Librarian-girl goes fashion blog

Best investment ever! I've always wanted these kind of mittens, they're so practical! Not to mention supercute when you colour co-ordinate with your nail-polish. Got them at Accessorize in London last fall, and they made the longest, wintriest winter ever more bearable. Colour really does that! Also, bright pink may seem odd for winter but my hands are in my peripheral vision all day long so I really think it improves your mood.
(yes, it's late May, but believe it or not I wore these up until last week and anticipate needing them again tomorrow - weather forecast says a high of 11 degrees and rain....)



Now, this is... colour co-ordination librarian-style
(aka Overkill)

Still undecided if I can actually wear this colour to work. It's not like they're going to fire me now that I've already resigned. Still, I don't like to appear unprofessional. Mind you, someone in my office occasionally wears a pair of silver boots. Another one wears purple lipstick.

Hmm. Maybe if I team it with lots and lots of black polyester...

Ehm. Not really interesting for anyone not undergoing thyroid replacement therapy

Right, so, this is just to collect my thoughts and will be completely uninteresting for anyone but me (yes, I'm at work, but I can't focus on work beause my legs are spasming again making me panic about coming down with a spot of fibromyalgia/rheumatism/ALS)

Fact: a lot of people feel like crap when they start T4 hormone replacement therapy
(Me: muscle weakness, muscle spasms, joint pain, general feeling of being 'crummy', anxiety. Other common ones I've been spared: short term memory problems and migraine)

Supposed fact: you can't be allergic to Levothyroxine because it is an exact replica of the body's own hormone.
This is the cause of extremely heated debates bordering on hazing on hypothyroid forums: those that insist they feel bad because the hormone they are getting is synthetic and that the solution is natural thyroid hormone (ie Armour) vs those that claim that this is insane, they just need a higher dose.

Possible solution/exlanation:

Both could be right - Levothyroxine only supplies T4, which the body is supposed to turn into T3. However, not everyone's bodies have the same ability to turn T4 into T3 for various reasons, so in some people they get too much T4 and not enough T3. Since Armour includes actual T3, this can correct this problem. So, they are not really getting better because the drug is natural as opposed to synthetic, but rather as a side-effect of the drug being natural they get an extra hormone. In theory, this should mean that combined T3/T4 hormone replacement therapy could work just as well.

Caveat: natural thyroid hormone from pigs already has the right balance between T3 and T4, whereas getting that balance correct by supplying T3 and T4 seperately can be trickier, especially since T3 has a much shorter half-life. In addition, Armour also includes other hormones involved in thyroid function, and if you have an issue with producing any of these, Armour would help whereas T3/T4 combination wouldn't help.

Not helping discussion: argument about the fact that Armour is less standardized than synthroid drugs because levels of T3/T4 will vary (like the sweetness of strawberries depending on season). I have seen arguments both supporting and opposing this theory, I'm not convinced either way.

So, this part I get. The next possible explanation for feeling crummy when you start levothyroxine treatment, even if you maybe had no obvious symptoms before starting treatment, is apparently something called adrenal fatigue. Even subclinical adrenal fatigue, apparently to do with cortisone levels and extremely hard to measure, can cause worsening of hypothyroid symptoms when you first start medicating.
As far as I understand it, the symptoms will either get worse as you increase T4 levels to compensate for sudden, increased hypothyroid symptoms (despite normal TSH levels) until you feel like crap or sometimes, die, OR at some magical level the adrenal insufficiany will manage to correct itself using some substrate from the T4 and eventually if you keep elevating the dose you will be fine. Although first you will feel like crap for a really long time.

Yeah, that last one needs some more extensive research.

the stuff dreams are made of

Today is what we in very bad Swenglish call a 'squeeze day'. Hence I am working from home, but my tech is really screwing me over. Work laptop is having another unexplainable internet refusal day, so I'm connecting via VPN on my own shitty PC City laptop which crashes whenever you move it a millimeter in any direction. Also, I am doing migration umlaut-cleansing, and conveniently enough this laptop is the British one - which doesn't have any åäö's. I've managed to get Swedish as an input language but it's only working on the internet, not any other apps... I also have to have it on a tiny side table which is at an incredibly achy angle to my back - I just moved it so I could rest my wrists on the table aaaand it crashed (hence blog break from mini-pc)

In other exciting and unrelated news, I've been on a big electronica binge for a few weeks now, playing Röyksopp and Detektivbyrån morning and night. But just now as I realized I was in a mood for some german emo and reached for Zimmer 483 I realized that OMG - I had a dream where I made out with Bill!! Last night! This could certainly explain the urge to hear his voice. It was quite surreal, they were staying in the same hotel as me and there was lots of sneaking in and out of very scary bunker-like toilets. The kiss itself was at a dinner table with lots of other people and very stiff and ehm, surreal. I was like, dude, there are other ppl here! I was still devastated when they left the hotel though, he was very love and leave 'em (so, clearly unrealistic because I insist that Bill seems like a lovely person).

The part of the dream I really wish comes true is the part where he had his old hair back. Bill, if you read this, please grow your hair back out, OK? I know you had the mohawk for like 10 years already but 8 out of those 10 years you were only famous in Germany. Now you're depriving your fans all over the world of this hair-faboulousness! Also, I think it would do wonders for your sales figures.
Love
librarian_girl

International, that's me alright

So, apparently in the eyes of my new university I'm an International Student!! I find this highly amusing on many levels. I'm getting many useful tips on Visa permits, the social security system, travel etc. Apparently I can get a Swedish mentor - the only offer I might want to utilize. I would think being a rootless second generation immigrant Swede with hardly any acquaintances in this part of the country would qualify me, wouldn't you?

Yay me

On a more positive note, I have 3 months until I can once again experience daylight every day of the week, plan most of my own days, chill in libraries like, all the time, not to mention not spend 4h a day on public transportation. In fact, I'm hoping the only transportation I will need is by my own two feet.

This of course necessitates me finding student housing for my MSc (!!) which I start in August (!!). People who are knowledgeable about the housing situation in Lund have pretty much laughed in my face when I mention that I hope to get student housing for my year-long degree. I'm seriusly thinking of applying to rent a proper house and form my own collective. Does come with more responsibilities (finding people who are not potheads and don't, I dunno, draw on the walls when drunk) but on the other hand I can pick them and not the other way around. Determined to live in Lund though, so will try all avenues I think.

Fight for your right to non-synthroid drugs

So. Haven't written much lately, mostly because most of the time I feel like shit. It feels like someone replaced my body with that of a 70-year old sometime in the last few months. I had to go to the doctor this week because I had muscle cramps, everywhere. Yesterday I took a walk with the dog which was painful, resulted in more cramps and aches and well, I've always had sympathy for those with rheumatism but let's say it's renewed.

Not to mention how anxious I've been, do I have ALS? Rheumatism? Fibromyalgia? Ulcer? My stomach hurts or is distressed on a low level since several months now. I wake up and can barely walk because my hip bones ache. Feet spasm all the time.
Going to a doctor makes you feel stupid (or, in this case, called a lazy lard-ass in not quite those words). All doctors say is that no one ever had any side effects from synthroid levothyroxine drugs, which is quite funny really, since there are several forums and campaigns where many many people complain of everything from muscle aches to anxiety to IBS. Apparently there is a simple solution in the form of natural levothyroxine from pigs, which is only available in Sweden if you find a doctor willing to fight your case in a tangled web of global pharmaceutical rules.

Anyway, I'm gonna stop taking it for now. I only started because it was going to help me loose weight and I've lost nada, despite now practically eating Atkins. Let's see what comes first, a paradigm shift in the attitude toward natural vs synthroid drugs (highly unlikely), an Armour license for Sweden (not eligible to guess on this one) or a competent doctor who is not an ass and willing to battle paperwork for my health (not impossible I guess, but I don't see it anytime soon).
I had a great doctor - apparently she decided to have a baby.
Bloody democracy with year-long maternity leaves.