MauraL

Congratulations on that marvelous autoantibody reduction; you should be very pleased.

Many people have found that they didn’t feel like their old selves until they had lived with euthyroid levels for six months or longer. Thyroid disease is insidious and creeps up slowly for most people so that body systems have been thyroid hormone-deprived for many months or years before the patient get symptomatic enough to identify the problem, and that takes a toll on the body that isn’t corrected the instant thyroid hormone levels are normalized. However, it’s a very individualized thing, so no one can tell you how long it will take for you to feel like yourself again. But the fact that your TSH is normalized tells me that you should begin to feel better a little bit more every day.

Thyroid autoantibodies are not directly “felt” in the way that thyroid hormones are, but since TPO Ab’s are destructive, getting them lower will give your thyroid a better chance to function normally, and that will help you to feel better. Unfortunately, TPO and Tg autoantibodies destroy thyroid cells, so having them at high titers for long periods of time increases the chance that some degree of thyroid function is permanently lost. However, people have been known to move spontaneously from autoimmune hypothyroidism to euthyroidism if the Ab’s come down low enough and there is still a good amount of the thyroid gland in good shape after the Ab assault, so the fact that your TPOAb’s are down by half is a very hopeful sign.

There is nothing in Synthroid or any other LT4 drug that directly lowers Ab’s, but any replacement drug taken in the correct dosage to normalize the TSH, FT4, and FT3 will help because maintaining good thyroid hormone levels is the very best thing you can do to calm your endocrine and immune systems to the point that your body is less provoked to produce more autoantibodies.

Another thing you might try, if you aren’t already, is selenium supplementation. An article in The Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism (Vol. 87, No. 4 1687-1691) describes a blinded, placebo-controlled study in which the TPOAb’s of people with autoimmune thyroid disease who took 200mcg of selenium for three months were dramatically reduced. TPOAb concentrations were actually completely normalized for 25% of the study subjects. All the study subjects were taking enough LT4 replacement to maintain euthyroidism. It’s definitely worth a shot if you aren’t taking it now. However, I wouldn’t take much more than 200mcg per day. Selenium is an immune modulator and an excellent antioxidant, so it’s a terrific supplement to take. I take a good multivitamin with 20mcg of selenium and also a separate 200mcg selenium tablet for a daily total of 220mcg.