A surprising thing happened this past year: I lost my seemingly endless supply of energy!

In May, I started to feel tired all the time. My endocrinologist checked my thyroid level and it came back at 3. That’s not out of range, but she said it was slightly low and we would keep checking.

Throughout the summer, my mind felt foggy, and running, my usual form of exercise, became increasingly harder to do. By 4 in the afternoon my energy would bottom out, and I found myself drinking coffee almost every afternoon to find something to cling to for energy!

To top it off, I woke up faithfully every night, just enough to disturb my sleep, and then I would roll over and try to find my dreams again. By October I was incapable of focusing at all and my body seemed so out of sync.

What was happening? Depression? Too much stress?

My acupuncturist suggested a saliva test. While I agree with MDs that saliva is very inconsistent, I figured at least it was a place to start. I thought the doctors were missing something.

The results were interesting. According to the test results, my cortisol levels was all over the place. I tested positive for Hashimoto’s disease (low thyroid), I was extremely gluten intolerant and anemic.

The next question was: What to do with the results when saliva has a bad rap for false positives? The answer: Take blood. My acupuncturist suggested a test for Hashimoto’s and vitamin D.

Results: I was negative for Hashimoto, but my thyroid level was 4.756 (too low) and my vitamin D level was way low!

My acupuncturist suggested getting back to my endocrinologist for a prescription for thyroid medication. In the meantime, he would work on vitamin D, cortisol through acupuncture and supplements and that I remove wheat gluten from my diet.

What I love about my endocrinologist, Dr. Caroline Huang, is she is a good listener. She is often baffled by my choices for all natural over pharmaceutical, but she trusts my decisions because I’m not rejecting one over the other, I’m simply trying to find a balance that works for me! She is open -- if she doesn’t know much about integrative healing, often she will read what I bring in and together we decide if the science is actually there.

I like to go “au natural” first and if the results are not showing in 2-6 weeks I switch to traditional care. If she expresses something critical, I'm in agreement with her directive immediately. This is, in my mind, the mark of a great doctor!

She was extremely skeptical of my saliva tests, but agreed that if the blood test showed a low thyroid of 4.756, I was due for some pharmaceuticals. I started a prescription synthyriod right away and felt the fog lift from my brain.

My first plan of action was to study gluten-free living. What is gluten and what is Celiac disease? Why am I beginning to hear more about Celiac’s diagnosis and rate of people being diagnosed on the rise? And was there gluten intolerance without having Celiac Disease?