Studies show that about 30 million people in the United States have a thyroid disorder and about 80% of them suffer from hypothyroidism. If you’ve been diagnosed with hypothyroidism, you’ve likely been prescribed its most common treatment, Synthroid.
Synthroid is a hormone replacement therapy that attempts to compensate for your underactive thyroid. The active ingredient in Synthroid is levothyroxine, a synthetic form of your body’s natural thyroid hormone, thyroxine. You may be taking Synthroid with little change in your hypoglycemic symptoms. This can be due to many factors, but the first and easiest to treat is absorption.
Levothyroxine is absorbed in the small intestine. This is why you are told to take Synthroid with a full 8 ounce glass of water to push the pill to the bottom. If you’re not drinking at least one 8oz glass with your Synthroid, you’re getting the same results as if you had tapped the pill on your forehead. The hormone will not be absorbed by your system and you will see little change in your symptoms. Always drink at least 8 ounces of water each time you take Synthroid!
Well, that’s the first step. The next factor to check is calcium and iron intake. The thyroid hormone will bind to these substances and leave your body without being absorbed by them. So make sure you don’t consume calcium or iron 2-3 hours before or after taking your Synthroid pill. This includes supplements, milk, and fortified juices. Also, take your pill on an empty stomach and do not eat for at least an hour afterward.
Even if you’re doing all of that right, your body still may not be absorbing the hormone correctly. That’s because of the complex ecosystem of bacterial organisms that populate the lower intestine, where the drug can be absorbed. If that ecosystem is out of whack, and it’s usually with the highly processed foods we all eat, your gut wall won’t absorb the Synthroid into your system well. Therefore, we must rebalance the bacteria in your digestive tract. How do we do that?
Probiotics are bacteria that impart beneficial effects to their host, in this case our body. We need a lot of these to maintain a healthy gut and keep out nasty pathogenic bacteria that harm us. The goal is to consume probiotics regularly, in large numbers and with the bacteria in an active state. The best way to do this is to drink kefir.
What is kefir? Kefir is a fermented milk drink, rich in probiotics. It is made by adding kefir grains, a matrix of live bacteria that looks like cooked cauliflower, to milk and allowing it to ferment. After straining the kefir, the resulting liquid is a wonderful living probiotic drink. Much richer in fresh probiotics than yogurt or probiotic supplements. Drinking kefir daily will give your system the rebalancing it needs to absorb Synthroid properly.
In addition to that benefit, kefir can also help remedy some of the symptoms of hypothyroidism. These include acid reflux, constipation, and gas. When you have a healthy and properly functioning digestive system, these symptoms are no longer a problem.
Making sure that Synthroid is properly absorbed into your system is the first thing to check to ensure that your hypothyroidism is being properly treated.