Does high adrenaline compensating for lack of cortisol, cause stress and anxiety?

[cc120]

I'm just not sure what causes my terrible stress and anxiety, high or fluctuating cortisol or adrenaline or a combination of both?

[gabkad]

Do you eat sweet things? One of my friends used to come over here, eat a 'real food meal' cooked from scratch with fresh ingredients. But she simply had to have something sweet or her blood sugar went too low and she'd get the shakes and think she was about to die. She'd show up with a box of Tim Bits (little doughnut chunks) and eat a dozen of them before she felt good. I think she has hyperinsulinemia. It causes huge surges of adrenaline with all that entails. Then she'd fall asleep on the sofa. It's terrible. Good thing I'm not her only friend, because I have not invited her for dinner for a while.

I don't cook with sugar and don't bake sweet stuff. Don't buy bakery goods either. Fresh fruit is what I keep at home. No fruit juice especially not pomegranate 'juice' which is the absolute worst. Sometimes the only thing I had to offer her was a couple tablespoons of apricot jam. I've tried my best to explain how she needs to nip this in the bud by starting her day with something that does not stimulate huge insulin surges. She puts in the effort for months at a time, feels much better and then caves in to her habits. It gets so bad, she has to stop at a McDonald's drive in to get her 'fix'. She hates cooking and doesn't enjoy eating vegetables.

I've never been a sugaraholic but when my kids were young, we'd have a treat on Sundays, like apple pie or a nice cake or pastries. Mondays were 'brain fog' days. Once I quit the junk, the brain fog and desire for eating anything sweet went away.

[cc120 in reply to gabkad]

Hi gabkad, I did seem to crave sugary things a couple of years ago, but I did without sugar for a year, then started eating again slowly, and luckily my sugar craving had disappeared. Though I do believe I have low blood sugar, so that if I don't eat for long periods, when I do finally eat, it rises and plummets. Also, wake up early am at times with anxiety, which I believe is caused by cortisol rising to compensate for lack of nutrition.

[cc120]

After googling, I am able to answer my own question here via article: en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Demys...

Demystifying Depression/The Stress System

The effect of the stress hormones on the brain is curious and not what you might expect. The initial surge of adrenaline can make you feel good.

Figure 2: The relationship between adrenaline and cortisol. Please see this chart which I can't post here as is very comprehensive in illustrating what is described below.

Just as your levels of adrenaline start coming down, so rises the amount of cortisol flowing through your veins. Moreover, cortisol has a much larger momentum than adrenaline, which means that even though it builds up slowly, it also takes a long time to go back to normal. And should you constantly be engaging in activities which require adrenaline, so will your levels of cortisol slowly increase. In a sense, you can think of cortisol as a measure of the weighted average of your recent levels of adrenaline. I have tried to capture this feature in Figure 2.

Together with the rise of cortisol and the decrease of adrenaline, come the nasty side-effects of the stress hormones. It is at this moment that you feel bad, anxious, and having lots of negative thoughts. And this is perhaps one of the critical features of stress which flies against common sense: you only feel its bad aspects when your body is stressing down and progressing towards a more relaxed state. When you are building up on adrenaline, in effect stressing up, you might even be feeling good! This explains what is popularly known as the adrenaline rush and the consequent adrenaline crash.

Having too much cortisol flowing through your veins has another nasty side-effect: the recovery time from any adrenaline surge increases. In a sense, the relation between adrenaline and cortisol goes both ways: the adrenaline curve influences the cortisol curve, and vice-versa. Figure 3 tries to capture this reaction effect by showing the adrenaline response curve for three individuals subjected to the same physical exercise. Notice how the more serious the depression (which translates into higher levels of cortisol, as you will soon understand), the longer it takes for the body to go back to normal.

[gabkad in reply to cc120]

Maybe meditation classes and learning how to control breathing may help. Diaphragmatic breathing prevents adrenaline release. Upper chest breathing causes adrenaline release and then the cascade you describe.

I took hatha yoga classes from a true yogini. After a year I was breathing differently all the time and it kept me calm. Then my daughter and I attended meditation classes with her. It has helped.

[gabkad in reply to gabkad]

Oh yeah, I also read Full Catastrophe Living. That's a more clinical book than others by the same author whose name right now escapes my semi senile brain. Jon something or other.

[cc120 in reply to gabkad]

I've given in and finally ordered some Seriphos. I just can't stand the adrenaline, cortisol surges. Adrenaline subsides but cortisol takes days to go away, that's assuming that the cause of stress has been removed, otherwise, just keeps up at a high level. Can't relax, can't think straight, can't sleep, making me worse and worse each day.

[cc120 in reply to gabkad]

Hi gabkad, this is a very good tip, thank you, as I when stressed do find I'm not breathing deeply or well, and will try to get myself into the habit of diaphragmatic breathing.

[cc120]

Also in regard waking early ams and compliments to Roslin:

canaryclub.org/cortisol-str...

Sleep disturbances: Cortisol production follows a curve from highest levels around 8am, dropping throughout the day until the lowest levels are reached about 11pm. In early stages of adrenal fatigue the body compensates with high night time cortisol. In this case the person finds it difficult to relax from the stress of the day and has trouble going to sleep. High night-time cortisol results in reduced REM sleep which is neither restful nor restorative. This can lead to depression and reduced energy levels the next day. In later stages of adrenal fatigue, the body may produce adrenaline ("fight or flight" hormone) in an attempt to compensate for low cortisol.

[cc120]

From another thread, but relates well: healthunlocked.com/thyroidu...

CarolynB Administrator

It does sound like it could be an adrenal problem. The diarrhoea could be a symptom of high adrenaline compensating for lack of cortisol. If you have low or high cortisol levels T4 doesn't tend to get converted very well, causing high T4 levels. Low cortisol can also cause a low TSH that is not reflective of your thyroid function. If your TSH is low, conversion to T3 is usually slower too.

You could be right that the T4 is just building up in your system due to it not being converted. If you could get your cortisol levels checked this would at least point you in the right direction. If you have adrenal insufficiency, Dr S will probably want to prescribe T3 only from what I hear. Your body will be able to use the T3 and the presence of T3 will support cortisol production too.

There is also a possibility that you have low iron and/or B12. These are believed to help thyroid hormones get into the cells so they can be used. If you have deficiencies in these, your thyroid hormones would probably build up in your blood. So this is something else to look into.

NDT can help if you take it in accordance with Paul Robinson's Circadian method. I haven't tried this but many have and have found it extremely successful. Dr S may prefer T3 though.

It seems that anything containing direct T3 can help with adrenals (T3 is needed to make cortisol) so I would have thought NDT would be better than levo.

I'm not a doctor but I can tell you that I am better on NDT than levo. I had at least partially sorted out my adrenals before hand but NDT does suit me much better.

stopthethyroidmadness.com/t...

[anamnesis]

I sometimes take sage drops in liquid form (Menosan), when my cortisol is playing up, to calm the nervous system into parasympathetic mode. Really effective. You need to be at rest when taking it to allow the heart to slow down..you can actually feel it 'flip' into a steady rate. So caution is advised if you have any secondary issues there. You'll feel like you spent the day at the beach, calm and relaxed! Also helps with the god damn sweating which has nearly cost me my social life!

[cc120 in reply to anamnesis]

Hi anamnesis, thank you very much, I must confess to having already ordered Seriphos, but will certainly be considering Menosan for its benefits of controling sweats/sweating, sleeplessness, mood swings and promote physical and emotional well-being. Contains phytoestrogens that balance hormones, according to consumerhealthanswers.com/m... -and thank you for your tip on how to use it.