~ My INTJ Thoughts ~

Just saying this- if you have an autoimmune disease, don’t ignore it. 

When I was first diagnosed with an autoimmune disease I was 14 years old (remember this as you read forward because 14 year old me was a bit of an idiot). We saw a wonderful doctor in place of my normal physician after I had complained for 3 consecutive days of heart palpitations that were strong enough they were actually taking my breath away. 

This doctor, I’ll call him Dr. Show (even though that’s not his real name- a placeholder, if you will) had some blood work done- and now we had seen him before in the past. He’s a wonderful pediatrician and LOVES his job. He practically lives in his office and there have been times when I had blood work done and he would call in on Sunday to tell my mother the results- so in other words, he’s a good doctor. Anyway, I had had blood work done, and had to wear a heart monitor to school the next few days to track the palpitations, and when we got back, Dr. Show came in and we were promptly informed that not only did I have Hypothyroidism, I also had this little thing called Hashimotos Thyroiditis- an autoimmune disease that was the direct cause of my Hypothyroidism. 

Well, I thought nothing of it. He prescribed me some medicine that would supplement my low thyroid levels and I considered it all fixed and done. I went about two years doing nothing about it and no research on it. Taking the pill just became another mundane part of life and I didn’t think much about the illness. But then something amazing happened that I hadn’t even considered to be a symptom of low thyroid/Hashimotos.

My depression faded away. Just from taking that pill and fixing that part of the issue. 

For those of you that don’t understand what Hashimotos Thyroiditis is, it is, again, an autoimmune disease that primarily attacks your thyroid. For me, my thyroid hormone had been practically nonexistent because of it. But lack of that hormone can cause not only a number of physical issues (Such as weight gain, hair loss, fatigue, etc.) it can also cause a number of mental issues (Depression, anxiety, anger, etc.). From my knowledge going to long without it can actually cause you to go mentally insane if it gets to serious. 

But here’s the deal- Doctors tend to say that it only attacks your thyroid. The only way they really treat it is by giving you thyroid medications. But the deal is that it is an Autoimmune disease.

It does more than just that. 

Hashimotos symptoms can include but is not limited to

Hair loss

fatigue 

insomnia

weight loss

weight gain

joint pain

depression

anxiety 

heat sensitivity 

general temperature sensitivity 

mood swings

and more

It can make someone prone to miscarriages if it goes untreated. It can make you more prone to illness and make those illnesses last longer because, news flash, your body is to busy attacking itself to realize that the full front needs to be focused on the germs that just entered your body and not the body itself. 

It doesn’t just attack your thyroid- it attacks your body. 

I didn’t realize nor associate a lot of my symptoms with my disease for two years. I have a bad shoulder, my joints tend to ache, I can’t stand hot weather, I’m tired all day every day but I still have issues going to sleep and there’s more. I even developed lactose intolerance (well, more noticed it. I’ve been mildly lactose intolerant my whole life and just refused to admit it (thing is this autoimmune disease very well could have been attacking me on a more mild scale for years considering my behavior and body-type as a child)) soon after my diagnosis, and I only noticed it after watching Phil Lester’s non-dairy milk tasting video when he described the feeling dairy products gave him. Lactose intolerance, turns out, is actually a common pattern among Hashimotos fighters. Not only that, but gluten intolerance are common in us as well, and it took me years to actually admit that MAYBE it was a part of my issue. After finally going on a gluten free diet, it did actually help. As a matter of fact, I’m able to better tolerate dairy products because of it, or so it seems. 

My overall point here is that, if you’ve been diagnosed with an autoimmune disease, don’t ignore it like I did. It was effecting me in a ton more ways than I had ever thought. I was sure it wasn’t effecting me at the time, but it really was. 

Also: there are a lot of gluten free options nowadays. I know Canyon Bakehouse makes really nice bread and bagels. And gluten free pasta has come a long way too. Theres King Arthur Gluten free flour and Bobs Red Mill flour (Idk if those are available world wide or not tho) which are both rather good and I use in place of normal flour in things like cookies and brownies. There's even gluten free Oreos now!- so what I'm saying is that if you should want to to try going gluten free, there are a lot of options available to find replacement food for anything you like to eat already.

I've actually read before that people with hashis should be screened for celiac (which pro tip, if you want to do that/haven't been screened before cuz idk your medical history, get screened BEFORE going gluten free because you need to eat a certain amount of gluten before they can do the tests, or at least that's what I was told).

I would recommend doing research on hashis and find personal accounts and such on what works for others and decide what's best for you personally. (Like with diet I see a lot of accounts saying "you should go gluten/dairy free / avoid added sugars but not everyone's expirience with hashis is the same. So decide what is best for you and your health. I am not saying that to add pressure on you but simply to inform you.) That is, if you haven't already. Cuz most doctors really just give you a pill and call it a day. It's good to find the community of people with it even if you never interact with them because they can sometimes bring to light issues with hashis you either don't associate with it or didn't know about.

Person: You argued for 20 minutes with the teacher on whether the theory they were using was true or not, and afterwards went to library to look up more information and then, after gathering all the data, wrote an extra 20-page essay you then turned in on the next class just to prove that you were right and the teacher was wrong.

That my heart breaks for things that don’t exist,

For things that never will,

For things that exist, but I’ll never get to see;

That my heart shatters for people who aren’t there,

For people that have never been there,

For all these minds inside my own;

That it hurts so infinitely

That it doesn’t even hurt at all,

And that you‘ll never know of this pain,