A Personal Note From Orion
We are thrilled to have you back for another transformative episode of the Stellar Life Podcast! We’re diving into a topic that impacts every facet of our well-being: thyroid health. Joining us on this enlightening journey is Dr. Amie Hornaman, the brilliant mind behind the top-rated podcast, The Thyroid Fixer™.
Dr. Amie is the powerhouse behind The Institute for Thyroid and Hormone Optimization, and offers groundbreaking solutions for thyroid dysfunction to guide individuals back to vibrant health. As the creator of The Fixxr™ Supplement line, she’s on a mission to address common struggles—weight loss challenges, fatigue, low libido, hormone imbalances, and more. Dr. Amie’s wealth of knowledge and commitment to optimizing lives make her the perfect guide on our journey to wellness.
In this conversation, Dr. Amie and I explore the intricate connections between thyroid health and living your best life. This episode will give you insight into how to reclaim your energy, vitality, and confidence. So, without further ado, let’s dive into the show!
In This Episode
- [02:43] – Dr. Amie Hornaman shares how her passion for optimizing thyroid health started and talks about her struggles with weight gain despite a healthy diet and exercise and the impact on her mental health.
- [05:14] – Dr. Amie lists various symptoms associated with thyroid problems and the significance of testing thyroid components to diagnose problems accurately.
- [11:00] – Dr. Amie explains the essence of full thyroid testing and finding a practitioner who addresses the root cause of your thyroid problems.
- [14:08] – Orion asks Dr. Amie what causes thyroid problems in men and women.
- [18:57] – Dr. Amie discusses thyroid healing and recommends some methods and medications you can explore based on your needs and health status.
- [22:12] – Dr. Amie highlights the benefits of T2 supplements for weight loss and thyroid health, particularly in addressing hypothyroidism.
- [26:59] – Orion and Dr. Amie discuss the potential effect on an individual’s libido having thyroid problems.
- [28:36] – Dr. Amie emphasizes addressing underlying health issues, believing in the power of the mind-body connection for healing thyroid and other physical ailments.
- [41:10] – Dr. Amie enumerates her top three stellar life tips.
About Today’s Show
Hi, Dr. Amie. Welcome to the show. Thank you so much for being here.
My pleasure. It’s great to be here.
Can you tell me a little bit about your origin story? And how did you discover your passion for what you’re doing right now?
Absolutely. I’ll bring everyone into the fold of this. If you can just even imagine, and maybe some of your listeners will resonate with this, putting on 25 pounds in a month, literally while you were eating clean—chicken, broccoli, and vegetables, going to the gym twice a day, and doing all the things, even all the biohacking things that you know will bring you to optimal health, and your body is rebelling against you. That was my story.
I competed in fitness and figure competitions, requiring a very strict diet and exercise regimen. Every time I stepped on the scale, it went up. Biologically, that doesn’t even make sense. Whether you believe in it or not, the calories in, calories out model didn’t make sense.
What did I do? I ate less and exercised more because I started becoming depressed and frustrated. I started blaming myself, thinking that I was crazy and maybe I was not doing enough. Ultimately, I had to quit getting ready for the show because the weight was going up, which was the opposite of what was supposed to happen.
You Can Heal Your Life by Louise Hay
On top of the depression and the frustration, I felt a lot of shame. I was embarrassed. I felt like a failure. I felt like people were talking about me behind my back, like, “Oh, she’s eating too many donuts. She went off her diet. Look at how big she’s getting,” and to learn that it really wasn’t my fault.
I was misdiagnosed six times. I wouldn’t be here today if I had stopped at doctor number four. I encourage women to continue even if they aren’t getting the answers. This is what I preach, really the battle cry. I’m saying women, I’m not leaving out the guys, but the battle cry is no more of the same because we need to demand more answers and demand that someone looks at us as full human beings with symptoms and not just a lab value. That’s what brought my pain and purpose story into this space.
That’s beautiful. How did you find out how to cure it? Did you use the normal medications for thyroid? What happened between you figuring it out and then developing your products?
There’s a lot of space in there. The functional medicine doctor who finally fixed me became my mentor. Obviously, at that time, I didn’t know what he was doing. But now I can look back and see, “Oh, this is exactly what you did.” First of all, we started with full testing. When I first complained to my doctors about the symptoms, they only tested Thyroid-Stimulating Hormone (TSH) and Free T4. We can get into the thyroid testing if you’d like.
Conventional medicine only tests a few tests, a few markers. You need all of the different markers done to get that full picture of what your thyroid is doing. That was problem number one. That’s the issue that he solved by testing thoroughly. I had pages and pages of labs that we were going over. He spent 90 minutes with me going through those labs, going through all my symptoms, and putting that puzzle together.
Yes, I did use thyroid hormone replacement. I was prescribed a medication, and it wasn’t just herbs and wasn’t just supplements. Sometimes, some people need thyroid hormone replacement because we’re replacing hormones no longer made by your thyroid gland. That’s what saved me because my thyroid gland was so destroyed from Hashimoto’s, from the autoimmune attack, that it wasn’t producing the thyroid hormones that it should have or that it once did. I had to come in and replace those hormones.
It was a combination of proper thyroid hormone replacement therapy and supplements. When I look back at my journey, this was 27 years ago, but when I look back at that, and I look at even the different supplements that my mentor, my savior, put me on, some of them are similar to what I now create for my patients because there are specific issues that we see.
There are specific deficiencies that we see. It just all coincides together. Whenever you have a thyroid problem, you see insulin resistance and low hormone function. That’s how my supplement line came to be, but it started with the proper treatment and someone listening to me.
That’s awesome. Let’s start with the role of the thyroid. What happens when it doesn’t function right?
When your thyroid is not functioning properly, you are going to have a multitude of symptoms because we have to remember that the thyroid is the master gland. Every cell in your body has a receptor site for thyroid hormone, specifically T3. T3 is the active thyroid hormone.
When the thyroid is not working properly, someone may experience weight gain, fatigue, low motivation, brain fog, depression, anxiety, constipation, joint pain, hair loss, dry skin, intolerance to colds, slow heart rate, heart palpitations, and the list goes on and on. I’ve had patients come in and think that they’re in early Alzheimer’s.
Every cell in your body has a receptor site for thyroid hormone, specifically T3. T3 is the active thyroid hormone.
I have patients come in that they’re doing all the things just like I was. They’re eating clean, they’re exercising, they’re biohacking, and the weight still isn’t coming off. They’re doing gut healing protocols and adrenal protocols. They’re doing all these things out here without getting to the root cause. If they just focused on fixing that master gland, that would fix so much. When your thyroid is off, it affects every area of your life.
What type of testing do we need to do if somebody has those symptoms?
That’s where we have to get specific. That was part of the problem that I ran into. They only tested TSH and Free T4. Now, let’s break that down. TSH means thyroid-stimulating hormone, a pituitary hormone; it’s not a thyroid hormone. It’s released by your pituitary when the body senses that insufficient thyroid hormone is being made.
As that TSH rises, it’s getting louder, meaning it’s poking the thyroid gland, saying, “Hey, thyroid gland, wake up, you’re not doing your job.” As TSH goes up, thyroid hormone production is down. That’s where we’ll see someone get diagnosed when TSH is screaming, “Hello, here’s a thyroid problem.”
The problem with just testing that is (1) It’s a brain hormone, it’s not a thyroid hormone. (2) It doesn’t give us the whole picture. As we go down that list, we have the test Free T4. We have to test Free T3, the active thyroid hormone. We have to test reverse T3, which is the anti-thyroid hormone. It’s like the brake. T3 is the gas. It runs the engine, it runs the car. Your body is the car.
Reverse T3 is the brakes. If reverse T3 is high, it will put the brakes on your body—brakes on your metabolism, brain function, and mood. Everything slows down. We need to know what that number is.
Then, there are TPO and TG antibodies, which are your thyroid antibodies—Hashimoto antibodies. That tells us whether or not you have soldiers that go out and beat up your thyroid gland. When that TPO and TG antibody number is elevated or if there’s any, quite frankly, if there are any soldiers or antibodies, those are destructive to your thyroid gland. That’s the full testing that we need.
The thyroid-stimulating hormone (TSH) is a pituitary hormone released by the pituitary gland when the body senses insufficient thyroid hormone.
Who does those tests? When you go to the doctor, they probably will do a very small test. How can people get the full panel?
Good point. If you go to your doctor, you say, “Hey, doc, I want a full thyroid panel,” but you’re still only going to get those two, TSH and T3 or T4. They think a “full thyroid panel” is those two markers. Many doctors tell patients, “You don’t need the other markers. We don’t run those other markers.”
How do you get it done? Unless you’re lucky enough to be working with an insurance-based provider, let’s say your PCP or your OBGYN who happens to know the thyroid, which many of them don’t, maybe they will do the full testing. But most of the time, you have to go outside the box. You have to work with a functional practitioner like myself, an integrative naturopath. Then, you have to make sure that they specialize in the thyroid because treating the thyroid is a nuanced art. There is no one-size-fits-all all.
I even complain about this on my podcast. I have seen “functional practitioners” that my patients have seen prior to working with me. These people are treating the thyroid just like conventional medicine does. I’ll see their labs come in, they’re thrown on the same medication, they’re not being listened to, their numbers are all out of whack or not in the optimal ranges, and they’re being told that they’re normal by these practitioners, even in the functional space. You really want to find someone who knows the thyroid gland.
Now, if you’re curious, “I think I have a problem. I don’t know if I have a problem, I have some of the symptoms, maybe I should test,” you can go to places like Ulta Lab Tests on my website. I have a banner that says, “Order your own lab tests.” It’s just for those people that are like, “I just want to see myself.”
You can click on that banner, and you can order your own lab tests depending on what state you’re in. Then, you can at least get those numbers and see where you fall. That leads us into the optimal range versus the normal range if you want to go there, but it’s important to be in the optimal range, not just normal per that standard lab value range.
How often do we need to do those tests?
It just depends. If there is a problem, we look at those labs and say, “Hey, these are not optimal. They pair up with your symptoms. We need to do something.” Let’s say I’m working with you, and then I would test you probably six weeks when we implement treatment and then stretch it out to twelve weeks. Once you’re optimized, we can go once every six months.
Treating thyroid issues is a complex process that requires a personalized approach. There is no universal, one-size-fits-all solution.
In the beginning, when we’re working on rebuilding those hormones, and this is the same with bioidentical hormone replacement—I do that as well because we tie in the sex hormones with the thyroid hormones, we do everything at once—we want to give those time to move before we make a dose adjustment. It’s usually about 90 days for hormones to start moving and shifting.
What causes thyroid problems?
Hypothyroidism, 95% is Hashimoto’s. That’s the autoimmune form. That is where your body attacks your thyroid gland because it thinks it’s an invader. Only 5% of hypothyroidism is due to another cause of just a thyroid downregulating, crapping the bed basically. That can be over-exercising and eating disorders, such as under-eating. It can be different drugs like chemotherapy drugs, birth control—known to down-regulate the thyroid, radiation or something like that to the thyroid gland. That’s only 5%. Most of the cases are Hashimoto’s.
My relative came to visit. She’s got a thyroid problem. While she was here, she lost a lot of weight. All of a sudden, her thyroid medication was too high, I guess, because she was tired all the time. She just wanted to sleep all the time. What is the connection between losing weight and all of a sudden, maybe the medication is too much, or the thyroid is over-functioning or functioning a little more. It is so complicated.
If hypothyroidism is left untreated, it can start affecting the different systems of the body.
It’s so complicated because now you just said two things that overlap. She has the hypo symptom of fatigue, but she has the hyper symptom of weight loss. Is she possibly slightly overmedicated? Possibly, I don’t know. We’d have to test her labs, and then we would have to look at her medication dose and how they pair up with their labs. Also, it’s important to look deeper.
When you have that array of symptoms on different ends of the spectrum, you have to go, “Well, maybe she lost weight because something else is going on in her body, or she has a parasite. Maybe there’s a cortisol issue. She has too much adrenaline. Who knows? Or maybe she’s fatigued. Maybe she is overmedicated, but she’s fatigued because it’s taxing her adrenals. She’s starting to get that fatigue.”
When you’re hyper, you crash. Even if she’s overmedicated and hyper, it’s messing with her blood glucose, something like that, and you would have to sit down and go over things to find out what exactly it is.
How do thyroid problems relate? Can they cause or trigger other diseases?
Great question. Yes and no. When talking about Hashimoto’s, any autoimmune where we see one autoimmune, we see more than one. We normally see two or three different autoimmune conditions. Things are not implemented when one is not treated properly and has a different lifestyle.
Hypothyroidism, if left untreated, can start affecting the different systems of the body. Constipation is one symptom of low and slow thyroid function. When you’re constipated, you’re not eliminating, and you get that toxin buildup. We naturally get some GI distress, maybe even a bit of gastroparesis, where the bowels are not pushing waste through properly.
When you’re hypo-low and slow, you have a lower heart rate. Oftentimes, people can get diagnosed with Afib, where they’ll have irregular heartbeats or SVT, supraventricular tachycardia. We have to go back and make sure thyroid function is on point before we start medicating because what if it’s just the thyroid? One of my co-workers or one of my employees had to have an ablation earlier before—she was a patient, actually—and started working with me.
What is an ablation?
It’s where they go in, and they cauterize a part of her heart because she was having irregular beats.
It wasn’t until her thyroid was tested that we figured out this was the cause. She was able to get off her heart medication and all of that because we’ve properly treated her thyroid. It can read its way into the different systems of the body. As I said earlier, a lot of patients will be put on antidepressants and anxiety medication as a band-aid. Again, instead of getting into the root cause and fixing the thyroid, they just get prescribed a band-aid medication.
That’s crazy. Do you think everyone can heal their thyroid?
Everyone can get optimized. For the healing of the thyroid, you can’t diet your way into healing. You can’t supplement your way into healing. We can do diet, lifestyle, and supplemental protocols to improve overall function.
Going gluten-free is imperative because gluten mimics the thyroid gland. Whenever a Hashimoto patient eats gluten, they’re launching an attack on their thyroid.
For something like Hashimoto’s, where the antibodies are high, we can use black cumin seed oil, which has been shown to lower antibodies, sometimes upwards of 200-plus points in a very short time. When you lower the antibodies that stop the thyroid gland’s destruction, ultimately, we want antibodies at zero.
There are different little hacks that we can do like that. Going gluten-free is imperative because gluten mimics the thyroid gland. Whenever a Hashimoto patient eats gluten, they’re launching an attack on their thyroid. We can do different supportive things, such as making sure you’re not estrogen dominant, making sure you’re not insulin resistant, and using something like Berberine.
Yes, we can help with healing. But if you’re too far along in the process, in the destruction of your thyroid gland, then you’re not just going to magically heal with any kind of protocol, herbs, supplements, lifestyle changes, or diet. That’s where the thyroid hormone replacement comes in to simply replace those hormones that aren’t properly being made.
What do you replace it with? Do you replace it with what the doctor gives you, or is there something that is more natural?
Great question. It is important to break it down. There are a multitude of different thyroid hormone replacements. There’s the category of natural desiccated thyroid (NDT), and that’s a dried-out pig thyroid gland. Armour and NP are the two medications.
Over here, what the medical world will call synthetics, I called the biosynth. Meaning they’re biologically identical to the thyroid hormones that your thyroid produces. They’re just separated. They’re not in the dried-out pig thyroid gland format; they are manufactured to be identical to our own thyroid hormones, and they’re T4 and T3 separated.
When I get asked the question, “What thyroid hormone replacement or thyroid medication do you like the best?” I say, “The one that’s going to work for you, and the dose and the combination that will work for you.” Maybe you do just fine on the natural desiccated thyroid meds, but maybe for Suzie. She needs the NDT plus a little bit of T3. And maybe Jane needs the Synthroid and T3 separated, so Synthroid and Liothyronine. Maybe someone like me can only do T3. I can’t do the T4, and I can’t do the NDT. It is about finding what’s going to work for you.
If we go deeper into their lifestyle changes, you said gluten-free and maybe adding berberine to lower blood sugar levels. What else is good for the thyroid? Are there certain foods that can nourish the thyroid or a certain lifestyle?
It's a rare case that someone regrows their thyroid with thoughts, but when it occurs, it shows the power of incorporating a mind-body connection into your life. Share on XIt’s all about inflammation. Whenever the body is inflamed, you will have issues with whatever issue you have that will be amplified. If you have Hashimoto, since we’re talking about thyroid, whenever there’s inflammation caused by the standard American diet, eating a lot of sugar, eating a lot of processed foods, chemicals, and toxins, you’re naturally not going to work as well.
Your thyroid gland isn’t going to produce the thyroid hormones. Chances are very good if you have Hashimoto’s, that inflammation is going to spur on an autoimmune attack, meaning those soldiers go out and beat up your thyroid gland. The simple things, the cliche things of eating whole foods, eating real foods, eliminating processed foods, eliminating sugars, going gluten-free, going organic, all of those things that some people roll their eyes at, really do work.
There are some supplements. There’s one particular that I have made because I’ve seen over my clinical history performing so well—it’s T2. So 3,5-Diiodo-L-Thyronine is T2. That’s a thyroid hormone, but it doesn’t have to be prescribed. This is something that you can get in supplemental form, so I put it in my product, the thyroid fixxr, and I put it in the metabolism fixxr because it increases your basal metabolic rate. It acts at the mitochondrial level to produce ATP.
We get more ATP production. More ATP means less fatigue and more energy. Increasing your basal metabolic rate is fantastic because most people struggle with weight gain and the inability to lose weight. We’re increasing that basal metabolic rate without having that negative feedback loop on your thyroid.
More ATP means less fatigue and more energy, increasing your basal metabolic rate without having a negative feedback loop on your thyroid.
It won’t cause your thyroid gland to shut down and stop producing its fibroid hormone. It won’t affect your cardiovascular system; it will only work at the mitochondrial level and increase your basal metabolic rate (BMR). It also protects your muscles because sometimes, when we get into the world of thyroid hormone replacement, we get into the world of T3.
T3 is fantastic. It’s the active thyroid hormone. However, it can have a negative impact on muscle. This means T3 will go out, it’ll burn body fat, and it’ll burn muscle. T2 only goes out and burns body fat; it leaves muscle alone. There are some definite pros with adding in T2, whether you have a thyroid problem or not, but there are some pros with adding in T2 if you have a thyroid issue.
With the thyroid fixxr, your formula, does it matter what type of thyroid problem you have? Does it address all thyroid problems?
I don’t really see a lot of hyper, nor is hyperthyroid common. Graves’ disease is the autoimmune form of hyperthyroidism. That’s where you’ll see people losing weight, anxious, insomniac, bulging eyes, and thyroid eye disease. There’s just not a lot out there. When I do see them, they’re usually swinging back and forth between hyper and hypo, which might be the case of, I think, your cousin that you were saying was visiting. She might be swinging from hyper to hypo going from Graves disease to Hashimoto’s.
In some cases like that, we do have to remove the thyroid if we can’t calm down that swing. Most cases are hypothyroidism. We’re not dealing with the hyper end of things, in which case, yes. For anyone with hypo and anyone who’s trying to lose weight and can’t, we’d implement T2. If you’re hyper and the weight is just peeling off you, then there’s no need for T2.
That’s a lot. The thyroid fixxr is more for people with hypothyroidism, which is feeling more sluggish and gaining weight.
Exactly.
That’s most of the population now. What’s the difference between men and women? How does it affect men? How does it affect women?
Of all the hypothyroid cases out there, you’re going to see about 90% in women and 10% in men.
Women get affected. I would say, of all the hypothyroid cases out there, you’re going to see about 90% are women, 10% are men. Testosterone is a very protective hormone, and men just have more of that.
I’m a huge proponent of optimal testosterone levels in women and men—huge. It’s a fantastic hormone. It protects the body against autoimmune conditions. That’s why, since women just have less testosterone than men, we get affected by autoimmune conditions more.
What’s the relation to libido?
Testosterone and libido?
No, hypothyroidism. If you have testosterone, you have a lot of libido. If you have a problem with the thyroid, you probably don’t have enough testosterone, so you have a low libido, right?
You just nailed it. You just said what I was going to say. Low thyroid function affects your sex hormones. Now testosterone goes into the tank, along with possibly DHEA. It can also affect estradiol. Testosterone estradiol is huge for libido.
Estradiol gives us vaginal lubrication and prevents against vaginal atrophy. Testosterone gives us the libido, improves circulation down there, and that motivation factor. That mood and motivation factor is huge with testosterone, so yes. That’s the thing I see with men a lot. I see it with women every day, too. But with men with hypothyroidism or Hashimoto’s, we will almost always see low testosterone.
If you give them that man testosterone, will that improve his Hashimoto?
It can. It can calm down that autoimmune attack. Same with women. We’re not just going to give you testosterone and say, “All right, we’ll just leave your thyroid alone, check it in six months, and see if it improved.” No, we’re going to do both at the same time. If you need thyroid hormone, here’s a thyroid hormone. We’re going to give you testosterone as well.
That’s interesting. How does your formula affect people? You said they’d see results quickly. Can they take it alongside their thyroid medication?
You have to look at the whole thing. It’s just one more piece of the puzzle of doing everything, and that’s the case for anything in life.
Yes, they can take it alongside thyroid meds. Results-wise, we get everything across the board, which comes down to, “How’s the rest of your life?” Thyroid fixxr will increase basal metabolic rate. T2 will increase basal metabolic rate, but not if you’re eating garbage, sitting on your bum, not working out, or being stressed out. You’re not meditating. Your cortisol is all out of whack. Your blood sugar regulation is wonky. You have insulin resistance. You have no testosterone. You have to look at the whole thing.
It’s just one more piece of the puzzle of doing everything, and that’s the case for anything in life. You could do a gut healing protocol, but if your testosterone and your thyroid are in the toilet, that’s not going to work. Like myself, I was eating perfectly, going to the gym, and doing biohacking. “Okay, there was no reward for my efforts because my thyroid was low and not working.” It’s about doing everything together.
When you fixed your thyroid, did you compete after that? What happened to you?
I did a couple of more competitions. I just changed over to doing powerlifting because I got sick of standing on stage in a bikini and having to dye it down all the time. I’m like, “You know what, with powerlifting, you either lift that weight or you don’t.” You don’t have the subjective judgment of the judges, but I did. I got my energy back. I could lose weight, regulate my weight, and all that good stuff.
A long time ago, I dreamed of doing a fitness competition. Nothing happened since. Just listening to you, I’m like, “Oh, gosh, Orion, you neglect your body. When was the last time you lifted weight?” It’s been a long, long time.
We have to start there with you. That’s okay.
I was even a fitness trainer. But that was a long, long time ago.
So you know what to do.
I know what to do, but I don’t do it. I know so much. It’s just that it’s not about what you know. It’s about what you do with that knowledge.
So true. Absolutely. It’s funny. I was on a panel this past weekend, and we were all asked the same question. There were a bunch of doctors. “What do you do for yourself to take care of yourself?” I grabbed the mic. I’m like, “Well, here’s the thing. This is a taxicab confession moment. What I tell people to do and what I do are sometimes two different things. I used to take that morning as a sacred time to walk my dog in the woods. That’s when I would get in my deep breathing, my meditation. I’d listen to a meditative app and then get a nice workout in, even if it was 30 or 45 minutes.”
When there is inflammation in the body, any pre-existing conditions are likely to amplify.
Where do you live?
Right now, I’m in Pennsylvania. We’re moving to Iowa, but I’m big into the woods. I love the woods. Trees are very therapeutic. The problem is that I’m answering emails on my walk, making phone calls on my walk, and answering emails during my workouts. I’m not even taking care of myself anymore.
Your dog probably feels neglected, too.
Yeah, he’s pissed off too. Exactly. They know. Back to you, you have to do what you know to do. We all do.
I know. It takes discipline, but it’s a matter of creating inertia. What do you do to take care of yourself these days? What gives you the best feeling? What do you do for self-care?
That’s the thing. I have to get back to it. I need to block out time. I know what I need to do. I’m not horrible at it. I don’t want you to think I don’t self-care because I do. I will go to yoga once a week. I will still work out even if I answer emails during my workouts.
Hormones give you life.
I’m still getting that in. I’m taking peptides, I’m taking supplements, I’m getting good sleep when I can, when I’m not traveling. For the most part, I feel solid, and I take hormones. Hormones give you life. I take care of myself, but I know it could be better.
You definitely look like one that takes care of herself. You look gorgeous. When you see some very vibrant people, it shines through. This is what I see when I see you.
Thank you, I appreciate that.
I heard a podcast, and somebody said they went to Dr. Joe Dispenza’s event. They know of a person who, through meditation, actually had their thyroid removed, and they grew a thyroid.
I heard Joe talk about that. I was at an event that he was speaking at, and he gave that story. It’s crazy, but it speaks to the power of our mind.
What do you think about the mind-body connection when it comes to healing our body and thyroid?
It’s huge. Our minds have more potential than what we give them credit for. But I don’t think most people make the time, have the capability to dive that deep, or have the patience to wait that long, because I guarantee you that person made the time to do the work every day because you’re not going to get a healing or regrowth of your thyroid by doing a five-minute meditation. This is a commitment thing. This is working on yourself and working on your mind-body connection.
The thyroid gland plays a vital role in keeping your entire body healthy. When your thyroid functions at its best, you'll feel energized, focused, and ready to take on the world. Share on XAnyone can start anywhere. I’m not saying not to start because you don’t have the time. Starting anything is better than nothing. Like me, I am working out while answering emails. But it’s better than no workout. It’s just such a rare case that we see someone regrowing their thyroid or healing their thyroid with thoughts, but it needs to be incorporated.
It’s building certainty beyond logic that you can create miracles in your life, but you have to do the work. You have to do everything you can physically and signal to the universe like, “Hey, look, I’m doing whatever I can, and I’m ready for the next level,” then you create a miracle.
But you got to do the work. You have to do your panel, go to the doctor, and take supplements. From there, you can create miracles, whether healing or even growing a new thyroid. If it’s possible for one person, it’s possible for everyone. It’s about stepping outside the matrix and breaking that belief pattern that we can’t because, as Henry Ford said, “Whether you believe you can or you believe you can’t, you’re probably right.”
I love that. I don’t know him personally, but this isn’t just like a story I heard in the ether. This was actually from a friend of mine who knew this gentleman, and he was diagnosed with cancer. Every day, he would picture aliens shooting lasers at his tumor. That was his visualization, he saw it breaking down, he saw it getting destroyed, and he went back for an MRI and it was gone. It absolutely is possible.
Our minds have more potential than what we give them credit for.
That’s amazing. When I was a teenager, my mom gave me the book You Can Heal Your Life by Louise Hay. I love her. In one of her recordings, she says, “You can imagine a war in your body, or you can imagine that everything is healing with water flowing through your body.”
I think aliens shooting lasers is more interesting. That’s more me. I would have a bigger emotional reaction to that than to just flowing water. When you want to activate a miracle, you need to be in a very strong emotional state. Whatever can trigger that is a good thing to do.
Yeah, absolutely.
Yes. This was amazing. Can you share some success stories with me, please?
I have two that come to mind. One of them is a gentleman. We said it mainly affects women, but this one’s for the guys out there. I had a phone call from a gentleman in a different state. He was down in Florida. He was working down there, and he checked himself into the hospital because he was having symptoms of blood sugar dysregulation.
He came out of the hospital and called me. He didn’t know me. He’s like, “I need your help.” He was diagnosed with an insulin-dependent type 2 diabetes. His blood sugars were in the 600s, and his thyroid was all out of whack. His testosterone was low.
My goodness, that’s crazy. That’s a heart attack.
Yeah, he knew, too. He knew how he felt. He’s like, “This isn’t good.” He left there on metformin, insulin, Synthroid, and T4 only for the thyroid, which doesn’t work. He was 150 pounds overweight.
I wrote a case study on him and published it because it was so fascinating. His A1C, the marker of your glucose, started at 13.9. To give a reference, optimal is a 5.1 and 5.3. He started at 13. 9, he’s like, “I want off this insulin. I don’t want to be on this for the rest of my life.” I said, Okay, well, you got to give me time here.”
Little did I know, he was so determined, so this brings in the mindset piece. He was so determined that he dropped his A1C from 13.9 to 8. 4 in six weeks, which got him off the insulin. Then, we’re still working on optimizing his thyroid. We got testosterone in the mix. He’s changing his diet.
Optimal levels of testosterone can protect the body from autoimmune conditions.
In six months, he reversed his diabetes a hundred percent. I know we’re talking about the thyroid, but it plays a role because it was dysregulated. It was throwing off his blood sugar. It was down-regulating his testosterone, dropping his testosterone, as we talked about earlier. It was the whole gamut of everything that he did. He ended up losing a hundred pounds, too. That took about a year, but reversing his diabetes in six months was crazy. There’s that story that I always refer to because it just sticks in my mind as just so phenomenal.
On the female side, we have a woman who had multiple miscarriages. They told her she couldn’t get pregnant, was overweight, started falling into a depression, and started affecting her marriage because she didn’t want sex. She feels bad about herself. She’s depressed about the miscarriages, of course. All relationships are starting to get affected. She’s falling into a depression.
Her mom has Hashimoto, so she thought, maybe this is my thyroid. A large percentage of miscarriages are thyroid-related. She came to me. We started fixing her up. She lost weight, she got pregnant, and her marriage is better. It’s just like this trickle effect into the rest of your life.
It’s funny. I joke that fixing your thyroid can make you more money, but it’s true because your brain lights up, you’re more motivated, you feel better about yourself, and you’re more confident, you can think, and you can remember things. It has a trickle effect in every area of your life.
That’s amazing because I love biohacking. I even had Dave Asprey on the show. At one of the conferences, I got some brain supplements this and that. You can take as many brain supplements as you want, and it’s just like a band-aid. It doesn’t work long-term if you have an issue.
Thyroid hormones are the life force within us. They’re the keys to unlock our empowerment, confidence, strength, and vibrancy. No matter how many endeavors we pursue, progress begins with the vitality of our thyroid. Share on XYou know it.
Yeah, I definitely know it. It’s so weird. Before you gave the second example, I knew you would say something about fertility. I just knew it. It was annoying. I think I’m developing my psychic side.
You have strong intuition. You’re intuitive.
Thank you so much for sharing all this with us. I’m sure you’re being helpful to many people and all our listeners. Everyone who chose this probably chose it for this specific reason, so what a blessing. What a blessing you are to the world. Thank you.
My pleasure.
What are your three top tips for living a stellar life? And then where can people find you?
I have a saying: better thyroid, better hormones, better life. I tend to be a little bit biased. I start with thyroid hormones because they give you life. If you’re not feeling empowered, confident, strong, and vibrant, it doesn’t matter how many other things you do.
Have some self-care practice where you get into that parasympathetic state.
Again, it goes back to the conversation that we’ve had. It doesn’t matter how many other things you do. Better thyroid, better hormones, fix those. Have, like you said, some kind of self-care practice. Whatever your jam is, whether sitting on the beach, walking in the woods, going to a yoga class, or sitting in your sauna, just have some kind of self-care practice where you actually get into that parasympathetic state.
I don’t mean just going to the gym throwing around weights. That’s great. That’s awesome. But you have to do something to get into the parasympathetic and to calm that nervous system down because we live in a world where we go all the time. We’re always on fire, and you need to get into that parasympathetic.
You can go to my website at dramiehornaman.com. My podcast is The Thyroid Fixer podcast. If you want to go directly to the store to check out the T2, the thyroid fixxr we discussed, that is betterlifedoctor.com. That’ll take you right to the store.
Beautiful. How many supplements do you have there? What are they for?
I manufactured supplements based on what I saw in my patients. I won’t go into all of them, but the top ones are thyroid fixxr, which we talked about with T2. Blood sugar fixxr, which I see a lot of insulin resistance and glucose dysregulation. That’s Berberine. Then hormone fixxr. I see so much low testosterone in the ladies, so hormone fixxr is specifically to raise testosterone naturally in women.
We have a metabolism fixxr that just released. It not only has T2 in it, but it has green tea and purple tea for the metabolism, and it has an ingredient called Suprenza, which is a trademarked ingredient that controls appetite and lowers hunger, like all these GLP-1 agonists that we’re seeing now, like Trulicity, Ozempic, and all of that. This doesn’t have the side effects of slowing gastric motility, causing heartburn, and all those things. There are plenty of others. We have D. We have MAG, all the deficiency ones, digestive enzymes. They’re formulated for what I see in my patients.
You also have a quiz on your website that people can take to learn more about themselves.
When healing the thyroid, it's important to follow specific protocols that include dietary changes, lifestyle modifications, and supplements. Share on XWe have quizzes. We have free guides and free downloads. We have the lab checklist, which you can download and get the optimal lab value ranges versus the normal ones because that’s important when looking at your own labs.
Fantastic. Dr. Amie, thank you. It was a pleasure. I appreciate you being here. Thank you for sharing all your wisdom.
Thank you so much for having me. Absolutely.
Thank you. Thank you, listeners. Remember, better thyroid, better hormones, better life, and have some kind of self-care. Take care of yourself. Just find time to sit under a tree, get some grounding on the grass, walk on the beach, and hug a tree again. I love trees. Trees are amazing.
I love trees. They are so good.
Hug your loved ones, hug yourself, and have a stellar life. This is Orion till next time.
Your Checklist of Actions to Take
{✓}Ensure a thorough examination beyond TSH and Free T4 to assess your thyroid health. Include tests for Free T3, reverse T3, TPO and TG antibodies to get a complete picture.
{✓}Work with functional medicine practitioners or integrative naturopaths. Those specializing in thyroid health can ensure accurate diagnosis and treatment.
{✓}Eliminate gluten from your diet to reduce inflammation and prevent autoimmune thyroid attacks. Support your overall health by opting for real, whole foods. Eliminate processed foods from your diet.
{✓}Reduce inflammation by eliminating processed foods and sugars from your diet. Minimize inflammation by cutting back on high in sugar, processed foods, and toxins.
{✓}Add berberine to your diet to help regulate blood sugar levels. Berberine is especially helpful for those with insulin resistance. Explore the benefits of T2 supplementation to increase your basal metabolic rate, aid in weight management, and increase your energy levels.
{✓}Recognize the importance of optimal testosterone levels to protect against autoimmune conditions. Consider hormone replacement therapy to address both thyroid and testosterone levels.
{✓}Explore options like natural desiccated thyroid or synthetic biosimilar medications, to discover what works best for you. Thyroid hormone replacement therapy should be tailored to the individual.
{✓}Prioritize regular exercise, including weightlifting, to support overall well-being and thyroid function. Establish a routine and commit to regular physical activity for long-term benefits.
{✓}Remember the connection between thyroid health and other bodily functions. Treat the thyroid as your master gland, and ensure its proper function for overall well-being.
{✓}Access helpful resources such as free guides and downloads, lab checklists, and quizzes from Dr. Amie Hornaman on dramiehornaman.com and listen to The Thyroid Fixer podcast.
Links and Resources
Connect with Dr. Amie Hornaman
Book
YouTube Videos
Previous Stellar Life Episodes
- Dave Asprey – part one
- Dave Asprey – part two
People
Further Resources
About Dr. Amie Hornaman
Dr. Amie Hornaman, The Thyroid Fixer, is host to the top-rated podcast in medicine and alternative health: The Thyroid Fixer™, with listeners around the globe. She founded The Institute for Thyroid and Hormone Optimization, an organization with transformational, proven approaches to address thyroid dysfunction and support you in returning to full health.
Dr. Amie is also the founder of The Fixxr™ Supplement line with revolutionary, proprietary supplements that specifically address the struggles Dr. Amie saw in her patients: inability to lose weight, fatigue, low libido, hormone imbalance and more. From the Fixxr™ products to her one-on-one programs, Dr. Amie is on a mission to optimize you and give you your life back.
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