I have health anxiety, and I'm afraid of increasing my levothyroxine dose.
So I went to an endocrinologist that is specialized in thyroids. I paid a lot of money, and he is the head of the thyroid department in the most important university in my country.
I do have very bad health anxiety, and he agreed to move from 75 to 88 on levothyroxine, and I'm afraid of going hyper. To be honest, I had the same fear when starting on 50, which felt like hell; heartburn and fatigue were so bad I had to try going on 75, which felt better for a short while.
I was on 1.4 TSH six months ago, and now I'm at
TSH 2.38 uUI/mL
Free T4 1.10 ng/dL
The problem is some things he said during consultation made me not be able to be confident in his decision-making. I asked about Nature's Bounty B12 and gentle iron supplements, and he told me that 8 ug of B12 could cause toxicity and neurological brain damage because it was 133% of the needed dose for a day. This sounded very strange to me, so I was, "Are you sure?" Is the water-soluble B12 vitamin we are talking about here? To which he answered he was sure. I told him I was put on a 500 mcg supplement by my GP once because I'm always on the low, and he told me that was a very dangerous thing to do. He ended up saying not to take the supplement because iron would give me acidity and burn a hole in my stomach. Of course I'm too afraid to take supplements now. My current B12 is 250 and my ferritin is 34. He says it's fine and that I don't need supplements.
He told me that I shouldn't be on medication because my TSH is not over 10. I told him that I started medication because of a failed SIBO antibiotic course. The gastroenterologist told me that subclinical hypothyroidism affects gut motility and that this causes SIBO. My TSH was 7 at that time, along with fatigue, hair loss, and many other symptoms. This endocrinologist told me that is very wrong and that subclinical hypothyroidism does not affect gut motility in any way.
He agreed to up my medication dose because he said it would calm my health anxiety and that if I saw any improvements, it would be because my health anxiety got better because that kind of increase in medication would do nothing at my current TSH levels.
I also managed to get a TSH, total T3, free T3 test, and total T4. I asked to get free T4, but he told me that free T4 and total T4 are always the same. Again, he agreed to do the test to calm my anxiety only. Which I'm not complaining about; I like to get all the tests I can for calming my health-related anxiety.
Sorry for the long rant. Now I have the 88 pills and I'm too afraid to take them, but it's also very difficult to continue with my current symptoms.