Unraveling the Complexities of Hashimoto's and Hypothyroidism with Dr. Gupta

Ever been confused between Hashimoto's and hypothyroidism? We've got you covered! Our recent episode features Dr. Gupta, a certified functional medicine physician, who helps us untangle this common healthcare confusion. We journey through the medical landscape, from the conventional approach to these conditions, the overlooked autoimmune aspect of Hashimoto's, to the promising perspective of functional medicine. Harvest valuable insights as we discuss potential methods of rejuvenating the thyroid gland by addressing root causes, reducing inflammation, and lowering antibodies.

As we explore further, we also delve into detoxification and preventive measures through nutrition. We shed light on the significance of giving harmful foods like processed, fast, and gluten a wide berth and discuss the possible benefits of reducing dairy consumption. Uncover how incorporating a rainbow of vegetables, high-quality protein, fats, and gluten-free whole grains into your diet can support your health and prevent toxin overload.

Our conversation extends to the importance of accurate thyroid testing, discussing common symptoms like weight issues, fatigue, brain fog, hair issues, gut issues, cold intolerance, female menstrual issues, and infertility. Learn why it's critical to include TSH, T3, and T4 in your thyroid test and grasp the possibility of Hashimoto's being a cause of thyroid nodules. Tune in and join us as we discuss healing strategies and lifestyle changes that could restore health in thyroid patients. Don't miss the chance to expand your knowledge and join the conversation on our social media platforms.

Dr. Anshul Gupta is a best-selling author, speaker, researcher, and the world expert in Hashimoto’s disease. He educates people worldwide on reversing Hashimoto’s disease. He is a Board-Certified Family Medicine Physician with advanced certification in Functional Medicine, Peptide therapy, and Fellowship trained in Integrative Medicine. He worked alongside Dr. Mark Hyman at the prestigious Cleveland Clinic Department of Functional Medicine. He has helped thousands of patients to reverse their health issues by using the concepts of functional medicine.

His Book Reversing Hashimoto's
AnshulGuptaMD.com
Instagram
YouTube

Chapters

• 0:03 Understanding Hashimoto's Disease and Hypothyroidism
• 11:21 Detoxification and Preventive Measures Through Nutrition
• 24:41 Testing for Thyroid Disorder
• 34:42 Hope and Healing for Thyroid Patients

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:03

Hello and welcome to what Women Want Today, podcast season three, the Soul Sister series, where we will tackle tough topics straight from our heart to yours. I'm Terri Kellams, your host and coach for women who struggle to find meaning in fulfillment in midlife.

Speaker 2: 0:17

I am Amanda Kieber. I am your new regular contributor. I come straight from the Midwest Rockford Illinois. I'm a public speaking teacher and leadership development professor. I'm also a coach and clinical mental health counselor. I am so thrilled to be here, and let's get started.

Speaker 1: 0:33

Let's do it. Hello, welcome to this week's episode of the podcast. I'm your host, terri Kellams, and today I have a guest. I've been looking forward to speaking with Dr Gupta. Welcome to the show. Why don't you start by introducing yourself to the audience?

Speaker 3: 0:50

Absolutely. Thank you so much for having me on the show. You guys are doing an amazing work, so it's my pleasure and an honor to be here, thank you. So a little bit about me. So by training. Actually I'm a family physician and then, after doing my family medicine residency, I'm also a functional medicine certified physician and also integrative medicine fellowship trained. I worked at the Cleveland Clinic Department of Functional Medicine alongside Dr Mark Hyman and did research in the functional medicine model of care, and that's where I found a passion in thyroid health and developed a protocol that has helped thousands of females to get their life back and that prompted me to write my best seller book, which is the reversing Hashimoto's, which again has a three step process that gives hope to all the people who are suffering from thyroid and Hashimoto's to get better. And, as you were just discussing, I launched this YouTube channel close to six months ago where again sharing lots of information to females with Hashimoto's and thyroid disorders.

Speaker 1: 1:57

Awesome, there's so much great information on there. I will put a link to both your Instagram and your YouTube channel. Are you active on any other social media that we can include as well? Yeah, great, we'll make sure, because, as I was saying to you before we started recording, I had dived into some of your information, but I didn't discover the YouTube channel until it was too late to really watch a lot of them. But the content I was just scrolling, scrolling, scrolling forever. And why don't we start by defining Hashimoto's, just so everybody's kind of on the same page? Let's talk about what it actually is.

Speaker 3: 2:34

Absolutely so. Hashimoto's is an autoimmune condition of your thyroid gland where your body is producing antibodies, which starts a very slow destruction of the thyroid gland and ultimately it leads to hypothyroidism. Now most people actually have this confusion of what is the difference between hypothyroidism and Hashimoto's disease.

Speaker 1: 2:56

Yeah, and that was one of my questions, so I was going to ask you. Well, thank you.

Speaker 3: 3:01

Absolutely so. Hypothyroidism is just a condition of your thyroid gland where your thyroid gland is not able to produce enough thyroid hormone to keep up with the body's demand. Now there are various reasons of hypothyroidism. The number one reason 10 or 20 years ago was iodine deficiency. That's where we came to know about hypothyroidism. But currently the number one reason of hypothyroidism world over is Hashimoto's disease, and that's what people don't know about that. Their actual reason of hypothyroidism or low thyroid is Hashimoto's disease, and that's the reason it is even much more important for people who have been diagnosed with hypothyroid or low thyroid to know whether they have Hashimoto's or not, because it's an autoimmune condition. It is destroying the thyroid gland in a very slow manner each and every day.

Speaker 1: 3:50

Okay, so Hashimoto's is an autoimmune disease, but hypothyroidism is not necessarily an autoimmune disease. Is that what you're saying?

Speaker 3: 4:00

That is the case. You know like, maybe 20 years ago. You know like hypothyroidism was mainly iodine deficiency but currently it is because of Hashimoto's we are getting hypothyroid.

Speaker 1: 4:14

Yeah, that is a little confusing. Also, I think it would be helpful for the listeners to know, like, because you work in the functional medicine realm versus the conventional medicine realm, can we talk about how you approach it differently than maybe conventional medicine would be approaching it?

Speaker 3: 4:31

Absolutely so. Again, like the conventional medicine, the way they approach hypothyroidism or Hashimoto's. The only way they can do it is by giving a medicine called Levotroxin. Okay, so they are basically giving you external thyroid hormone because your body is not able to keep up with the thyroid hormone levels it needs Right. They do not have a medicine for Hashimoto's disease. They do not have medicine to control the autoimmune conditions, so basically, they leave your thyroid at the mercy of those antibodies which will ultimately destroy the thyroid gland. And that's the reason most people with Hashimoto's disease, even though they are taking that medicine called Levotroxin, still continue to suffer from symptoms.

Speaker 3: 5:16

Research is very clear. You know that 70 to 80% of people, even after taking the medicine, still will have residual symptoms of Hashimoto's disease. And that's where functional medicine comes into place, because we are what we call as a root cause medicine. We identify the root cause why your body got Hashimoto's disease and by working on those root cause approach, we are able to reverse it. By reversal, we mean that we can reduce inflammation in the body. By reversal we mean that we can lower those antibodies which are causing this destruction and that way we can actually safeguard the thyroid gland, and in a lot of cases we can rejuvenate the thyroid gland so it can function on its own again.

Speaker 1: 5:58

Okay, so I read this morning that about one in eight women experience thyroid issues. Does that sound about right? That is correct, and for every five to eight women that experience it, only one man will. So why is it so much more prevalent for women than it is for men?

Speaker 3: 6:17

So we do not know the exact answer for it, but there are some floating theories about that.

Speaker 3: 6:23

But all the theories that because of the complexity of the female hormones, you know, males have only one hormone, testosterone and obviously that hormone remains at the same level throughout their life most of the time. But in females, you know, they have different kinds of hormones estrogen, progesterone and testosterone and unfortunately they go through the cycles of these hormones every month. Plus, you know, during their menopause also, and plus pregnancy also, there's a big shift in the hormones. So this hormonal complexities predisposes the females to all of these autoimmune diseases, especially Hashimoto's and hypothyroid. So that's the first reason for it. The second reason is that what we feel is that the females endocrine system is more susceptible to toxins. Now, in our environment currently we have too much of Zenoestrogens, so females produce natural estrogen in their body, but then these are external Zenoestrogens, which are the chemicals which are in the lot of products that we use on the regular basis, and these Zenoestrogens affect the females body more than a male body and again also lead to these autoimmune conditions and hormone imbalances like hypothyroidism.

Speaker 1: 7:35

Okay, so I'm going to pause there real quick because I keep thinking hypo. I always think of it like a needle, like hypo goes underneath the skin, so that's low and hyperthyroidism is high, I think, like a hyperchild. So they have too much energy, so you have too much thyroid going on, right, right, let's talk about these Zenoestrogens from all of them. Because are these? I think I read recently that these are like things that we get because we wear deodorant with chemicals in it. We put cosmetics on our skin where, you know, our skin is the largest organ on our body. So everything that we're doing on a daily basis and women are doing so much more of it than men shampoo and hair styling products and for fumes and body lotions and all those things that make us look beautiful and smell great, are actually not great for us.

Speaker 1: 8:25

But there's also the aspect of like the plastic bottles, right? Did I read that correctly? So if we're buying bottled water, which I have, you know I'm patting myself on the back first. I can hear I've really drastically cut down my use of buying bottled water. But this is the mental image I want to give the readers. You know that these bottled water cases come on these big trucks and, like I think, of Arizona and we've been having this horrible heat wave and so these bottles are sitting on these trucks with temperatures in excess of 120 degrees for sure, right? So when those bottles heat up, it's releasing those chemicals from the plastic into our water, correct, that is correct. Is it also the same for using, like plastic baggies to store our food, plastic containers to store our food in the refrigerator? Is that kind of all the same exposure right there?

Speaker 3: 9:22

It is similar. Obviously we now have different kinds of plastics, so that also depends. You know there is BPA free plastics and some of the thicker plastics and good qualities that is a little bit more heat resistant and that releases less amount of toxins. But still, plastic is plastic, you know, and it is going to release these Zenoestrogens in our body, in our environment. So again, living a plastic free environment as much as possible is very important.

Speaker 3: 9:49

And, as you pointed out very correctly, all these skincare products there was a research study done. Before a female leaves their house in the morning, they have already used more than 200 products just in the morning. So in all of these products, you know they are like, you know they are filled with toxins. Whether it is Zenoestrogens, whether it is heavy metals like lead, mercury, whether it is other kinds of chemicals, they all have those right. And then again, just imagine that putting them day in, day out, every day for years and years. Definitely your skin is the biggest organ of your body. All that stuff on the skin gets absorbed and then goes to your bloodstream and your thyroid gland is definitely the biggest sponge in the body that absorbs all of these toxins and slowly and slowly over the course of years, the toxins lead to the toxic levels and that's where you know, like you know, your thyroid gets affected or gets damaged.

Speaker 1: 10:41

Okay, so then do you? What is your take on or your opinion about doing like detoxes? Is there really such a thing? Can we really detox our body?

Speaker 3: 10:52

We can detoxify our body, but again, detox is this best word which is going around in each and every community and online places, and a lot of people are doing detoxification by buying these products or kits online Absolutely wrong thing to do. Detoxification is one of the most complex thing that our body does. It has different phases to it and what we are trying to do is that we are just trying to kind of, you know, pick up things here and there which actually harm our body than doing good. A lot of times we have heard these horror stories oh, it gets worse before it gets better. Oh, I'm just detoxifying, so I'm just in bed, you know, for seven days or 10 days, but I'm going to get better.

Speaker 3: 11:32

But these are the people who land up in trouble. You know, a lot of people have landed in the hospital. A lot of people have damaged their liver, their kidneys because of doing it. So detox is a thing, but it is very important to work with a practitioner or a person who knows different phases of detox and what is the safe way of doing detox. Then only people should be doing it. So that's the detox I would like to talk about, but it's very important. Why don't we lower the burden of toxins? I think that's the first thing is a preventive measure. Everybody should be knowing about what they can do to lower the burden and then work on the detoxification after that.

Speaker 1: 12:07

Yeah, I like how you talk about in your in a lot of your videos and your material, your content online you talk a lot about foods, like foods that we can do and supplements we can do. Do you want to go there for a few minutes and talk about, like, what are some of the things? So if I'm a, you know, a 20-something year old woman and I don't have a lot of these problems yet, what can I do to prevent or set myself up for success as I, as I age?

Speaker 3: 12:36

Absolutely so. Food is definitely medicine, you know. We all know that. So right food is a medicine. But wrong food is also causing trouble to our body. So we need to stay away from the wrong food and we need to include the right food.

Speaker 3: 12:49

So first, the wrong foods that we need to stay away from. So these are like the processed food, the processed meats that we eat, the fried foods that we are eating, fast foods that we are eating. Definitely we need to curtail them and stay away from them as much as possible. We do have good amount of research, especially if a person, a young female's family, does say that they have thyroid or any autoimmune condition. So maybe staying away from gluten or reducing gluten will also be a good choice. Similar thing happens with dairy. Again, dairy is another source where we, lot of females, will get these external hormones, because a lot of the dairy is being produced by giving hormones or even the diet that has been given to these dairy, like to our cows and things. We know that that can again increase the hormonal levels in females. So dairy is another thing Definitely we should stay away from or lower it as much as possible.

Speaker 1: 13:44

Those are two sad things. Everybody loves bread Most everybody loves cheese. Okay, that's okay, we can live without those things.

Speaker 3: 13:53

Yeah and again, I don't think that each and every person should completely avoid them, but I think just being aware that this might be an issue and just looking at options or places where you can lower it, that's why I think that's a very good step For our prevention aspect. If you are already having a disorder like thyroid and Hashimoto's, then definitely you need to go a step further and completely avoid them. But I think in the prevention side of it, lowering the burden will definitely be good in that aspect. Then, I think, comes about the food which is healing or good for our body. So in that aspect, non-star-chic, colorful vegetables definitely are a very important key. We all think that we are eating enough vegetables, but in reality we are not Even the best person. We need to have at least seven to eight colorful, different kind of colorful vegetables in a day, as much as we can. So again, eating those veggies, getting them in in terms of salads, sauteed, whatever form you want to have, those definitely very important key Because they have different vitamins, they have different minerals. Plus they have different kind of antioxidants.

Speaker 3: 14:59

What people don't know is that each and every color of these vegetables is a different antioxidant and that different antioxidant plays an important role. So what are antioxidants? Antioxidants are compound which basically lower oxidative stress in our body. Oxidative stress is a fancy term of inflammation, so basically any inflammation that is present in our body, these antioxidants lower it. And obviously, what better way to get these antioxidants as compared to the food right? So if you eat those veggies, you are getting all of these antioxidants that your body needs.

Speaker 3: 15:33

So that's the first thing each and every person should be focusing on as much as possible. Then, second comes the good quality protein. Protein, we already know, is a building block for our body, for our immune system, for each and everything Again. So good quality protein should be important. Chicken, fish, turkey if you eat meat products, if you don't eat them, if you're a vegan or a vegetarian, then going through, you know, for your lentils, legumes, beans, you know, your seeds, nuts those are all great choices for proteins. That's the second thing.

Speaker 3: 16:04

The third thing is good quality fats. What we have done in the last decade is that we have just created this bad name to fats. I'm on a low fat diet. Oh, you should be eating low fat diet. What we forgot to mention to people is that there is good fat and there is bad fat. We have to stay away from the bad fat, but we need good fat. 60% of our brain is fat. So if you don't give any fat to our body, our brain is not going to function. Each and every cell of our body has a cell lining which is made with good fat. So we literally need good fat. So it is very important to include good fats and stay away from the bad fat. So these good fats are again these fatty fishes that we can eat Avocados, nuts, and seeds, like almonds, walnuts, you know, like our oils, like olive oil, coconut oil.

Speaker 3: 16:51

These are all important things chia seeds, flax seeds. Good fats are very, very important, very key of including them into your diet on the regular basis. And then comes the gluten free whole grains, like quinoa is great, brown rice is great, some oats are also good. So I think these are all good grains that can be included in the diet. And again, like, if you eat this well balanced, nutrient rich diet, then definitely you are setting yourself, you know, for a healthy future without any disease.

Speaker 1: 17:25

And so would you say that organic should be included in front of those words.

Speaker 3: 17:30

Vegetables eating as much organic as possible, as much as possible, right, you know, because obviously a lot of people are not able to afford organic. In a lot of communities or places, not everything is available organic. So I'm very careful with using that term. Because what happened, you know like, I learned it in the hard fashion, you know, there was a mom which came with her kid, you know, like again, like having some issues with Hashimoto's disease. We said, well, it looks like toxins, why don't you eat organic old vegetables and fruits? She came back and the child was actually worse. I was like what happened? How is she worse? It doesn't make any sense.

Speaker 3: 18:05

And she said well, you know, I'm just giving her these five foods. I said, why only five foods? Because in my grocery store these are the only five food which are organic. I was like, oh, that's so sad. I said, no, no, no, definitely she needs the vegetables, she needs the fruits. If you do not get them organic, that is okay. Still, those are good. And she said, well, I didn't knew about it, I thought everything should be organic, so I'm just giving her this limited diet. So I tell people, obviously, if you can buy organic, if you have the ability, absolutely. But if you don't, then only you know like you have to get the regular groceries and regular foods and vegetables are still better.

Speaker 1: 18:40

You know. So, going back a step into the fats, I noticed and I think America has noticed too that when they took fat out they put sugar in to kind of replace some of the taste. And I think I've read that sugar can be a very inflammatory thing in our body as well. Would you agree with?

Speaker 3: 18:57

that Absolutely. Yes, you know, our sugar consumption in the last 10 to 15 years has skyrocketed. This is the highest amount of sugar that we are eating ever ever. You know, like you know, since our existence. And sugar is definitely inflammatory. Sugar basically causes insulin spike in your body and insulin spike has been related to inflammation in the body and all of our hormones are interrelated, whether it's insulin, thyroid estrogen, progesterone or cortisol hormones. So when you have that insulin spike, that also affects your thyroid hormone negatively and again can lead to hypothyroidism. So absolutely cutting back on that sugar is very important too.

Speaker 1: 19:37

Okay, so I sure you're saying all this and I love vegetables. I actually like them more than fruit, and that used to be the opposite. I used to be a really big sugar eater, but when I stopped eating all the sugar, the fruit didn't seem as peeling to me as much and I really started eating a lot more veggies. But as much and as diligent as I tried to be to eat some of the things that you mentioned excuse me, today my allergies are bothering me. I feel like I could not possibly get enough good food into my body. I feel like I don't have a big enough appetite to eat all that food. So do you think everybody should be taking some supplements then?

Speaker 3: 20:15

I think, depends on person to person, right. So, again, if we can get the food from the diet as much as we can under the right portion sizes, then that is good. But again, supplementation is not a bad idea, the reason being there was again a research study done which compared the nutritious value of a current food from 1980s and 2010. And what they saw was that the current food from 2010 is nutritious lower, lower in different vitamins and minerals, as compared to 1980s. So now here's the problem that even though we might be eating the right foods and the right content, but as our food itself is low in lot of different vitamins and minerals, so we might not be getting enough, and I think that's why supplementation is useful. That way, you know, like we are making sure that our body is getting enough of these vitamins and minerals.

Speaker 1: 21:08

Yeah, I thought it's just tough for people. Because there's so much information out there, I think it's hard to like know. You know always where to start and then I know, like, my husband takes a multivitamin, so his is just kind of like all in one, whereas I tend to want to take things separately. But then you always got to know like what time of the day. Like I recently learned that magnesium is better to take in the morning, and I take vitamin D, but I don't take it every day, because there are days when I'm in the sun quite a bit, I don't feel like I need to take it every day. But what I mean is like a general overall. Like how do we find good supplements? How do we know when to take them? Like, is there an easy way for us to figure all this out?

Speaker 3: 21:54

Unfortunately, no, there is no kind of you know guidebook in that, but I think there are a few supplements which do pertain to each and every person out there. So one of those you mentioned, like vitamin D right, you know, so easy vitamin. Most of the people are low in vitamin D. Unless you know, like you're living in Florida and you're just sunbathing all the time, then only we. Then also we see that why people are low in vitamin D. So that's one of those vitamins and plus, people can get a simple blood test to check their vitamin D levels. But taking a vitamin D supplementation is kind of safe and definitely is very important. We have more than 5000 research studies that show that vitamin D is so important, not only for thyroid but each and everything in our body. So very important vitamin.

Speaker 3: 22:37

And the second one that you mentioned is magnesium. Again, magnesium participates in more than 300 enzymatic processes in our body Very important mineral. And magnesium actually doesn't get the limelight, you know like that it should get. You know because as compared to vitamin D, but magnesium is so important and, again, a lot of people are low in magnesium because magnesium is one of those minerals which have actually depleted in our food, so we are getting less of the magnesium in the food and that's the reason supplementation could be very, very useful for magnesium. The good part about magnesium there is kind of no toxic line of you know burden of magnesium, you know even a little bit of a high dosage. It doesn't cause too much of a problem to the body, so it's kind of safe in that manner. What form do you recommend? What company you sent?

Speaker 1: 23:25

No, what form? Like citrate glycinate.

Speaker 3: 23:29

So again, depends, right, you know, if you are having constipation issues, if you're not regular, then citrate is a great version of it. If you're already having loose bowels or diarrhea, then they do not do citrate, because that is going to make them even more loser. Then glycinate is a good version of things. Glycinate is very relaxing, promotes, you know like, also deep sleep. So that is another one. The third one is magnesium, threonate, which actually is very important for brain health. So if you're going through, like you know, brain fog, or if you have attention span issues, then threonate could be also useful. So these are the three most common magnesiums that you know can be useful.

Speaker 1: 24:07

Okay, this is also fascinating information. Thank you again for being there with me today. Let's talk about what kind of symptoms, because I think the majority, a lot of my audience, are midlife women. What kind of symptoms might seek up on somebody and they maybe not be aware that they have a thyroid issue? When would you say that these symptoms would warrant a visit to the doctor? To start, you know, investigating a little bit.

Speaker 3: 24:35

Yes. So the list is long. Okay, I'm going to share as much as I can over here. So the number one symptom is obviously weight issues, is that you know they're gaining weight or not able to lose weight. The second thing is being tired or fatigued. That you know. Again, those, like you know, females are feeling that. Okay, well, you know I need to take a nap in the afternoon, or by two o'clock I need that coffee or caffeine, or just in general they feel more tired as compared to before.

Speaker 3: 25:02

The third one is brain fog, and this brain fog is an interesting symptom because everybody describes it in different ways. The best way to know is that you feel that your brain capacity is not as good as before. You are maybe tend to not able to remember names or things, or maybe you know your concentration or attention span is low, that you're not able to pay attention to long things. So that's kind of the brain fog. The fourth most common symptom is hair issues hair thinning or hair loss Very important symptom. And then comes the gut related symptoms like either you have inconstipation, diarrhea, bloating, cramping again very important issues. And then comes the cold intolerance that you know. You just kind of feel cold all the time. Or, like you know, even with you know, air conditioner running at like 30s and you feel cold, or you're shivering and everybody's like, oh, we are so hot. So that is the same. And then female menstrual issues, whether those are irregular menstrual periods or heavy menstrual periods, or even infertility. So these are all the signs, so these are the most common ones. And, again, I can keep going on and on, but I think these are the most common ones. If you have any of those things, then it is very important to kind of check for thyroid. But here's the deal Most commonly, the test that people get for thyroid disorder is not enough, because when you go to the conventional doctor, the only test you get is TSH, which is not the test that is going to give a complete profile.

Speaker 3: 26:25

So let me talk about the testing also, so people have an idea. Yeah, so let's understand the anatomy a little bit, how the thyroid hormone is being produced. So this all starts in our brain. So our brain has this master endocrine gland called pituitary. So pituitary actually produces this hormone, which is the TSH, which is the thyroid stimulating hormone. Now this is the only test you are getting. Now TSH is not even a thyroid hormone. This is just a signaling hormone from your pituitary to your thyroid gland. So the job of TSH is to give signal to the thyroid gland to start producing thyroid hormone. The thyroid gland starts producing the thyroid hormone, which is the inactive thyroid hormone called T4. Now this T4 circulates in your body, but in your cells of the body it needs to be converted to the active version of thyroid hormone, which is the T3. And that is the hormone your body cells can utilize.

Speaker 3: 27:17

So now, when you're only getting the TSH levels checked, you are missing the opportunity of detecting low thyroid hormone levels at a very early stages because a TSH might not keep up with it. So, first of all, make sure that you're doing the test for TSH, t3 and T4, all of them. Even these hormones are not checking you for Hashimoto's disease and remember, hashimoto's is an autoimmune condition. So, before your gland gets destroyed, there is an opportunity for you to detect this Hashimoto's at an early stage and reverse it. So that's where you get to check for Hashimoto's disease, which is these antibodies, two antibodies which you can get it tested TPO, which is a thyroid peroxidase antibody, and the other one is thyroid globulin antibodies. Easy test to do the same blood work which is checking your thyroid hormones, can check these antibody levels also, and insurance pays for it. Any lab can do it. So, again, if you're having these symptoms, then making sure that you're getting the whole testing done is very important.

Speaker 1: 28:22

So a couple of things. So I had shared with you right before we started recording that I had recently got diagnosed with some thyroid nodules and I'm going to have an ask what is that biopsy on my thyroid in a couple of weeks. So I had to get my medical records and I was just kind of looking through my lab results because I remembered someone else talking about the TSH versus the T3 and the T4. And I noticed that my T3 was like 4.3. What does that indicate? Because that was higher than the range that it showed with the result.

Speaker 3: 28:57

So I think it will be important for you again to check for Hashimoto's disease. Okay, because a lot of thyroid nodules that we are seeing today are inflammatory. That means it is because of the inflammation we are getting the thyroid nodules. And again, doctors do not check the Hashimoto's levels. What the reason I'm saying is that in Hashimoto's disease there is a very small window initially. What happens is that when there is your thyroid gland is too much inflamed, that releases excess amount of thyroid hormones. So people can have a little bit of a hyperthyroid picture initially, until the thyroid actually starts getting burned more and more and then they develop hypothyroid. So it can be easily a possibility that you have a thyroiditis condition and that can be Hashimoto's, which is causing this issue and that can also lead to thyroid nodules.

Speaker 1: 29:46

So I believe that use that there's a way you can naturally shrink your nodules on your YouTube channel. I didn't get to finish watching all of it yes.

Speaker 3: 29:56

So again, first of all, like some medical disclaimer about it, that anytime there is a thyroid nodule it is very important to follow with your regular doctor. Make sure you're getting all the investigations done because obviously there is a small chance that it can be canceled, although 90% of thyroid nodules are benign. But still it doesn't make any sense to kind of take that chance. So make sure everything is done, everything you know that they are benign and good. Then you do the next step. And, as I kind of explained, there are two or three reasons for thyroid nodule. The most common reason is inflammatory currently, which is either because of Graves disease or Hashimoto's disease. Both of them are autoimmune condition. The second one is because of Goitre, which is iodine deficiency. That's the most again, which used to be very common. Now we don't see it so much. But in those two situations again, reducing inflammation in the body is very important. In that diet is very good. Definitely following an anti-inflammatory diet is going to help support your nodules.

Speaker 3: 30:51

There are certain vitamins and minerals which has shown that can definitely help support the shrinkage of thyroid nodules. Selenium is one of those. Selenium has shown in several research studies that that definitely can help to shrink some of the thyroid nodules. So that's one thing that people can use. Zinc is another one. Zinc and selenium actually work together with each other so that again, zinc and selenium, both are great vitamins and minerals to minerals, to kind of include that. Vitamin D is another one and omega-3s are the other one. So these are the supplements which can definitely help support the shrinkage of the thyroid nodules. And then otherwise, looking at the whole body picture of what is actually causing inflammation, is it your gut, is it your adrenals, is it your stress, is it your hormonal imbalances or the top scents? So then looking at all of the other picture of the whole body and finding that root cause of your inflammation and then addressing it definitely also improves the thyroid nodules.

Speaker 1: 31:50

So it sounds like you're saying that even if you are diagnosed with having a thyroid issue by a conventional medicine doctor, they're going to try to put you on a orthodoxy, and I heard so many stories from people that say it is so hard for them to get your dosage right and you still feel like crap. And so are we destined to be on this kind of medication. Or are we going to read your book and we're going to find out that there are some ways that we can kind of site stuff the medicine and try more food and supplements that we can take to avoid that path? I would rather not do that path. I don't have to.

Speaker 3: 32:31

So again, you know, like we are still. You know, like the problem is that nobody is actually researching so much Hashimoto's disease, because the whole research whenever there is a big pharmaceutical company who finds a medicine or a cure for a particular disease, then all the money flows in and the big research happens. Nobody is looking into it. So all the research is very small. Small studies are here and there. So in that aspect I don't want anybody to just kind of stop their medicine and feel miserable or actually do harm to their body, because it depends, right? You know, somebody has thyroid disorders for 20 plus years, right? Well, their thyroid most likely needs some thyroid medicine because now body is dependent on it, right. But on the other hand, a person is just diagnosed with thyroid disorder in less than five years, then obviously they have a very good chance that they can reverse the disease and maybe, you know, live without the medicine.

Speaker 3: 33:21

But I think, beyond the medicine, what we have seen is that it's just not the medicine causing the side effect, it's actually the body's underlying inflammation which even gets flayed up with the medicine and people who have worked with us a lot of times we are not able to completely stop their medicine. But even with medicine now, their body tolerates the medicine better and their quality of life is much better. So I think if we address all of the underlying problems that you know people with Hashimoto's disease have, then we have seen phenomenal results. Definitely your quality of life will be much better. Whatever things you know is limiting your Hashimoto's, whatever things you are feeling not so good about your body or your life, those all things definitely change At the end, even if you have to take a small amount of medicine, but your body is doing good and you're feeling great. I think that's still a win-win situation.

Speaker 1: 34:13

Great. So again, thank you so much, dr Gupta. The information is phenomenal. I invite all my guests to go down to the show notes and find the link to his YouTube channel, his Instagram account. Following him both places, I guess it's subscribe on YouTube, get this information, talk about it. We need to shed more light on these kind of things. What would you like to leave the listeners with today, other than they should probably buy your book, which I will also put a link in there? What would you like to leave the listeners with today?

Speaker 3: 34:42

I think I would like everybody to have hope, you know, because I think most of the thyroid patients and Hashimoto's have been told that there is no hope for them to get better, and I think that's totally incorrect. There is hope for you to get better. There is no reason for you to live a life which is limited or defined by thyroid disorders. If you do the right things, change your lifestyle, work with the right practitioner, find the root cause of your disease and address those, then definitely you can get your life back.

Speaker 1: 35:14

I love that. Thank you so much, and thank you again for being here with me today. Really enjoyed our conversation.

Speaker 3: 35:20

Thank you so much. It was really a pleasure.

Speaker 1: 35:24

Well, that's a wrap for this week. Thank you so much for joining us. We're so glad to be here with you.

Speaker 2: 35:29

And just remember, we're here to serve. Reach out, connect with us on social media platforms and dig in deeper.

Speaker 1: 35:36

All those links will be in the podcast show notes. So join us. We hope we can continue the conversation with you over there.