How I’m Reversing Hashimoto’s Naturally: What’s Actually Working
- Bethany Montgomery
- Jan 3
- 5 min read
I’m going to share my health story with you and be as transparent as possible. If it helps you or someone you know, I’ve accomplished my goal: to help others through my own health journey.
A few months ago, I woke up on the bathroom floor with my blood pressure in the 80s/40s, terrified that I was making all the wrong decisions about my health. I've made so many positive changes in the last year that I had no idea some of them might be causing my body more stress.
My story begins with how I discovered I had Hashimoto’s, and although I am not fully healed, my labs are trending in the right direction to put me in remission. If you’ve ever struggled with hormonal issues like skin problems, mood swings, irregular periods, or been dismissed by your doctor or handed a pill as the only solution, I know something in this post can help you.
The Beginning of My Journey
In September 2024, I made a decision that unintentionally changed the course of my health. I enrolled in the Mind Body Green Functional Nutrition Program because I wanted to understand how food, lifestyle, and environment actually affect the body.
As I moved through the certification, I made changes immediately. Within a few months, I had lost 15 pounds and my cravings disappeared. I passed my final exam in January 2025 and launched my YouTube channel, https://www.youtube.com/@montgomeryfitlife, to share what I was learning.
Red Flags
I’ve struggled with hormones since I was a teenager and went on birth control at 15 for mood swings, irregular periods, and PMS symptoms. I’ve also struggled with constipation most of my life, and in 2017, that led me to a doctor to try to figure out why I wasn’t having regular bowel movements.
They ran bloodwork, and the crazy thing was I tested positive for autoimmunity even back then. The doctor asked me if I had ever gotten a tattoo, told me to stop eating vegetables, and sent me on my way. They didn’t investigate why a healthy twenty-something woman was showing autoimmune markers. They slapped an IBS diagnosis on me and called it a day.
Functional Health Labs
Fast forward to 2024, and I was still having PMS-related issues. I asked the only person I thought could help, my gynecologist, if she could run a full hormone panel. She told me that if I was having a period, then I didn’t have hormone issues.
This is when I decided to take my health into my own hands.
In February 2025, I found Function Health. They test over 100 biomarkers that regular doctors do not. It’s not covered by insurance, but I knew I wasn’t getting anywhere with my doctors and wanted answers.
I won’t go into a ton of detail here, but if you want a deep dive into what you get with Function Health, check out this video I made.
My Diagnosis
Eight years later, I tested positive again for autoimmunity. But this time, because these tests included a complete hormone panel, I learned that my thyroid was the main issue. This scared me. My nana has hypothyroidism, and my dad had thyroid cancer, but from my studies, I learned that while some things are genetic, only about 2% of disease outcomes are truly unavoidable. Our environment and lifestyle play a far bigger role than we’re led to believe.
My results showed I was essentially in Stage 1 - my labs showed Hashimoto’s, but I didn’t have symptoms yet.
The stages of autoimmune disease:
Stage 1: labs show the disease, but no symptoms
Stage 2: labs AND symptoms
Stage 3: everything from stages 1 & 2 AND 90% destruction of the affected organ — in most cases, there's no coming back
Most people don’t get labs until they’re in Stage 2 or later. If I had never done these tests, I would’ve ended up like others in my family, and my doctor would have blamed genetics and handed me a pill. But I knew I could control this. So I started making changes based on the foods/supplements list from my results. Thankfully, I had already gone overboard with my diet overhaul, so it wasn’t that hard to adjust.
Functional Doctor Experience
I still had questions, and since Function Health is online-only, I wanted a functional doctor I could talk to. My first consultation was in June 2025 and I took a stool and allergy test to see how my gut was performing and find out which foods may be triggering my thyroid issues.
A few months later, the results came in. I had dysbiosis and 21 food sensitivities. When you have dysbiosis, food leaks into your bloodstream and your body treats it like a foreign invader. Then your immune system starts attacking organs. In my case, it was attacking my thyroid.
I was told to avoid certain foods and feed my gut things that would correct the dysbiosis — lemon in my water, oranges and grapefruits, sauerkraut, yogurt, dates, and green banana, just to name a few.
The doctor also put me on eleven different supplements. Two months in, I woke up in the middle of the night to use the bathroom and blacked out, hitting the floor. Thankfully, my husband was there and gave me electrolytes and checked my blood pressure, which was extremely low at 80/40. I stopped all supplements immediately. It took a month for my BP to come up, and now it trends low but normal — around 100s/60s.
Positive Outcomes
I just took my second round of Function Health labs, and my numbers are trending in the right direction. Some of my thyroid markers even came back into range, which is huge.
Will I need to avoid those 21 foods forever? No.
Will I still enjoy my life? Of course.
I learned stress is the biggest killer. Stress is what wrecked my gut, triggered leaky gut, and caused antibodies to attack my thyroid.
The biggest thyroid triggers:
Gluten — one of the biggest triggers for thyroid issues
Dairy — casein and whey mimic thyroid tissue
Foods that showed as allergies on my IgG test
Even though I don’t have symptoms, I know I need to stay balanced and not eat like an A-hole so I can control my Hashimoto’s and prevent it from progressing.
Conclusion
If you're where I was, you can change your trajectory long before symptoms destroy your life.
Get labs that give you the full picture
Learn your triggers
Work to heal your gut - it's your second brain and affects every part of your body
Be your own advocate when it comes to your health.
I learned that I don't need a prescription pill or even a ton of natural supplements. All I needed to do was stay consistent with my diet, staying away from triggering foods and feeding my gut foods that it loves and eat foods that support my thyroid.
I’m not in remission yet but I am now in control of my health and know there are things I can do about it that actually work.
Resources
If you're not sure which foods could be causing your body harm, you have several options:
Get an IgG and IgE test done which will tell you exactly which foods your body is allergic or sensitive to.
Do an elimination diet. Eliminate the biggest triggers and document how you feel once you reintroduce them. Here is a post showing how this works and a one-pager that helps - https://www.montgomeryfitlife.com/post/how-to-pinpoint-solve-chronic-inflammation-using-the-elimination-diet
My thyroid lab numbers in April 2025:
TPO: 397
TgAb: 2
TSH: 5.41
T4: 1.3
T3: 3.2
ANA Titer: 1:40
My thyroid lab numbers in December 2025:
TPO: 225
TgAb: 1
TSH: 3.74
T4: 1.2
T3: 3.2
ANA Titer: 1:40
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