Kiss My Goiter, Dr. Phil

[Guest guest]

This is from about.com

An Open Letter to Dr. Phil McGraw, of the Oprah Show, About

Hypothyroidism

Celisa Dyan is a humorist and thyroid patient who periodically pops

in to the About thyroid site to " tell it like it is, " and usually

with hilarious but often quite on-the-mark results!!

On a recent Oprah broadcast, Dr. Phil made a comment which makes me

ache from my thyroid gland all the way down to my ever-widening

backside. I'll summarize for you, since direct quotes and the upswing

of my wrath never go hand-in-hand.

Dr. Phil seems to be of the opinion -- bless his poor little

uninformed heart -- that hypothyroidism isn't a major factor in

weight control. He mentioned that we can't walk around with a sign on

our backs reading " Fat, but bad metabolism " -- or words to the effect

of that idiotic statement -- so that, I assume, others will know

we're not the Ant Eaters of the human world rapidly sucking up whole

cheesecakes through our snouts. (I don't know about Y'all, but I

really don't care what strangers think of my retreating rump -- as I

told my former private Christian school principal who commented years

ago as to the tightness of my then-size-three jeans, " Well, Joe, if

ya hadn't been starin' at my posterior, you wouldn't have noticed,

would ya? " Further, how many folks do y'all know who WANT to walk

around with their medical history printed on their backs so nobody

will think they're pleasantly plump by overfeeding their own bodies?)

Dr. Phil validated the upscaled difficulties of weight loss in

certain thyroid situations, but expressed his opinion that it's not

about metabolism, it's about what we eat. Well, Doc, pull up a chair,

enjoy a plate of the rabbit food which is my only diet day-in-and-out

while hypothyroid, and allow me to educate you on your unfortunate

misconception of the effects of this disease.

Since the age of twelve, my thyroid gland has done a Polka back and

forth between hypothyroidism and hyperthyroidism -- at age 37, that

Polka's turned into a slow Tennessee Waltz, but that's another gripe-

fest for another time. For the past year or so, I've looked like a

cow being fattened for the kill. Nothing takes the weight off, but

everything puts it on: I've been there, done this, and grown out of

that T-shirt so many times that the moment my hypothyroidism steals

my eyebrows --usually my first sign -- I go on full weight control

alert. I cut my caloric intake to 1000 a day, tune up the old

treadmill, and declare war on that first frightening ten pounds. I

swear to myself that I will not gain another ounce, thyroid gland be

damned -- for such a tiny gland, that sucker sure does fight dirty!

Two weeks later, I drag out the scales, stepping carefully onto them

so as not to shake that needle to one ounce more than I actually

weigh. I do this newborn-naked because I'm not sure how much my

drawers and over-the-shoulder-boulder-holder will add to the

horrifying reading I'm about to recieve from " Judas, " as my new

bathroom scale is affectionately called. Despite my daily cross-

country treks on the treadmill, the many 50-pound bags of horse feed

I haul atop my shoulders across vast acreage daily, and that

temperament-destroying diet of 1000 calories a day, I find that I've

gained five pounds. I open my bathroom closet door and kick old Judas

where it hurts, hard enough to knock his betraying base into the

closet -- I slam the door while calling him everything but a helpful

weight-management tool. I then cut the calories back to 800 a day,

add a couple more miles a day to the treadmill routine, and decide to

re-fence my pasture -- not because it needs new fences, but because

it's great, sweaty exercise and I need to win the next battle in this

war against my own body.

Judas, of course, betrays me again a couple of weeks later: when I'm

ready to take the battery right out of Judas' " heart, " I notice a

culprit far more cruel -- a golf-ball-sized goiter forms at the base

of my neck, looking much like recently ingested snake food. My vanity

tries to convince me that the goiter weighs twenty of my overweight

pounds, but I know better each time I have to make a run to Home

Depot to buy a wider mirror. By the time true desperation strikes,

I've gained 40 pounds while exercising as if I'm Tom Hanks preparing

to do the film Castaway and eating nothing but garden salads without

dressing, croutons, or even those neat little fake bacon bits -- I'm

down to 400 calories a day and my horses are as wide as their barn

simply because I needed the added caloric burning of hauling heavy

bags more frequently. I have deliberately concentrated this paragraph

on the weight issue alone because it is that to which you referred on

Oprah: as you'll see later in this rant, with this disease, the hits

just keep on coming.

An Open Letter to Dr. Phil McGraw, of the Oprah Show, About

Hypothyroidism

About the time I begin to feel human as my thyroid bores of

hypothyroidism, I begin to notice sudden, unexplained weight loss

accompanied by supreme hunger and thirst. My hands shake, my electric

bill increases as I pop the central unit down to fifty to combat

the " heat, " and I can't shake hands without first wiping the moisture

off them on my suddenly tight tookus. My eyes bulge, my hair falls

out again, and my skin becomes decorated periodically by hives. I

regret cursing that constipation factor of hypothyroidism as I spend

more and more time on the number " Two. " I begin to wonder if age

thirty-seven is too young to have a heart attack when those lovely

palpitations and pains kick in. My teenage neighbor asks to buy

cocaine from me, certain that my straw-thin, scarecrow-like

appearance is connected to an addiction to such a substance: that

teen's mother whispers to others, " I wonder if she's got AIDS? "

Whoever said you can never be too rich or too thin was only half

right. When I'm convinced it can't get any worse, the shortness of

breath bonus brings back my childhood asthma.

It is not, Doc, " what we eat " -- it is also not our gene pool, our

comfy couch, an addiction to soap operas or Bon Bons, and it is not,

you poor, deluded soul, lack of effort in weight management. It is a

butterfly shaped gland in our necks which, depending upon the path

the disease has chosen to take, either makes us gain or lose massive

amounts of weight despite our every effort to combat it. When

underactive, it blows the roof off our cholesterol levels despite

having avoided consumption of a single fat gram since 1989. It slows

or speeds metabolism: it makes our blood pressure high or low, it

makes us feel like teenagers or geriatrics, and as an added little

bonus, it makes our hair and eyebrows fall out. It alters our

personalities and behavior, causing our loved ones to wonder who we

are and what we did with the Real Person they love and admire. It

makes us sweat profusely when there's snow falling or freeze to death

in tropical temperatures. It makes our joints and muscles ache, it

affects our menstrual cycles adversely and it gives us the ability to

put out an eye at twenty paces with breast milk -- even if we haven't

had a baby in eleven years. It throws surprise parties for our

bodies, the gifts being depression, inability to concentrate,

irrational fears, constipation, skin problems, alterations in thought

and speech patterns, and BY GOD, Doc, the biggest gift of all is,

indeed, an ever-widening-or-shrinking caboose.

Don't believe me? I challenge you to a little experiment, Phil Old

Boy -- for six months, I'd like for you to pharmaceutically alter

your thyroid level. Lets start with the fun one: make it underactive

for the first six months and see if you're right or if we who live it

are right. First, though, buy a good supply of Ex-lax and Prozac --

don't forget to pick up a toupee, a girdle, clothing in at least

three upscaled sizes, an arsenal of exercise equipment and do plant a

salad garden. Have a T-shirt printed, a bold drawing of the thyroid

gland in the center, fluffy female sheep encircling it: your caption,

per your own ridiculous suggestion on Oprah, should read " Ewes not

fat, Ewes just thyroid impaired. " After six months, drop the meds and

see how long it is before you feel and look " normal " again. As soon

as this occurs, take medications to flip-flop you to hyperthyroidism -

- make that souped up thyroid rock and roll! Buy clothing in three

sizes under your normal body mass, learn to sign your name with

trembling hands and imprint onto your brain that you are not having

heart attacks, you are experiencing thyroid-related chest pains and

heart palpitations. Buy stronger antiperspirants, an asthma inhaler

for those little shortness of breath blessings, some anti-diarrheal

medications, and lots of small belts. Eat more liver to combat the

anemia factor and never leave home for more than ten minutes without

a gallon jug of water. Stock your freezer with cheesecakes and eat

one whole at each meal so as to maintain what little weight you have

left -- otherwise your neighbors will begin to whisper that you're

anorexic, bulimic, a cokehead, or HIV positive.

An Open Letter to Dr. Phil McGraw, of the Oprah Show, About

Hypothyroidism

Until you've lived it, Doc -- both sides of it -- you are whistling

Dixie up our sit-upons by pooh-poohing the tremendous association

between thyroid disease and weight problems. Your opinion that weight

control might not be as easy for thyroid patients as for those not

afflicted with such disorders, but added effort will do the trick, is

most likely the biggest hunk of manure I've seen since my mare's

colic suddenly released itself all over her veterinarian's work

boots.

My prayer is that when medical science does catch up to the Hell we

thyroid patients live daily, you'll all go back on Oprah to eat

healthy servings of Crow Pie: I'd gladly bake a few dozen to donate,

myself. I do not need for you to " pat my back " and say it's ok to be

fat because I am thyroid-challenged as you so outrageously implied on

Oprah's usually factual show. It is not OK to ME when I am too fat,

nor is it OK to ME when I begin to look like a late-blooming, skinny

teen boy -- but those are merely outward signs of the disease, the

ones others see, while our bodies and minds are inwardly devastated

daily and further beleaguered by physicians and laymen who simply do

not get the big picture yet. There are conditions more important,

more trying, than forsaking the Hollywood Figure, Doctor Phil: we're

not all Barbie dolls nor are we all Roseanne at the onset of her

career. It is not about body size: it is about body torment. Perhaps

if the medical profession spent as much time researching thyroid

disease, causes and cures, instead of telling us what size our jeans

should be, many " fat, lazy, food-disposal Lardos " would get the

thyroid treatment they need and the problem would solve itself -- but

that wouldn't sell too many diet books, programs, or public

appearances for Diet Gurus, would it?

So, Doctor Phil, I reiterate -- Physician, Educate Thyself on thyroid

dysfunction before commenting on what you clearly do not understand

as related to weight control. I do not need for you to pat my back or

validate my size, but you are cordially invited to take my challenge,

lose your hair with your mind and health, keep a department store of

clothing sizes in your closet and a pharmacy of symtpom-reducers in

your bathroom year-round, and kindly kiss my ....

big old spongy goiter.