How Lemon Balm for Hyperthyroidism By Accident Changed Everything

Maya Brooks is a thyroid patient who shares her unbelievable story. After years of struggling with hormonal imbalance, Maya began experimenting with plant-based approaches — and found surprising results where conventional medicine had stalled.

In February, I quit everything. Weed, kratom, caffeine. Cold turkey. I was tired of being tired. I wanted to sleep, to feel clean. To feel like I had a body again, instead of just a bundle of nerves and cravings.

That’s when I started using lemon balm. First just one cup of tea. Then two. Strong cups. I was using it every night — maybe too much, honestly — but it worked. At least at first.

For a couple weeks, I was sleeping deeper than I had in years. My thoughts felt quieter. My breath felt heavier in a good way. And then… it flipped.

Suddenly I was wide awake at 2 a.m., every night. My limbs buzzing. My hands started to go numb. My digestion, which was always weird, got weirder. I thought, “okay, too much lemon balm,” and stopped.

I didn’t think much of it. But what happened next? I still don’t know how to explain.

I’ve been underweight my whole life.

Not thin — undernourished. The kind of thin that makes people whisper. In high school, I used to stuff my pockets with granola bars before doctor visits so I wouldn’t get weighed and then lectured. I ate constantly and never gained anything. I blamed parasites, candida, a fast metabolism, whatever Reddit told me it might be that week.

Turns out, it was probably my thyroid all along.

My mom has Graves. So does my grandmother. I never got tested, never pushed. Just figured I was fragile.

But within a month of quitting lemon balm, everything shifted. And I mean everything.

I gained weight — a lot. My ribs weren’t showing anymore. My jeans hugged instead of sagged. I caught myself in the mirror one morning and cried. Not because I looked amazing (though I did), but because I looked real. Solid. Like someone with a heart that wasn’t running a marathon all day.

Even my skin changed. My hairline started filling in. Baby hairs on my forehead. My cheeks looked flushed instead of hollow. I looked like a woman. With hips. With boobs. With a body that felt safe to live in.

I didn’t change my diet. I didn’t start working out. All I did was stop using lemon balm. And yet somehow, something inside me reset.

I went online to look up if anyone else had gone through this, and the deeper I dug, the weirder it got. There’s actual research out there — stuff buried in plant medicine texts and old PubMed papers — saying lemon balm can suppress thyroid activity.

That it interferes with TSH binding. That it slows conversion of T4 to T3. That it’s calming not just in a chill-out way, but in a hormonal way.

I wasn’t taking meds. I wasn’t following any protocol. I just accidentally did something my doctors never could.

I felt normal. I felt alive.

And then came the voice in my head: “But what if this is all in your head?”

So I asked the internet.

And the answers rolled in.

“I’ve been using lemon balm too — it’s the only thing that helps.” “My mom’s Graves went into remission without treatment.” “You probably had hyperthyroidism for years and didn’t know it.” “You need to get bloodwork and talk to an endocrinologist — now.”

One person told me that lemon balm blocks thyroid antibodies in Graves patients. Another quoted Tilgner’s text on how it impacts thyroid hormone conversion. Someone else sent me a case study from PubMed about two patients treated with Melissa officinalis and Lycopus who regained full thyroid balance.

I was stunned. Why had no one told me any of this before?

Why had I been walking around with every red flag of an autoimmune endocrine disorder and no one had taken it seriously?

Why did it take a tea I bought for sleep to help me feel human?

I’m not saying lemon balm cured me.

I’m not even sure I’m cured.

But for the first time in my life, I’m not obsessing over calories. I’m not freezing under five blankets. I’m not lying awake with my pulse in my ears. I’m not scared of mirrors or spoons or test results.

I feel… solid. Here.

And that’s something I’ve never felt before.

If you’ve ever lived in a body that felt like a trap, I see you.

If you’ve ever had doctors brush off your symptoms, or chalk everything up to anxiety, I see you.

If you’ve ever stumbled on something natural that helped more than prescriptions ever did — yeah, I see you too.

I’m not saying lemon balm is the answer for everyone.

But maybe it’s a place to start asking better questions.

I’m writing more about this in the next issue of my newsletter.

Not just my story, but:

What the research says about lemon balm + thyroid health

How herbs like Lycopus and Ashwagandha interact with hormones

What you should know before trying lemon balm if you have thyroid issues

A downloadable “Thyroid Tracker” to log your own symptoms and progress is already in progress.

📬 Subscribe for free here: modernpainrelief.org

Maybe this isn’t a miracle. But it feels like one to me.

— Maya