldn't be good in my case. He seemed most interested in anti-thyroid meds. He didn't even mention radioactive I131 treatment. But I was still worried about the whole reason we started all of this... what about starting a family? He obviously listened to me because he started to explain to me what we can do. Apparently you can take thyroid meds while pregnant. Whoa. I figured they'd hurt the baby. The only restriction is you can't take methimazole during the first trimester because it could cause aplasia cutis to the baby's scalp. So you take PTU (propylthiouracil) during the first trimester, and then switch to methimazole for the second and third trimesters. I was worried about liver issues on either med. The doc said methimazole related hepatopathy was pretty rare. But we won't worry about meds yet until the final test comes in.
I had to race across town as fast as possible to get back to work for an important appointment. There was no way a blood draw was happening that day...
So today we were slow likely because of the snowstorm. I jumped on the chance to go in for another blood draw. Was hoping I'd get results today, but no phone call yet... *sigh*
Still taking the progesterone and prenatal vitamins.
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