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When I originally started the journey to heal myself from Hashimoto’s disease I thought it would only take about 6 months..  Turns out I was wrong.  It took me almost triple that amount of time.

I was so used to healing quickly from sicknesses by just taking an antibiotic.  At the time, I didn’t realize how much I was damaging my gut and not replacing the beneficial bacteria being massacred along with the pathogenic ones.

How long would it take to heal my busted thyroid from Hashimoto’s?  This was a question I wondered constantly when I began my process of healing from Hashimoto’s.  Now that I know the answer to my own question and I thought my answer may be beneficial to others.

Our bodies do not heal quickly.  My experience led me through a slow and steady healing that took over a year and in some ways still continues now.

THE HEALING DETAILS

As I said it took me over a year to heal and the best way I can measure that for you is with my TPO antibodies (Understanding thyroid tests– if you need more information about this blood test).  

When I began to change my diet to heal my leaky gut, my TPO antibodies were 188 IU/mL.  Over a year and half of making lifestyle changes, they have dropped to 18 IU/mL since my last blood test.  

During the first month of following a gluten free diet, it was exciting to see a steep drop in my thyroid antibodies.  My TPO antibodies dropped from 188 IU/mL to 110 IU/mL and my TgAB antibodies were gone completely.  It was really inspiring, especially when my energy returned!

After this steep drop from quitting gluten, my TPO antibodies had a consistent drop of about 6 to 8 IU/mL per month for the next year and a half.  Maybe yours will be different- we all have different levels of sickness.  And many of us react differently when we are sick.

I liked being able to project what my TPO antibody decrease would be (approximately!) because then I could estimate how many months it would take to finish healing.  

Also, if I had done something that had irritated my body then the drop would be less than expected.  It was nice to have a measure for my progress, however, it may not work this way for everyone.

I am not a doctor so please discuss your progress with your functional medicine doctor.  When I began my healing, I looked for anyone sharing these details of their experience and never found it.  I hope sharing this information can be helpful to you.

OTHER NOTES ON HEALING

Our bodies heal very slowly when compared to our desire for instant results.  It is extremely hard to wait it out. However, slow and steady wins the race.  This was a hard lesson for me.

I think the silver lining comes with knowing your body and learning how to care for yourself correctly.  If we give our bodies the correct tools, then we can heal naturally. It’s a powerful thing!

A wonderful resource for healing from Hashimoto’s is Izabella Wentz’s book, HASHIMOTO’S THYROIDITIS: LIFESTYLE INTERVENTIONS FOR FINDING AND TREATING THE ROOT CAUSE.  She is a pharmacist who is trying to bring awareness to the ability to heal from Hashimoto’s.  

This book is a game changer for understanding the many root causes of Hashimoto’s.  I highly recommend ordering it. Reading it was one of the very first steps I took when I began to heal my thyroid. 

Another book that helped me on my journey is AUTOIMMUNE: THE CAUSE AND THE CURE by Annesse Brockely and Kristin Urdiales.  This book focuses on autoimmune diseases as a whole and is broken into two parts.  

Part one is very technical in explaining how the body begins to breakdown into autoimmune disease.  The second part tells you how to recover from it.  Even if you don’t get through the first part- the second part is the most important!

This book was pivotal in helping me understand how different foods impact your gut bacteria and how to restore the balance in your gut.  It is also contains a list of resources to find the foods that you need. 

I could not have gotten to where I am today without these two books.

After seeing my TPO antibodies continue to go down, I was excited to find that I was able to quit my thyroid medication.  

After getting off of my medication completely, I discovered that I had to wait for my Free T3 to recover.   This has been another very slow process.  I hope to write a post on this in the future when my Free T3 finally gets to an optimal point.

So here I am again… waiting.

What is your experience with healing and what have you learned from it?