Having Bad Side-Effects on Levothyroxine

There are more knowledgeable and more experience members here who can help you more than me but here is my two cents - I've been on varying doses of the med for almost a year. my endocrinologist says my thyroid shut down because of radiation therapy i rec'd a year ago and that is why I became hypo-thryoid and need the med. to my understanding the hair loss, which i have experienced in eyebrows and eyelashes, is not from the med but from being hypo-thyroid. once the appropriate thyroid hormone level is restored in a human body, the hair is likely to come back. so far for me this has not happened. everyone is a little different in how the condition effects our bodies and also how the med might affect us as well. im not a fan of taking meds either and feel like in the case of levothyroxine, once we are put on it, we have to take it the rest of our lives - a bad deal and not all of us are told that from the start. everyone here will warn you that you must follow your dr recommendations and not vary the dose or regularity for taking the med. thyroid is a very slow acting hormone and it takes weeks or even a month or more for any change in dosage to have stable effects in most of our bodies. you must be patient (no pun intended) and give the med time to work - assuming you are taking it on time every day per instructions. now watch for other responses that will be much more qualified than mine. best wishes.

Hi Pandacake, I also struggled with all sorts of symptoms for the past 8 years. I will share some things that helped me get almost back to normal in hope to save everyone else the pain.

I had my thyroid removed and now I am on 150mcg levothyroxine. I had side effects like:

- anxiety & panic attacks

- easy to get tired

- trouble sleeping

- muscle cramps

- joint pain

- inflammation

- mood swings

- depression

Doctors were for the most part ignorant as long as the blood tests were fine. I did complete blood work (not only thyroid) and looked perfect but I was feeling like crap. I tried myself multiple things to improve my life quality and the things that worked are:

  1. try different brands of hormones, even though all have levothyroxine, the body reacts differently to each one. At first I was on Euthyrox and it was completely bad. This helped improve things by 20%

  2. split the dose during the day. I take 150 as 25 in the morning, 50 before lunch, 50 before dinner, 25 before sleep. Also at lunch I take it with a complex supplement of magnesium, calcium, D3, B6. This helped improve things by 20% 

  3. exercise to burn all the extra adrenaline. Gym, sports & jogging work very well, yoga also helps, but better to have action exercises. This helped improve things by 20% 

  4. eat properly. I gave up all animal protein a couple of months ago and has been going very well so far. No refined sugar, less salt, no dairy, no junk/fried food, no alcohol is a must. Meat I choose to gave up for moral reasons but try to reduce at least. Plant-based food is what I eat (fruits, legumes, veggies, smoothies, juices, grains, seeds). There are plenty resources online. This helped improve things by 20% 

  5. try to get good sleep. For me, the sleep quality decreased on this meds. Get quiet, dark room, try some stretching before sleep, plant-based teas/drinks for calming and easing the sleep. I also use an anti-inflammatory cream for some muscles that ache before sleep/when I wake up. This helped improve things by 20% 

Good luck and hope my experience is helpful.

Hi Panda, I had migraines so bad, I feared I'd have a stroke when I started the levo. Of course I couldn't get out of bed, so I wouldn't have known. It took me two weeks to get up the strength to get to urgent care. In addition, the anxiety was through the roof and I was supper ADD. I also had horrible gallbladder and liver pain, blew up like a balloon, and developed liver lesions in a matter of a few months. Went from a size XS to XL in a couple months with massive water retention. 

I started on Synthroid, then tried a generic bc it had less allergenic fillers, then went to a compounded. I messed around with this horrible medication for over two years. It worsened my thyroid disease, caused horrible bone loss, I broke my foot with multiple compound fractures, was on bedrest for two months, irregular periods... Spent a year recovering from the broken foot enough to walk... Horrible autoimmune and food sensitivities...toxic, calcified liver, kidneys shut down, hair falling out, gained 50 pounds... On and on. My life went down the drain, couldn't cope bc of anxiety. 

I was so spacey that I really couldn't tell you if the symptoms got better or worse with increased dossage. 

So, yes, many people experience side effects from this medication worse than the disease. There are many posts on this site about this.

There are dietary and supplement solutions that can help curb the autoimmune disease that causes hypothyroid disease. Also, many people have switched to NDTs. But even these can trigger anxiety. The anxiety can basically be triggered by any imbalance in thyroxin levels, and even by incorrect ratios. So if your T4 is in the high end and T3 in the low end, or vice verse, you can have anxiety. Since none of the prescription thyroxine match the natural ratios of T3 to T4, they can all cause anxiety. Of course hypothyroid and hyperthyroid can cause anxiety. My experience is the anxiety from meds is far worse than from the disease.

Many  people have found that OTC bovine glandular supplements are very helpful because the bovine products are closest to human ratios. You buy these without a prescription, so you're on your own to pay for them, but worth every penny.

Alternatively, a natural holistic approach is a lot more work and requires discipline, but well worth the health benefits. I've seen both ways, as my mother struggled with thyroid disease her entire life and went the traditional medical route. The disease progressed and she eventually had her thyroid surgically removed. I have struggled for decades with undiagnosed thyroid disease, was able to get it into remission for a blissful ten years with diet and cleansing... Later it returned with a vengeance, and I was eventually diagnosed, tried all the meds... They didn't work and made me sick, which is what my mother told me for decades. I finally retraced my past medical history, found some alternative practitioners and got some relief from the thyroid symptoms by dumping the meds and doing amino acid therapy, diet and TCM.   The amino acid therapy was as effective as the meds, without the side effects. Of course by the time I tried them, my kidneys could hardly handle the added stress. Still much better without the meds, hair is growing back much healthier and less grey, I have better energy than with the meds.

My mother is on ThyroGold and is much better on that than she was with any of the other meds.

I have seen some posts where people feel the levo works for them.  But do read lots of posts to get a sense of other peoples' experiences with the meds and thyroid disease. 

Thank you very much everyone for the kind help. There's some good ideas here, and things I've been hoping to try out. I think taking the dosage throughout the day might be a good idea. I'd have to ask my doctor.

I'm so sorry for the migranes you have suffered, and how harsh they were. Mine seem to be subsiding but there's nothing good happening with anxiety.

I all ready had anxiety disorder. Come to think about it it did start around the time I started Levo. I've always thought that Levo helped to deal with symptoms like gaining weight, joint pain, etc. But what, may I ask, is the point if it just adds these symptoms itself?

I don't mean to be... so focussed on one point because obviously good health is better than how you look. But I've recently been trying to diet and lose weight because I'm at a weight now that can't be good for my health. So stories of people going up several sizes rather scare me. It's not been easy losing weight but it's certainly doable. Is it POSSIBLE to lose weight while taking Levothyroxine? Will it just be harder to do or is it impossible? Because I can't go on the way I am. 

Levo can give you anxiety. Some say its the different fillers in the different brands that mess with histamine levels. Maybe try a different brand?