Comment by DanBC | Hacker News Reader

Comment by DanBC | Hacker News Reader

This is not medical advice: I have no qualifications nor registrations.

Hypothyroidism is full of some really fucking harmful quackery on the Internet. Please avoid those bad websites. You're right that it needs careful monitoring to get the dose right.

A general supplement of vitamins A,C, and D is probably not harmful. (Do not overdose on vitamins. They can be toxic and can kill.)

And now some other stuff:

Work towards getting better food and some exercise into your life. Set small, realistic, achievable goals. Give yourself credit when you meet those. Fresh fruit and veg are not too expensive and will make a difference. Good food will help you feel better. Exercise will help to reduce stress.

Investigate some course of CBT. This can be done by yourself from a book; or online; or you can get some guided course. In the UK it's available free (you ask your GP and say words like "CBT" and "IAPT" and "Primary care mental health services" until you get it; or you can sometimes self refer.) In other countries you'll want to find out who registers therapists and then search for a therapist with that registration.

It is surprising how much difference a short course and hard work can make - 8 weeks at 1 hour per week can really help a lot of people.

Frankly, I am finding the doctors to be the quakers.

"the internet" helped me there loads more than any medic, this became painfully clear when I started to bother to read official documents that medics should have been reading, for example I saw on internet a study that was about specifically my case, all doctors I went refused to trust the study and said they only trusted the association and the lab numbers... I asked the lab their source, they pointed me a association-made document, I read the document, and behold, the official association document that the lab and doctors claim to follow, cite the study I was citing, and for precisely the same reasons...

I could only conclude that doctors are lazy, and like to take whatever number someone (their teacher, lab, whatever) spoon fed them, instead of reading the source of that number (including the endocrine association guidelines... seriously, I went to 8 or 9 different doctors in the last 12 years, some of them absurdly expensive, and not a single one read the guidelines, despite all of them claiming to follow them!)

What is CBT and IAPT? Google keep throwing me stuff on my own language, despite me using english as default (for example for Google CBT is the brazillian tennis confederation).

Hi, sorry for using initialisms.

CBT is "cognitive behaviour therapy" - this is an evidence based talking therapy that is used for a wide variety of problems, from mild mood disorders through to pain management for cancer patients.

The Australian site "MoodGym" is a respected website that will teach you about CBT. https://moodgym.anu.edu.au/welcome

It's important to realise that CBT is not just about psychological problems. CBT can give you the skills to talk to clinicians about thyroid problems, for example.

IAPT is only relevant to the UK. It is a program to fund talking therapies for mental health problems. It stands for "improving access to psychological therapies".

Some really small changes to your life will build up over time to make significant differences. Small changes in diet and exercise will help improve mood and motivation; that will help you research the thyroid stuff and prepare documents to challenge clinicians; and so on.

I wish you best of luck.

How certain are you that you understand those documents better than medical professionals?

The problem is not of conflicting interpretations, it is of medics claiming that I am saying bullshit, and that the correct thing is the document, when I am quoting said document... So either the medic is a liar (unlikely) or he never read the document.

There are most certainly conflicting interpretations: your interpretation of the document and the medical professional's interpretation of the document. It's just like how if both you and, say, a journalist or a firefighter read the same piece of code; you would have two wildly different interpretations.

Look, while I can't claim to know your situation, 9 times out of 10 it is a very bad idea to do self-diagnosis over the internet vs. taking professional advice. Even if you have a pretty good idea of what might be ailing you, there are subtle nuances to all kinds of diseases and conditions that doctors tend to understand. If you've already got second (maybe even third) opinions already, and you've come to the conclusion that none of the doctors in your area know what they're talking about, you should probably move. I don't see what other options you have here, particularly if you require prescribed medications. You might even be able to find other employment that way.

As for the startup, yes, it's unfortunate that it will tank without you, but the way you've described it, you're literally killing yourself slowly. It will end the same way regardless. You are doing NOBODY a favor by continuing on, least of all yourself.

PS Exactly how expensive are your Vitamin D supplements? They're ridiculously cheap in the US, maybe $15 for 90 capsules. International shipping might still come out cheaper.

To be fair: some clinicians are hopeless at reading research documents. See, for example, Gerd Gigerenzer's book "Reckoning With Risk" where clinicians are asked to interpret some stats and they fail hard.

Having said tuat I tend to agree with you. Some health problems (and thyroidism is one) have large communities on the Internet and some of those communities are full of cranks.

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