Latest / Love Your Gut / Ep. 77: Hyperthyroidism, Hashimoto’s, and the Gut–Thyroid Connection with Dr. Eric Osansky

Transcript

Ep. 77: Hyperthyroidism, Hashimoto’s, and the Gut–Thyroid Connection with Dr. Eric Osansky · Love Your Gut

• 0:03
  Dr. Heather Finley: Welcome to the Love Your Gut Podcast.
• 0:05
  Dr. Heather Finley: I'm your host, Dr.
• 0:06
  Dr. Heather Finley: Heather Finley, registered dietitian and gut health specialist.
• 0:10
  Dr. Heather Finley: I understand the frustration of dealing with GI issues because I've been there and I spent over two decades searching for answers for my own gut issues of constipation, bloating, and stomach pain.
• 0:21
  Dr. Heather Finley: I've dedicated my life to understanding and solving my own gut issues.
• 0:25
  Dr. Heather Finley: And now I'm here to guide you.
• 0:28
  Dr. Heather Finley: On this podcast, I'll help you identify the true root causes of your discomfort.
• 0:33
  Dr. Heather Finley: So you can finally ditch your symptoms for good.
• 0:36
  Dr. Heather Finley: My goal is to empower you with the knowledge and tools you need so that you can love your gut and it will love you right back.
• 0:43
  Dr. Heather Finley: So if you're ready to learn a lot, gain a deeper understanding of your gut and find lasting relief.
• 0:48
  Dr. Heather Finley: You are in the right place.
• 0:50
  Dr. Heather Finley: Welcome to the love your gut podcast.
• 0:56
  Dr. Heather Finley: Welcome back to the next episode of the Love Your Gut podcast.
• 0:59
  Dr. Heather Finley: I am so excited to be here today with Dr.
• 1:02
  Dr. Heather Finley: Eric, and if you're jumping over for part two from his podcast, welcome.
• 1:07
  Dr. Heather Finley: And if you miss part one, jump on over.
• 1:10
  Dr. Heather Finley: But Dr.
• 1:10
  Dr. Heather Finley: Eric is a chiropractor, a clinical nutritionist, and a certified functional medicine practitioner.
• 1:18
  Dr. Heather Finley: Who has been helping people with thyroid and autoimmune thyroid conditions since 2009.
• 1:23
  Dr. Heather Finley: He is the author of the Book's Natural Treatment Solutions for Hyperthyroidism and Graves Disease.
• 1:29
  Dr. Heather Finley: The Hyperthyroid Healing Diet and Hashimoto's Triggers is the host of the Save My Thyroid podcast.
• 1:36
  Dr. Heather Finley: And the creator of the Healthy Gut Healthy Thyroid Newsletter, Dr.
• 1:40
  Dr. Heather Finley: Eric was personally diagnosed with Graves' Disease.
• 1:43
  Dr. Heather Finley: After seeing how well a natural treatment approach helped his condition, he began helping others with thyroid and autoimmune thyroid conditions.
• 1:50
  Dr. Heather Finley: So welcome to the show.
• 1:53
  Dr. Heather Finley: Yeah.
• 1:53
  Dr. Heather Finley: Well, um, thank you so much Dr.
• 1:55
  Dr. Heather Finley: Heather.
• 1:55
  Dr. Heather Finley: Great to chat with you again.
• 1:57
  Dr. Heather Finley: Yeah.
• 1:57
  Dr. Heather Finley: Well, so the name of your podcast is Save My Thyroid, which is a pretty bold statement.
• 2:04
  Dr. Heather Finley: Uh, and you have a very popular podcast in the thyroid space.
• 2:07
  Dr. Heather Finley: So why was saving your thyroid so important to you personally?
• 2:14
  Dr. Heather Finley: Yeah, so great question.
• 2:16
  Dr. Heather Finley: So, my personal journey relates to having Graves Disease, and that's how I started doing what I'm doing today and what led to me writing, uh, the books related to, um, hyperthyroidism and, and the one on Hashimoto's.
• 2:32
  Dr. Heather Finley: Uh, just, uh.
• 2:34
  Dr. Heather Finley: SI was, I was diagnosed with Graves back in 2008.
• 2:39
  Dr. Heather Finley: At that time, I didn't really know anything about Grave or didn't know much about Graves.
• 2:44
  Dr. Heather Finley: My background's a chiropractor, so I had a traditional chiropractic practice for about seven and a half years.
• 2:50
  Dr. Heather Finley: And, um, and I, as a chiropractor, I would always attend for my continuing education credits.
• 2:56
  Dr. Heather Finley: I would always attend nutritional seminars, functional medicine seminars, never attended chiropractic seminars where we learned technique.
• 3:04
  Dr. Heather Finley: Um, so it was always nutrition or functional medicine.
• 3:07
  Dr. Heather Finley: And there were a couple of.
• 3:08
  Dr. Heather Finley: Functional endocrinology seminars I attended.
• 3:12
  Dr. Heather Finley: And when I attended those, they did speak very little about graves.
• 3:17
  Dr. Heather Finley: Most of it was of course, um, like diabetes and Hashimoto's, but they, they did talk a little bit about a natural approach for hyperthyroidism and Graves disease.
• 3:28
  Dr. Heather Finley: So, I mean, little did I know that one day I would need that information, but when I was diagnosed with Graves, uh, I.
• 3:34
  Dr. Heather Finley: I knew I was going to at least give it a try.
• 3:37
  Dr. Heather Finley: I, I was a little bit skeptical even with my background.
• 3:40
  Dr. Heather Finley: 'cause again, I didn't know anybody who had graves.
• 3:43
  Dr. Heather Finley: Um, but sure enough I started, um, say just, uh, changing my diet and lifestyle and did some testing and, and took some supplements.
• 3:55
  Dr. Heather Finley: And, uh, and yeah, long story short, I restored my health and I mean.
• 4:02
  Dr. Heather Finley: The purpose of the term Save My Thyroid.
• 4:05
  Dr. Heather Finley: I mean, really it applies to both Graves and Hashimoto's.
• 4:09
  Dr. Heather Finley: Um, with graves, so many endocrinologists recommend radioactive iodine that destroys the cells of the thyroid or a thyroid thyroidectomy, thyroid surgery, which completely removes the thyroid.
• 4:22
  Dr. Heather Finley: And so that's, um, but even with Hashimoto's at Hashimoto's.
• 4:27
  Dr. Heather Finley: You get the damage from the immune system taking place to the thyroid gland.
• 4:32
  Dr. Heather Finley: And most endocrinologist or regular medical doctors, they just give thyroid hormone replacement, which again, there's the time and place for that.
• 4:39
  Dr. Heather Finley: But if that's all they do and they're not addressing autoimmune component, then you're just getting further damage to the thyroid.
• 4:45
  Dr. Heather Finley: So, so again, either way, whether you have hyperthyroidism Graves disease or.
• 4:51
  Dr. Heather Finley: Hypothyroidism, Hashimoto's.
• 4:53
  Dr. Heather Finley: You know, I think it's, um, it's important to at least attempt to save your thyroid.
• 4:58
  Dr. Heather Finley: Yeah.
• 4:59
  Dr. Heather Finley: And you, you kind of mentioned this a little bit, that Hashimoto's is talked about a lot more.
• 5:05
  Dr. Heather Finley: Even hypothyroidism is more common, commonly spoken about.
• 5:10
  Dr. Heather Finley: I know, even on my podcast.
• 5:11
  Dr. Heather Finley: So for someone listening, you know, they may not even really know what Graves disease is.
• 5:17
  Dr. Heather Finley: Can you give us just a little.
• 5:19
  Dr. Heather Finley: Download of what the, the difference, like kind of distinguishing factors between Hashimoto's and hypothyroidism and Graves disease and hyperthyroidism.
• 5:31
  Dr. Heather Finley: Yeah, no, definitely.
• 5:32
  Dr. Heather Finley: I think that's a great idea.
• 5:33
  Dr. Heather Finley: So.
• 5:34
  Dr. Heather Finley: So again, your, most of your listeners are familiar with hypothyroidism, so that's when someone has low thyroid hormones.
• 5:42
  Dr. Heather Finley: So the main thyroid hormones, at least the ones we could test for at a lab, are T three, T four, and then there's what's called TSH, which is thyroid stimulating hormone, which is a pituitary hormone that communicates to the thyroid gland.
• 5:55
  Dr. Heather Finley: And in the case of hypothyroidism.
• 5:58
  Dr. Heather Finley: You typically have elevated levels of TSH and the reason for that is because when the thyroid hormone levels are low, either they might be within the lab range but less than optimal or they might be overtly low.
• 6:10
  Dr. Heather Finley: But either way, you're getting more TSH production because pituitary is telling the thyroid gland, Hey, we need more thyroid hormone.
• 6:18
  Dr. Heather Finley: And so you present what hypothyroidism you have, typically an elevated TSH, or again, it might be.
• 6:26
  Dr. Heather Finley: Higher than optimal.
• 6:27
  Dr. Heather Finley: It might be like a 3.5, which is within most lab reference ranges, but greater than optimal thyroid hormone levels on the lower side or overtly low.
• 6:35
  Dr. Heather Finley: So hyperthyroidism is the opposite.
• 6:38
  Dr. Heather Finley: That's when you have too much thyroid hormone.
• 6:40
  Dr. Heather Finley: So T three, T four will be elevated.
• 6:42
  Dr. Heather Finley: And as a result, the pituitary gland is telling the thyroid gland, Hey, we don't need any more thyroid hormone.
• 6:47
  Dr. Heather Finley: Let's stop the production.
• 6:49
  Dr. Heather Finley: So you see low T, SH, many times undetectable, TSH, like less than 0.01, for example.
• 6:57
  Dr. Heather Finley: And so that's really the difference between hypo and hyper, at least on a blood test.
• 7:02
  Dr. Heather Finley: I mean, symptom-wise.
• 7:04
  Dr. Heather Finley: Um.
• 7:05
  Dr. Heather Finley: I mean, when I dealt with Graves with hyperthyroidism, everything is sped up at the metabolism.
• 7:10
  Dr. Heather Finley: So I was having increased resting heart rate and palpitations and tremors and um, looser stools are common, and anxiety and insomnia are some of the more common symptoms, hair loss.
• 7:23
  Dr. Heather Finley: Common with both hypo and hyper.
• 7:25
  Dr. Heather Finley: But um, and then hypo of course the opposite.
• 7:28
  Dr. Heather Finley: You get the slower metabolism.
• 7:29
  Dr. Heather Finley: So fatigue is very common.
• 7:31
  Dr. Heather Finley: Weight gain is common.
• 7:32
  Dr. Heather Finley: Actually, actually, I didn't mention weight loss.
• 7:34
  Dr. Heather Finley: I lost 42 pounds when I dealt with.
• 7:36
  Dr. Heather Finley: With hyperthyroidism, but weight gain with hypo coldness.
• 7:41
  Dr. Heather Finley: Um, the, uh, the brain fog, constipation, uh, again, brittle hair, sometimes hair loss as well.
• 7:49
  Dr. Heather Finley: Uh, and then, and we could talk more about the symptoms, but as far as like Graves, Hashimoto's, so.
• 7:55
  Dr. Heather Finley: Most cases of hypothyroidism are autoimmune.
• 7:59
  Dr. Heather Finley: And same thing with most hyperthyroid conditions are autoimmune.
• 8:03
  Dr. Heather Finley: So the, so we got Hashimoto's where you have certain autoantibodies, and with graves you have different autoantibodies.
• 8:12
  Dr. Heather Finley: So graves, you have what's called thyroid stimulating immunoglobulins, um, which are, is the type of TSH receptor antibody.
• 8:20
  Dr. Heather Finley: And what happens is that th the, the thyroid stimulating immunoglobulins, they bind to, or, or attack, stimulate the TSH receptors of the thyroid gland.
• 8:30
  Dr. Heather Finley: And that what causes, that's what causes the elevation of thyroid hormone.
• 8:34
  Dr. Heather Finley: And then with Hashimoto's, you have.
• 8:37
  Dr. Heather Finley: Antibodies such as thyroid globulin, antibodies, um, and or thyroid peroxidase or TPO antibodies and the antibodies themselves aren't causing damage and more of a consequence.
• 8:49
  Dr. Heather Finley: But when you have those antibodies, that means that the immune system is damaging the thyroid gland and, um, which could lead to hypothyroidism.
• 8:57
  Dr. Heather Finley: But in a nutshell, that essentially is the difference between hypothyroidism, hyperthyroidism, graves disease, Hashimotos.
• 9:05
  Dr. Heather Finley: Yeah, that's super helpful to, to understand.
• 9:08
  Dr. Heather Finley: And one thing that I've heard from patients and read, online and doing research and, just talking to people is that Graves disease often hits pretty fast and people will often say like, I feel like my body's kind of spinning out of control.
• 9:24
  Dr. Heather Finley: You mentioned like anxiety or rapid heart rate, feeling, insomnia.
• 9:28
  Dr. Heather Finley: Everything just feels fast.
• 9:30
  Dr. Heather Finley: What was.
• 9:31
  Dr. Heather Finley: Like being inside your body kind of at the height of your symptoms or what led you to go get testing finally and figure out what was going on?
• 9:41
  Dr. Heather Finley: Yeah, great question.
• 9:42
  Dr. Heather Finley: So I was, so late 2007, I started to, I was.
• 9:50
  Dr. Heather Finley: 180 2.
• 9:51
  Dr. Heather Finley: My weight was 182 pounds.
• 9:53
  Dr. Heather Finley: Ideally, I would like to have been, and still even now, like 1 65, 1 70.
• 9:59
  Dr. Heather Finley: And so I was trying to lose weight.
• 10:01
  Dr. Heather Finley: So I started, um, exercising intensely.
• 10:06
  Dr. Heather Finley: Just, uh, too intensely.
• 10:08
  Dr. Heather Finley: I was, I was dieting, pretty much dieting, detoxifying, exercising vigorously, and uh, everything was going to plan according to plan.
• 10:17
  Dr. Heather Finley: I was losing weight.
• 10:18
  Dr. Heather Finley: Um, and, uh, again, eventually the, the weight loss became extreme.
• 10:24
  Dr. Heather Finley: But even then I didn't really catch on.
• 10:26
  Dr. Heather Finley: I just thought everything was just because of what I was doing.
• 10:29
  Dr. Heather Finley: 'cause it, I mean, it wasn't like I was losing 10 pounds per week, but I mean, just, I was.
• 10:34
  Dr. Heather Finley: Losing weight and had increased appetite, but I wasn't eating as, uh, a lot.
• 10:39
  Dr. Heather Finley: I was restricting, um, calories, which I shouldn't have been doing.
• 10:42
  Dr. Heather Finley: But, uh, then one day I was walking around a retail store, a Sam's Club specifically, and they had a blood pressure machine and I, um.
• 10:53
  Dr. Heather Finley: Took my blood pressure at one of those sit down machines and my blood pressure was fine, but my heart rate was about 90.
• 11:00
  Dr. Heather Finley: And I was wondering, well, maybe it's just because I'm walking around.
• 11:03
  Dr. Heather Finley: And so I took my heart rate the next few days and it was anywhere between 90 and one 10 beats per minute.
• 11:09
  Dr. Heather Finley: And so I'm like, okay, this is not normal.
• 11:12
  Dr. Heather Finley: And um, and then I was.
• 11:15
  Dr. Heather Finley: Kind of put in the pieces together.
• 11:16
  Dr. Heather Finley: But again, at that point I really didn't have much experience with hyperthyroidism.
• 11:21
  Dr. Heather Finley: So I just, um, went to a primary care doctor and he just ran some blood tests and diagnosed me with hyperthyroidism.
• 11:31
  Dr. Heather Finley: And, uh, and then eventually I saw an endocrinologist who, um, tested the antibodies.
• 11:38
  Dr. Heather Finley: And, I mean, knowing what I know now, if I had to do it all over again, I could have done all that on my own, but.
• 11:43
  Dr. Heather Finley: Just, again, just didn't have the know, I mean, again, just wanted to get that, that the so-called expert exper, um, opinion when it comes to is, you know, the hyperthyroidism graves.
• 11:55
  Dr. Heather Finley: And, and I'm glad I did.
• 11:56
  Dr. Heather Finley: I mean, it's, you know, just, um, at, at, like I said, at that point, I didn't work with people with thyroid conditions, let alone hyperthyroidism.
• 12:04
  Dr. Heather Finley: I just again, practiced chiropractic and just adjusted, um, patients.
• 12:08
  Dr. Heather Finley: So, um, but yeah, that's how my journey began.
• 12:11
  Dr. Heather Finley: That's how I found out.
• 12:13
  Dr. Heather Finley: That I had hyperthyroidism as far as like how I, how it felt, kind of like just being in the, you know, that state.
• 12:21
  Dr. Heather Finley: Um, like I said before I was diagnosed, you would thi, you would've thought that I would've known because again, a lot of people, you know, they feel the anxiety, they feel certain symptoms.
• 12:32
  Dr. Heather Finley: Um, but I honestly didn't, you know, before taking the heart, I mean, once I took the resting heart rate, I became more aware.
• 12:41
  Dr. Heather Finley: You know, just coincidentally, I, I, I started noticing the palpitations.
• 12:44
  Dr. Heather Finley: Maybe I was experiencing them before that, but just wasn't really paying.
• 12:49
  Dr. Heather Finley: I mean, you know, quite frankly, it was so long ago, I forgot, but after.
• 12:54
  Dr. Heather Finley: After I got diagnosed, I started realizing I was having the palpitations, or again, being more aware of it, the weight loss, you know, I realized that at least in part was due to the hyperthyroidism and not solely due to, you know, just, um, the diet and exercise.
• 13:11
  Dr. Heather Finley: But, um, but yeah, I mean it's, um, it's, it's hard to explain.
• 13:16
  Dr. Heather Finley: Um.
• 13:17
  Dr. Heather Finley: Just, uh, like when you're dealing with hypo, you know, it's, it might be easier with the, and, and maybe even that, I mean, you could, you could, I didn't ask you that question when you were on my podcast, like how specifically you felt, but again, I've also worked with a lot of hypo patients, so I kind of have an idea.
• 13:33
  Dr. Heather Finley: And with hyper, it's just, I mean, and everybody's different.
• 13:37
  Dr. Heather Finley: Not everybody experiences the, um, exactly the same.
• 13:40
  Dr. Heather Finley: And, um, I mean, the anxiety I don't think was crazy high with me, where it's like, some people, it's like really extreme, uh, with me.
• 13:49
  Dr. Heather Finley: I think a lot of it was just honestly just also a state of disbelief.
• 13:54
  Dr. Heather Finley: Like just, um, as, and maybe that was the case with you when you got your diagnosis, although.
• 13:59
  Dr. Heather Finley: I know you said on when I interviewed you that you went to a few different doctors, so you in a way was probably more relief maybe.
• 14:06
  Dr. Heather Finley: Yeah, for sure.
• 14:07
  Dr. Heather Finley: That you got the diagnosis with me.
• 14:09
  Dr. Heather Finley: Uh, you know, I wasn't expecting to get diagnosed with hyperthyroidism le and, and Graves disease, so it was more like a, a shock.
• 14:16
  Dr. Heather Finley: So now that you know what, you know, and you've seen probably thousands of patients at this point, what is one thing that you wish more practitioners understood or that you understood at the time about how the gut plays into thyroid autoimmunity, especially, you know, related to graves?
• 14:34
  Dr. Heather Finley: Yeah, great question.
• 14:35
  Dr. Heather Finley: I mean, yeah, I, I, I wish that I knew.
• 14:41
  Dr. Heather Finley: J just simply the relationship that most of the immune system cells were located in the gut and just ha you know, the, the impact of having that increase in intestinal permeability.
• 14:52
  Dr. Heather Finley: And I guess how common it is.
• 14:53
  Dr. Heather Finley: I mean, this was going back.
• 14:56
  Dr. Heather Finley: I mean, we're talking about 2008 into 2009, so now everybody has heard of leaky gut, you know, increasing intestinal permeability.
• 15:05
  Dr. Heather Finley: And we know, and there's so many, I mean, there's the, the stool tests now are definitely better than the stool tests from years ago, and a lot more practitioners are doing them.
• 15:15
  Dr. Heather Finley: And so, I mean, just overall, I wish I had greater knowledge of how big of a factor the, the gut played.
• 15:24
  Dr. Heather Finley: In autoimmune conditions.
• 15:26
  Dr. Heather Finley: Um, just it beca again, just wasn't, I mean, that information wasn't, I mean, not to say it wasn't available, but now of course also it's good and bad with everything on the internet.
• 15:37
  Dr. Heather Finley: You could find everything, which not everything's reliable, but back then there weren't podcasts there.
• 15:43
  Dr. Heather Finley: I'm trying to think, was there YouTube in 2008?
• 15:45
  Dr. Heather Finley: Um, I think, think so.
• 15:46
  Dr. Heather Finley: My my maybe.
• 15:48
  Dr. Heather Finley: But, um, but you know, again, it still wasn't what it was today and you gotta be careful even of course today, but.
• 15:54
  Dr. Heather Finley: You know, as a practitioner I learned some of that, like some basic endocrinology going through chiropractic school and basic gut health information.
• 16:02
  Dr. Heather Finley: But again, they didn't really get into that relationship.
• 16:06
  Dr. Heather Finley: So, um, so yeah, I wish when it comes specifically to the gut, I wish I, I did have more knowledge, um, back then.
• 16:15
  Dr. Heather Finley: But, you know, again, just that's what any practice, you just, uh, evolve and you, you know, over, over the years you learn more and more.
• 16:24
  Dr. Heather Finley: Jumping in really quick to tell you about an exciting offer that we have.
• 16:29
  Dr. Heather Finley: I know so many of you have found this podcast to be really helpful on your gut healing journey, and my goal is to help as many people find relief from their GI symptoms as I can.
• 16:40
  Dr. Heather Finley: And you are a part of that mission.
• 16:42
  Dr. Heather Finley: So when you leave a rating and review on this show, more people can find it.
• 16:47
  Dr. Heather Finley: What I would love for you to do is.
• 16:49
  Dr. Heather Finley: Go and leave a five star rating and review and share why you love this podcast.
• 16:54
  Dr. Heather Finley: Go ahead and take a screenshot of it and then send it to our email.
• 16:57
  Dr. Heather Finley: Will be entered to win a free HTMA test with our team.
• 17:01
  Dr. Heather Finley: So the hair tissue mineral analysis, as well as a consult to review your results.
• 17:06
  Dr. Heather Finley: So once again, just go ahead and leave your five star rating and review, then send a screenshot to our support email and we will pick a new winner every single month.
• 17:18
  Dr. Heather Finley: Yeah.
• 17:19
  Dr. Heather Finley: So on those, on that same line, like how do you figure out what's actually driving someone's graves?
• 17:26
  Dr. Heather Finley: Uh, how do you decide, you know, whether to start with gut nervous system, thyroid, n nutri, like what's kind of your process that you go through with your clients?
• 17:37
  Dr. Heather Finley: Yeah, so I mean, the first thing with Graves is, and even with other types of hyperthyroidism, is safe symptom management.
• 17:48
  Dr. Heather Finley: So we wanna do more than just manage symptoms.
• 17:51
  Dr. Heather Finley: But it's a little bit scary when someone has a resting heart rate and triple digits and mm-hmm.
• 17:58
  Dr. Heather Finley: You know, they, you might've heard of like the term thyroid storm where, you know, can become a life-threatening situation if the heart rate becomes really high and un uncontrollable and then they ends up at the the er.
• 18:11
  Dr. Heather Finley: So we want to try to prevent that from happening as much as we can.
• 18:15
  Dr. Heather Finley: So if I'm working with someone, they might already be taking.
• 18:19
  Dr. Heather Finley: Antithyroid medication.
• 18:21
  Dr. Heather Finley: Um, I chose not to.
• 18:22
  Dr. Heather Finley: I took the herbs bugleweed as well as mother wart.
• 18:25
  Dr. Heather Finley: Bugleweed is an herb with antithyroid properties.
• 18:28
  Dr. Heather Finley: Doesn't work for everybody, and that's something I learned.
• 18:31
  Dr. Heather Finley: When I was attending those functional endocrinology seminars, so I didn't know if it would work with me, but, but again, it did.
• 18:38
  Dr. Heather Finley: And so if someone's taking the meds and it's helping and they're comfortable taking the meds, so that's fine.
• 18:43
  Dr. Heather Finley: They could stay on the meds and we could still try to address the cost of the problem.
• 18:47
  Dr. Heather Finley: Um, if they're not taking the meds, we definitely wanted to do something, whether it's the Bugleweed or um, something else naturally to try to lower those thyroid hormone levels and keep them safe.
• 18:58
  Dr. Heather Finley: Um.
• 18:59
  Dr. Heather Finley: Then we wanna incorporate the foundations, and I think really with any health condition, graves, Hashimoto's, other conditions that don't relate to the thyroid and immune system.
• 19:10
  Dr. Heather Finley: We want to have people eat a.
• 19:14
  Dr. Heather Finley: Healthy diet, whole healthy foods and, uh, drink purified water or, or spring water of a glass bottle.
• 19:21
  Dr. Heather Finley: So another area of controversy, which water should we, I think we all could agree, avoid the top water, the water from the plastic bottles.
• 19:28
  Dr. Heather Finley: Um, stress.
• 19:30
  Dr. Heather Finley: So we spoke about stress when, um, you are on my podcast, uh, relationship between, you know, stress and, and, um, Hashimoto's and stress in the gut.
• 19:40
  Dr. Heather Finley: And, um, so just trying to do things to reduce stressors and probably more importantly, improve stress handling and, um.
• 19:49
  Dr. Heather Finley: Sleep, of course, is important.
• 19:50
  Dr. Heather Finley: Another foundation, and a lot of people have sleep issues and sometimes it's intentional because people are staying up late and, you know, just surfing the, the internet or on their iPhone in bed.
• 20:02
  Dr. Heather Finley: But, um, but other times people just can't fall asleep or they wake up in the middle of the night.
• 20:07
  Dr. Heather Finley: So trying to, um, help people get more sleep, uh, just uh.
• 20:12
  Dr. Heather Finley: You know, basic things, at least initially, like to reduce some someone's toxic burden.
• 20:18
  Dr. Heather Finley: So those are, uh, so the foundations are important.
• 20:21
  Dr. Heather Finley: Uh, and then, I mean, I do like to do some testing.
• 20:26
  Dr. Heather Finley: I don't go crazy with the testing in my practice, and not everybody gets the same testing.
• 20:31
  Dr. Heather Finley: So, uh, I mean, I do comprehensive blood testing on, so that's something I do on everybody.
• 20:36
  Dr. Heather Finley: And even that depends on the per, like if I give.
• 20:40
  Dr. Heather Finley: Like what I think is important and then those that I think maybe could be helpful, but maybe more optional, um, in case if someone is paying out of pocket.
• 20:48
  Dr. Heather Finley: But, you know, of course I want to do comprehensive thyroid testing, looking at antibodies and um, you know, the basics like a CBC with differential comprehensive metabolic panel, lipid panel vitamin Z.
• 21:03
  Dr. Heather Finley: Healthy vitamin D level is important for healthy immune system.
• 21:07
  Dr. Heather Finley: Um, I know you mentioned iron panel when you are on my podcast, so I do like a full iron panel, you know, as well.
• 21:13
  Dr. Heather Finley: I do, uh, homocysteine, CRP, so again do do a decent amount of blood testing and then, uh, and blood sugar.
• 21:22
  Dr. Heather Finley: Look at blood sugar markers as well.
• 21:25
  Dr. Heather Finley: Uh, and then I do like adrenal testing, so adrenal testing.
• 21:29
  Dr. Heather Finley: You know, I don't know.
• 21:30
  Dr. Heather Finley: We didn't talk about really, we spoke about some other tests, uh, like hair testing and spoke about gut testing and, and you know, definitely I like, I like those tests as well, but adrenal testing, some practitioners just assume that everybody has compromised adrenals.
• 21:46
  Dr. Heather Finley: Some practitioners test for it.
• 21:48
  Dr. Heather Finley: I don't think there's really a right or wrong.
• 21:50
  Dr. Heather Finley: I like testing just because.
• 21:53
  Dr. Heather Finley: I guess there's a few reasons.
• 21:54
  Dr. Heather Finley: So one, probably the biggest reason is when I dealt with Graves, I was in denial that stress was a factor.
• 22:02
  Dr. Heather Finley: You know, I, I, I knew, I mean, I knew stress impacted, like, not that I thought I was stress free, but I just thought I was naturally good at handling the stress, and if I didn't see how bad my adrenals looked.
• 22:14
  Dr. Heather Finley: I wouldn't have made the effort, I don't think, to improve my stress handling.
• 22:19
  Dr. Heather Finley: Just not back, not only back then, but just up until now too.
• 22:23
  Dr. Heather Finley: Just making a, you know, just blocking out time for stress management, um, on a daily basis.
• 22:29
  Dr. Heather Finley: And so I do like adrenal testing.
• 22:31
  Dr. Heather Finley: I did back then, I did adrenal saliva test, and I, I still do that too now.
• 22:35
  Dr. Heather Finley: There's.
• 22:36
  Dr. Heather Finley: Dried urine test, like the Dutch test, um, that also looks at circadian rhythm of cortisol.
• 22:40
  Dr. Heather Finley: So sometimes we'll do, you know that, that test.
• 22:43
  Dr. Heather Finley: Um, and you know, we, we spoke a little bit about hair testing on, um, on my podcast when I interviewed you and.
• 22:51
  Dr. Heather Finley: So I, I, which is again a controversial test, but I do like hair testing.
• 22:55
  Dr. Heather Finley: I like stool testing.
• 22:57
  Dr. Heather Finley: Um, again, I don't do stool testing on everybody, but I do a decent amount of them and sometimes I'll do organic acid testing.
• 23:04
  Dr. Heather Finley: So, so really it depends on also the health history, but I do like to do testing rather than guessing.
• 23:10
  Dr. Heather Finley: Um, and so sometimes you have to guess because the tests aren't perfect, but if you can do testing and see what's on the testing, and then based on.
• 23:19
  Dr. Heather Finley: The test, we give recommendations.
• 23:22
  Dr. Heather Finley: Um, so, uh, again, I'll give some general support like probiotics and omegas and, um, I mean, again, like sometimes selenium, but selenium could also look at things like hair testing or if someone wants to do like RBC, selenium and the blood, I mean, that's also an option.
• 23:39
  Dr. Heather Finley: But vitamin Z we want to test for, uh, again, h Pyl, we spoke about h pylori.
• 23:46
  Dr. Heather Finley: Which we could definitely talk more about'cause we didn't, we spoke a little bit about HP Lium parasites, but I think that's a really big factor with Graves and Hashimoto's.
• 23:55
  Dr. Heather Finley: I mean, in the re research as a relationship, it's something I see a lot in practice as far as a potential trigger.
• 24:02
  Dr. Heather Finley: Um, but yeah, that's my, my, so my, a summary of the process start with symptom management foundations.
• 24:10
  Dr. Heather Finley: Testing, you know, to, to try to find triggers underlying imbalances and obviously address those triggers and underlying imbalances.
• 24:18
  Dr. Heather Finley: And that, and again, that all ties into the gut too, because I mean, the, the foundations will help with gut healing.
• 24:25
  Dr. Heather Finley: Doing some of the testing, you know, could help with gut heal healing as well, depending on what we find.
• 24:30
  Dr. Heather Finley: Yeah, well you kind of answered this, but my next question was gonna be what gut related triggers do you see?
• 24:36
  Dr. Heather Finley: You know, usually you see things like h pylori and parasites, online about Graves Disease and Hashimoto's.
• 24:44
  Dr. Heather Finley: So would you say that that is something that you commonly see, or is there, are there other things on gut related tests that you tend to find?
• 24:52
  Dr. Heather Finley: Those are the two.
• 24:53
  Dr. Heather Finley: As far as like trigger triggers, I mean, we de, de de.
• 24:56
  Dr. Heather Finley: I definitely see other things on.
• 24:58
  Dr. Heather Finley: The stool test as you do too.
• 25:00
  Dr. Heather Finley: But I don't know if you'd say they're triggers, they're, I mean, they could give signs like, you know, someone has like, I see a lot of.
• 25:08
  Dr. Heather Finley: Depressed or lower pancreatic elastase on the stool test, which I wouldn't say that's a trigger, but that's a sign of other things.
• 25:16
  Dr. Heather Finley: Again, very common with h pylori to see like that low pancreatic elastase.
• 25:21
  Dr. Heather Finley: And, um, you know, we see a lot of, uh, just general dysbiosis.
• 25:26
  Dr. Heather Finley: Like, uh, if, like, again, there's different tests.
• 25:30
  Dr. Heather Finley: Uh, like I, I do GI maps, but also I've done like the GI effects and, you know, um.
• 25:36
  Dr. Heather Finley: Again, a lot of good companies, but streptococcus, for example, is something I see a lot of, but I wouldn't say it's a trigger, it's just uh, um, I think even in some healthy people we would see that even though it's red flagged and it's under the opportunistic and, but again, to me it's even if someone is in remission, it's not uncommon to see some imbalances on a stool test.
• 25:59
  Dr. Heather Finley: So I would say H plar is a big one.
• 26:01
  Dr. Heather Finley: Um, definitely parasites could be a factor as well and a potential trigger.
• 26:06
  Dr. Heather Finley: Um, candida overgrowth, I mean stool, in my experience, it's not the best test to pick up candida.
• 26:14
  Dr. Heather Finley: Yeah.
• 26:14
  Dr. Heather Finley: But, and candida, I don't know, even if you would call like a trigger trigger, but it can affect, the gut, can increase permeability of the gut.
• 26:21
  Dr. Heather Finley: Um, so an organic acid test is actually really good for picking up, uh, yeast overgrowth.
• 26:28
  Dr. Heather Finley: Uh, we spoke, uh, when you are on my podcast about sibo, small intestinal bacteria overgrowth, which again, I don't know if you really would consider a trigger, but it can affect.
• 26:36
  Dr. Heather Finley: It could cause leaky gut too.
• 26:38
  Dr. Heather Finley: So if you have sibo, you have yeast overgrowth, um, one or both of those.
• 26:44
  Dr. Heather Finley: Uh, and if you don't address those, it's gonna be hard to heal due to the impact they have on, on the gut.
• 26:50
  Dr. Heather Finley: Uh, but yeah, I would say those are, I mean there's, in the research, in the literature, there's uh, a yersinia entera, which is, uh, a bacteria, and I can't say I see a lot of that on the stool test.
• 27:04
  Dr. Heather Finley: Um.
• 27:06
  Dr. Heather Finley: I know I had Dr.
• 27:07
  Dr. Heather Finley: Nicholas Hedberg on the pod on my podcast, and he mentioned like blood testing is actually better for Yesinia.
• 27:13
  Dr. Heather Finley: I guess the only concern about that is same thing with h Pylori, if you have it, is it like a current problem or is it a past problem?
• 27:21
  Dr. Heather Finley: 'cause the antibodies could last mm-hmm.
• 27:23
  Dr. Heather Finley: For a while in the blood, but occurrence to the research, that could be a factor, you know, as well.
• 27:28
  Dr. Heather Finley: But yeah, as far as the gut goes, I mean, those are probably some of the, the more common gut microbes, gut, gut infections that we would see.
• 27:38
  Dr. Heather Finley: So what is the typical timeline that you see?
• 27:40
  Dr. Heather Finley: You asked me a similar question on your podcast, and I'm curious just with Graves specifically, you know, if someone's taking antithyroid medication or taking the herbs, like you mentioned, whichever route they choose, how long does it take typically?
• 27:56
  Dr. Heather Finley: To kind of stabilize things where you start to see the resting heart rate come down, you start to see just improvement a little bit in symptoms or even just improvement in labs kind of normalizing.
• 28:07
  Dr. Heather Finley: Um, or do you feel like it's all over the place?
• 28:10
  Dr. Heather Finley: I mean, it is all, excuse me, it is all over the place, but it, it's, yeah, so it does depend on the person, but I mean, it's not uncommon to see, like, I do like to see changes.
• 28:21
  Dr. Heather Finley: And how people feel within, I mean, sometimes we see it within a few weeks, but it, it could be a few months.
• 28:29
  Dr. Heather Finley: I mean, when I dealt with Graves personally, and I took the bugleweed, I noticed within the first month that it was working, you know, even before doing the first blood test, I, I felt I was able to measure my heart rate and the heart rate was decreasing, and I, I started with Bugleweed.
• 28:46
  Dr. Heather Finley: But I was still having palpitations, so I added mother wart and that helped with the, the palpitations.
• 28:51
  Dr. Heather Finley: Um, even further.
• 28:53
  Dr. Heather Finley: So symptom-wise, I mean, and if someone's taking the meds, it, it'll, it can work much quicker.
• 28:58
  Dr. Heather Finley: The, the problem with a medication in the world of hyperthyroidism with antithyroid medications such as methimazole or propal uracil, which is PTU, is that side effects are very common.
• 29:10
  Dr. Heather Finley: Um.
• 29:12
  Dr. Heather Finley: But they work, they so someone could feel better quickly with the meds if they do take it.
• 29:17
  Dr. Heather Finley: The herbs, if they work, they could also, maybe not as quickly, but within a few weeks.
• 29:23
  Dr. Heather Finley: Labs.
• 29:23
  Dr. Heather Finley: It depends.
• 29:24
  Dr. Heather Finley: I mean, again, it's not unreasonable to start seeing some changes with the labs, like even the first test.
• 29:31
  Dr. Heather Finley: But it's, everybody's different.
• 29:32
  Dr. Heather Finley: Some, sometimes they'll take a few labs and one thing that's very common with.
• 29:38
  Dr. Heather Finley: Hyperthyroidism, especially Graves, is that TSH will remain undetectable usually for quite a while.
• 29:46
  Dr. Heather Finley: So it's not uncommon for th like, we'll see thyroid hormone levels decreasing, and TSH is staying where it is, um, for a while, and it frustrates people.
• 29:55
  Dr. Heather Finley: But what I tell'em is as long as the thyroid hormone levels continue to decrease, again, eventually the TSH will start increasing.
• 30:03
  Dr. Heather Finley: It might be three months, it might be six months, it might be longer.
• 30:07
  Dr. Heather Finley: But if we see the thyroid hormones trending in the right direction, I wouldn't worry about it.
• 30:13
  Dr. Heather Finley: Okay, and I think, a common thing, and you, you mentioned this at the beginning, is that people are often told that they kind of quote unquote, have no choice and they need to have the radioactive iodine or surgery.
• 30:26
  Dr. Heather Finley: And why do you think this has pushed so hard?
• 30:29
  Dr. Heather Finley: And what do people need to understand before they make that kind of decision?
• 30:36
  Dr. Heather Finley: Yeah, I mean it's uh, there's probably a few reasons.
• 30:41
  Dr. Heather Finley: I mean, I think one reason is.
• 30:45
  Dr. Heather Finley: Endocrinologists feel more comfortable dealing with hypothyroidism than hyperthyroidism because again, there is that risk of a thyroid storm or so.
• 30:55
  Dr. Heather Finley: You know, just, uh, just again, there's more, not that hypothyroidism doesn't come without risks, but again, when someone has elevated thyroid hormones, it's more risky.
• 31:05
  Dr. Heather Finley: So they feel it's easier to manage.
• 31:08
  Dr. Heather Finley: Just get the radioactive iodine thyroid surgery, and we just put the person on thyroid hormone.
• 31:14
  Dr. Heather Finley: And, and they'll live happily ever ha after, which doesn't of course always happen, but that's what they're thinking.
• 31:20
  Dr. Heather Finley: And um, so that's one reason.
• 31:22
  Dr. Heather Finley: I mean, you know, is it profit also?
• 31:26
  Dr. Heather Finley: I mean, it's hard.
• 31:27
  Dr. Heather Finley: You would hope that, would it be the case, but I mean, by doing that, uh, obviously there's profit with thyroid surgery.
• 31:34
  Dr. Heather Finley: Radioactive iodine, I don't think is that profitable.
• 31:36
  Dr. Heather Finley: But either way.
• 31:38
  Dr. Heather Finley: If someone becomes hypo, they do have a lifetime thyroid patient that they'll be managing and, and um, you know, with a thyroid hormone replacement.
• 31:46
  Dr. Heather Finley: But, you know, again, you would like to think that's not the main reason.
• 31:50
  Dr. Heather Finley: And, and I, I think the main reason is just because, again, they're very nervous about the hyperthyroidism.
• 31:55
  Dr. Heather Finley: And I mean, some of them also, they'll, at least this is what I hear.
• 32:00
  Dr. Heather Finley: I mean, when I dealt with my, I just went to the endocrinologist one time when I dealt with Graves.
• 32:04
  Dr. Heather Finley: 'cause I wasn't gonna follow her recommendation.
• 32:06
  Dr. Heather Finley: So I just wanted to get.
• 32:08
  Dr. Heather Finley: Diagnosed and I got an ultrasound and, um, and she recomme recommended Antithyroid medication.
• 32:13
  Dr. Heather Finley: She didn't push the radioactive eye or thyroid surgery on me.
• 32:17
  Dr. Heather Finley: She just gave me medication, which I, I mentioned I didn't take.
• 32:20
  Dr. Heather Finley: So I was like, uh, it's no use for me seeing her.
• 32:22
  Dr. Heather Finley: But, but, um, when endocrinologist, they, a lot of them will give the antithyroid medication and they'll tell their patients that they can't take the medication for more than.
• 32:34
  Dr. Heather Finley: A year and a half, two years.
• 32:35
  Dr. Heather Finley: 'cause it'll damage their liver.
• 32:37
  Dr. Heather Finley: And it does, it can put stress on the liver.
• 32:41
  Dr. Heather Finley: So that's not, I mean, they're being honest with that, but it's not the case with everybody.
• 32:47
  Dr. Heather Finley: And so, um, I'm not, I'm not saying people should be on the medication long term, but if it's, if choosing between long term antithyroid medication, especially at lower doses, like five milligrams of methol, 10 milligrams of methimazole.
• 33:02
  Dr. Heather Finley: And then getting his thyroid removed completely or ablated with the radioactive iodine.
• 33:09
  Dr. Heather Finley: The research actually shows that taking something like meth, like low dose methimazole is safe for like 10, 15 years or longer.
• 33:17
  Dr. Heather Finley: So it's not, I don't prefer that'cause that means that the person, we haven't addressed the cause of the problem and they're relying on antithyroid medication, but.
• 33:26
  Dr. Heather Finley: That just goes back to the question why do some endocrinologists recommend it?
• 33:31
  Dr. Heather Finley: Some of them aren't quick to recommend it, like some will will recommend it pretty quickly.
• 33:35
  Dr. Heather Finley: But some will say, go, let's go on the meds for a year and a half, two years.
• 33:39
  Dr. Heather Finley: Let's see if you get in remission.
• 33:41
  Dr. Heather Finley: And they're not doing anything to improve the person's immune system, so the person may, people, may time, will either won't go into remission or relapse.
• 33:49
  Dr. Heather Finley: But those are some of the common reasons why endocrinologists are hasty to recommend a radioactive eye on thyroid surgery, or again, maybe not hasty, some of them right off the bat, but a year and a half, two years later, we'll recommend it even when then it's not necessary.
• 34:04
  Dr. Heather Finley: Okay.
• 34:05
  Dr. Heather Finley: Yeah, that's super helpful.
• 34:07
  Dr. Heather Finley: In your opinion, what would you say?
• 34:10
  Dr. Heather Finley: Is the number one thing that you see people like holding people back from getting better?
• 34:15
  Dr. Heather Finley: You've probably had clients where you're like, you should be responding to this, or, you know, maybe we're not seeing the results that you want.
• 34:22
  Dr. Heather Finley: Is there one like common thing that you think is a big barrier to seeing the symptom improvement that they wanna see?
• 34:33
  Dr. Heather Finley: Or even improvement on labs?
• 34:35
  Dr. Heather Finley: It's hard to pick one.
• 34:37
  Dr. Heather Finley: I mean, you know, if I had to like pick one, I'd cheat a little bit and say the foundations, which include a few different things.
• 34:44
  Dr. Heather Finley: Yeah, just, just not incorporating either, not.
• 34:47
  Dr. Heather Finley: Being strict enough with the diet.
• 34:49
  Dr. Heather Finley: And it's tricky.
• 34:50
  Dr. Heather Finley: 'cause again, I nobody likes restrictive diets.
• 34:53
  Dr. Heather Finley: And to me, if someone's gonna be like on an elimination type diet or an autoimmune protocol, it's not a long-term thing.
• 35:01
  Dr. Heather Finley: Um, but either way, and again, not that everybody needs to be on like an a IP, like even paleo is pretty healthy.
• 35:09
  Dr. Heather Finley: The the point is.
• 35:10
  Dr. Heather Finley: Some people have issues or have very difficult time giving up gluten, giving up other common allergens, giving up, um, you know, like, uh, fast food, just things that they shouldn't be eating.
• 35:22
  Dr. Heather Finley: So just eating whole healthy foods for some people is a challenge.
• 35:27
  Dr. Heather Finley: And then I, I'd say the, the two, I'll, I'll narrow it down to two things, the diet and the stress.
• 35:32
  Dr. Heather Finley: If you're gonna say two, like there are other things, but.
• 35:35
  Dr. Heather Finley: The stress a lot of times is, I guess you could say overlooked, like,'cause they, I mean, a lot of people do focus on the diet.
• 35:44
  Dr. Heather Finley: But overlook the stress.
• 35:45
  Dr. Heather Finley: And then of course, some people neglect the diet and also aren't really focusing on the stress.
• 35:50
  Dr. Heather Finley: But again, I gave my story where if I didn't see my adrenals, I wouldn't, I also probably would've not really focused on stress management as much.
• 36:00
  Dr. Heather Finley: And so I, I think I see that when I do like follow up consults with, with patients, uh, you know, I find that, I mean, some of them are blocking out time for stress management, but some of them.
• 36:10
  Dr. Heather Finley: Aren't, or they just consider like walking as stress management, which is, I mean it is walk, but I think sometimes people need to do more need.
• 36:19
  Dr. Heather Finley: They need to incorporate some type of deep breathing, some type of mind body medicine.
• 36:24
  Dr. Heather Finley: Totally.
• 36:24
  Dr. Heather Finley: Yeah.
• 36:25
  Dr. Heather Finley: Walking while listening to a podcast and you know, totally distracting yourself, might not actually be.
• 36:32
  Dr. Heather Finley: Super stress reducing.
• 36:34
  Dr. Heather Finley: Depending on what you're listening to.
• 36:36
  Dr. Heather Finley: You might need to walk and not listen to something, listen to the birds and yeah, I totally get that.
• 36:42
  Dr. Heather Finley: So if someone just got diagnosed and is feeling, a little bit overwhelmed, what is one thing that you think they could do this week and maybe the answer's kind of obvious to feel a little bit more on the path that they need to be on.
• 36:58
  Dr. Heather Finley: Uh, yeah, I guess, uh, I guess we kind of like going back to like just, I mean, what can people do on their own?
• 37:06
  Dr. Heather Finley: They could change their diet and lifestyle.
• 37:08
  Dr. Heather Finley: That's, uh, and I won't say that's the easiest thing, but that's something that people could do today or tomorrow, is just, uh, clean up their diet.
• 37:16
  Dr. Heather Finley: Just with the stress management.
• 37:19
  Dr. Heather Finley: I would say, if we're gonna again, say one thing.
• 37:22
  Dr. Heather Finley: Block out five minutes per day for let's say just deep breathing.
• 37:27
  Dr. Heather Finley: Um, and again, not that that's going to reverse your.
• 37:30
  Dr. Heather Finley: Graves or Hashimoto's condition, but it's really about getting in the, into the routine of stress management and just, uh, trying to incorporate it not just a few days a week because I mean, which is still, which is great, but you know, there are a lot of people that don't do, don't do anything from a stress management perspective.
• 37:46
  Dr. Heather Finley: But then there are people that say, well, yeah, you know, I do yoga maybe like twice a week and that's it.
• 37:52
  Dr. Heather Finley: Um, which is great, but then not doing it at all, but.
• 37:56
  Dr. Heather Finley: You know, just incorporate trust management every single day.
• 37:59
  Dr. Heather Finley: So I would say take five minutes per day.
• 38:01
  Dr. Heather Finley: If you don't have five minutes per day, then you definitely need to do this.
• 38:05
  Dr. Heather Finley: Um, so, uh, and then once you're doing it for five minutes per day, then you could gradually increase the duration.
• 38:11
  Dr. Heather Finley: Maybe some days you only do five minutes per day, but other days you have a little bit more time, so you do 10, 15, 20 minutes per day.
• 38:19
  Dr. Heather Finley: So, so that, again, the diet, I would say, if we had to make a choice, yeah, I would probably say diet, but.
• 38:26
  Dr. Heather Finley: It's hard to heal without, you know, if you're in a fight or if you're in fight or flight mode all the time and eating a perfect diet, it's still gonna be difficult to heal.
• 38:34
  Dr. Heather Finley: So I really do think they both go together.
• 38:36
  Dr. Heather Finley: And obviously the sleep, you know, we could also say sleep, but if you're eating well and your stress is really under control and managing it, that those two things will do wonders for a lot of sleep issues.
• 38:49
  Dr. Heather Finley: Totally.
• 38:50
  Dr. Heather Finley: You mentioned adrenals and how you wouldn't have necessarily bought into stress being a piece, and we see that a lot with our clients as well.
• 39:00
  Dr. Heather Finley: What's the most common adrenal pattern that you see?
• 39:02
  Dr. Heather Finley: Do you see people completely flatlined to just burn out or do you see the kind of the opposite cortisol curve that you should?
• 39:11
  Dr. Heather Finley: And the reason I ask is because online right now there's this huge trend of like.
• 39:16
  Dr. Heather Finley: Cortisol face and cortisol drink, and everybody's talking about cortisol and how you know your cortisol is actually too high and all this stuff, and we actually see a lot of clients that are just so burned out that their cortisol is actually just completely flatlined.
• 39:33
  Dr. Heather Finley: So I'm curious what you see.
• 39:36
  Dr. Heather Finley: Yeah, I mean, I see a mix, but I, I tend to see more of what you just said, and that was me.
• 39:41
  Dr. Heather Finley: When I dealt with graves, I, um, pretty much had like a flat line cortisol, so definitely like low in the morning, and it wasn't high at night.
• 39:49
  Dr. Heather Finley: It was low.
• 39:51
  Dr. Heather Finley: Pretty much throughout the day.
• 39:52
  Dr. Heather Finley: My DHEA was low.
• 39:53
  Dr. Heather Finley: My secretary IGA was low everything.
• 39:56
  Dr. Heather Finley: Um, so every, everything was low.
• 39:58
  Dr. Heather Finley: And yeah, that's not the case with everybody, but I'd say that's more common.
• 40:01
  Dr. Heather Finley: We do, we do see some people where cortisol is elevated in the morning and then I gotta see, you know, like, was it a stressful morning or like, are you having sleep issues?
• 40:11
  Dr. Heather Finley: And so there's, um.
• 40:13
  Dr. Heather Finley: Yeah.
• 40:14
  Dr. Heather Finley: So, and, and then yeah, sometimes we do see like low cortisol in the mor, that opposite pattern you mentioned where cortisol is low in the morning, but then kind of spikes up at night.
• 40:22
  Dr. Heather Finley: So yeah, we, we see a mixture of things, but I would say the flat line is, is pretty common.
• 40:29
  Dr. Heather Finley: The low cor, and then the same thing I mentioned that I had low DHEA.
• 40:33
  Dr. Heather Finley: It's not everybody, but that's pretty common too.
• 40:37
  Dr. Heather Finley: This has been super helpful and I'm excited to share this episode.
• 40:41
  Dr. Heather Finley: So last question before we wrap real quick is because this is called the Love Your Gut podcast, what is your favorite way, or what is one thing that you do to love your gut?
• 40:53
  Dr. Heather Finley: Uh, another challenging question.
• 40:55
  Dr. Heather Finley: One thing that I do to love my gut, um, oh boy.
• 41:01
  Dr. Heather Finley: Um, I.
• 41:04
  Dr. Heather Finley: I mean, I'll go back to the stress management just because the impact that stress has on the gut.
• 41:11
  Dr. Heather Finley: It, it's, um, again, stress has negative impact.
• 41:14
  Dr. Heather Finley: I mean, chronic stress has a negative impact everywhere.
• 41:17
  Dr. Heather Finley: But again, the, the stress, I think real,'cause I mentioned how.
• 41:21
  Dr. Heather Finley: When I dealt with Graves again, I had that low secretary IGA and um, and it stayed low for quite a while after a few retests and eventually it did get, um, to where it needed to be.
• 41:33
  Dr. Heather Finley: Um, probably need to retest it again.
• 41:34
  Dr. Heather Finley: It's been a while since I did a retest and looked at what that secretary IGA'cause.
• 41:38
  Dr. Heather Finley: Again, that's the one thing about stress.
• 41:41
  Dr. Heather Finley: Is, I think I'm a lot better.
• 41:42
  Dr. Heather Finley: I know I'm a lot better when it comes to stress management, which has helped my thyroid, my gut, my immune system.
• 41:48
  Dr. Heather Finley: But it's always, I think, a work in progress.
• 41:51
  Dr. Heather Finley: So, um, so if I, again, diet of course, is a, has played a big role as well.
• 41:57
  Dr. Heather Finley: But if I had to choose one thing, I'd, I'd also say the stress is, is probably the biggest factor or stress handling them.
• 42:04
  Dr. Heather Finley: The improve stress handling, um mm-hmm is the one way I've really helped to love my gut.
• 42:10
  Dr. Heather Finley: Love it.
• 42:11
  Dr. Heather Finley: Well, where can everybody find you?
• 42:13
  Dr. Heather Finley: Um, with your podcast, website, all the things.
• 42:17
  Dr. Heather Finley: Yeah.
• 42:18
  Dr. Heather Finley: So my podcast, uh, save my thyroid.com.
• 42:21
  Dr. Heather Finley: Um, or just go see your favorite podcast and type in Save My Thyroid.
• 42:26
  Dr. Heather Finley: And, um, then I have three books.
• 42:28
  Dr. Heather Finley: Uh.
• 42:29
  Dr. Heather Finley: Natural treatment solutions for Hyperthyroid and Graves Disease, which is in its third edition, Hashimoto's Triggers and the Hyperthyroid Healing Diet.
• 42:36
  Dr. Heather Finley: You could find those on Amazon.
• 42:38
  Dr. Heather Finley: And then my newsletter, uh, healthy Gut, healthy Thyroid, um, and then you could check that out by visiting save my thyroid.com/newsletter.
• 42:49
  Dr. Heather Finley: Awesome.
• 42:49
  Dr. Heather Finley: Well, thanks so much for joining.
• 42:51
  Dr. Heather Finley: Thank you so much, Dr.
• 42:52
  Dr. Heather Finley: Heather.