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By Root 343 0

I always assume they exaggerate; I think if there’s a problem it will present itself. But this was making me nervous because it was actually presenting itself. I had been exercising, eating healthily, and getting further and further away from the day I gave birth, yet I couldn’t lose any weight. So something was obviously wrong. The doctor explained the science of my body, specifically the role of the thyroid in controlling hormones, metabolism, the brain, and the pituitary gland. And half of my thyroid had shut down, so basically my body was working at only a fraction of the capacity it was supposed to. My metabolism had all but shut down. I was dieting and exercising just to maintain my current weight and keep up my energy. But no matter how much I did, I was never going to lose weight. He said to me, “Frankly, I’m shocked you don’t weigh two hundred pounds and that you are not passed out in bed right now completely tired.”

So when I moved back to L.A. shortly thereafter, I got in touch with a new doctor and got on a new diet. This doctor prescribed me 180 milligrams of Synthroid, a prescription synthetic thyroid hormone intended to replace a hormone that is normally produced by your thyroid gland. I’m now on only 100 milligrams, but I’ll have to take it for the rest of my life. The Synthroid regulates me and keeps my level at a livable state. It started working immediately, and within two weeks I had lost about three pounds—three more than I had lost since giving birth! Five months after going through hell, I finally figured out my problem. Better late than never!

There was so much ridicule in the tabloids and on the blogs over my not having lost the baby weight, and yet what people don’t realize is that I was fighting a serious condition. Being in my body at that moment made me realize what other people go through, people who can’t lose weight, people born with genes that mean they are going to be big. I feel bad for them because I was stuck in that body despite my efforts. I felt so lucky that the right medication was going to help me fight it off. It was weird because I was used to being healthy. I’m used to fighting to be a size zero, but here I was fighting something bigger.

I took all of the doctors’ advice on what to eat and what to do, along with medication, and finally the weight started melting off. I started pushing myself so hard that I fainted a couple of times from working out. I just felt like I needed to do everything I could to make up for lost time; I didn’t want to give up. I was so proud of myself for finding out what it would take to get over my problem. I didn’t care that I hadn’t lost weight anymore. I felt proud that I had figured out what was wrong with me and was trying to take care of it. Even if I never lost another pound at least I was getting healthy now. I remember looking at the mirror and smiling for the first time at my body. Even with the stretch marks, even with my fat rolls on my stomach, even with all of the uneven and unbalanced weight-gain areas, I remember thinking, “I’m well on my way to getting back to being Kendra.”

I linked this thyroid problem back to the postpartum depression immediately. I was such a mess for so long, and so many people think hypothyroidism is a joke; they don’t believe that this thyroid thing is real. But just like postpartum, the more you talk about it the more you hear of so many other women who are affected by it.

When I finally got my head on straight, I was mad at myself (and Hank) because I realized the main contributing factor to my not having anything diagnosed sooner was that I was traveling all over the country following Hank. Every few months I had a new doctor, and then just when he or she got to know me I would leave. Nobody took the time to properly assess me and what was going on with my body. I was in Indianapolis for the last stages of pregnancy and then birth, L.A. for first few months of Hank Jr.’s life, then Philly, then Minnesota, then back to L.A. No one had the time to fully check me out. It was always a quick test of my blood