# Took Too Much Iodine by Accident. Need Help with Labs.



## yeahyesok (Feb 22, 2018)

I have a bit of a different story and absolutely no doctor has been any help. I'm looking for help from those here that may be able to shed light on my issue. This has been extremely annoying to go through and I would be very grateful for your help.

I've been a long time sufferer of digestive issues after taking Accutane when I was younger. I had been diagnosed with Blastocystis (a GI infection that is fairly common and difficult to get rid of) many years ago. Being completely uninformed about the thyroid and iodine in general, I had purchased some iodine drops for the sole purpose of putting them on a mild toenail infection at the time. Then one day I had read that iodine kills stomach bugs. So I looked at the label and the lowest dosage example it talked about was 30mg. This is a very large amount to start with, but again I had no idea, I followed the label. I too this only ONCE because it made me feel all weird. That's right just ONE day, ONE time. For months afterwards I had extremely greasy hair and wayyyy more hair loss than normal. I immediately started looking it up and realized my error. My TSH went up over 3 around that time, to something like 3.4. I monitored it religiously and hoped it would just come down. It eventually did and has varied around 1.8 - 2.4 these days. Hair loss stabilized although I never regained the amount I lost. It hadn't changed really for years after that.

However, I noticed some major things.

1. I used to be on the very warm side, even to the point of sweating more than most people. This changed immediately after the one day of iodine.

2. I used to have mild anxiety, this also stopped and I found myself caring a bit less, being way more calm and "chill".

3. Sex drive used to be very high and stabilized to being lower. It's not that it's nonexistent, it's just not high.

Fast forward to now. A couple of years ago I started looking into it more, because I noticed I have cold extremities. I don't typically have a ton of energy, although it varies by day. Especially these days, I notice that my hands and feet are very cold when my partner's aren't, so it's not the temperature. However, all doctors seem to insist that my TSH is in range and I'm fine. I found a couple of places that I could go in and get more thorough testing, but I've found that this is difficult being in Canada with mostly highly public healthcare.

One naturopathic doctor pointed out my rT3 of 17 and thinks that's the problem (i.e. adrenals, etc.) but I still have no idea to this day what happened to my thyroid when I took iodine and if it's primary, secondary or some other type of thing. However, when I look at my labs, the latest ones seem to look on the low side for free T4, so that makes me unsure. It's not low, but it's in the lower 1/3. Keep in mind that all of these aren't the exact same lab, as that was not an option.

Please help me make sense of this! Any ideas? I am waiting on a new rT3 test to see if that's gone up as well. One my latest theories (if I didn't physically damage my thyroid...) is that when a large surge of iodine is taken, perhaps rT3 also shoots up to stop the drastic rise in thyroid activity. However, I'm not sure if 17 is high and this was several years ago that this happened.

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*3-12-2016*

TSH 1.8

Range: 0.27-4.2 mU/L

T4 Free 16.1

Range: 10.5-20.0 pmol/L

T3 Free 5.3

Range: 3.5-6.5 pmol/L

Thyroperoxidase Ab 13

Range <35 IU/mL

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*11-23-2016*

TSH 2.26

Range: 0.32-5.04 mU/L

T4 Free 12.8

Range: 10.6-19.7 pmol/L

T3 Free 4.96

Range: 3.00-5.90 pmol/L

Thyroperoxidase Ab 9

Range: <35 IU/mL

Reverse T3 17

Range: 8-25 ng/dL

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*2-15-2018 (Latest)*

TSH 1.73

Range: 0.32-5.04 mU/L

T4 Free 12.6

Range: 10.6-19.7 pmol/L

T3 Free 4.33

Range: 3.00-5.90 pmol/L

Thyroperoxidase Ab 12

Range: <35 IU/mL

Thyroglobulin Ab <10

Range: <40 IU/mL

Thyroglobulin 7.8

Range: <60.0 ug/L


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## Lovlkn (Dec 20, 2009)

Your last FT-4 and FT-3 are on the hypo side.

Are you still under active diagnosis for the digestive infection?

All illness starts in the gut -

Your issue does not appear to be autoimmune.


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## yeahyesok (Feb 22, 2018)

Yes I am still under active diagnosis for that. I also tested positive for SIBO, but I am 100% sure that I've had those gut infections for many many years before all of these symptoms. This started after iodine.

In the second lab (11-23-2016) it looks like my free T3 is fairly normal, but my free T4 is in the lower 1/3 range. That didn't change much in the latest lab (2-15-2018), but the free T3 is notably lower but still about midrange so it's not WAY off. I'm wondering why my free T4 is low in the second lab while my free T3 was not. Perhaps it was using a lot of free T4 to make reverse T3? Does it seem possible that my issue is just the reverse T3 or does it look like basic primary hypo?

The naturopathic doctor just said it means I'm converting to T3 well and mad no mention of my lowish free T4...


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