Re: Schisandra and Hashimoto's Thyroiditis

 I was given this herb along with lemon balm back in 2006-2007 as part of a herbal tincture mix..I have never been well since. I have lost much of my hair and my eyebrows.

I still do not think the ashwagandha had anything to do with it. Polysaccharide rich herbs will aggravate autoimmune conditions, but ashwagandha is not one of them. More likely the problem was from the lemon balm (Melissa), which is a thyroid suppressant. Bugleweed and prunella also fall under this category.

But again both Grave's and Hashimoto's are autoimmune disorders. Autoimmune disorders occur from immune suppression through the adrenals, they are not a hyperactive immune system as is commonly stated. Anything suppressing the adrenals, such as stress, stimulants and steroids will aggravate autoimmune conditions by further suppressing the immune system. Ashwagandha supports the adrenals and is low in polysaccharides, which makes it beneficial for autoimmune conditions. Point is that there could have been a lot of things that made your condition worse including the stress of being sick or the lemon balm.

It is quite well documented that Ashwagandha will increase the conversation of T4 to T3, definetly not to be taken if you are hyperthyroid, or have an over senstive thyroid.

This does not mean it is raising thyroid hormone levels. It is merely changing one thyroid hormone to another.

I wish that I have never taken ashwagandha, I trusted some experienced herbalist who had no idea of the side effects of this herb.

Again I seriously doubt the ashwagandha has anything to do with it.  Study the process of autoimmunity, especially the role of the adrenals and low affinity antibodies and you will see what I mean.

I am quite ill, and wish I had never visited a herbalist, I was desperate, suffering from endometriosis, and NHS was not helping me.

They should not have given you lemon balm and ashwagandha for endometriosis anyway since these herbs are not for this condition. Endometriosis is treated with bitters, rice bran, vitex and phytoestrogen sources in particular. The idea is to get the estrogen levels under control. Again lemon balm and ashwagandha have no role here. Ashwagandha is good for post-menopausal hormone issues though since the adrenals become the primary source of hormones post-menopausally.

Also just to say you can start of with graves and then develop hashimoto's, this is possible and more likely.

These are both autoimmune conditions and it is possible to have more than one autoimmune condition at a time since the basis of autoimmunity is the over production of low affinity (nonspecific) antibodies. 

So yes, you are right and it can go the other way as well. On the other hand Hashitoxicosis can occur with Hashimoto's thyroidosis and can be mistaken for Grave's disease.

One fairly respected herbalist said to me, herbs could not cause any health problems, they're effects were too weak....I beg to differ.

I agree, that was a pretty stupid statement. I work with a number of herbs that can be poisonous if not used properly. And there are some that I would never use or recommend such as blue cohosh, tansy, oleander, etc. Herbs do tend to be much safer than pharmaceutical drugs and often work better and faster. But they do have effects on the body that can be good or bad, which is why people should learn their actual properties as well as how the body really works.  Keep in mind though that foods also have effects on the body both good and bad. We don't stop eating because of this. Herbs are no different. Pharmaceutical drugs still remain a lot more dangerous than the average herb commonly used.  But you don't eat cake when you are a diabetic, you don't take estrogen replacement therapy if you have breast cancer and you don't take lemon balm when you are hypothyroid. There are proper foods, drugs and herbs for specific conditions. This is why I encourage people to learn how the body really works and how these things apply. Unfortunately there is a lot of misinformation out there about herbs as well mostly put out by the government and drug companies. Licorice root is a good example. They claim it raises blood pressure. This is true but they fail to mention the fact that you would have to take 50g a day for over 6 months to do this. This is a full bottle of capsules daily for 6 months, which is highly unlikely. Then there was the study that claimed that Saint Johnswort (SJW) caused infertility. When you read the study what they had done was to apply the SJW directly to the semen causing death and deformation to the semen. Using that kind of manipulated study then we would also have to conclude that vitamin C and even oxygen cause infertility since these will also kill the semen with direct contact. Then there are the claims that kava causes hepatitis. This came about all because a German pharmaceutical company saw how popular the herb was becoming and decided to jump on the bandwagon. To make a long story short they bought up the waste material cheaply that was being discarded from the root, ground it up and capsuled it as kava, which it technically was. The reason that waste was being thrown away was because that part of the plant is toxic to the liver. Using that reasoning we could also conclude that tomatoes are deadly since parts of the plant contain the deadly alkaloid solanine. So we need to be careful when judging herbs as well because manipulated and misinterpreted studies are frequently used to give herbs and even other supplements a bad reputation falsely.