Diagnosis | Miss Lizzy Thyroid Support

The Importance of Body Temperature in Thyroid and Adrenal Health

One of the most important lessons I learned in my thyroid and adrenal journey is this: your body temperature tells the truth.

No one told me about temperature tracking. I didn’t read it in a book or hear it from a doctor. I discovered it because I was so fed up with the endless cycle of labs, medications, and symptoms that didn’t make sense.

I was tired of waiting for test results that didn’t match how I felt. I knew something wasn’t right and was determined to figure it out. That’s when I started taking my temperature out of curiosity, frustration, and honestly, desperation.

Most doctors had dismissed my low body temperature as “normal,” but through years of research, I found thyroid experts like Dr. Broda Barnes, Dr. James L. Wilson, and Paul Robinson who talked about the importance of body temperature for thyroid and adrenal health. So I started tracking.

And what I found was shocking. My temperature was consistently low and fluctuated wildly, sometimes dropping as low as 95.5°F in the afternoon. No wonder I felt so many symptoms—fatigue, brain fog, cold hands and feet, and that constant feeling that my body just wasn’t keeping up.

That was the turning point. Tracking my temperature became the tool that helped me finally understand what my body was trying to tell me. When thyroid lab testing failed me, tracking body temperature saved me.

Low Temperature Is a Clue, Not a Fluke

Low body temperature is one of the clearest signs that your thyroid and adrenals are struggling. It’s a message from your body that it’s running too slow, that something is off with your metabolism, and that your thyroid needs support.

If you’re waking up tired, struggling to focus, feeling cold all the time, or noticing stubborn weight gain, you’re not imagining it. And you’re not alone. Your temperature may hold the answers.

What I Wish I’d Known Sooner

If I had known how to track my temperature the right way and use it to guide my healing, I could have saved myself years of frustration.

That’s why temperature tracking is the foundation of the HypoHero™ Thyroid Protocol. It’s not just about taking random readings or guessing what they mean. It’s about learning how to spot patterns, understand the clues your body is giving you, and use that information to empower your healing.

This isn’t something most doctors teach you. And it’s not something you can just figure out from a quick internet search. It took me years of trial and error to uncover this system, so I built the HypoHero™ Thyroid Protocol to guide others through it, step by step.

The Path to Healing

If you’re frustrated by thyroid lab results and thyroid medications that aren’t helping, and you have ongoing symptoms that don’t make sense, there’s a better way. Your temperature holds the clues. You need the right system to understand it and know what to do next.

That’s what the HypoHero™ Thyroid Protocol is here to help you with.

👉 Learn more about the HypoHero™ Thyroid Protocol and take the first step toward understanding what your body is trying to tell you.

The Importance of Sleep for Adrenal Health

Miss Lizzy

If you have adrenal fatigue like me, or know someone who does, getting up before 9 a.m. can often be painful. As far back as high school I joked about not being “a morning person”. Staying up late at night was easy for me, but mornings were so bad that in college I scheduled all classes after 2 p.m. Seriously, I did. I would be a zombie until around noon. People thought I was lazy, I thought I was lazy. But my brain just didn’t function in the morning, so I did what my body was telling. And you know, my body was pretty darn smart, thank you.

Even as a adult it was painful to wake up before 9 AM. I admired early-risers and longed to be one, having a strange idea that morning people are good people. Only the lure of coffee would pull me from the comatose state of sleep. The idea of waking up at 6 a.m. actually made me panic. If I woke up before 9 a.m., I could easily drink two cups of coffee and go right back to sleep for hours. Curiously though, if I slept until about 9 a.m. I could pop right out of bed awake and alert. This always seemed odd, but apparently, there are lots of people out there like me!

Anyone who has chronic illness will understand you lead a secret life, arranging your business hours around rest opportunities and finding excuses for missing social events – Lynne Farrow, author The Iodine Crisis

Then I started learning about Adrenal Fatigue and how cortisol runs our body clock. So my sleep pattern wasn’t a matter of choice after all. What a revelation! According to James L. Wilson, Ph.D, Adrenal Fatigue: The 21st Century Stress Syndrome, though most people’s schedules do not allow it, it helps to sleep until 8:30 or 9 in the morning.

Wilson also writes, for people with normal functioning adrenals, cortisol rises rapidly between 6-8 am, which helps them to pop out of bed. (And explains why some people can’t sleep past a certain time.) Further, there is something magical about the restorative power of sleep between 7-9 a.m. for people with Adrenal Fatigue. Partly, he says, because cortisol levels rise slower in people with adrenal fatigue, and when cortisol levels are lower it takes longer to feel fully awake. Wilson also explains that with adrenal fatigue, when you sleep may be more important than how much you sleep.

Finally something that made sense after all these years! After getting treatment for Adrenal Fatigue, my Cortisol levels have become more normal, so waking up is much easier. In fact, I can get up at 7:45 a.m and actually function these days. But given the chance, I sleep late without guilt, knowing it will help me tackle the day with energy. Brilliant.

Health Tracking is Vital for Treating Hypothyroidism

Miss Lizzy

I’ve accepted the fact that either I am health obsessed or a hypochondriac. That said, if I’ve learned anything trying to heal from hypothyroidism and adrenal fatigue, its that good health is a practice which takes effort, research and intention. In doing so I have become a bit of a health detective.

For example, I use a spreadsheet to track every day of my life; charting my medicine, mood, weight, body temp, cycle, PMS, energy, hair loss, even sex drive (yep, I track it!). I start on Day 1 of my cycle and track every day until the next Day 1. It’s amazingly informative!

Otherwise life just blends together and its sometimes hard to see progress or setbacks. Like tracking point on Weight Watcher’s, writing it down helps me see what’s happening. It’s not about judgement either, tracking is about awareness and observation.

By tracking I discovered a big mood shift in my cycle, but didn’t see the monthly pattern. When I started tracking I realized this mood swing happened like clockwork on Day 19. On Day 18 every month, I felt great. And then suddenly on Day 19, I would feel the weight of the world on my shoulders. I would feel sad and have difficulty coping even with everyday chores. Sometimes I could actually feel my mood slipping as the day progressed on Day 19. Then as quickly as it started, the mood would lift around Day 24. I never connected it with PMS because it came so much earlier in my cycle.

When I showed this pattern to my doctor he suggested we run hormone lab tests. Sure enough, he learned my estrogen and progesterone levels dramatically flip on Day 19, which created the mood swing. He prescribed bioidentical estrogen creme for days 16-24 of my cycle, and sure enough, no more mood swings. Also I learned if I start the estrogen creme to late (like Day 18) or end too early (like Day 22) the mood swing hits me hard. Incredible isn’t it?!

Tracking also helped me realize when I overstimulated my adrenals by increasing my thyroid medicine too much.

But I know, we are all so tired already, how will manage to do this too? My advice is just do your best and forgive yourself what you cannot do. I am reading the The Four Agreements, A Practical Guide to Personal Freedom, by Don Miguel Ruiz. It’s a great book and I especially like what Ruiz writes about crime and punishment. When there is a crime it is punished once, but in our minds we punish ourselves over and over for years. He explains happiness is directly related to quieting the inner judge, and then attempting to do our best. If you track a little and that’s your best, then great. If you are too tired to track today, maybe you will tomorrow. Whatever it is, do your best.

In case you are curious, here is a section of my tracker from 2009 (done in Pages, but will open in Excel). The notes can be as loose or detailed as you like. Download a copy and take a look.