Recently I interviewed Annabel Bateman, who hosts another thyroid-related podcast called “Let’s Talk Thyroid”. If you would prefer to listen the interview you can access it by Clicking Here [1].
I am excited to interview another host of a different thyroid-related podcast, Annabel Bateman, who is a Hashimoto’s patient, author, advocate, and coach. She has learned in 25 years of living with Hashimoto’s that the key is developing a lifestyle that supports and doesn’t stress her thyroid health. Drawing on skills learned in previous years as a lawyer, life coach, family law mediator, and author, Annabel seeks to empower, educate, and encourage women with thyroid conditions to develop their own thyroid-friendly lifestyle approach to their health so they can thrive, not just survive.
As I mentioned, she hosts a successful podcast, Let’s Talk Thyroid, which seeks to spread thyroid awareness and information. She is active on social media to spread positive, practical thyroid-related information. Annabel’s latest book Let’s Talk Thyroid: Positive and Practical Thyroid Health is all about how to live a thyroid-friendly lifestyle. While there is no magic happy thyroid formula or protocol, you have to start somewhere. This book is that somewhere.
Annabel lives in Brisbane, Australia with her husband and three teenage sons. Thank you so much for joining us, Annabel.
Annabel Bateman:
Thank you for having me, Eric. I just had you on my podcast, which is being released soon. I am looking forward to being on the other side of the microphone today.
Dr. Eric:
Same here. You made a note that I should also let listeners know that the Let’s Talk Thyroid book was published under another name, Kiss and Make Up with Your Thyroid.
Annabel:
That’s right. For most people now, you’ll find it under the name you gave. That’s what it’s called on Amazon. For people buying locally in Australia, I still have copies with the original cover. Same book, new title. Trying to keep the Let’s Talk Thyroid thing simple.
Dr. Eric:
Makes sense. Why don’t we dive into your history? Why did you decide to write your book and create your podcast, which obviously relates to your journey with Hashimoto’s?
Annabel:
Let’s go back to a bit of my story. I was diagnosed when I was 22/23, back in 1996. At that point, I look back and think I was struggling for a long time. I suspect that puberty was one of the key triggers for me. Going back to around that 12ish mark. By the time I got to the end of my degree, which is when I was diagnosed, I had all the classic hypothyroid symptoms. The hair was thinning, frizzy, falling out. I was puffy. I gained a lot of weight and couldn’t lose it. I was tired. My muscles were fatigued. I couldn’t hold my arms up to wash or blow dry my hair. That was the final sign.
I was lucky in a lot of ways. It had gone so far that it was very easy to diagnose. I didn’t get the runaround that a lot of thyroid patients get. Went to see my doctor. “Your TSH is 185. You need to go see the endocrinologist tomorrow,” which I did. The endocrinologist said, “You’ll be fine. Just take a pill for the rest of your life.” I sat in the car and cried, thinking, I am 22, I don’t want to be on medication for the rest of my life.
That started me down the traditional hypothyroid management path of taking medication. I needed that, and I still need it. I still take thyroid medication. I am always someone who has been fairly open to natural things. I remember seeing naturopaths early on in the journey and taking different supplements. I still largely managed it fairly traditionally. I took the medication. That was probably the core thing I would say I did.
Around the five-year overlap, I was probably starting to hear about diet and lifestyle changes but not really wanting them to be true. I dabbled for a few years. I tried going gluten-free. Then I would give up because it would seem too hard. I didn’t know if it was making a difference. For the last 10 years or so, I got to the point where I was going to give the diet thing a really good go. I went paleo pretty hardcore for 30 days about 10 years ago. I didn’t know I could feel like this. The bloating went away. I am not just greedy and lazy; I thought I was greedy and lazy, and that’s why I felt six months pregnant every time after I ate. I was able to start to feel different and better with the diet. Over the last 10 years, there are a lot of other things like stress and mindset and reducing toxins that I have done. That’s 25 years in a nutshell.
I guess I’m the sort of person that when I find something that works, I like to share it. I like to talk about it to other people. When I started changing my diet, I started a food blog, which was called What Annabel Cooks. It was more of a way of recording what I was cooking. Instead of writing in an exercise book like my mom and grandma used to do, I thought I would start a blog. That sounded like fun. And it was fun. It spread a bit, and it spread a bit more. One of my friends said, “You should write a cookbook.” I thought that was a good idea, so I did.
Getting to the Let’s Talk Thyroid book and podcast has been a process of sharing what I am learning along the way. Realizing that it is this holistic approach. There is never just one thing. While the diet was massive, it’s not the whole story. I had the idea of writing another book that encompassed everything. It was the food, the lifestyle, how to reduce your toxic load, how to deal with mindset. It was a lot of different things.
A few years ago, when I had that idea, my husband said, “Don’t start anything new. You’re always starting new things.” Fine, I’ll have six months where I won’t start anything. In that six months, I planned to start the podcast first. I thought I would do that first. I’ll meet new people, get more content for the book. About 2.5 years ago, I started the podcast. It’s been fabulous. Last year, I wrote the book. This year, I’ve been trying to do a bit of both. Get the message out there.
Dr. Eric:
That’s an awesome story. For the first 15 years, you didn’t do much from a diet and lifestyle perspective. It wasn’t until 10 years ago that you finally made changes, followed the paleo diet, noticed improvements. Then you started incorporating other lifestyle factors. That led you to write your blog first, it sounds like, and then the diet-related book before finally rolling out the current book and podcast. Is that correct?
Annabel:
That’s a really good summary. There are all sorts of waves and twists we take in life, but that is a good summary.
Dr. Eric:
With the thyroid hormone replacement you are taking, has that stayed consistent over the years? As far as the type you are taking and the dosage. Are you taking levothyroxine?
Annabel:
Good question. Over the years, I have tried a number of different thyroid medication options. I have ended up back on the levothyroxine. We call it oroxine here. I have been on a pretty stable dose for a long time now. That’s why I started gradually increasing the doses. I have tried the natural desiccated thyrone. I have tried slow release T3.
The other options just didn’t work well enough for me. They weren’t that light bulb moment that they are for some people. While I don’t know that the levothyroxine is brilliant either for me, I have spent a lot of time working on some of those conversion pathways and getting my gut right and making my body about as healthy as I can within the limits of life to allow some of that T4 to T3 conversion. For me, it’s been a lot of trial and error over the years. The different forms of medication never really were that amazing for me to stay on them, so I have ended back on the standard.
Dr. Eric:
Everybody is different. There are people who switch to desiccated, and they feel a lot better. They feel a big difference. There are people who make the change to desiccated and don’t feel any different. Some people even feel better on the synthetic T4, the levothyroxine. A good example of why you need to listen to your body, which you did. You did try different things.
Annabel:
I have had a really good doctor for the last 15/16 years. The trialing of different medications, that’s what attracted me to her in the first place. I knew through someone else that she was open to prescribing different forms of thyroid medications. I am really glad I tried that. Maybe I will again at some point in the future, I don’t know. For a while now, I’m back on the standard treatment.
This is where I guess I say it’s the medication plus. It’s the holistic thing. If I wasn’t doing the diet and lifestyle things, maybe I would still be exploring thyroid medication options. I don’t think just the standard synthetic T4 replacement is enough for me. It’s everything.
Dr. Eric:
With that being said, why don’t we dive into some of the aspects of your book, including the four core lifestyle pillars that you talk about?
Annabel:
When I looked at all of the core categories of the different diet and lifestyle factors that both have helped me- When I have talked to different experts around the world and done lots of reading and courses and other things we do, I don’t think there are four core pillars that are unique to me. I think they are pretty consistent. When we were chatting the other day on my show, I thought we were on the same page.
I have broken it down into mindset first. I put it as the first pillar because it helps to have both a long-term approach and a curious, hopeful approach to our thyroid health. We are in it for the long haul. This isn’t something that will be fixed in 30 days or six months. Even if we are able to get our thyroid back into remission and feel great, you can’t just abandon everything that got you there. I think having that mindset of “This is long-term. This will take some experimentation. There is always something I can do.” Having that attitude and approach from the beginning is the first pillar.
The second pillar is what I have called unwinding, which is that positive spin on stress management. Stress is critical, that we learn how to manage it. I wanted to call that “unwinding” because that’s what we have to learn how to do.
The third one is food. Obviously, food is important. Food is the first place a lot of people start. I didn’t want to put it as the first pillar because I think sometimes people get stuck there and don’t move on.
My approach to food generally is about being anti-inflammatory. It’s removing the things that for my body are inflammatory. That’s ultimately going to look slightly different for everybody. A lot of core things.
The final pillar is low tox living. Reducing that day-to-day chemical exposure as much as we can. There are lots of great products out there—cleaning to skin care and makeup—to make it so much easier than it used to be.
Those are the four. There are other things I have fit into there, like sleep and exercise are in there as well. They could be their own pillars probably as they are really important, too. Part of what I am trying to do is keep it super simple. That is my principle. Keep it to four things.
Dr. Eric:
Makes sense. When it comes to mindset, when you work with someone, is that something where you find people could change? Do they already have to come in with that natural mindset? I could address the cause of this condition. My experience is most people probably already come in with the proper mindset, but there are some people who just don’t. A lot of people have the natural mindset, but some people are just trying to-
In my case, I deal with a lot of hyperthyroidism. They are trying to do everything they can. They are more desperate to avoid radioactive iodine or thyroid surgery. In the case of Hashimoto’s, some don’t see it as big a deal to take thyroid hormone replacement. My guess would be is most people already have that natural mindset who see you. I figured I’d ask since it’s the first pillar you discuss.
Annabel:
As you said, there is a bit of both. Even to be open to looking at diet and lifestyle requires an element of that mindset. A lot of what I hope that I do, both in my programs and even on the podcast, is to catch the people that are new on their journey. From the get-go, understand that there is more that you can do than just take the thyroid pills. Even if they are not making those changes straight away, just be aware right from the beginning there are other things.
Also, the people who may have been taking their thyroid replacement for 10-15 years without any real thought that there is anything else they can do, but still trudging through life. Part of what I am trying to do is spread that awareness to get that mindset. “I just thought I had to take my pill. I didn’t know there was anything else I could do.”
Once people get to wanting to work with people like you or I, they do have more of that. They are open to making some changes. Obviously, there is a broad range of people. Some are really ready. Some are desperate. Some will give it a go, probably a bit like me, more of that five-year overlap. “I’ll give it a go, but I’m not sure it’s going to work. I don’t know if I want it to work. It sounds too hard.” It takes a long time to change that mindset and be open to long-term diet and lifestyle change. Just even accepting that you have to deal with this forever in a reasonably active way, there is a lot of grieving that I think can go along with that.
I have to remind myself sometimes that this is me 10-15 years down the track. It took me a while to get there. It does take a lot of people time to get there. For other people, it’s like “Bang, done.” There is a variety.
Dr. Eric:
What do you currently do about stress management? Do you block out time on a regular basis, whether it’s yoga or meditation? What do you do? What do you recommend to your clients or as part of your programs?
Annabel:
I’m a constant work in progress when it comes to this. One of the things I have tried to do over the years is not have an overscheduled calendar. I am reasonably good at that, I think. I don’t make myself available all the time.
My kids are older, and that’s helped a lot. When they were little and needed a lot more of my time and attention, even the fact that they can get themselves home from school now, that helps. I have found for me that I need time on my own. I get a lot of that. I work from home. The kids are largely at school. My husband is at work. I get some of that naturally now. Perhaps in years past, I didn’t. I can also be deliberate about that.
I am not a great meditator. I have tried all the apps. I will do that from time to time. just go listen to one minute, two minutes. I am not very good at the long things.
When I really need to unwind, I’ll get out a big jigsaw puzzle; that is my preferred way to meditate, is to do a puzzle. There is enough tuning out of everything else to find where this piece goes. That gives me that calm state of mind.
I use my essential oils a fair bit to unwind. I’ll put something in the diffuser or roll something on my wrist and take a few big, deep breaths. I have a few favorites for unwinding.
Dr. Eric:
Can you name some of your favorite essential oils?
Annabel:
My favorite for when I need to calm down is neroli. That is my favorite one. There is a blend I use called Balance that has a lot of those earthy oils although neroli is a flower. There are trees that ground me. I like Siberian fir and lime as a blend in the diffuser. Probably my go-to, just to put on me, would be neroli, when I am feeling stressed.
Dr. Eric:
You said you use it every day. You put it in your diffuser typically?
Annabel:
I use essential oils across the day in all sorts of different formats. If I am really aware that I am wound up and need to calm down, having something in the diffuser. I will just grab something and roll it on and take a few deep breaths. Put a drop of an essential oil on my hand. Sometimes taking that minute to stop and take a couple of big, slow, deep breaths in and of itself, even without the essential oil. I find myself sighing a lot when I know I need to unwind.
In terms of the oils, either diffusing them or putting them on. I use them in my cooking and other ways. In terms of that, reducing stress, yeah, either on me like a perfume or in the diffuser are my favorite ways.
Dr. Eric:
Then food. You said you followed a paleo diet. Do you follow a similar diet currently?
Annabel:
I describe my diet as paleo-ish. 100% gluten-free. I am 99% dairy-free these days. That took me much longer to get to, but I do feel a lot better without dairy.
When I first went paleo, the gluten, grains, dairy, sugar, legumes, the whole thing. I definitely feel best when I am following that quite strictly. Life comes and goes and ebbs and flows. I suppose over time, what I have found is as long as I am 100% gluten-free, that gives me a little bit of leeway with some of the other things. Less and less leeway with the dairy over time.
For example, I had a wedding anniversary this week. We went out for dinner as a family. We went to a Chinese restaurant that does gluten-free which in and of itself is a miracle here. I don’t know what Chinese is like in America, but to find one that does gluten free is next to impossible. I did have a small amount of rice, and I was fine. If I ate rice all the time, then I would feel bloated. That’s why I say I am paleo-ish.
I am now super strict with dairy. I don’t do well with dairy. I found great alternatives now. That’s what takes a bit of time. I switched out the milk in my coffee for almond milk. I found some nice ice cream for that occasional treat that tastes good. It’s finding those replacement foods that have helped. The gluten is pretty easy once you know where to find and what to do. The dairy, I did find harder. Paleo-ish would be my diet now.
I run a Kickstart Your Thyroid friendly lifestyle program a couple of times a year. That’s around all of these things we are talking about, but diet is core. We follow that paleo diet. When I am running that, I will do that, too. It’s a good reset for me.
I let things looser a little bit. I know when I have to rein things in a bit, too. For me, that is part of maintaining that long term. It is still a lifestyle. I am not throwing everything out. I won’t eat gluten at all. Increasingly, over time, I guess I’m not deviating as much because I just feel better when I’m eating closer to paleo.
Dr. Eric:
I would say I’m similar. I eat modified paleo, pretty close to paleo, most of the time. I stray from the diet sometimes. I have to have my pizza! Usually it’s gluten-free pizza, but it’s not dairy-free pizza. I have had the Daiya, dairy substitute, but I usually don’t eat dairy-free pizza. How is the pizza in Brisbane? That’s an important question.
Annabel:
Interesting question. I have one son who delivers pizza for Pizza Hut. He has the youngest on a trial shift this week. Three teenage boys who love their pizza. I haven’t enjoyed pizza personally for a long time. Gluten-free pizza, there is some decent ones now. By and large, as soon as I eat pizza- I think it’s the tomato, which isn’t great for me. There is lots of great pizza in Brisbane.
I am probably happier not to bother these days. I would rather have something completely different. It’s just not worth it. We have pizza in the house often. I will just have a piece, and then I feel bloated and get reflux. I think it’s the combination of the grains, even though it’s gluten-free; the cooked tomato sauce; and the dairy. I think that dairy-free cheese is just vile. It’s artificial anyway. I’m with you. It’s hard to find.
Dr. Eric:
I assume you stay well hydrated, too. Do you drink purified water or spring water? What type of water do you drink?
Annabel:
This is one of those things that took us years to make a decision on a filter for our tap at home. I have been drinking purified water for years. For a long time, I was buying it in casks because we couldn’t decide on a water filter. The water filters take out all the minerals. You have to remineralize. I didn’t want the fluoride. We got stuck in overwhelm of researching water filters.
Cut to a few years ago. We have to make a decision. Let’s just get one. We did make a decision. We have a water filter, one that filters out core chemicals from the whole house. In the sink, we have one that does a bit more and takes the fluoride out as well. It’s interesting. Recently, I bought a set of those really fancy scales that tell you about your body.
One of the things I discovered is that even though I drink a lot of water, my body is not properly hydrated. It was ranked really low in the body water component according to these scales. That’s something I just had a meeting with my doctor this week about. I think I’m dehydrated even though I am drinking a lot of water. We are working on that at the moment.
Dr. Eric:
Interesting.
Annabel:
It is interesting.
Dr. Eric:
When you urinate, it’s not a lighter urine? That is one sign that you usually are hydrated.
Annabel:
My urine isn’t really dark. I drink plenty of water. I suspect that my cells aren’t hydrating properly. It’s going through, but I don’t know. That is a work in progress. I do drink a lot of water. I don’t drink a lot of other things. I have one cup of coffee a day. I’m not saying these scales, they’re off Amazon. But I was quite low, so I am going to start taking a few electrolytes and see if that can help rehydrate from the inside.
Dr. Eric:
That sounds like a plan. You mentioned there’s Pizza Hut, but you also mentioned coffee. Do they have Starbucks in Brisbane?
Annabel:
Starbucks hasn’t been very successful in Australia. I don’t even know if we have Starbucks in Brisbane. Having traveled to America a couple of times, you might do pizza better, but we do coffee better.
Dr. Eric:
I am not a coffee drinker, so I am just curious. I don’t go to Starbucks or eat at Pizza Hut. I have never been to Australia, so I was just curious.
Annabel:
We have a lot of small coffee shops, espresso coffee. You can get all the flavored coffees like they do at Starbucks. I would say generally in Australia, we are probably more about the espresso, the cappuccinos, without all of the pumpkin spice latte flavoring. Less sugary, and more small brewers and roasters. We have a very competitive coffee market here. I do like my one cup of coffee a day. I don’t know if it always likes me, but I like it.
Going back to the unwinding thing, for me, we have a coffee machine at home. It grinds the beans and makes a good coffee. That’s part of my morning ritual actually. I’ll take the kids to school, come back. I will have breakfast. Make myself a coffee. Just sitting down with my cup of coffee, I do Wordle. I don’t know if you know about Wordle. Anyway, it’s an online word game. I do Wordle for the day. Then I will read the Bible and journal. I have half an hour with my coffee just to set the day up. I think it’s more about the ritual and the time than it actually is about the caffeine.
Dr. Eric:
Same with my wife. I have never been a coffee drinker, but my wife has a cup of coffee per day. It’s not because she is addicted to the caffeine, but she really enjoys it. Now I have become an herbal tea drinker. To me, I do it for the health benefits, but I enjoy it. Years ago, if you told me I’d be drinking herbal tea on a daily basis, I wouldn’t believe you, but I actually enjoy it. It sounds like it may be similar. It’s part of your routine and your unwinding, like you said.
Annabel:
Yeah, I think so.
Dr. Eric:
You mentioned fluoride, which falls under the toxin category. What other things do you do as part of your low tox living, the fourth pillar?
Annabel:
This has taken years to figure out good products. 10-15 years ago I gradually started to remove some of these products that we are using on and in our bodies every day. I started switching to natural makeup and skincare. That was one of the very first things I did. Finding different brands that didn’t have all of the toxic stuff in them. That was harder back then. Now, here at least, you have choice. There are lots of brands that are making good makeup.
If you think about all the stuff you’re putting on your skin, a good place to start is what are you putting on and in your body that contains chemicals? A lot probably. Makeup, skin care. Food, not wanting to eat food that is full of chemicals and processed food. Water without the chemicals. Not drinking out of plastic is important, too. Skin care and makeup is something that you can replace one item at a time over time.
Same with household cleaning products. That’s another one I have changed a lot. Use natural products. Every time you spray the kitchen counter, I am not breathing in a lot of chemicals. I don’t have scented candles in the house. I don’t use air fragrance sprays. Those sorts of things, I have over time been replacing in the house. That is something we can just do. When the surface spray runs out, make yourself one or buy one from a natural brand that doesn’t have all of the toxic stuff in it.
Dr. Eric:
Agreed. We do the same thing. If someone is getting overwhelmed by hearing this, saying, “I have all of these cosmetics and cleaners.” You can just finish your current supply and then swap it out. Anything you are using on a regular basis, I would recommend try to make the switch to natural.
It’s going to be more expensive. When you eat organic food, that does add up because you are going through the food pretty quickly. With the products, if you spend a little bit more for something that cleans your counters, it takes us a month or two to go through that bottle. I don’t keep track. Same thing with makeup. I don’t really use makeup, but I imagine most makeup will last a while. It will last a month or two if not a few months.
Annabel:
More than that probably.
Dr. Eric:
Alcohol.
Annabel:
There’s another toxin.
Dr. Eric:
I wanted to bring up alcohol. I listened to your solo episode on alcohol. Haven’t covered that on the podcast yet. I wanted you to talk about alcohol. If you want to talk about the effects it has on thyroid health. Wherever you want to go with it, I’m cool.
Annabel:
It was a topic that I had been wanting to cover on the podcast for a while, too. Generally, as a patient advocate, not as a medical practitioner of any qualified kind, I like to bring on the experts. That’s one of the things I love about the podcast. I get to talk to different experts who bring the expertise. I certainly don’t have the qualifications for- You can know a lot without being qualified as well.
The alcohol is something that kept coming up in conversations with different people. Increasingly, I was finding my personal tolerance to alcohol- I would describe myself now as intolerant. I haven’t quite found the right person to bring on, so I decided to do some research and do a bit of a talk on it.
What I found was interesting. This is a big topic. If you listen to that podcast episode, I called it an introduction. There is probably a lot to it that I don’t even understand and haven’t delved into. It made me realize that alcohol is complex, isn’t it? There are so many different things associated with alcohol.
What I got from that was it really can impact thyroid health in a lot of ways. It can impact the thyroid gland itself. It can impact the gut. When we have a leaky gut, that’s not going to help the autoimmune response. Obviously, it impacts the liver. The liver is a core place where that thyroid conversion takes place. I don’t have a gallbladder. I haven’t had one for 15 or 16 years, which is reasonably common in Hashimoto’s patients. I have always been aware that my liver needs extra support. Alcohol impacts the liver. It’s going to be another thing. It’s another layer of inflammation.
In the end, everyone has to make their personal decisions about alcohol. For me, it’s just taken a gradual decline. I have never been a big drinker. I went back to decades of dieting, and I would rather eat my calories than drink them, is what I used to say. I like food more than I like alcohol.
I wouldn’t say I don’t drink. I do enjoy a drink, but I don’t enjoy the aftereffects, which usually for me is I have trouble falling asleep, even just with one. It doesn’t take a lot. I think I am pretty intolerant, or super sensitive at least. I don’t think it’s just me. I have worked out from talking to lots of different people in this thyroid space, it often doesn’t agree.
There are things we can do. There are better forms of alcohol than others, I suppose. Your super sugary cocktails, probably not a great idea because of all the sugar and cream and other things that go along with those. Clean spirits generally seem to be better tolerated even than wine. That was probably the first one. I don’t think I’m enjoying wine. I think it’s the sugars.
There are lots of things you can do now without alcohol. I don’t know what it’s like in America, but Australia has a big drinking culture. That’s another conversation. I have started to see there are more non-alcoholic drink options being promoted in the alcohol space. Alcohol-free gins and whiskeys and things. There is a place for that obviously. I like kombuchas and water kefir and things like that. I don’t drink those all the time, but having something special on a Friday night or going out with friends sometimes, it’s nice to have something that’s not just water. That’s my take on alcohol. There is a lot to it.
Dr. Eric:
I’m not a drinker either, but I bring it up just because like you mentioned, coffee. A lot of people have a difficult time with coffee. There are people who want to have at least once or twice a week a glass of red or white wine. Sometimes other alcoholic beverages, but wine is a common ask. Usually initially I am telling people to completely avoid alcohol while healing, but once you’re in a better state of health, every now and then, I don’t see it being a big deal, having a glass of wine or even other types of alcohol sometimes. I just wanted to get your opinion.
You’re right about the impact it has on the gut, potentially increasing the intestinal permeability, at least being a contributing factor to leaky gut. It’s a big reason I don’t want people to consume alcohol. There are a lot of things. You mentioned gluten. We want to avoid all those foods and beverages.
Annabel:
Beer. A lot of people don’t know that beer has gluten in it.
Dr. Eric:
Even the gluten-free beer, while regaining your health, I would say to avoid the alcohol. I assume they have gluten-free beer in Australia.
Annabel:
Yep, we do.
Dr. Eric:
Any additional tips for those dealing with thyroid or autoimmune thyroid conditions? Is there anything I should have asked you, or you want me to ask you, or you want to chat about?
Annabel:
The biggest thing I like to say is there are lots of things you can do, but try not to get overwhelmed by those things. When we feel overwhelmed, we end up doing nothing. You are better off just doing one thing and developing that into your lifestyle. Then pick another thing. Some of us, when we are making changes, some of it does depend on our personality and approach, whether we like to dive all in or just do a little bit at a time. Whatever is going to work in the long term for you, then do it that way.
If you’re listening, and you’re new to thyroid health issues, and you think all you have to do is take medication, you’re cheating yourself. You’re cheating yourself out of feeling much better than you could. That is probably what I would say. There are things you can do. Just take it bit by bit. You don’t have to do everything all at once, but you are going to have to make some changes if you want to feel great. The medication will get you somewhere, but probably not everywhere.
I think we all want to be feeling as good as we can. We all want to get as much out of life as we can. We want to contribute to our communities. The better we can feel, then the more we can be of benefit to our communities around us. You can do it.
I am a words of affirmation person. I tell myself all the time, “It’s okay. You can do it, Annabel.” If I can do it, you can do it.
Dr. Eric:
Well said. Annabel, where can people learn more about you? There is your podcast, Let’s Talk Thyroid, which you interviewed me on recently. You can find my interview as well as other great interviews there. There is also the book with the same title. What’s your website?
Annabel:
I have just made everything Let’sTalkThyroid to keep it simple. Brand new website, LetsTalkThyroid.com. You will find everything there. That is the simplest thing.
My social media, I am pretty active on Instagram and Facebook. That’s Annabel.Bateman.Wellness. Everything else is Let’s Talk Thyroid.
Dr. Eric:
Thanks, Annabel. It was great chatting with you again. It was nice diving into the pillars and talking about alcohol. Didn’t expect to talk about Pizza Hut and Starbucks, but it was nice chatting about that, too. It truly was a pleasure.
Annabel:
Thank you so much for having me on your show. It’s been really lovely to connect with you. That’s one of the loveliest things about this whole thyroid health space is connecting with like-minded people around the world. Thank you.
Dr. Eric:
I definitely agree.