is there anyone out there controlling blood sugar without insulin (ie diet/exercise/metformin, etc.) who eats less than 100 grams of carbs a day and feels they have good thyroid function?
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Only with medication—it seems to have stabilized once I started on Levothyroxine. I eat 25-30 carbs/day—which helped me maintain a good A1c (5.4) even as I gained 35 pounds in 7 weeks before we caught the thyroid problem-----3 years ago or so…
I was surprised as I studied the subject at how common thyroid problems are for diabetics of all types…Blessings…
Yes 5 years off meds good thyroid function which is good considering my mother had thyroid issues ) LCHF woe
a 70kg male can make 200g of glucose a day
According to Steve Phinney and Jeff Volek, low carb researchers who have performed numerous studies with hundreds of patients, patients who follow a low carb, calorie sufficient diet have not been observed to have thyroid problems. What will cause thyroid problems is calorie restriction, which turns out to be the diet recommended by the “establishment.” If you have any question, you can do a low carb high fat diet and ask your doctor to run a thyroid panel, and be sure to ask for free T3 and free T4 to be included.
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I had a full thyroid panel done after 2 years of strict low-carb, often keto dieting (no meds). My TSH, T4 and T3 were in range but my rT3 was through the roof. I am interested in repeating the test with my new endo, and see what it looks like on 75g-100g of carbs a day, assisted with Mr. Insulin.
Statins can cause a false TSH reading, making it look like hyperthyroidism.
Your liver can convert fats to ketones - a necessary step before using the fats for energy. Many people are afraid of ketones, though, since the old tests for ketones could only detect the very high levels resulting from very high blood glucose levels. However, switching on this conversion takes a few days during which you will be hungrier than usual.
Your liver can also convert proteins to glucose more than fast enough to supply your thyroid and the portion of your brain that cannot switch to using ketones instead. However, certain liver and kidney problems may make it unwise to rely on this.
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judith, what were your earliest symptoms of hypothyroidism? you have been low-carb for years, so if low-carb was triggering your hypothyroidism, i would think that you would have had problems with your thyroid years earlier.
i know you gained a lot of weight as an obvious symptom, but looking back, do you think there were more subtle symptoms? if so, what were they?
brian, have those researchers looked at diabetics on low-carb specifically?
Yes, patients with diabetes have been a particular focus of this research. You can see some of the major published studies by Volek (for instance) here.
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