19 Signs of Thyroid Problems (and Their Solutions)

It is not unusual for an otherwise healthy individual to experience an unusual symptom and wonder if something is wrong. If that happened to you, you’ve found the right place. On this page, I provide answers to important questions about your thyroid health that, as a board-certified endocrinologist and naturopath, I hear all the time.

• How do you know if your thyroid is causing problems?
• Why do my thyroid medications not work on some symptoms?
• How can I accurately assess my thyroid health?
• Are the 19 signs of thyroid problems different in female and male patients?

I can answer these questions and provide you with potential solutions that can immediately improve your quality of life. I hope you find this information helpful and can use it to determine where you stand with your thyroid health.

Offering Solutions Today

All too often people share their symptoms with their doctor and are told that nothing is wrong. If you don’t feel well, you want answers. You want solutions.

Ultimately, your thyroid plays a critical role in pretty much every part of your body. So, how do you know if your thyroid is causing problems? Certain signs can give you a clue.

Let’s dive into it with a quick video that covers the 19 signs of thyroid problems that may appear in male and female patients. I’ll discuss the importance of diet and nutrition, and how you can naturally improve your thyroid health. It may help you understand how prevalent thyroid conditions are, how they can be improved with the right dietary approach, and why natural hormones may help when thyroid medication does not work on relieving symptoms.

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Table of Contents

The Role of Your Thyroid
Who Is Most at Risk for Thyroid Problems?
Understanding Thyroid Problems Through Symptoms
The Most Common Thyroid Symptoms
The Most Predictive Thyroid Symptoms
The “Required” Symptoms for Thyroid Disease
Action Steps for Those With Thyroid Symptoms
When Should You Test Your Thyroid?
What Are the Best Treatments for Thyroid Symptoms?

The Role of Your Thyroid

I want to start with some context so you can understand why so many symptoms, including symptoms on my list of 19 signs of thyroid problems, may occur in female and male patients. I want you to understand the problem with long symptom lists, and why synthetic thyroid medications may not work.

Your thyroid does a lot. It makes hormones that control how well the body makes energy, how well it repairs itself, and how other hormones work in your body.

That means your thyroid can affect weight loss, energy levels, the condition of your skin, hair, and nails, and many other hormonal symptoms.

The thyroid typically encounters problems when:

• It makes the wrong amount of hormone (too much or too little)
• It becomes inflamed due to autoimmunity

Those are the two main problems that your thyroid might face. When there is too little hormone, we call that hypothyroidism. When there is too much, we call it hyperthyroidism.

Some of the 19 signs of thyroid problems may indicate Hashimoto’s disease, an autoimmune condition caused by too little thyroid hormone.

Who Is Most at Risk for Thyroid Problems?

While thyroid disease can affect anyone at any age, some are more susceptible than others. Thyroid disease is the most common if you are:

• Female
• Aged 30 or over
• From a family with thyroid disease

That said, because thyroid disease affects so many people, it is worth considering for all ages and genders. Risks vary, so it’s important to keep them in mind no matter what.

Identifying Thyroid Problems Through Symptoms

In females, the 19 signs of thyroid problems may point to different conditions than in male patients. There is no shortage of systems that could be affected by your thyroid, and this is one reason thyroid medications may not work on all symptoms.

The list of symptoms is long. As these lists become longer and longer, they become less helpful. That’s because listing countless symptoms means that you may have a few by random chance, making it more difficult to determine if it’s truly an issue with your thyroid.

For that reason, you’ll want to focus on specific symptoms that are most often associated with issues concerning the thyroid.

The Most Common Thyroid Symptoms

The 19 signs of thyroid problems that I look at most closely include the common symptoms of Hashimoto’s disease, the most prevalent type of thyroid disease.

Here’s a quick list of the eight top symptoms:

• Hair loss
• Weight gain
• Irregular menstrual cycles
• Poor libido
• Numbness in hands or feet
• Depression
• Anxiety
• Insomnia

Another important distinction is that these symptoms tend to come about over a set period of time. The more clearly you can point to a timeframe in which these symptoms appeared, the more likely they are to be related to your thyroid.

Is It Hypothyroid or Hashimoto’s?

An important consideration to make is that many signals of thyroid problems, including the 19 signs I discuss, may be caused by having too little thyroid or autoimmune thyroid disease.

Hypothyroidism is when there is too little hormone. Hashimoto’s is an autoimmune disease that damages the thyroid – some who have it eventually get hypothyroidism. Nearly everyone suffering from hypothyroidism is already struggling with Hashimoto’s.

When your thyroid is not working properly and you have symptoms of Hashimoto’s disease, medications may be prescribed by some physicians. These medications, synthetic hormones, may be ineffective and cause other problems.

The Key Role of Antibodies

Did you know roughly 27% of adults have significantly elevated thyroid antibodies from Hashimoto’s?

The two most common thyroid antibodies tested are anti-thyroid peroxidase and antithyroglobulin. When these are significantly elevated, the person in question has Hashimoto’s disease.

The truth is that most people with Hashimoto’s do not have hypothyroidism. But, Hashimoto’s by itself in males and females can cause some of the 19 signs of thyroid problems and the same symptoms of hypothyroidism – it’s tricky in that way.

The Most Predictive Thyroid Symptoms

When your thyroid is not working at 100% due to medication or any other reason, it may result in a variety of symptoms.

Not all symptoms are the same. Predictive symptoms are more accurate at predicting the presence of thyroid disease, so it is important to recognize them.

So, how do we know which of the 19 signs of thyroid problems are predictive symptoms? A large study was done to answer this question. It examined 24,000 people and found which symptoms were the best predictors of thyroid disease.1

What they found offered a list of the 11 most predictive symptoms, including:

• Deeper voice
• Constipation
• Hoarse voice
• Hoarser voice
• Puffy eyes
• Feeling colder
• Muscle cramps
• More tired than usual
• Slower thinking
• Weaker muscles
• Drier skin

Out of all of the 19 signs of thyroid problems I may find in male and female patients, these 11 are important and specific. They mean that the likelihood of having thyroid disease is increased when someone has these symptoms – making them better predictors overall.

The “Required” Symptoms for Thyroid Disease

When we talk about common and predictive symptoms, it begs the question of whether any particular symptoms are “required” for thyroid disease.

The fact is that no specific symptoms need to be present. In some cases, your thyroid may not be working right but medications you are taking for symptoms unrelated to your thyroid may prevent you from noticing something is wrong.

There are no required symptoms for thyroid disease. While some may not have symptoms, others may have a single strong symptom or any combination of these 19 signs of thyroid problems. So in female patients and males, the absence of symptoms does not make thyroid disease less likely, it just makes it more difficult to discover and diagnose.

Action Steps for Those With Thyroid Symptoms

If you are struggling with uncomfortable symptoms, the first step is to get a blood test. Ideally, you would work with a Naturopathic Endocrinologist who specializes in thyroid disease, and request thyroid screening tests.

There are many different thyroid tests. You may find many experts recommending that you do as many tests as possible, even if you experience just one of the 19 signs of thyroid trouble that I discuss. This can be overwhelming and may not be necessary.

These tests all have their place at various points along the thyroid journey. They can help you find treatment for some symptoms and medications for a thyroid that is not working properly. But all of these tests are not needed when you’re just trying to see if your symptoms are caused by thyroid disease.

The necessary tests include:

• TSH
• Free T3
• Free T4
• Thyroid Antibody Panel (anti-thyroglobulin and anti-thyroperoxidase)

TSH Test

Thyroid-stimulating hormone (TSH) is a hormone made by the pituitary gland which tells the thyroid to work. It is a sensitive gauge of how much hormone is coming out of the thyroid in males and females. If you have any of the 19 signs of thyroid problems, your pituitary gland may be part of the puzzle.

But, it is important to know that it is what we call a backward marker. The less hormone coming out, the higher the number goes. The more hormone coming out, the lower the number.

Most labs consider the normal range to be between 0.4 to 4.5. Below range means hyperthyroidism, and above range means hypothyroidism.

When it comes to your TSH scores, it becomes all the more important to understand the difference between normal and optimal. Here is my complete guide to optimal thyroid levels.

Free T3 and Free T4

These are the main two hormones released by the thyroid, and incorrect levels may indicate thyroid problems and cause some of the 19 signs of trouble.

Low T3/T4 levels are a symptom that your thyroid may not be working right. Some medications, however, can cause low T3/T4 levels, so be aware of this and make sure your physician understands all the medications you are taking.

You may need to request to check T3/T4 since in most cases these hormones are not included in a thyroid screen, but they should be, and both should be in the normal range.

Some of the 19 warning signs of thyroid problems in female and male patients may occur even with good T3/T4 levels, and those who take thyroid medication may need closer monitoring and fine-tuning of their T3 and T4 levels.

Some thyroid advocates say T3 and T4 levels must be on the high side of normal. That said, healthy people have a wide range of T3 and T4 levels.

If you’re not already on thyroid treatment, and you’re trying to find out if your thyroid is causing symptoms, you need to look into whether your T3 and T4 levels are normal.

Thyroid Antibody Panel

A thyroid antibody panel is essential when trying to identify the cause of thyroid problems if you have one of the 19 common signs of trouble or several. This is the most important single thing to test at this stage. That’s because it is common to have thyroid autoimmunity cause symptoms rather than hypothyroidism being the root cause. You don’t want to start a treatment or medication for thyroid symptoms and have it not work because it is intended for another target.

A thyroid antibody panel includes two tests: anti-thyroid peroxidase and anti-thyroglobulin. There are other antibodies that can be tested, but they are not important for these purposes.

When the thyroid antibody level is not normal, it may cause all 19 signs of thyroid problems. In female patients, it may indicate Hashimoto’s disease.

Seriously elevated antibody levels may cause all the symptoms we’ve mentioned as well as health risks for heart disease, infertility, and more. How high is too high? 1000 units or greater may be considered seriously elevated, but problems often start when they are in the high hundreds.

When thyroid antibodies are barely positive, or in the low 100s, they may or may not be relevant. It is important to have your doctor take them into account along with other factors to determine the reason you are experiencing any of the 19 signs of thyroid problems.

When Should You Test Your Thyroid?

I have explained when to test your thyroid in past articles, but here’s a quick summary.

You can test to determine the state of your thyroid health, plan your healthcare, and learn why therapy or a thyroid medicine does not work on your symptoms or seems to work differently.

It is critical to run your tests at the right time to get an accurate reading.

Here are the five key rules to help you get the best possible results:

1. Test in the morning, ideally between 7:00 to 9:00 a.m.
2. Test after fasting and have nothing but water after midnight before testing.
3. Test after a three-day supplement holiday. Supplements can skew thyroid levels.
4. Test during the first week or last week of your menstrual cycle, if applicable, as some of the 19 signs of thyroid problems may occur in female patients with regular menstrual cycles.
5. If you are on thyroid medication, take your medication after your test (not before).

What Are the Best Treatments for Thyroid Symptoms?

If you are currently suffering from any of the thyroid problems or symptoms that I mentioned above, you’ll want to consider some of the best treatment options available.

The main things to consider include diet, nutraceuticals, and medications. Please don’t skip straight to medications. They are rarely helpful and are used far too often.

Diet

The role of your diet cannot be understated. It alone may be responsible for most of the 19 signs of thyroid problems. An imbalanced diet may result in deficient thyroid function, medicine not working, symptoms getting more serious, and more negative outcomes.

Changes in diet have been proven to reverse thyroid disease for the majority of people. Depending on the type of disease, diet can work between 60 to 80 percent of the time (and within two to three months).

Nutraceuticals

There are a host of nutraceuticals that can reduce the effect of thyroid symptoms, lower thyroid antibodies, and help improve thyroid function. These benefits have been proven in high-quality human studies that addressed thyroid symptoms, including the 19 signs of thyroid problems, in female and male patients. We know the benefits are real, and we know nutraceuticals can help.

Medications

You might think that if too little thyroid hormone was causing symptoms, then replacing that hormone with medication would resolve those symptoms.

But, it turns out that when we take thyroid hormones in a pill, it’s not the same as when the body makes them. Many who take thyroid medications find they do not work on symptoms in ways that enhance their quality of life, are ineffective, or have unwanted side effects.

To combat many of the symptoms of thyroid problems in my list of 19 signs, some people get stuck in a cycle of switching medications and changing dosage levels in a quest to feel better. The real problem was they weren’t good candidates for medication to start.

How do you know if medications will help? This table should offer a quick guide.

All of these same points can be applied to all types of thyroid medication. In my experience, functional doctors are quick to put people on medication even for suboptimal thyroid levels or thyroid antibodies. They are apt to use natural thyroid, compounded T3 and T4, or a T3 only, in male and female patients. For many of the 19 thyroid problem signs that cause the most severe symptoms, this type of therapy may be ineffective.

On the other hand, conventional doctors are often too quick to put people on medication for subclinical diseases. They are more apt to use T4-only medication.

Getting to the Root of Thyroid Problems

If you suspect that you might be suffering from thyroid disease, identifying the cause of any of the 19 most common thyroid problem signs in female and male thyroid patients can help bring you some clarity.

If they are caused by your thyroid, you will want safe, natural ways to help your thyroid and feel your absolute best again. The good news is that this is completely possible!

The best part is that you can start today by taking my Thyroid Quiz. It can give you helpful information and clarity on the next best step for your thyroid. I truly hope it helps.