It's Graves'er Than You Think

[LittleEd]

Folks, I have a really good question and I'm sure it's been asked on here before, BUT....

If Graves' is an autoimmune disease that CAUSES hyperthyroidism and toxic goiter, what happens to the disease itself after they have killed my thyroid? If that's all a result of the disease, where does the rest of the autoimmune disease go? Just killing the thyroid is one part of it, right? What should be done for the actual CAUSE itself?

[LittleEd]

I had blood taken today--tomorrow will be five weeks since RAI. I'm curious what the results will be. If I'm still hyper, I almost expect the doc to put me on a low dose of the Tapazole for a short time. And that stuff always made me feel depressed.

I am so screwed up that every time I eat I feel like I'm having an anxiety attack, sometimes with a little bit of chest pain. It seems the more I eat at one time the worse it is, so I've been doing smaller meals more regularly. I won't be hungry for a while and then all of a sudden I'm STARVING. The Xanax always helps, so I know it's anxiety, but there is some serious metabolic malfunction going on here. I can't complain too much, though, because I'm much better off than I was six weeks ago.  

[AR-10]

My heart still bothers me too.

Yeah, some other disgusting thing might come along, but worrying about it is a waste of energy and happiness.

I worried about my adrenals for a long time. Didn't help any. Ran tests. didn't believe them. Ran more tests, and more tests. Adrenals are good. Had to let it go.

I'll be glad when this is behind me.

[suep112]

I kind of wondered this, too. I had a tt for the treatment of graves instead of RAI. I figured if i had to kill it off, take it out and be done with it. So I ask my doctor and he says, yes you still have graves, but you should be ok now....what does that mean? Once you have graves, you always have graves? And like you said, what if my immune system starts on another organ and this one I really need to keep. Guess we can do with out some organs,  like appendixes, gallbladders, thyroids...ext.

[LittleEd]

Thanks, AR. None of the docs have really explained that to me. I learned a little from researching online, etc. I just wondered if my immune system could start attacking another organ or something. Hehe. I've had some really good days lately but I still have these anxiety attacks and that weird feeling in my heart.

[AR-10]

The answer to your question is; the antibodies that cause the damage reduce in number, but rarely go away completely.

The root cause of Grave's disease is a defect or breakdown in your immune system that causes it to start attacking your own body. There is no way to fix that at this time.

[LittleEd]

This link goes to a woman's site. (Everything's all about women and kids in today's world, right? Hehe.)

http://www.4woman.gov/faq/graves.htm#b

BUT...this is another good example of how they make Graves' sound like no big deal. Look at some of those symptoms. That would be a piece of cake to live with. I just can't understand why some of these thyroid disorders are treated like minor inconveniences. Those symptoms don't describe ANYTHING like what I've experienced. I got a chuckle out of reading it.