Grey’s Anatomy star Camilla Luddington assured fans that she’s focused on “self-care” following her recent Hashimoto’s disease diagnosis.
“It’s still new to me,” Luddington, 42, told People in an interview published on Saturday, October 4. “I got the diagnosis at the beginning of summer, so I’m fresh into this journey. I am on Levothyroxine, which is a thyroid medicine, and I can tell you that a lot of things have changed.”
Luddington — who plays Dr. Jo Wilson on the ABC medical drama — announced on her Grey’s Anatomy costar Jessica Capshaw’s “Call It What It Is” podcast on August 6 that she’d recently been diagnosed with the autoimmune disorder.
According to the Mayo Clinic, Hashimoto’s disease develops when “the immune system attacks healthy tissues,” which can cause “the death of the thyroid’s hormone-producing cells.” Frequent symptoms include fatigue and sluggishness, sleepiness, muscle weakness and aches, joint pain and stiffness, lack of concentration and depression, among others.
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Luckily, Luddington assured the outlet that her health has noticeably improved since she was officially diagnosed.
“I feel like I have so much less inflammation,” she said. “I was very puffy all the time, not knowing why I was exhausted. I was not working out. I hadn’t seen a workout class in years, and I’m back at Barry’s bootcamp lifting weights. So I feel more myself. I feel like I have more energy for work, for my family.”
The actress went on, “One thing that I couldn’t understand was I had a lot of brain fog, and now I understand that when your thyroid is sort of all over the place, that’s what that can feel like. The exhaustion of brain fog. So just literally being able to be present with whoever on set, with my family, is a huge difference.”
Luddington and her husband, Matthew Alan, share two children: daughter Hayden, 8, and son Lucas Matthew, 5.
When she first announced her diagnosis in August, the actress confirmed that some routine bloodwork helped her realize there was more to her “feeling slothy” in recent months.
“Truly, when they said ‘autoimmune disease,’ I was really freaked out, and then when they said it’s really common, I was like, ‘That sucks but OK,’” she remembered.
Luddington explained to her costar that she “knew something was up” because she was “f***ing tired all the time,” though she suspected she may have been perimenopausal.
“It makes you feel tired and cold. It can make you foggy, depressed, you can have dry skin, your hair can thin. Basically, you’re feeling gorgeous with Hashimoto’s,” she joked. “It got to the point where, by 11 a.m., it felt like I had chugged some Benadryl and I needed to nap, and it didn’t matter how much sleep I’d gotten the night before. There was no pushing through the day.”
When she finally received a diagnosis, Luddington was prescribed Levothyroxine, a medication that is used to treat thyroid hormone deficiency.
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“I’m still not normal,” Luddington said in August. “I do feel a lot better. My energy’s a lot better. I’m not as puffy anymore.”
Meanwhile, Luddington recently returned to Grey’s Anatomy after a summer hiatus to film the shocking season 22 premiere, where a gas tank explosion in an operating room at Grey Sloan Hospital puts the entire staff’s lives at risk.
“It was incredible. This season is bananas already. I can’t give any spoilers … it was not my favorite premiere to shoot, because it was just so traumatic for everyone involved,” she exclusively told Us Weekly in August.
Grey’s Anatomy airs Thursdays on ABC at 10 p.m. ET. New episodes are available the next day on Hulu.
