Chances are rather good you've heard the news that you've got a thyroid -- but it’s likely that also pretty decent you are not completely up to date on exactly why you might have one. These two hormones, calcitonin and parathyroid hormone, work in tandem to help keep your calcium level in balance. Assuming your thyroid made the trip right all, it will have set up camp right in front of the trachea (commonly called the windpipe). The initial the first is triiodothyronine and the next one is thyroxine (or tetraiodothyronine) -- but to their friends, they're known respectively as T3 and T4. Whenever your thyroid's not around to rev up your metabolism, a complete large amount of things can fail. The thyroid has four teensy glands called the parathyroid glands also, that are embedded within the relative back from the thyroid and produce the hormone creatively called parathyroid hormone. We all know how important calcium is to prevent diseases like osteoporosis, but an excessive amount of a very important thing isn't ideal either. Want to find out if your thyroid's doing fine in the ring? If you've been dealing with several items on the list, chances are you may choose to check in with your doctor for some tests. They both have deliciously unpronounceable names, but luckily, there is also abbreviations if you are not within the mood for a tongue twister. The th­yroid's main job would be to produce two very special hormones. ­If you're an adolescent, you probably wish everybody would shut up about hormones, but they're vital for the body to operate properly. Excited yet? The list continues with pale, dry skin; a puffy face; hoarse voice; raised chlesterol; inexplicable Weight Loss Before And After gain; tender, stiff and swollen muscles and joints; muscle weakness and more. It weighs about less than an ounce usually, but it sure can pack a punch when it comes to your health. Let's go over how the thyroid affects your well-being, through the standpoint of hyperthyroidism first. Once the old thyroid conks out, trouble brews. On another page, there are always a couple of great links if you've got health and well-being in your thoughts. However before we get into everything medical mumbo jumbo, let's take a step back for a second. ­When someone has hyperthyroidism -- this means their thyroid is putting in some serious overtime and producing hormones a touch too enthusiastically -- a lot can fail with the body. Roizen, Oz and Michael, Mehmet. It gets its marching orders in the pituitary gland, which answers to the area of the brain called the hypothalamus. Require a hint? Thyroids can be found in peoples' throats right below the larynx (also known as the voicebox), although in very rare instances they are able to migrate while a person is in fetus-mode. In case your thyroid is being conducted a rampage, you might have what's known as hyperthyroidism; whether it's slacking off, you have hypothyroidism. It isn't until things start going wrong with their thyroid that a lot of people notice the amount of it was doing for them to begin with. On another page, we'll learn what an unruly thyroid affects and what you can do to turn it around. The hormones also have a tactile submit stimulating heart muscle contraction and nerve function, increasing the utilization of nutrients and cholesterol, ensuring normal growth and brain development -- some important stuff pretty! This type of thyroid condition can cause someone to feel increased fatigue, forgetfulness, sluggishness and depression, have brittle nails and hair, be more sensitive to cold and feel constipated. Take a couple tyrosine amino acids, slap on additional ingredients and you've got yourself some hormones ready to hit the town. Can you point to your thyroid? But instead of memos to conduct all of this communication, the physical body uses hormones. The technique behind the moniker madness stems from the known proven fact that T3 gets three atoms of iodine, while T4 gets -- ready for this? Barnes & Noble Books. Like mailmen, they deliver messages (hormones) between themselves along with other parts of your system so all those tiny cells are regulated and functioning at the proper levels. A variety of hormones are produced in the many glands round the physical body; many of them affect many types of others and cells are more specialized. Shaped a little like a butterfly's wings, the thyroid has two lobes that curl round the trachea connected by a narrow isthmus (think of the strip of land split from the Panama Canal). On the other side of the coin is hypothyroidism. In the end, initially it may look like an unimportant organ, however the thyroid is actually crucial for the body's metabolic function -- and an unbalanced metabolism means poor health in general. Remember, the endocrine glands don't normally output massive quantities of hormones; a little goes quite a distance. Go to the next page to learn the basic operations of the glorious gland. If you've got a number of the symptoms in the list, it can't hurt to chat up a health care provider to see if she or he thinks your thyroid may be the culprit. Without the thyroid bossing everybody around, plenty of work around the plant wouldn't have finished -- or at least wouldn't depend on quality standards. Now, some of these symptoms are more serious than others, but at the same time, many of them are issues most people would associate with regular aging, a chronic lack of sleep or various other routine problem. Don't go thinking the thyroid is the top dog, however. A lot of the cells in the thyroid are called follicular cells, but there are others calledparafollicular cells (or C cells) which produce another important hormone called calcitonin. If your thyroid's acting wacky, you might create a goiter; be sweatier than normal; feel nervous, irritable and anxious; have tremors in your hands; be sensitive to heat; experience continual muscle and fatigue weakness; have a problem sleeping; grow hair that's increasingly brittle -- the list continues on. You'll only need a little more trouble living through your day without your trusty coffee, or you may look into the mirror and see that person appears a bit puffier and much more aged than it used to or you can get an ache in muscle tissue even with just walking a brief distance. Starr, Cecie and Taggart, Ralph. Like door-to-door salesmen or restaurant flyer distributors, the hormones visit every single cell, knock on the entranceway and tell the cell if it requires to be consuming more oxygen and nutrients -- thereby stepping up its metabolic rate -- or vice versa. After a while, you'll start to feel miserable on a regular basis without even knowing why. So, remember you can find tests for thyroid dysfunction and a number of treatment options can be found. If that happens, the person ends up along with his or her thyroid by the back of his / her tongue or completely down in his / her chest. You'll really understand why your thyroid is indeed important now. In general, hormones are molecules that signal the cells of the physical body to perform certain actions. When someone experiences hyperthyroidism, he or she can have a number of symptoms, most of them rather unpleasant. Ready to find out how these microscopic masterminds impact you in the bigger scheme of things? That's where calcitonin will come in; it decreases just how much calcium is within your blood, while parathyroid hormone works to beef those levels up. What's even sneakier is you usually don't awaken one morning with every symptom around the list in full-fledged severity. The human body operates such as a complex factory, and like any factory, there are many assembly lines, machines and moving parts, not to mention all of the workers going about their business. Wilson, Doug. "Thyroid Guide." University of Maryland Medical Center.