It sounds like you have great awareness of your body and that you are good about listening to it, so that’s great.

Looking forward to your positive results!

Don’t worry about your hair falling out, I went through the exact same thing. Your hair goes through growth and shed cycles, and any change in your thyroid levels will affect those cycles 3 months later. So if your thyroid was out of balance 3 months ago, your hair is just now reacting. I was very upset when I noticed extra hair in the shower drain and in my brushes, but then 3 months later, I noticed new growth along my hairline and in my part so I knew it was growing back. It takes just as long for your hair to grow back so try to be patient. My hair today is much fuller and longer than it was 3 or 4 months ago. Try to avoid using styling products, or applying any heat to your hair, which will only dry it out and cause breakage. Use a leave-in conditioner. I started using Wen products and my hair is shiny, healthy and bouncy.
Also, if you aren’t already, take a women’s multi-vitamin. Get your vitamin D and iron levels checked since thyroid disease can deplete you of these vital nutrients. I supplement my multi with extra iron and 2,000 of vitamin D and I think this may have helped with my hair growth.
And yes, stay away from Aspartame! I was eating a yogurt every morning, not realizing it had aspartame in it, and months later I started having symptoms of grave’s disease. It may just be a coincidence, but I don’t think so. I avoid anything with aspartame, it is poison and should be banned for human consumption!
Dianne

But Dr Brownstein wrote that hypothyroidism doesn’t occur. So I emailed Dr Brownstein (and tried to post on his blog) and Dr Abraham because my TSH was a lot higher than normal not just slightly higher and I had all the symptoms of hypothyroidism including muscle weakness, cold hands and feet and weight gain. Dr. Brownstein totally blanked me and wouldn’t allow my comments on his blog.

However Dr. Abraham was more helpful and very kindly recommended that I continued to take the lugols iodine and to start taking L-Tyrosine 500mg per day, Vitamin B-2 Riboflavin 100mg per day, and non-flush B-3 500mg per day. Actually I took niacin (B-3) which causes flushes but it made me feel even more weak as it can cause muscle weakness and lots of other symptoms besides. So I dropped the B-3 dose down to 100mg per day and then the three suplements started working. I now feel stronger each day and my hands and feet have warmed up so I’m happy.

Everyone is different so sometimes you need a little help and advice if you run into difficulties. In about 7 weeks time I will have another blood test and I’m hoping that my Free T3 and Free T4 levels will be normal then. I’ll post my results here.

http://www.sweetpoison.com/aspartame-side-effects.html

I started out from the blood work at T4 56.1 and T3 24.6
My THS had gone to sleep at .01 and has yet to kick in and likely won’t for about another 3 months) The THS is the one that reads if you have to little or too much and tells your thyroid to give you more or none at all.. mine has gone to sleep as I had way too much
I was put on Carbimozole 6 @ 5mg) day 3 in the morning and three at nightto get the T4 and T3 back down to a normal range as quick as they could. A month later they were T4 21.6 and 7.6 . Still not in the normal range yet. A month later they were T4 .10 and T3 6.7. sill not there yet one month later T4 10.7 and T3 4.5. MY dosage is now at 4 tablet ( 20 mg per day) tablet a day in the morning only. (They are still watching the levels so they don’t send me to under active so it is monitored once a month) The advice given is to stay on the medication for 18 months as staying on it for this length of time as the best chance of going into remission. They have found that any time less it seems to come back. After that they will take me of the meds and see how we go, if it come back there are other option which include the Radioactive pill or Surgery. They are also keeping an eye on my liver as staying on the medication for long term may cause damage. Hence the other options.
They have also sent me to an Opthomologist for my eyes (who specialises in Graves), which are quite good just swollen and puffy bags , He keeps watch so there are no changes or damage but they are no too bad considering.. suggested Fish oil for the anti inflammitory (Bearing in mind my original trip to the doctor was my vanity (eyes).
Yesterday was my first melt down and cried for an hour when I found my hair has started falling out. It has been light shedding until recently but I have had a day off and cleaned my hair brushes and had a good look and found behind my ears there are bald patches. The straw that broke the camels back so to speak.!. I rang the Endo, remember she have moved to another city, they will put me in urgently if they get a cancellation. but they also rang my old Doctor who rang me at home, very surprised and said with a bit of luck it would grow back but there may be more to my auto immune disease and I could have alopecia areata. But as she is no longer my Doctor I will have to see the new endo, So now I am about to ring my local GP as I would like to do something before this gets any worse. Any tips from those of you who have lost hair please send them along, how long does it last
did you do anything to help it grow back… I was due to go on my first trip overseas in April, as I am crushed about the hair loss.
Funny thing was I also only started using Aspartame in my coffee about two years go . I stopped a couple of weeks ago when I saw some info of the net about food to avoid. The stress of loosing may hair still keeps me smoking..I have oder some ecigs from the net

Your regular endocrinologist didn’t say your thyroid was normal size and could have understated the size. Equally the two Mayo clinic doctors could have overstated the size. Without precise measurements it’s difficult to know either way.

The reason that I mention this is that like you the iodine also reduced my excessive sugar cravings and hunger. The iodine is at least promising in this way. But equally it’s possible that the iodine could have enlarged your thyroid gland. Although my thyroid gland wasn’t enlarged by the iodine every individual is different so who knows what the effect would be on other people.