Hypothyroid hair loss

Lemonro1 · Newbie Joined: 26 Apr 2007 Posts: 1

I am a 19 year old male, attending college. When I started in the fall of this year my hair started falling out slowly and then quickly increased until it was coming out in handfuls. I made an appointment with my doctor and was diagnosed with minor hypothyroid after a blood test. I started taking Synthyroid 25 mcg. My hair has continued falling out but has slowed. My hair is now visibly very thin, which is depressing because I used to have very thick hair. My hair is not falling out in any visible pattern but I have noticed large amounts of hair loss on the back of my neck, above my ears and at my hairline. Not much visible thinning of my eyebrows but I tweeze them so I don't think I would notice if there was. My hair has also become very brittle and the texture has changed to be completely unmanageable. I made another appointment with my doctor recently and now he says he doesn't think my hair loss is a result of my hypothyroid, I'm confused as to what else it could be. Haven't gotten my results back from the recent blood test yet. What should I do???
- Rob
Also - I used to be a compulsive runner averaging 9 miles a day but stopped around the time my hair loss stopped. Now I circuit train 2 days of weight lifting followed by a day of Cardio.

Mojammie · Newbie Joined: 20 Apr 2008 Posts: 1

I'm no doctor but I also have the same problem. I'm a female runner, and averaged about 30-40 miles a week. I did this for a few years and then bam! overnight my hair started falling out in handfuls. This was very distressing, I had VERY thick lush hair. Mine also is thinning in the back. I have done much research on this and hair loss in the back of the head is related to thyroid. I am tring to find someone to treat me. My blood tests put in the low end of normal which, according to research can still be enough to cause hair loss. I was wondering if maybe your thyroid medication needs to be raised. You mentioned that your hair loss slowed down after taking meds. It does take a few weeks to get your system on the right track so maybe you aren't at a high enough dose. As soon as my dermatologist found out I was a marathon runner he said I had telogen effluvium (caused by stress).. I'm not buying it. Why would it start 5 years after I started running? Anyway, I feel your pain and I encourage you to do research on thyroid and hair loss. I wish you the very best.[/b]

ksf · Supporter Joined: 06 Jan 2007 Posts: 224

I had terrible hair after being diagnosed with Grave's Disease and then undergoing radioactive iodine treatment wihich made me hypothyroid.
Thank goodness my hair is better now and thicker than ever. My hair dresser now uses thinning scissors!
These are the things I think helped:
Good thyroid levels
Using salon hair care products (Paul Mitchell was my choice). Some OTC hair products just do not work on my hair anymore. They cause it to dry and become brittle then fall out.

Several times I've had a pharmacist accidently give me generic thyroid medication (generic does not work with me!) and after a couple months my hair starts getting awful again. My point I'm not sure which one made my hair better...maybe BOTH.

Whytedrgn2006 · Newbie Joined: 30 Apr 2008 Posts: 2

Hi, I am 45 yr F w/ Hashimoto's thyroiditis. I would like to tell you what I found out in the last two years of research for my thinning hair and thyroid and diverse illnesses. 1. Get off chlorinated and fluoridated water. Start drinking mineral water or de-chlorinated de-fluoridated filtered water (you will need a reverse osmosis filter if your water has fluoride in it.) Don't shower in it. Hot water causes the chlorine to be sucked into your pores and a gas to be released that is sucked into the lungs and bloodstream faster than you could ever drink it. Chlorine and fluoride are endocrine/metabolic destroyers of our bodies and kill the thyroid and pancreas islet cells slowly but surely - think diabetes. Chlorine also causes heart disease by causing plague deposits in the arteries. They have found fluoride mixed with aluminum deposits in Alzheimers victims brains. How do you think it got there? The water sewer systems are using aluminum to cause the solid waste to be able to be cleaned out of the sewage easier without a thought as to what happens to any excess aluminum that escapes into our water systems. Google chlorine and fluoride and aluminum and it will change your life. The kind of fluoride that naturally occurs in mineral water is different from the kind they put in toothpaste and water. That kind is a waste product that BigChem used to have to pay to dispose of until they had the bright idea to sell to poison our water. The EPA has been trying to get this country to stop using chlorine and fluoride but no luck yet. You can buy Tom's toothpaste at Walmart just make sure it is not fluoridated they do still sell fluoridated toothpaste unfortunately. Because you take your Levoxyl in the am and generally brush your teeth in the am the fluoride will bind to your thyroid and keep the Levoxyl from doing its job. It will take a while for your thyroid to come back but it will, I used to have to be on 200mcg and am now down to 100mcg levoxyl. Just watch for the signs of overactive thyroid like rapid heartbeat because then you will have to get off the Levoxyl at that point. They used to use fluoride to kill overactive thyroids but stopped because it caused undesirable cancers afterwards in some victims. Also I would recommend not using anti-persiperants or anti-acids containing aluminum. All these things cross the blood brain barrier and the American Medical Assoc and FDA know this but are not doing anything about it.
2. You need to be taking Levoxyl not Synthroid. Synthroid doesn't hardly work for anyone and is one of the biggest frauds out there. My doctor said "All my patients claim they are losing their hair with Synthroid but it is just in their heads." What a stupid statement. If many people are saying the same thing couldn't it be possible it is true. I switched to Levoxyl (not generic but brand name) and my hair started growing in thick and full again with no bald spots.
3. You need to address vitamin and nutrient defiencies you may have as a result of drinking chlorinated/fluoridated water...your doctor may help you or may not. Mine doesn't believe in vitamins/herbs but of course he doesn't get any bonuses from vitamin/herb companies like he does from BigPharm companies so of course he doesn't advocate what doesn't profit him. I can't say as I blame him. I would google Hair Loss and vitamins and add in as many of the vitamins and herbs and stuff to eat as you can find. I am on Potassium (by prescription), magnesium, vitamin d, ginko bilboa, evening primrose, flax seed oil, multi vitamin, separate antioxidant vitamin, chromium, bilberry, coQ10, aged garlic, milk thistle and several others just to name a few but then I have Chronic Fatigue and Fibromyalgia besides the thyroid disorder.
4. I just found out this past month about how the adrenals, the sex glands and the thyroid work in symphony and if any one is out of whack it usually can mean one or more of the other glands is also out of whack. From what you stated you were running too much IMO. Your adrenals could be borderline low and that will tax your thyroid enough and put your testerone out of whack which too much can cause hair loss as well as too little thyroid. I just bought a book called feeling fat, fuzzy or frazzled? by Richard and Karilee Shames MD and Phd RN. It is all about the subject of hormonal imbalances and how to naturally and medicinally with your doctor's help re-balance yourself. I have also been trying to find out about exercise for the first time since I hurt my back in 2001 and was dxd with CFS and FMS so I bought a book called Smart Exercise by Covert Bailey and he talks about the fact that some marathon runners end up sick because they run too much without any breaks for their bodies to heal up in-between. There is a good article here also along those same lines:
health.msn.com/fitness/articlepage.aspx?cp-documentid=100160344
5. You didn't say anything about your diet or lifestyle but I am just guessing that having just started school you might have been stressing about stuff and maybe not eating or sleeping properly which can also wreak havoc on the body. I was a type A personality who worked 40+ hrs and went to school too until my body broke and now I am less than a bedridden couch potato. You have to sleep at least from 9:00pm to 6:00am EVERY single day for your body to really be able to do its job properly and because we Americans are so bad about staying up late that is one more reason we are all breaking down and falling apart. In other countries where they still go to bed early they are not keeling over with the illnesses we have here. A good book to read on this is Lights Out! by Bent Formby and T.S. Wiley.
Good luck to you in feeling better and getting your hair back, I know as a young man it is even more important to have good looking hair than it is to an old woman like me. Don't stop searching. A friend of mine's son had sudden hair loss and weight gain and it took the docs more than 10 yrs to find out he had Cushing's syndrome and he has had to have two surgeries to remove tumors from his pituitary gland. I had so many ignorant doctors it took them 8 years to dx my Hashimoto's thyroid disorder and by then I could not even walk anymore and they had put me on all kinds of steroids and antidepressants which kills the thyroid even more. God bless you in your search for better health.

ksf · Supporter Joined: 06 Jan 2007 Posts: 224

That's the one thing I didn't think about.
I quit taking Synthroid also and started taking Armour Thyroid instead....maybe that is the reason for the change in my hair,
I know my body didn't like Synthroid very well. I feel much, much better since I switched meds.

Hypothyroid hair loss

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