 [ Symptoms ] why is my new prescription of zolpidem a differant color and size [ Disease ] what is considered normal on lab tests may not necessarily be normal for you let me give you some background information the test they usually perform to initially diagnose hypothyroidism is tsh or thyroid stimulating hormone it has an inverse relationship with your actual thyroid hormone think of it as a bill collector if you do not respond when the bill collector knocks on your door they will start to knock on your door or call you with increasing frequency until you do respond the tsh is the bill collector and if your thyroid is not paying the bills aka is not producing enough thyroid hormone t4 tsh levels will continue to increase until the thyroid responds or your pituitary master gland decides its a hopeless cause and tsh production decreases or stops the reason for this diatribe is because people get confused when they are told they have hypothyroidism and their tsh is too high they do not realize the tsh is not actually the thyroid hormone which is the hormone that will be low in this case i just want to ensure there is no confusion when your provider gives you lab results some providers do not realize that if your tsh is in the upper range of normal people and especially women may still have symptoms thus you may want to work with your doctor on getting your tsh down to the lower ranges of normal 0 7  2 approximately  the range used to be 0 5 to 5 for tsh the national board of endocrinology now suggests the normal range be changed to 0 3 to 3 because people are still having symptoms despite being within normal range i prefer to keep my tsh around 1 because that is when i feel normal  everybody is different so that may not work for you what it boils down to is you are a person not a lab result if you have symptoms tell your primary care doctor do some research write down questionssymptoms when you think of them and talk to your pcp about it if you do not think he or she is taking you seriously get a second opinion