Hashimoto’s Thyroid disease, with fevers spiking to 105 while pregnant!
Jessica had a Thyroid problem, but she called True Health because she was sick with a cold. She had been sick for 12 weeks by the time she called True Health, which included extreme spikes in body temperature to nearly 105 degrees, and she was 3 months pregnant!
At the onset of this, her third pregnancy, she had such severe morning sickness that she was throwing up almost daily. That’s considered normal in our culture, but with the help of True Health she learned how to relieve morning sickness during her next pregnancy. We will come back to this later.
She called True Health after 12 weeks of miserable cold symptoms because the 105 temperature spikes worried her. Jessica was smart enough to know that 107 causes brain damage! She had gone to the doctor and he suggested Tylenol. Taking his advice, her health worsened over the next week leading to bronchitis.
When I met with her, she graded her energy at 2/10 and her sleep at 2/10. She couldn’t sleep even though she was exhausted, and she was on the fifth day of a migraine that she rated 8/10. In my experience with migraines, which is only as a caretaker, the pain of a 9 or 10 is bad enough to cause vomiting.
Following her doctor’s advice, the bronchitis had sunk deep into her lungs causing her to cough so hard that she had thrown up, multiple times!
Her throat was swollen and sore, and she still had the crazy temperature spikes that really concerned her because of the dangers to her baby.
She was concerned enough to go to the emergency room. Medical staff took her temperature, ran a pregnancy test, and said, “It’s 100 degrees now. Go home, there’s nothing to worry about here. You are still pregnant.”
She was very concerned, and nobody was listening or helping. That’s how I meet almost every patient I see. I offer hope even to those without any – with faith in God and Nature. And both helped every step along the way to make her story about amazing healing instead of hopelessness.
Let’s start with her exam.
I discovered while taking her medical history that she had been diagnosed with Hypothyroidism four years earlier after her first pregnancy and birth. She had returned to her doctor because she was exhausted, her hair was falling out, and she had gained 30 pounds by 3 months postpartum. I’m pretty sure it is healthy to lose weight in that particular time frame!
Her doctor prescribed Synthroid, and her energy was restored!
She lost the weight and stopped losing hair. Success! But she noticed her heart racing and that she had obsessive thoughts of hurting herself and her baby. It frightened her enough that she called on her doctor again. They called it postpartum depression, and prescribed Zoloft.
On the Zoloft, she was void of emotions. She said it was worse than the dark thoughts she had been having. As a result, she stopped taking Zoloft, and just battled through the dark thoughts. She pushed through the pain, eventually finding some control over it.
Her second pregnancy was much better. Easy labor, easy delivery, and easy postpartum, except for the dark thoughts. Once again, she failed to lose weight in the first 3 months postpartum. But at least no weight gain.
I tell all my patients to lean into a healing trend, and she leaned in to Synthroid for energy and metabolism for three years. But now Synthroid couldn’t lift her energy above a 2, and zero would be dead.
Her third pregnancy brought the crises, which led her to True Health and root cause diagnosis.
When we tested for the root of her healing crises, we discovered that she had an autoimmune thyroid problem called Hashimoto’s Thyroiditis.
I was taught that any autoimmune condition must be evaluated for triggers. Triggers are whatever irritated your immune system causing it to hurt you. Triggers include chronic infections, environmental toxins, and food allergies or sensitivities.
Pregnancy is often the tipping point for the onset of autoimmune thyroid problems because of the natural shifts in immune balance that ensure your body doesn’t reject the baby. This is a normal and healthy shift if your immune system is strong, but her’s was clearly not.
Her labs revealed the trigger. Her immune system was heavily out of balance, leaning toward bacterial defense. H.Pylori is an example of a chronic bacterial infection. It quietly eats holes in your stomach lining. The first symptom is often a burning pain after eating as the stomach releases acid for digestion and it burns the wounded tissue.
She rated heartburn as 7/10, which is also considered normal in our culture: suffering with heartburn during pregnancy.
But this wasn’t normal pregnancy heartburn, it was a chronic bacterial infection that triggered an autoimmune disease.
I prescribed a Native American tradition to strengthen her immune system towards defeating whatever bacteria she was fighting. As I understand, the custom was to hunt an animal and eat its organs as a ritual to honor growth and strength. She needed strength, so I prescribed thymus tissue (the organ that offers defense), which is found in supplement form from Standard Process.
Her labs revealed hypoglycemia, or low blood sugar, which is caused by adrenal exhaustion.
Adrenal exhaustion is very common with chronic infections. “Life” stress has breaks. If not much more than sleep, but chronic infections go to bed with you. If not properly diagnosed, at the first symptom, like the fatigue and weight gain she experienced after her first pregnancy, chronic infections wear out your adrenal glands. Your adrenal glands are active through the night, to assist with sleep. Adrenal exhaustion was the root of her insomnia.
I prescribed Rehmannia, a plant known as an adaptogen, which means “to bend but not break.” It helps build resilience to stress and literally protects your cells from damage or death. In China, doctors find Rehmannia of great value in the treatment of Parkinson’s and Alzheimers disease. They even suggest that it’s value is scientifically proven. Neural Regen Res. 2017 Aug;12(8):1
Nothing has been proven to stop the damage of Hashimoto’s thyroiditis, but with no known side effects, and nothing else working, I offered my best, Rehmannia.
Her labs revealed that the estrogen increase that is critical to sustaining pregnancy was also suppressing the function of her thyroid gland. Her thyroid was being “held down and beat up,” so to speak.
Our focus initially was her immune crisis and trigger. I learned after we helped heal feeling sick and exhausted, that she had suffered with horrible PMS symptoms, including pain that was disabling at times for 15 years! But it’s normal in our culture, to suffer with menstruation. I’ll share the resource that eliminated her PMS later in her story. We have to get her out of crises first!
To effectively treat autoimmune conditions…
I was taught to look for immune triggers first, and then shift the immune system back to balance. In her case, the trigger was a chronic bacterial infection which we offered strength to, in the form of thymus extract. To pull her immune system out of autoimmunity, I prescribed Vitamin D.
In Brazil, a real doctor discovered that his patient had an autoimmune disease called Myasthenia Gravis that progressively weakens muscle strength. He explained that “there is no cure,” but she refused to believe that she couldn’t heal and turned to alternative medicine. This case report was published in the National Library of Medicine database calling for large scale research on Vitamin D because his patient returned to him strong and vibrant, forcing him to face that what he knows wasn’t completely true. Am J Case Rep. 2016; 17: 51–54.
A couple weeks on my medicine, and Jessica had found no relief; in fact, her condition was progressing, which is what doctors call getting worse. She also shared that her entire family was sick. So this sick, pregnant woman was caring for two sick children, and one was waking up screaming.
She needed more
I prescribed more strength with a plant called Golden Thread. In 2011, this plant was compared to Vancomycin, the antibiotic that is used for antibiotic resistant staph infections (MRSA), to see which would save lives more effectively. Vancomycin has side effects listed as “serious allergic reaction, anaphylaxis (vomiting, difficulty breathing, shock), and hives.” Golden Thread was “comparable in effect” to this powerful antibiotic, without any reported side effects! Bioscience Horizons (2011)
Two weeks of more strength and she finds her healing trend. Every symptom is improving…celebration!
But a new one appears… critisim of her choice to follow True Health. She describes a medical professional rolling her eyes, and her family telling her she’s “making a mistake.”
It didn’t stop there, she attracted criticism everywhere. She chose organic meat and attracted people that told her she’s “wasting her money.” She chose to homeschool, and attracted people that said, “I went to public school, is there something wrong with me?”
She feltthe results of choosing True Health, however, very clearly. She was feeling better, and her new resource was Dr. Stone and Mother Nature. So she chose to lean into results instead of fitting in. And the result was strength and energy! (What does fitting in offer, again?)
By her third trimester, we aren’t even discussing her sickness anymore; we’re just building up her Thyroid and energy. Now we are talking about the criticism that people feel when you make a different choice. Somebody suggested “Jessica thinks she is better than us” because Jessica chose to follow her results rather than popular opinion.
This concept baffles me. I have always sorted for results, because I didn’t find much relief from fitting in. And it’s true, I don’t fit in, but I do seem to find results.
Self Criticism
I refer to Jessica’s disease as “self criticism,” and when it arrives in the form of a autoimmunity, it requires multiple steps to unravel. I prescribed more strength in the form of Reishi mushroom.
There are no studies that find that any single resource can unravel this mysterious disease process we call autoimmunity, so medicine’s best resource is cancer causing immunosuppressive drugs like Methotrexate. Hashimoto’s is considered incurable, but it’s not bad enough to warrant the danger of those medicines. Rheumatoid Arthritis can be bad enough to take the risk, but this study concludes that Reishi, alongside 3 other plants, created a healing trend for patients with Rheumatoid Arthritis.. Arthritis & Rheumatism Vol. 57, No. 7, October 15, 2007
Could it heal the hurt of self criticism, aka Hashimoto’s Thyroid Disease? Alongside the others I prescribed of course.
Jessica was extremely sensitive to criticism, so the suggestion that she was wrong or bad hurt her self confidence and heart passion. Reishi offered strength and protection.
But I had to change her strategy for dealing with criticism.
Nobody enjoys criticism, so when we feel it, we look for a strategy to avoid running into it again. Some go into hiding, others react and fight, but in her case, she chose popular opinion, the “People Pleaser.”
The Pleaser tries to predict what other people want, and then chooses actions based on what they think will make someone else happy. It’s exhausting, and the result is attracting more criticism because pain always expands if you don’t discover and resolve the “Natural Law” you are breaking.
She was breaking the Follow Your Heart Law by allowing criticism to doubt herself and her heart. I invented my own protocol for this disease, because there’s no cure offered in medical or chiropractic school.
I prescribed antagonism for her condition. It proved to be successful, so don’t judge based on popular opinion.
I antagonized her heart passion, but in a way that she would be able to see the folly of not following her own heart. I would ask her why she used coconut oil with a tone of judgment. In her panic, she could easily recall that I used coconut oil too, so it was just a tiny challenge to her self doubt. I pushed further, and several times into what she felt was hurtful. I even made her cry several times.
If you sort for fitting in, you would have been “nice” to this sensitive girl.
She would have tried to please you, which all self assured humans push away from, and you would have hurt her further. You would observe growing anxiety and uncertainty in the sweet woman you were so nice to. I always give what healing needs, even if it hurts a bit. If you sort for results, you will notice that her confidence grew.
I antagonized her as the helpful grandmother. “Did you pick out those clothes yourself?”
Literally, I asked her “who picked out your clothes?” Words are used to convey opinions in this culture, not the reality of results. She squirms, but she likes her clothes, and her doctor was wearing a superhero t-shirt, so she was clearly in a safe place to dress how she wanted.
She still thinks I was hurtful at times, but she couldn’t deny the results she was feeling.
By the time she needs to birth her baby, she is feeling strong. But the months of stress and exhaustion left her baby weak. That could be considered an opinion, but the fact was that “Baby Temperance crashed” shortly after birth: not responsive, with a blood sugar of 22. Mom offers one of the many strengths her chest provides, nursing her weak baby, but her caretakers insist that the results of “her strength” are not “good enough.” After a very brief attempt, they pull the baby from her caretaker, to offer medical care.
Mom disagreed, but she didn’t have enough strength yet, to speak her heart to the prestige of white coats. Medical care was able to bring her blood sugar back, and her baby back. But her story is far from over. A whole other story of healing, at the hands of True Health.
Remission/Cure/Healing??
Whatever you call it. While caring for a newborn, Jessica starts feeling so energetic, that her heart wondered why she was taking thyroid medication. At 3 months postpartum, instead of postpartum depression, she is weaning off her thyroid medication.
At 6 months postpartum, life continues her criticism therapy in the form of a Christmas party. We reflect together about how we sacrifice our own wellbeing to make others happy. It’s not my strategy, but I can relate to the energy and feel of it, and she didn’t need a push to notice it.
At nine months postpartum, she hasn’t needed Synthroid for energy or metabolism for nearly 2 months, and her thoughts are happy thoughts. Until she gets a shock from the pediatrician: her baby isn’t ‘developing normally. She is now doubtful of popular opinion, so she doesn’t worry about weight and crawling milestones, but she responds to the wound she is able to see.
Her baby isn’t looking at her momma. Her eyes tend to cross, and don’t seem to be looking at anything.
She believes in True Health, but eye problems go to the eye doctor, not True Health. The eye doctor says, “I’m sorry, your baby is blind.” She refers Jessica to an endocrinologist for further testing to be safe.
The specialist makes her assessment, and leaves a phone message for Jessica “that her baby has no hope, She will die in 6 weeks without our medicine.”
She ignores that message and leans in to True Health, where she found results in the face of no hope.
With past experience as a guide, she follows her heart and declined medical protocol in favor of True Health.
She is reported for child endangerment by her doctor, and suddenly is confronted by a government official. I’m sure glad I offered basic training in criticism! That’s another story, of Tempi the zombie toddler. Mom was a main character of course. In the end, she said to a Real Doctor, “No, You are going to listen to me. This is how it’s going to go.”
Wow, not many people in this world have the certainty of heart to say that to a person who has the authority to take their child from them. A certain heart, backed by results. We created a way better story, than blind and doomed.
While facing this battle for her child, at 12 months postpartum, someone criticizes her for being selfish. Jessica does what she wants, instead of what someone else wants, so Jessica is selfish. Interesting!
I swear, when I last flew on a plane, they said, “First, care for you, and you will have more for others.” Is that only on airplanes? Jessica felt, “Whatever, I don’t have time for your lack of strength.”‘
Her story continues
Another 3 months, and she’s confronted by the return of her cycle, which is “normally” painful. With all the relief nature has provided, she wonders if she can find more ease, even beyond normal.
She regularly visits True Health at this point, and during a visit, she wished that her pain and irritability could be eased. Jessica said that her pain is overwhelming and often disabling. She said something like, “I just screamed at everyone I love.”
I prescribe relaxation in the form of Dandelion, Hyssop and Yarrow.
Next month she reports that her tension, irritability, and cramping are 80% better! Two month’s on natures relaxation, and she reports that menstruation was completely easy and comfortable.
Pregnant again
A healthy moon cycle means a healthy libido, and a couple months later, she is pregnant with number four. This time armed with the strength of True Health.
When the nausea and vomiting began, I prescribed Barberry, Gentian, and Peppermint. She finds the first trimester doesn’t require morning sickness, and who knew, Mother Nature offers the comfort she desired..
The second trimester always brings headaches for Jessica. In pain, she emails True Health. I suggest lemon balm and echinacea, and she discovers that suffering is not normal or necessary, when you know how to meet your needs.
Third trimester brings heartburn for almost all mommies, as the growing baby pushes the stomach up toward the throat. She emails True Health to find pain relief. I suggested a digestive enzyme with hydrochloric acid. In pain, she emailed again wondering why I hated her.
This is an established healing protocol. Challenge the stomach with acid, and if it hurts, you have an ulcer. If it helps, you keep adding until you feel a slight burn, and you drop back one pill, which offers the optimal digestive effectiveness.
Calendula
She didn’t get past one pill, and it revealed the ulceration of stress. The stress of being pregnant again and caring for 3 babies and so many people offering “wrong or bad.” For heartburn caused by stress, you take Calendula. Perfect, she had some in her garden.
It relieves her pain almost completely. She reflects that it was the easiest and most comfortable birth so far. I see healing trends like crazy when you partner with nature.
Her first pregnancy weakened her to her hypothyroid diagnosis and Synthroid for life.
Baby three left her hopeless enough to look anywhere for help. She found True Health, and while leaning in, her fourth pregnancy was amazing in every direction. This time, she didn’t have to pay the price of dark thoughts and bruised knuckles. She lost weight in the 3 months postpartum. And she was full of energy.
Man, what is the deal with criticism?!?
Five months postpartum, she comes in depressed and exhausted. Could it be? Postpartum depression under the protection of True Health?
Nope, she was criticized again. This time for nursing her baby in church.
I prescribed “speaking her heart.” In order to show what it sounds like, I raised my own voice. It was important, so I encouraged her to start small, but speak from her heart. I assured her that her perspective is important to this world.
In my unorthodox, unscientific, unprecedented way.
What do you know, she found results. The next visit, she walked in with a strut and tons of energy. She said her medicine was “putting on her big girl panties.” I call it speaking her heart, but who cares, it worked.
I can relate to her story of self doubt. Yes, I was doubtful of what I am, even while I helped solve these problems. I just did my best, and Jessica came along, to prove to me, and her, that you can have faith in God and Nature. Results prove it.