Phil: 0:03

Welcome to Take Your Medicine podcast. My name is Phil Cowley. I've been a pharmacist for 25 years and if I have learned anything is that everybody's story is worth listening to. And today we're going to jump right in. Thyroid. I think I probably get 80 questions a week about thyroid and the truth is, nobody really knows a whole ton about it. So today's guest is Aubry Bennion, and Aubry is the queen of colorful fluffy balls of great, big, huge, exciting projects and crafts. And of course we all love her. Thank you, Aubry, for being on.

Aubry: 0:38

Kind of you to say, I'm adding that to my personal resume. Queen of fluffy balls.

Phil: 0:42

It's so cool though. Cause I love color. So you're like, I'm like, I'm like a catfish. Like you put color on there. I'm going to jump at it. And so I love it. Haircare was never really my biggest problem until it became. And now I found the difference between one product and another is huge. So, what I listened to is you, my listeners and followers. What you like BondiBoost has never had a bad complaint given to me. I love the products that BondiBoost have because people always love them. Don't you like a product you can just tell people to use and you know, nothing's coming back to land on you. You know, you can trust it. BondiBoost their HG product line has been wonderful, that thick, full looking hair that you've always been looking for. But the best part is your scalp, your head, your hair will all love it. It will feel the way you want to. So go to BondiBoost.com right now, use MEDICINE20 save a little bit money. And I don't have to worry about a thing because I know you're already going to love it. All right. So we're gonna jump right into it. Thyroid problems are a universal issue and part of the problem you have with thyroid issues is that you first go into the doctor and because so many people are in the weight loss train, they come in asking for thyroid. Yeah. And a lot of people get pushed to the side. Because the doctors hear something that they don't really mean. You talk thyroid like, oh, you just want to lose weight. I'm going to preface that because most people I know have had that issue. So what I want to do, I want to dive right in. I want to, let's start at the very beginning. So the year was 20

Aubry: 2:17

Spring of 2021. And this doesn't have to be a COVID story, but it is, there is a theme of COVID because it just was that time, right?

Phil: 2:25

Well, everything's a COVID story now. Like, unfortunately it changed every, like anybody can say what they want, but 2020 and all of our lives took a 15 to 80 degree turn one direction or another. So it is, and it also is because COVID changed healthcare forever. So it absolutely is. It doesn't mean you're positive or negative, but you can say it's a COVID story just because nothing has been the same since.

Aubry: 2:51

Okay, well then this is a COVID story. Excellent. Let me tell you a COVID story. So, it was right about the time I got my vaccine. And I'll say, I'm just a relatively healthy person. And admittedly, I felt so naive to the healthcare system to medical care to hospitals to all those things. If I ever had anything, I just would go to the urgent care, get it handled for a hundred bucks and be on my way.

Phil: 3:13

Blissfully unaware. It's the perfect place to be.

Aubry: 3:15

I wish we could go back to that time. Right. Yeah. I got my vaccine and I was, I was heading out of town, my first trip, my first airplane ride. Please bless it that this vaccines not going to give me, You know, any sort of issues where I'm not going to feel down, like, please bless. I can eat the good Nashville food and I can have a good trip and be a good guest, you know, not, not be a buzzkill. And I was good through the week. And about a week later, a week after I came home, I just flipped 180 on my head. Like I, I went from being a super healthy person to I was shaky. I literally shook like this. I felt like I had run a marathon every single day. I was, down taking a nap at two o'clock. Every single day. I didn't have a fever, but I was hot and I was sweaty. I mean, just like textbook answers, but they were textbooks only if you know to look for what is Graves disease or what is hyperthyroidism. And I didn't know that at the time.

Phil: 4:13

Well, you had no history. So this makes it even a trickier thing. And let's remind people at that time when you would call with symptoms to a telehealth doctor, what would they tell you?

Aubry: 4:24

It was COVID.

Phil: 4:25

That's it.

Aubry: 4:26

Yeah. Everything. So I just knew nothing about this is normal and I have been flipped on my head from, I mean, to me it really is like the BCAD of my life of when I got Graves disease. And listen, thyroid issues, every woman has them, right? Yeah, I acted like this was, like, that I was the one in a million case, like, can you believe this happens to people? You know, like, I was the rare case in my mind because it was just such an anomaly that I went from what I was to what I was currently, right?

Phil: 4:58

But I love that statement because here's the deal. It's when it's you. It is the one in the million because you don't realize, okay, so, in general, I talk about childbirth and I'm going to get like bombarded with things because I don't know. And there is no way for me to know that. But when you watch somebody go through it the first time, they become that one. And they are that one in a million. And that's the reason why when we tie this up at the end, we're going to talk about how you need to be your own one in a million.

Aubry: 5:26

Yeah. Oh, for sure. For sure. Yeah. So I didn't know where to go because I didn't know what was happening to me. And what do we do? We instantly turn to our phones and I'm like. Do I have cancer? Do I have, you know, I'm just, I'm just thinking through all these things and, and anyway.

Phil: 5:40

It's funny because cancer will always be the first thing we jump to, we've never jumped to, Oh, I ate bad food. It's like, Oh, I got cancer. It's done. Like it's our, it says something about us.

Aubry: 5:50

Yeah. I mean, it's easy, like, you know, it's been four years in hindsight is 2020, but like my heart rate was beating at 200 beats a minute. And that wasn't normal. Like I knew that wasn't normal. Am I going to wake up in the morning? I don't want to be too dramatic about it, but like in the moment, I was being really dramatic about it because what was happening to my body was really dramatic. And the first thing I needed to do was to find a primary care doc because I knew I needed to get to a specialist and I couldn't, I couldn't do that without a primary care doc. And as my former healthy person, it wasn't the urgent care. And so I was, but like, how long does it take to get into a primary care doc? Another thing I was naive about. I'm out there like, who has a primary care doc? I'll take them if they're mediocre. I don't need just somebody to get me to where I need to go. It took weeks to get into a primary care doc. It was just unnecessary time.

Phil: 6:46

So this whole time you're dealing with hyperthyroid. So what we've got here with a hyperthyroid situation when you have it, so. In Graves disease quite often it'll go super hyper and then sometimes it'll be so stressful on the thyroid itself it kind of starts to disseminate. But during that time it actually is one of those points where you can have major issues. When pregnant women get Graves disease it becomes a nightmare for pharmacy and for doctors because the heart rate does go up like that. Your chances for blood clots go up. Your chances for diseases of the heart and lung and if you have any underlying cardiac issues they do come out. So to give you credit And anybody else, if your heart rate's at 200, you should be panicked, just to put it out there.

Aubry: 7:26

Oh, it was 170 to just walk to the mailbox. The day it hit 200, I had walked up one flight of stairs. I work with contractors who like it's very brotherly and I thought if this is the way I go, like save me some dignity that they don't have to find me in the women's restroom. You know, I'm like, none of us want to do that. But

Phil: 7:47

no.

Aubry: 7:47

The day I hit 200 I was like, this cannot be this, this, get me into someone, but. To the point of all of this is how do I raise the flag that my issues are as important as anyone else's and that I deserve immediate attention? You know, and I don't want to get to the front of the line.

Phil: 8:08

I'm guessing from, from a little light, from the way I know you, Drawing attention to yourself saying that I'm weak is probably not your strongest suit. You probably want to say, I can do this by myself. It'd be my guess.

Aubry: 8:19

I'm a rule follower. So I'm like very process, right? Like I'm going to go through the channels, but what I did do and like, bless the internet. I put out a call on the internet and I was like, anyone who has any connection to anyone in scheduling, please help me, right?

Phil: 8:36

Right.

Aubry: 8:37

But, I did get into a primary care doc, but it was that much longer before I could get in to see a thyroid specialist, before I could see an endocrinologist.

Phil: 8:44

So we started this in 2021,

Aubry: 8:47

I got my shot in March. I think I struggled through until about May. I remember being on vacation in May, making phone calls poolside and trying to get into a specialist the soonest I could get in was July.

Phil: 9:03

And this is the whole time you're in the whole time your heart rate's high. You feel sick.

Aubry: 9:08

I'm shaking as I'm trying to put on my mascara.

Phil: 9:12

And the other thing so they actually quite often talk about hyperthyroidism and it feels like you've run a marathon at the end of every day is what they say because your heart rate's so high and you start to lose fairly substantial amounts of your lean muscle and so it starts to like really get after you so your appetite's kind of gone. But then you kind of feel like uh, you've you can't move you're seeing atrophy.

Aubry: 9:35

Everything was low. I mean, there are bad things that happen all over the world, but for me in that moment, everything was low. Everything was hard.

Phil: 9:44

Did that primary care specialist, where they did, I mean, the primary care doctor, when you got in there, were they pretty accepting of the whole thing? Did they check it pretty quick?

Aubry: 9:52

Yeah, that was easy, right? That's just like lab work. That's pretty routine. And so I was really glad to just use them as like a stepping stone. Like, thank you very much. I'll take these results to a specialist. They had recommended someone that I couldn't get into for so many months. Of course, I'm crowdsourcing on the internet again and everybody's favorite endocrinologist is out of network for me, so I couldn't go see her. I thankfully did get a DM from someone that was like, Hi, I'm the queen scheduler for University of Utah. I will get in with this person. And so I got in with a woman who, I hear probably has really great plaques on her wall. It says we're masked, right? I'm feeling terrible. She can see this much of me. She walks in and it's very clinical, right? She's like, I have your blood results, your numbers are off the charts, you have hyperthyroidism, you have Graves disease, all the weight that you've lost is going to come back, sorry to tell you, right?

Phil: 10:53

I love the sigh right before you said because that's what she did to you, because you start out with, you have hyperthyroidism, like almost like she's bored of because it's so mundane.

Aubry: 11:03

Because I think she had seen eight of me that day, right? Like this was, This was so life altering for me and so routine for her.

Phil: 11:12

And the thing is, is, so I, I say this all the time because I put it out there. The system is broken. So you've taken a physician there who went into this to come into that room and give you the equivalent of a huge hug and make you better. But the system has driven you batty because you can't get into it. Yeah. And it's so much easier, like, hey, can we take another COVID test because we get paid for it? You're like, that's fine, but can we please, please look at something else, too? Like, you're on board, but like, I get it, you're getting extra money for the test, that's fine, go for it, but can we please move forward? And so you're frustrated, but she comes in and burnout of the whole system is there, and nobody does their job on the expectation of being burned out on a daily basis.

Aubry: 11:58

Absolutely, because she said, you have three courses of treatment. Take methamazole, which I was already on that. I think my primary care doc prescribed that. That made my body itch from the inside out. Head to toe. If we are bad people and we go to the bad place, our body itches. That's like, I swear that's

Phil: 12:17

the worst

Aubry: 12:18

pain on earth.

Phil: 12:19

So you can't sleep, you can't think, you can't do it. And you're so mean to everybody around you.

Aubry: 12:23

I hope I was just more pathetic than mean.

Phil: 12:25

But most people, they come in. They're so angry in the pharmacy. It's like, they want to just chuck stuff at every, like you can see them pushing through and so you start talking to him like, Oh no.

Aubry: 12:36

It was bad. So, number one, take more methimazole, but she's like, I know that's not going to work for you because you're already having bad side effects. Number two is the radioactive iodine. Number three is surgery. And at that point, you know, one, two, three, I said, do I try one? And if that doesn't work, then I move on to two. She literally put her hand out. She said, don't interrupt me. I am simply explaining to you your options and you have to let me explain these and you're going to have to make a decision in 48 hours of what to do.

Phil: 13:03

You got the three year old

Aubry: 13:03

I started to well up. I mean, you know, I'm in a mask. She can only see my eyes and I thought this wicked woman, this will do me no favors to cry in front of her, but get me out of here. I don't want anything to do with this woman who came with such high praises and so highly recommended and someone pulled some favors to get me into her. I choose not this.

Phil: 13:24

Right. Well, it's interesting, too, because what you're feeling there, I think, is like a universal feeling. I have some families we work with, and one of our families, it's been a long time, it's been in another city, but they had a bunch of kids who had some really bad eye, I think they've had like, I don't know, 20 or 30 eye surgeries for those kids. And those guys roll through everything, but the first few times, it was the worst thing in the world. In the same aspect, I've seen moms, I've seen grown men come in just scared to death, and I think to myself, I don't think our brains have a way to compensate the suffering of somebody else. We only can understand what we see. In her moment, she's like, you're fine. I'll give you the iodine. We'll send you home. It's going to be fine. I'll just put you on level thyroxine. We're going to be done in her mind. She's like, this is so boring, but I think it's a really important thing because as patients, you have to remember that if you're not advocating for yourself, they don't see it because we've become as part of the system, really jaded.

Aubry: 14:15

I could not get out of her office fast enough but then if you know the University of Utah medical system everything's done through the portal I genuinely thought I should have done my research there's an episode of Grey's Anatomy in some early season where the hospital gets overthrown with like, you know, roll out of a new system and there's these little robotic machines that come through and everything is handled that way. And the people, the doctors are like, are we supposed to do this? And to me, that's what it is like, Oh, I'm working through the system. The only way I can communicate with anyone in the entire University of Utah medical system is to write an email in the portal. And it says your email will be responded to in 72 hours.

Phil: 15:00

Right.

Aubry: 15:00

I was mind blown that that's really how it is and that that's what everyone around me has been doing. And that's how it functions. Because like, I mean, I'm a professional communicator. I talk to people, but like, I just want to talk to a person. Maybe not her because I don't like her anymore, but like, I've got questions, you know, she sent me home with a one pager, read this, make your choice. Let me know by Monday.

Phil: 15:25

Oh wow.

Aubry: 15:26

And I demanded, I called and called and called until I talked to somebody on the inside and they said, well, I can put a note in. And that got answered in 24 hours instead of 72 hours. And so I got a half hour appointment with the doctor again. I said, let me talk to a person to talk through my options. Because my gut said radioactive iodine wasn't for me. She didn't biopsy me. She didn't, we didn't do any ultrasounds. You know, I didn't know. Did I have nodules? Was I pre cancerous? Like, I didn't know. And, and I didn't seem like she was, she cared to find out. It's just path of least resistance, but.

Phil: 16:09

So I got a question for you, like, on this right here. And this is something I see all the time. So there seems to be that patients have a hard time getting ahold of anybody. And it's pushed them to this point where they feel like, well, I have to become pushy. I have to become ornery. I have to get into this. The frustration and everything you felt, how much that could have been solved with just a simple phone call from a nurse?

Aubry: 16:32

Yeah.

Phil: 16:33

Like, just to say, Aubry, this is super normal,

Aubry: 16:37

so

Phil: 16:37

Tell me what you're feeling. Let me hear ya. And then just stop.

Aubry: 16:42

Yeah. Just talk me through the options, right? Talk me through the pros and cons of each one or the likelihood of it, of them being effective.

Phil: 16:53

What are long term side effects? Yeah, all those things. What does it mean to be on medications? How am I gonna, hair falling out is like the number one thing women hate. Like, they'll put up with anything before. That is so hard for women. But number two, you start mentioning weight, and now you've just become that, that bully in junior high. It's one of those things where you, you know, it's pretty easy to say to him, well, with the fluctuation you've had, you went to hyperthyroid, which happens, and now that we've had some muscle loss, as well as some weight loss, but in the end, your healthy body will come back, and if you can regulate it, you'll be as good as new, compared to, you're going to gain back the weight, it's just so curious to me, how much time is spent making problems we have to clean up later, because the system is the way it is.

Aubry: 17:37

Yeah, I mean, couldn't we solve a lot of our problems if we talked with, like, benefits messaging, right? That's what I do at work, like, we gotta talk about the benefits, the risks, the benefits, all those things. Here's an 8. 5x11, take it home and research it.

Phil: 17:50

And then you reach out to the internet. Yes. And then it's hard to say, okay, so you get on the internet. You see the whole thing out there. Like you're gonna have somebody who goes out there and says, radioactive iodine will destroy your liver. And you'll grow a third eye.

Aubry: 18:03

I'll say like, we should rebrand it.'cause radioactive iodine is a frightening phrase. Swallow this like it's delivered to you in like a, you know, hazmat suit. And then you have to clear out your house and you have to isolate. And mind you, I live by myself. I had a renter at the time, so there was somebody downstairs. He's fine. But also like, this is mid 21. I've been isolating for a year and a half.

Phil: 18:29

Right. How freaked out were you?

Aubry: 18:30

They tell me to isolate even more while I'm going through this hardest thing of my life. Like that never sat well with me. So, so my question to her was, do I need to try this and if that doesn't work, then I go to surgery? Or can I just knowing my circumstances and knowing myself and my body and my gut and all these things. Can I just go to surgery? What is the, what's the drawback according to surgery? Like, why is radioactive iodine better than surgery? You know?

Phil: 19:01

So what did you find out I mean, they're going to want to know. So let's jump in because, well, if there's actually a fourth, so right now there's the last few days, there's been some new drugs that have coming out so they can block a lot. So Graves disease is interesting. So we're going to jump into this for a second. Okay. So Graves disease. At some point, we talked about the COVID vaccine. So I want to tie this in a little bit. So we have in our bodies, the thyroid, we have our T3, T4, and it runs through. And there are ways that our body will create mimic type, substances, molecules. And there's been really good ties to Epstein Barr. And sudden onset Graves disease, which is what you, really sounds like you had to me. So if you have somebody with sudden onset Graves disease, you start thinking, well, could it be a virus that set it off? Or could it be the fact that this was an underlying stress? Because if you have high levels of cortisol, it changes your thyroid. Your thyroid puts out more. Your immune system says, what's this? And then it puts out the antibodies. It could be, and you had high levels of stress. You are isolated. Now, the thing about our immune system is that we use vaccines because they look and act like the virus. So our immune systems, it's really interesting because everybody wants to point to one vaccine or another, Traditionally, there's always been side effects with vaccines that are similar to this. Like, if you have underlying autoimmune diseases, or your immune system's hyperactive, there's chance of creating issues. And so, but that's a chance, generally speaking, most of us know, and like, we were talking earlier. You knew, you were in line, you took one for the team.

Aubry: 20:33

Front of the line, yep.

Phil: 20:35

Front of the line, we're good to go. So when that happens, your immune system then puts out these antibodies, and these antibodies, they go in and they actually attach onto the thyroid. And that thyroid starts to pump out the gas, like. wildfire. It's coming out of everywhere, which then that extra thyroid is everything that boosts the metabolism. So your hair was falling out. I'd have to assume your hormones were all over the place.

Aubry: 20:58

I have so much hair,

Phil: 21:00

And so when you lose hair, generally speaking, even if it's another reason, the thyroid is playing in that hair loss. So when your hormones shift, so if your estrogen or progesterone goes up or down, especially your estrogen, your thyroid shifts with it. And so your hair falls out as a secondary cause quite often. At this point, to paint the picture, when we're in hyperthyroid, your heart is beating out of your chest. You can't do anything, so you feel like you're just wasting away. Your hair is falling out. You literally think that you're turning into a corpse along the way. Like, this is like a problem.

Aubry: 21:31

That like, melting emoji, that melting face, that was me.

Phil: 21:34

And I think there's that moment in most people with hyperthyroid where, And especially in your case, there had to be a few moments where you're like, I guess this is just my lot in life. Like, I'll never be good again.

Aubry: 21:45

Yeah. Yeah, absolutely.

Phil: 21:47

So, so that's Graves disease. Then now from here and forever, your body will produce this antibody when it decides to get angry. And so the answer usually right now has always been to this point to take out the thyroid and then it can't do it anymore, which is kind of treating the symptom and not the disease because the disease is an immune system. So now they're making new drugs that will help block that immuno response that you have. But of course those will be more than most people's houses to get ahold of. So that's Graves disease. And so here you are in the doctor to the doctor. This is a simple, which way do you want me to take it out? I mean, that's really all she was asking.

Aubry: 22:27

Yeah, choose option one or two.

Phil: 22:29

And they're really gonna lean on option one, heavily, with the radioactive, which freaks you out. They're gonna lean very, because it's easy, it takes care of everything, and it's done.

Aubry: 22:38

It never sat well with me. And, you know, for a handful of reasons, I didn't want to do it. I think mostly because at that point, I was so exhausted, so tired of dealing with this, and I just wanted to feel better again. What I didn't want was that. Waning hormone level as my thyroid is slowly dying and I'm having to compensate with a little bit more and more levothyroxine. I don't want to figure out the perfect poison of how much meds are compensating for my slowly dying thyroid.

Phil: 23:09

Well, they don't talk to you about your parathyroid and the fact that it's going to mess with your calcium which then become a crisis and they don't actually tell you all of that until after they're or if they do, you don't hear it.

Aubry: 23:18

Yeah. Yeah. My gut said, just remove it. Just do surgery. Right. Right. Is it five times more expensive? Is it like, like what, what is, what are we looking at? What, I don't, you know, all those things. With my insurance, how much does it cost? I don't know. I am Googling, how much does the thyroidectomy cost? Like the internet is going to tell me what my insurance is. So anyway, I ended up just in a routine, like OBGYN appointment. In the middle of all of this. And I had explained it to my doctor then. And she was like, absolutely not. We do not treat people like that. Swooped me up, pulled me out from that doctor that made me cry and said, I will, you know, we'll, you'll see someone else. And that doctor was one year out of medical school. She was fresh. She was bright eyed. She was, for better or worse. you know, green. She was not naive, but she wasn't jaded. She wasn't.

Phil: 24:19

That's the word right there. She hadn't been beaten down as of yet.

Aubry: 24:22

Yeah. And I walked in her doors and I just instantly knew this was going to be a much better fit. And we talked through a couple of things and right. Like the golden question is like, if this was your mom, what would you recommend to her? Would you suggest? radioactive iodine or thyroidectomy. And she said, honestly, radioactive iodine. And I was like, great, good luck to your mom. I still feel like I need to have the surgery. But she did say, and here's the thing all along, everybody I had seen said, but you still need to get the booster. And I said, this booster made my heartbeat 200 beats a minute Is the next dose, is the half, the next half, gonna make my heartbeat 300 beats a minute?

Phil: 25:01

What did she say when you asked people, I mean, what did they say? So I kind of got, I have, I have this very strong opinion. I believe, I truly believe that someone's healthcare should be their choice. I know that sounds terrible, but I really 100 percent think that I don't have a voice in your healthcare until it impacts me. And in this case. By the time that you're looking for the booster, Most of society had been infected like it had pushed through so at this point the you know If if you're living with some of the leukemia that I have an opinion or two But for the most part when somebody asks me my answer is usually I'm not going to answer that What do you want to do? So I'm really curious to see what you heard.

Aubry: 25:45

I asked everybody. I mean because right if I got my My first dose in March of 21, by four weeks later, I should have gotten my second dose, but I already felt bad. And so I was like, I'm holding off on this. I can't, I can't do this. And I asked all the doctors along the way and everybody just pushed. Do you remember, I mean, you remember like what a time to be alive.

Phil: 26:07

Well, everybody had an opinion. They all thought they knew what was best for everybody else. And the worst part was we were so isolated for so long, we were begging for attention. So when I had little kids, the child that was picking fights with everybody who was being belligerent, it takes till about your second or third kid, you realize all you really got to do is pay attention. And when society did it, we all threw our fits. Instead, we just kept throwing them at each other instead of listening at all. Yeah. And that's what it was. It's like they were so opinionated all the time. And, I don't know, it was like exhausting to have that. I don't know how people have that many opinions. Like for me, there's just, it's too tiring. I'm kind of lazy. Like, I mean, as cookies go. A snickerdoodle is the best cookie. I'll fight that one to death.

Aubry: 26:56

Yeah, there are worthy, worthy fights to fight,

Phil: 26:59

Right, like which cookie, if you only get one cookie, I have a fight. But in the case of what is best for you, you know, I see a guy go down the road without his helmet on his head, and I'm like, he made that choice. Like, I would never, if it's my kid, he gets home and he's done for, but for you, you have a right. But then that same person would get off that motorcycle and have a huge opinion on what you need to do with a needle. And that was a very curious thing because we'd never experienced that.

Aubry: 27:27

The narrative is completely written by the channels that we are subscribing to and the things that we're allowed to come into our feed. So I feel like my echo chamber was very pro vaccine, right? And the medical, I just feel like there was one party line that I was hearing from every medical professional and it was, You still need to get the booster

Phil: 27:49

And that scared you and then you had a right to be scared.

Aubry: 27:51

The booster's not gonna make this worse. And I would say, well, why not? How do you know? Right. How do you know you? None of you knew me.

Phil: 27:59

Right

Aubry: 27:59

You only know this version of me. You didn't know 2019 or 2020 version of me.

Phil: 28:04

Were they good at listening to you when they said it? Because that's the other thing I remember in those days is you had had an opinion and I'd be like, okay, you have to, or you don't have to like.

Aubry: 28:13

They all just said, you still need to get the booster.

Phil: 28:15

Like nobody said, why are you nervous? Like what, what happened? Is there something that could be said or done that would make you feel better? Like instead they're like, no, this is true. We have all this data. And I think we all got so tired of hearing about this thing. Data because I had more data on the vehicle I bought than I did on the booster. And I'm not trying to be, I'm really not trying to make a joke. Like, you know, it is funny, but the truth is I could go on and I knew how that car had acted for 10 years. And so I do believe in science. And I do believe in all those things, 100%, but I also believe that people have choice and anytime you take that choice away from them, in America, if I say you have to or you don't have to, you're going to do the opposite just because I said it.

Aubry: 29:01

Yeah. And there was a very narrow, impossibly non existent window for people who were not anti vax, but also had real lived experience, negative experiences with the vaccine. So I felt very validated in my opinions and my decision to hold off on the booster, until I had a more reasonable, explanation of what it would or would not do to me. So this angel doctor, queen angel doctor. We know a lot, but we don't know everything. And that's, that was like the humility that I needed that I hadn't received for the six months prior from anyone I had seen. And that's so perfect. She explained, she said, you are on levothyroxine. It is regulating the amount of hormones that are coming through your system. The booster will not, you know, whatever she explained to me, it made sense to me. And I was like, okay. I can feel good about that. So, I also want to go to New York. You know, I also need my card to complete.

Phil: 30:11

Yeah, but it's cool though, because what you're saying is that it wasn't about the booster, it wasn't about the shot, it was about being heard.

Aubry: 30:18

Yeah, and my question's being answered in a very reasonable and kind way.

Phil: 30:26

And you're out though from the time that it all started until you found your angel doctor how many months do you think you're out by this point

Aubry: 30:33

I started feeling crummy in March to September and then I had surgery in October.

Phil: 30:39

So as an outsider since I work in a system if you could point at the reason why it took that long for someone to start listening what would you say like if you say okay this is what I think is wrong like I love hearing what's wrong If you're an offensive person and you think you're right all the time, you're the most miserable person to be around. The best thing to do is say is what am I doing wrong? What are we doing wrong? And you hear it, your world like opens up. Cause that second you get to see that other person and you see them as a person rather than as a boxing competitor, you know what I mean? So what would you say? looking at that situation, what would you say is wrong with the health care system?

Aubry: 31:19

So the fact that I didn't have a primary care doc, that held me up a little bit,

Phil: 31:23

yeah.

Aubry: 31:24

The fact that I held my own with the doctor that made me cry. Right. I had to do a little bit of a start over to find a new doctor. So that took a little bit more time. But beyond that, that's where I find like, what could I have done and changed and lessons learned on my part. But beyond that, it is purely. bureaucracy and red tape.

Phil: 31:45

There you go. You have, so there are legitimately programs that the doctor has to watch. And if they haven't done step one, they cannot, the computer will have a hard stop saying you can't. So you have to have a doctor or a nurse who will bypass it with some work around that they've figured out to even get you to the next place. And so then they'll even, like, even in medication, so once you're on thyroid medications, there's a lot of people who Levothyroxine is not their best friend. They just don't like it. But then their insurance are dictating they have to take Levothyroxine for whatever reason. So they're being told they have to do this thing. And then someone like you, you're healthy. You've paid into the system. How long before you even really used it?

Aubry: 32:28

I mean, 20 something years, right?

Phil: 32:30

So they owe it. Like, honestly, at this point, you put the down payment on a long time ago. Like you got a better deal on your COVID Airbnb than you did on your health insurance because they gave you back all that money, you know? And so it's, I'm with you. I think the bureaucracy has become this place where you have to become an expert in the healthcare system, even for something. And I'm going to say now, because I, I understand you and for you, it was one in a million. It was fairly routine. I have an ENT that says if you're a woman and you're over the age of 45, you have thyroid issues. Totally. That's his, like he says all the time, they have it. They all have it. A hundred percent have them. So yours is something that should have been walk into an Instacare and Instacare says, okay, we're going to get you into a specialist. You would have been a month and done, but this is like six months in and you've become an expert because now you know on the portal if I put this thing in the portal, I'll get a response. They want me to do this, this and this. They won't even answer my questions. They're going to give me this thing. So now I have to turn it off. You became an expert on thyroid inadvertently.

Aubry: 33:37

Every night, Google nightly scroll learning about my thyroid.

Phil: 33:42

And you're talking to people, you're in support groups, and that's the interesting thing. Even more people are learning their healthcare from a support group, and that's the only reason why they're really finding their way through, which is crazy to me because there should have been someone along the way that says, okay, here's really what will happen. So wrap your head around these ideas. Come back to me once you've taught, and then let's talk about it in three days. So here, go, go do your stuff and come back.

Aubry: 34:07

Well, and that's why, I mean, I jumped at the chance to talk to you about this because I've not told this story except for just in a, highlight of the process, on Instagram. But like, I want the opportunity to have a landing place because I do still get emails from people or DMs from people that are like, tell me what, and it's such a thing. It's more than one message can relay. And so I'm glad for the chance to be able to tell the story and send them to one specific place to say, here it is.

Phil: 34:35

I get more questions about weight loss, drugs than anything else right now. Are they safe? Can I stay on them for long term? And yeah, I have a few concerns because you have to ask yourself, why did we need the shot in the first place? Our bodies produce GLP one inside the L cells. And those are found inside your small intestine. Whatever you could do to help those L cells produce its own GLP would be immensely important. And in this case, Triquetra got GLP Activate. GLP Activate combines multiple products in order to help your own L cells be the healthiest they can. And when the L cells happy you put out your own GLP and you don't have to take those shots. It also puts the amount that your body is used to having. So you can go back to the way it was GLP activate. So you want to go right now to TriquetraHealth.com and put in code GLP120. Get your GLP Activate, figure out what's going on in there instead of just trying to overwhelm it. Yeah. So I want to talk about the radioactive iodine because I'm with you. So as a pharmacist, iodine is this great big, huge, monstrous chemical. And so when you make it radioactive, it's just on this really far outer shell. For me, I know that the radioactive iodine that you have is very slow moving, it's not that dangerous. In fact, we have enough Molybdenum in our water in Utah. I know this stuff. So when somebody says radioactive iodine to me, I'm almost like, whatever. But for you, let's walk you through the day. Let's walk through the little process of what you did. Once they decided that you had a hyperthyroid, it was time to get rid of it. Tell me how that whole system looked from your eyes, because from my eyes, I know how it works, and mostly you just have to have your own toilet and away you go.

Aubry: 36:13

So I didn't do the radioactive iodine. I passed it on. Oh. I did the surgery.

Phil: 36:17

Look at you.

Aubry: 36:18

I bypassed it and went straight to surgery. And, you know, I don't know, maybe I'm being dramatic, but I thought, like, This is going to turn into cancer. This is going to be cancer. Like just get it out. And we did an ultrasound and there were nodules there. And so I felt all the more validated and truthfully, dollar for dollar. It was just as, you know, it was one and done in a week.

Phil: 36:42

Do you have any regrets? Cause this is going to be something people ask you have any regrets for going the way that you did instead?

Aubry: 36:47

No, no.

Phil: 36:48

Well, there you go.

Aubry: 36:50

And that's what I wanted, right? Like I mentioned earlier, I didn't want to have to guess and like my levels were fluctuating as my thyroid was slowly dissolving with the radioactive. I just, just remove it. Oh wait, do I have regrets? I do. I do.

Phil: 37:06

Well, I was going to say I regret over the sandwich I chose for lunch. Like I got the chicken and I really wanted turkey now. So good for you. Cause I, I can't, I live my life in regrets.

Aubry: 37:14

The surgery itself. I recognize I'm super routine. My doctor, I saw him up at Huntsman and He maybe specialized in cancer, which the fact that they had referred me to him and I was like, Ooh, is there cancer in there? You know, like we're all thinking cancer.

Phil: 37:31

It's just a hard, it's such a hard surgery. So you need, they want it to be super skilled. Did they tell you that? Oh yeah. So the thing about your neck is when they open up all your veins, all your vocal cords, there are so many things. So your ENT surgeons, because of what they're digging around in there, like it's crazy. If you look at it, you're like, I don't even know how you saw it. So it's a crazy hard surgery just to kind of put it out there. Because if you move a little bit, you don't talk because it hits your vocal nerve. So they sent you up there because of the skill level.

Aubry: 38:01

Okay. So I saw he was like a department head, but he was really great. He was very wonderful, very like bedside manner. I felt like I deserved him after having the other doctors that I had. And so I was really, I felt like I was in good hands that we were, we had a running joke, you know, I'm a professional communicator. I talked to strangers for a living. And he was explaining to me, you know, the risks, the teeny tiny 1 percent chance that this is going to happen. As he's wheeling me into the OR, he said, now, remember, like, you could lose your vocal cords, you know, you could, and I was like, now, remember, don't sever my vocal cords because I talk for a living. And that was like the, our final exchange. And then I woke up and like, my expectations of I was going to sound like and what it was going to be like, we're very, I mean, I recognize they cut into my throat, I don't know the order of things back here, but also that's a sensitive spot, so I was super raspy and he came in, if I woke up at like one o'clock, he came in by four o'clock that afternoon and he was like, you should sound better than this. And it was like instant fright.

Phil: 39:05

Oh no.

Aubry: 39:06

I'm send the, the speech therapist in tomorrow if, you know, let's just take it day by day. I still sounded terrible and they said if you don't improve through this coming week, we'll have to send you to the vocal clinic. I didn't improve, and because I talk for a living by taking the week off by the end of that week, I had tried to, it's so easy to not be heard when you are in a really captive one on one audience, you know, if you're close quarters and you can talk to a person, but if you walk right outside, or, you're competing with any other noise. I absolutely could not be heard.

Phil: 39:42

Oh, no.

Aubry: 39:43

About a week later. I felt fine. I tried to go do my job on a Friday and, you know, I'm five, six days after out of surgery. So I called the nurse. Thankfully I had the nurses line. So I called the nurse

Phil: 39:57

And you whispered to her like this.

Aubry: 40:00

Oh, absolutely. Right. And it was, she was pretty dismissive and she was like, you're going to be fine. You're not supposed to feel better or sound better by today. And I said, I totally hear you. The doctor was alarmed. So I don't want to wait one month until my follow up, you know, I don't want to go three more weeks until my follow up when, and then I walk into his office and he's like, why didn't you tell me? So this is me waving the flag. Yeah, this is bad. And he knew it. And the speech therapist knew it, you know, and she, it's absolutely her job to be his gatekeeper, right? She was doing her job, but she kind of went. party line just you know nothing could deviate from like she was a little bit like they're there you'll be fine you'll be

Phil: 40:47

fine. Right it's another moment like it's that other take your medicine moment that the first doctor that's like this the whole podcast is named take your medicine because every person has that moment where they were just told just take your medicine and get out of the office and I love this because you show the hot you show this so there's in a good story you have a character that develops so at the beginning of your story I gotta be honest you're a little shy You were kind of this slow, and then you've bloomed through it now, because I have a feeling, by that point, you were a fighter. You've gone through your training montage. You had become like, no, this isn't going to stand. It's cool how that character happens in every medical story I have, you have this character development. It always starts with the, I don't want to be a problem. It's okay, I must be fine. And by the end of it, you've tied the headband back. You've ripped the sleeves off your shirt. You drew first blood moment.

Aubry: 41:42

Aubry versus nurse Anne. Yeah, you're on. So, I mean, but also I couldn't talk like that was really hard. That was really hard. I it took all of the energy that I had to place that phone call to her. And she said, well, just don't talk unless it's absolutely necessary. And I was like, wait, you know, eight hours a day. That's what I do.

Phil: 42:06

That's a sweet way to tell you to shut up. Like now, sweetie, just this,

Aubry: 42:11

I, I gave it a go. Thanks for talking me up as the fighter, but I couldn't. Convey, just without a voice, even one dialogue on the phone, if she talked over me, I could not be heard. And just as an aside, we're still in 2021 stores aren't all open. Things aren't happening. I could not order through a drive through. It was very, I was very mindful of people with any sort of disabilities or adaptive needs because we don't create the situation conducive to those people. Like I could not, stores were closed and I couldn't order a vanilla ice cream cone through the McDonald's drive thru.

Phil: 42:51

Isn't it funny how empathy is so important? Like you can have sympathy for somebody saying, Oh, poor you. But empathy is the greater of the two emotions because at that moment you become an advocate for anyone in that situation from here until eternity. It's too bad that we always have to learn our lessons the hard way. Like, it's funny because I always think that everything leads to something else. So you know, I've had really bad years and really good years. And when it gets bad, I think, okay, this is a lesson. And I think this now that I'm 50, I didn't think this when I was 30. I'm like, okay, this is going to come in handy. And it's been kind of amazing how being that person maybe was the best thing that happened because I was able to do something kind later for someone else. So I love the fact that you're advocating for people who have any sort of issues.

Aubry: 43:40

Yeah, yeah, it was, it was a great lesson to learn and it just A little bit of a cherry on top of

Phil: 43:44

They threw some steroids at you after a little bit, the inflammation went down?

Aubry: 43:48

No, so I did have to wait the whole month until my follow up appointment with my doctor and they tried to reschedule me. I was in the waiting room and he had to rush to the ER and I was like, nope, I'm going to sit here and wait because I am not, going to go until I hear that this is, I mean, it did not improve.

Phil: 44:03

Right. Your life is impacted. This is, this is stopping. We're going to fix this.

Aubry: 44:07

Yeah. So I held out and immediately when he walked in the office, he was so fatherly and he was so apologetic. I wanted to say, even though I had no voice, like, Tell that to Anne, you know, tell that to your nurse. I tried to tell her, you know, and he said instantly, we're going to send you to the voice clinic. We're going to get you this, injection. They inject Juvederm. So he scoped right. So half of my vocal cord was paralyzed. He said, I didn't sever your vocal cord, but as I pulled that nerve away, either the elasticity didn't bounce back or, something which was absolutely like, I don't think he did it wrong. I don't think it was.

Phil: 44:45

No, it's just part of the process, unfortunately.

Aubry: 44:47

So he pulls that nerve away and your vocal cord, your sound comes out when your vocal cords slap together and one half was paralyzed open. Right. As I was slapping, nothing was, it wasn't hitting that. So I constantly, it just, it sounded like I had the worst case of bronchitis for six weeks. So, he wanted to, to pencil me into the vocal clinic. I got in super fast and like, I have a fair amount of vanity about me. I've never tried fillers, but I've tried other things that are made by the same, supplier as Juvederm and I've had very severe reactions to them. And so the vocal clinic said, And I was two or three days away from celebrating my 40th birthday in Mexico and she said, I am not going to put this in your, down your throat and send you off to a foreign country. Because also, maybe the scariest thing of all, is that they were going to go with a scope down my nose and a needle down my mouth and fill me with, hyaluronic acid.

Phil: 45:56

Yeah, this isn't getting a dirty diet coke. Like, this takes a little more effort. Yeah, I gotcha.

Aubry: 46:00

I thought, like, I deserve the biggest prize of all and I need someone here to hold my hands. This is worse than surgery. This is, I'm awake for this. Like, this is torture and so scary. But I'm having, I could potentially have. a, you know, bad reaction to this thing that is in my airway. Yeah. Like I don't want this. So the doctor was really, ENT who did my surgery, he was very compassionate and, but he was also really realistic. You know, he said 50, 50 chance this is permanent. And that frightened me because that was like, Change of life. Do I need to think of a new career? Like I can't do this. Like this is life altering in a way that I was like, Oh, here I am thinking I'm doing a good thing by taking the vaccine, you know, getting the vaccine. And then I have the surgery and there's an outside chance that there's, you know, a bad side effect and here trying to get the fix to that. And there's an outside chance that this is going to be permanent. Like. I can't win with all of this.

Phil: 46:59

Who did you call? Cause there's this person. So for me, there was a time where I seriously was sitting in the store on a Sunday, slumped on the ground. And there's only one person I wanted there. It was my wife. That was it. I didn't want anybody else there. Who did you call at that moment when you were like, okay, I can't do this anymore?

Aubry: 47:23

I called my dad.

Phil: 47:24

Oh, there we go.

Aubry: 47:25

My dad is the best at talking through, you know, it's a 40 minute conversation and it's like a little bit of like, where should we travel next? And did you read this book? And did you that, you know, and like, we have solved the world's problems. in total, not just that one thing, right? It's such a more holistic approach to, I've got this problem. Tell me what the answer is.

Phil: 47:47

Sometimes you got to paint all the happy trees in the background before the very middle of the Bob Ross painting. I understand it. It is very disarming. Yeah, he paints the whole picture. And then all of a sudden, wait, how did Bob Ross, your dad is Bob Ross of therapy. It sounds fantastic.

Aubry: 48:00

That's exactly the case. And here's another thing that it, that here's a, another little lesson learned. I was pulling out of the university of Utah. There was a lot of road construction happening, you know, and up there at the hospital, there's a lot of like windy roads that are really only going to one place. I work in. engineering road construction, like I speak flagger. I knew what was going on. I was coming down the hill and I can't speak through the Bluetooth of my car because I can't talk. So my voice has to be on my phone, up to my ear for my dad to be able to hear me.

Phil: 48:33

Yeah.

Aubry: 48:33

So I am stopped by a flagger. I stopped, like I know with full certainty. I am not distracted, but I am having this conversation with my dad as I am leaving the Huntsman Cancer Institute. And this flagger just unleashes, right? There's, there's this, there's that. And I thought of all of the places where there's be a kind flagger, you know, there are so many. Sacred phone calls that are being had as you're pulling out of the Huntsman Cancer Institute. Mine is the easiest, right? Easily the, the most lightweight conversation happening.

Phil: 49:10

Out of that, yeah, absolutely.

Aubry: 49:11

Exiting the Cancer Institute. Nobody deserves that. Nobody deserves that. The circumstances required me to be on my phone right then.

Phil: 49:21

The funny thing about that too is that flagger went home and was screaming about this lady that wouldn't listen. Like, the funny thing about it, whatever word really worked up, I found this to be true 100 percent of the time. The other side's really worked up too and it is completely ineffective. And so, that person being angry doesn't matter. And then telling you didn't actually make anything better. Like I've never had anybody say by yelling at that person, I feel so much better. Like, that's not a thing you're telling the story to me right now, because you didn't feel better and you want to feel better. Yeah. So I agree with you. Like you should be aware of people all the time, no matter how bad your day is. You don't know how bad that other person's day is.

Aubry: 49:59

Yeah. Just compassion goes a long way.

Phil: 50:03

Yeah.

Aubry: 50:03

Just. human to human.

Phil: 50:05

So your dad's on the phone. You're getting cussed out while you're talking to him.

Aubry: 50:11

Yeah. I mean, my parents were along for the ride, but also honestly, like, so was every single friend. Like I said, I treated this like it was a, that I was the one in a million,

Phil: 50:20

But you are one of the million

Aubry: 50:21

This has never happened to anyone else ever before. You know, I made everyone hear it. The internet heard it, Instagram, my audience heard it, and there was a lot of people who were invested along the way, which I feel grateful that I could be a resource to people who needed it, but also that, there was that many people who cared about my well being. My friends, definitely. I've got a very, very solid crew of friends and family who humored me. As if I was one in a million.

Phil: 50:52

See the thing I really love about this is you looked at it, you made a choice, the choice didn't go as smooth as you'd like, you still stand by what you did, and if, I don't believe, I actually don't believe that anything, like, we have to learn the way we do, so I don't ever, I don't really like the term of what would you do differently. What I do believe in, is I've heard a quote once that says, a wise man learns from his mistake, and a wiser man learns from somebody else's mistake. Yeah. So for people out there who think they're struggling with thyroid, what is the wiser man going to do for this?

Aubry: 51:28

The wisest person is going to have, even when they feel healthy, even before they're struggling with their thyroid, is going to have a primary care physician.

Phil: 51:37

Period, right? You should have one.

Aubry: 51:39

Yeah. Have one. Be on someone's role.

Phil: 51:42

Especially when you don't need them. So you can go in there in the 15 minutes. You're like, high five, doc. I'm out. Cause then you have that relationship.

Aubry: 51:48

If it's your annual physical, if it's just routine blood work, if it's anything, just go. Like everyone go home, schedule an appointment right now. Do it on your phone.

Phil: 51:56

Hey, that's number one. I'm on board. What's number two?

Aubry: 51:59

Number two is fight like hell for yourself. Not one person involved in this story knew me. Before May of 21, except for me, and I knew myself, I knew what was normal and I knew what wasn't normal. And I wasn't going to take a stranger's. professional opinion until they had heard me out. Until they treated me as if I was an individual instead of a thyroid case, right?

Phil: 52:29

Because you are one in a billion to you. That other doctor, you could be one of eight just in the last hour, but to you, you will always be that, and so you will fight for yourself stronger.

Aubry: 52:40

Yeah, I just think stick to your guns and like stick to your gut. I don't regret. I didn't take one medication and I knew signing up to have my thyroid removed or the radioactive iodine, either one of those options were going to require me to take a medication every day for the rest of my life. And that seemed. It's a really big commitment. I could not believe it. And everyone was like, it's just a tiny little pill. And it is. It's like a third of the size of an Advil. It's tiny. But it's the commitment to a, it's long term, right?

Phil: 53:13

Well, and being dependent on something is nothing that any of us like. It doesn't matter if it's, it's not addiction. But dependent means you have to take it every day. Dependency is something that we've been trained not to have.

Aubry: 53:25

And what I, I am proudly will say as like rule follower of the world, I've never missed one single day of a sense since then. Right. And I think a little bit of it is out of fear of, I never want to feel that way again. I never I, it took a long time. I, I'm what it was October of 21. So I'm three years out. And I barely this year feel like I can. Walk around the block, you know, I feel like myself again. My hair's not falling out anymore.

Phil: 53:57

No, you look fantastic. You look, you've come out the other side of the tunnel. You survived.

Aubry: 54:02

And it took a minute, but. If it's, taking that tiny little pill, do it all day long.

Phil: 54:09

Okay. So here's the thing though. I really do love all of your stuff on Instagram. So explain to the people what it is you do and how they can find you because they've, I got to send them your way because everything. Anyway, I love your stuff. So you explain it your way because for me, I just like bright colors So you got to explain what it is you do where you're at and how they can find you.

Aubry: 54:29

Okay. Well, I am just a regular girl. I'm like corporate america by day. I'm bright and colorful I own a small business called hello maypole, which is the the wool felt balls, but on my personal account, which is@aubryeliz it's a lot of my manicures. It's home decor. It's craft projects. It's like, realistically, my fun single life, but just kind of living happily, if, if possible.

Phil: 54:59

That's absolutely tell me that let's let's get your tagline again. What's your handle again on Instagram?

Aubry: 55:04

Is it my just my handle? Send them to@aubryeliz a u b r y e l i z

Phil: 55:10

One more time because I'm gonna have to say it three times because then you remember it this is for everybody So say a little more times we can throw it out there again@AubryEliz Absolutely wonderful. Your story is amazing. I loved every minute of it. You know, you're wonderful, right? You're wonderful.

Aubry: 55:26

That's very kind of you.

Phil: 55:28

And I want to say more than anything, thank you. Thank you for sharing your story.