The Doctor rang up...

...to say she had been talking to a colleague and decided I could increase my dose if I thought appropriate!
I'm to ring her tomorrow to discuss it.

Well so much for that 'good idea'!

Apparently my levels are now normal, so no increase in treatment.
The doctor glanced at her screen with the look of one who sees it in writing, so it's official - the fact I generally feel under par doesn't seem to cut any ice! However she did say it may take a while to settle down, so it seems I may have a course of appeal. She also asked whether I'd had one of the many bugs that have been going the rounds and I said 'no', but when I thought again this morning, I realised I'd had a mild dose of one, probably close to the time I felt most tired.
I am also going through the usual mid-summer 'can't sleep' cycle so no wonder I feel tired. I've decided to get more sleep and see how that helps.

Could be construed as cheating?

Blood test this morning... didn't take my thyroxine before I went so I wouldn't get a rise in levels! Well, yesterday I had felt I had more rather than less energy (which wasn't typical of the last month or so) so I didn't want to skew the reading in a detrimental direction.
I've just stared a course for work which includes awareness of common medications and, while looking up levothyroxine in the BNF, I was interested to see that a typical starter dose is at least twice the dose I have, so maybe I won't have much persuading to do to get the doctor to give me more. After the first few days and a blip a short while later, I really haven't felt much different from pre-treatment days.
Next doctor's appointment is in a week's time.

I feel like going back to sleep!

I do, I really do... going to sleep would be so nice right now, probably something to do with getting to bed at silly o'clock again last night, but as I actually slept till gone 8 this morning, I don't think it's all ordinary tiredness.
Anyway, moaning about it won't get anything done so I shall do as I generally do - get off the computer, which hasn't given me enough energy as I hoped it would, and go and get on with something.
Blood test in a week's time!

Recovery is quicker

I still don't feel I have quite enough thyroxine, and I need to make another blood test appointment and get my levels checked. Just over a month into this treatment, I'm having more 'down' days than 'up' days, but I haven't really worked out how much is normal tiredness as this is the height of June and my sleep pattern, such as it is, is always disrupted by the longest and shortest days.
I am still having sight problems and have had a few episodes of feeling 'wiped out' by activity, but I think I'm recovering more quickly from the exhaustion than I used to.
I'm beginning to wonder - anyone know any good thyroid jokes?

Three weeks in and a weigh-in

I reached the three-week point feeling, as I had for some days, that the thyroxine wasn't having any effect. In the last few days, though, I've been feeling slowly better. Perhaps the slump was because I was doing rather a lot - I had two four-hour train journeys on top of extra time at work, and spent several days in a too-hot-for-me house. It wasn't just ordinary tiredness, though, as my sight's been a significant problem over that time and still isn't quite as it should be.
I have, however, started to lose weight! It's been some time since simply cutting back had any appreciable effect, but I've lost a couple of pounds over the past few days through careful eating - a whole couple of pounds! Those with hypothyroid-induced weight gain may well appreciate how good this feels. This is on the same scale that I used to be able to lose weight, a couple of years or so ago, rather than the measly half pound I would have lost on the same regime over the past year.
In fact over the year I went from 9 stone 5lbs to 10 stone desppite my best efforts to the contrary.
I really want to get back to a suitable body-weight for my height and build, and am very much encouraged by this week's results.

Dreams

While I remember: the first week or so of thyroxine was one in which I had a couple of nasty dreams. It's not like me to remember dreams. I think they were the product of unresolved feelings after a medical scare that came to nothing, but I wonder whether the thyroxine has changed the depth at which I sleep, or at least portions of it?