Adrenal Fatigue

[Guest guest]

This is one good article explaining the way the HPA system works, plus why adrenal testing is just as legitimate, if not better, than blood testing. And it is not true that testing is not important at all, it is.

http://www.biomatrixmd.com/standard/adrenal_stress.html#SEC1A

[Guest guest]

What I meant is that if you know you are having adrenal problems,

testing will not make any difference in that knowledge. If you go and

read a lot of literature on the adrenals and testing, what you will

find is that there are many problems with testing and it frequently

misses problems with the adrenals. For example, one problem that

researchers will tell you about testing is that the act of going in to

the doctor or nurse to get the test will actually cause sick adrenals

to put out enough cortisol due to the stress of the activity. Cortisol

production during the day is dynamic and varies hugely, depending on

your activities. Frequently, in adrenal fatigue, the adrenals can

muster what is needed in the morning, but become depleted of hormones

from it and then later in the day they cannot meet demands.

Literature is full of the problems with one time testing and even the

24 hour adrenal test has it's problems due to the dynamic nature of

adrenal function. For example, just walking for 15 minutes or going up

a flight or two of stairs to get to the doctor will raise adrenal

output by 5 mg or more. But, then within one or two hours later

cortisol will drop to next to nothing and you will get the shakes and

feel sick to your stomach, because that flight of stairs depleted the

weak adrenal of it's stores of hormones. Literature is full of the

problems with the ACTH stimulation test and how it can make sick

adrenals function properly just for the test, because the test itself

if like creating a chemical emergency that forces the adrenals that

otherwise were not working well to do one last hurrah.

Endocrinologists bemoan the problems with tests and how a person with

obvious symptoms of adrenal hypofunction will test normally on tests.

So, if you have obvious symptoms of adrenal weakness, then why spend

the money on the test? To convince a stupid doctor to prescribe

medications? I guess you have to do what you have to do and maybe you

will get lucky and your adrenal situation will be low at the time they

make the blood draw.

A person cannot become hyperthyroid on low doses of thyroid

medication. The adult healthy thyroid gland makes 180mcg to 220 mcg of

thyroid hormone a day. When you take 50mcg of thyroid hormone in a

pill, the pituitary is aware of the outside addition of hormone. It

monitors the blood at all times. So, it knows you have added outside

thyroid and it will adjust TSH down to slow down your thyroid gland by

the amount taken. So, in other words, it will slow the thyroid gland

down by 50mcg and tell it to produce another 130 to 170 more mcg or

less to get total daily production of thyroid hormone to the 180 to

222 that is needed. So, taking thyroid is not like a vitamin. It does

not add on top of your own thyroid gland production, but is factored

in by the brain and the brain makes adjustments to thyroid output to

protect against overdose. So, it is not possible to have thyroid

overdose at any dose less than daily production due to regulation of

the brain and it's ability to slow thyroid gland production by the

amount of hormone taken in pills.

So, any time a person has a bad reaction to thyroid, it means two

things: They have weak adrenal function and they need thyroid hormone

and are definitely hypothyroid.

The reason for a bad reaction has to do with how circulating thyroid

levels control the size and function of the adrenal glands. Thyroid

hormone stimulates the adrenal gland. If thyroid is too low, then the

whole system slows down and this slows the liver. Slowing the liver

slows the breakdown and removal of adrenal hormones keeping the

lowered levels in the system longer. A hypothyroid slowed system uses

less adrenal hormones as well.

The minute you start to take thyroid and raise your metabolic rate up,

you are putting a huge stress on the adrenals. First, you are speeding

up the metabolic rate and this makes the body need more adrenal

hormones. Second, you are increasing the natural breakdown and removal

of adrenal hormones from the liver. Third, you are increasing

circulating thyroid levels in the blood and this increases stimulation

of the adrenal glands. The end result is that within a short period

the adrenal glands become exhausted.

They then go into a cyclic type of behavior. The adrenal glands store

hormones in the gland for stress and rainy days so to speak. When you

start thyroid with weak adrenal function, the adrenals are forced to

use up all their stores. When this happens, then they stop production

of hormones until they can rebuild them. This causes blood levels of

cortisol to go too low. The brain immediately sees this problem and

starts pumping out tons of ACTH to tell the adrenals to get to work.

But the adrenals can't do anything until they can build up some

hormone. So, ACTH builds up in the blood higher and higher.

Eventually, the adrenals are able to restore some hormones to the

gland, but then they see that there is LOTS of ACTH in the blood and

thinking like it is an emergency, they dump all the hormone they just

managed to make. This them will drive up cortisol too high sometimes.

Once again they become depleted and must stop production temporarily.

So it goes like this all day, with big ups and downs. So, what results

you get on your test depends on when your blood was drawn with respect

to this wide up and down function. So, you have about a 50% chance of

coming back with normal results. This wide up and down swing of

function of stressed adrenals causes lots of problems, like headache,

hypoglycemia (feeling hungry when you shouldn't) insomnia, the shakes,

symptoms of too much thyroid (thyroid will build up in the blood and

not be able to work in the absence of cortisol), emotional

instability, irrational anger, crying jags, nausea, vomiting, and on

and on. It isn't pretty, but it is adrenal caused.

The point I was making was that her only options are to reduce stress

hugely or do temporary adrenal support. She can do temporary adrenal

support without the doctor. IsoCort has 2-1/2 mg of cortisone per

tablet. Licorice root tea (1 teaspoon) is roughly equivlent to 4 mg of

cortisone.

Tish

[Guest guest]

I don't totally agree with this statement. If it were true, then we would all have to be on full replacement dose. I take 100mcg Levo (or equivalent combination) and my thyroid supplies what it can. My TSH has gone from 62.0 to 1.18 which I think is a nice respectable number. My T4 is top of range and my T3 is midrange.

I do agree that when you get to that point, adding more just causes your thyroid to produce less. When I switched to Armour, my TSH was pushed down tenfold to .118 while the T4 and T3 numbers remained consistent. I did however have many hyper symptoms and moved on to my current combination of 50mcg Levo and 3/4 grain Armour to relieve them. I had labs drawn this morning, so I'll post them next week.

I've heard many, many stories from folk with hyper symptoms from too much thyroid medication. Am I missing something??? ... Judy

The adult healthy thyroid gland makes 180mcg to 220 mcg of thyroid hormone a day. When you take 50mcg of thyroid hormone in apill, the pituitary is aware of the outside addition of hormone. It monitors the blood at all times. So, it knows you have added outsidethyroid and it will adjust TSH down to slow down your thyroid gland by the amount taken. So, in other words, it will slow the thyroid glanddown by 50mcg and tell it to produce another 130 to 170 more mcg or less to get total daily production of thyroid hormone to the 180 to222 that is needed. So, taking thyroid is not like a vitamin. It does not add on top of your own thyroid gland production, but is factoredin by the brain and the brain makes adjustments to thyroid output to protect against overdose.

__________________________________________________

[Guest guest]

This is exactly why I think that the saliva tests are best, done in the

comfort of your own home and in your own time, without the influx of medical

personnel and being stuck with needles. Ever since I found out about and

studied the use of these saliva tests (from reputable sources, that is), I

have believed in their use. I get white coat blood pressure just THINKING

about being under the eyes at a clinic with all that going on, and it's

pretty obvious that, if my adrenals have any cortisol to be dumped, that's

probably when they're going to be dumped. The saliva tests, on the other

hand, 4 times a day, would at least let me know whether the cortisol was

dumped, and, maybe hrs later, 0'ed out to nothing or whatever. It is pretty

obvious to me that I more than likely also have a DHEA deficiency, as I'm in

my mid fifties, and I am now taking 5 mgs of that, but what I don't know is

how that ratio is to my cortisol, so I know that I really need to get some

sort of idea what those ratios are, and at what general, rough time of day,

even if it was when I was under stress and did a dump. I'm thinking the

saliva tests are the best way. I do know that the ratio of DHEA to

cortisol has some importance, from everything that I've read over the last 2

or 3 yrs or so. These hormones really do an intricate dance around each

other, and of course, one or two of them even turns into the other one, if

needed. It can get complicated without knowing those ratios or what they

are all converting to eventually, as needed, or even as not needed.

Re: Adrenal Fatigue

> What I meant is that if you know you are having adrenal problems,

> testing will not make any difference in that knowledge. If you go and

> read a lot of literature on the adrenals and testing, what you will

> find is that there are many problems with testing and it frequently

> misses problems with the adrenals. For example, one problem that

> researchers will tell you about testing is that the act of going in to

> the doctor or nurse to get the test will actually cause sick adrenals

> to put out enough cortisol due to the stress of the activity. Cortisol

> production during the day is dynamic and varies hugely, depending on

> your activities. Frequently, in adrenal fatigue, the adrenals can

> muster what is needed in the morning, but become depleted of hormones

> from it and then later in the day they cannot meet demands.

>

> Literature is full of the problems with one time testing and even the

> 24 hour adrenal test has it's problems due to the dynamic nature of

> adrenal function. For example, just walking for 15 minutes or going up

> a flight or two of stairs to get to the doctor will raise adrenal

> output by 5 mg or more. But, then within one or two hours later

> cortisol will drop to next to nothing and you will get the shakes and

> feel sick to your stomach, because that flight of stairs depleted the

> weak adrenal of it's stores of hormones. Literature is full of the

> problems with the ACTH stimulation test and how it can make sick

> adrenals function properly just for the test, because the test itself

> if like creating a chemical emergency that forces the adrenals that

> otherwise were not working well to do one last hurrah.

> Endocrinologists bemoan the problems with tests and how a person with

> obvious symptoms of adrenal hypofunction will test normally on tests.

>

> So, if you have obvious symptoms of adrenal weakness, then why spend

> the money on the test? To convince a stupid doctor to prescribe

> medications? I guess you have to do what you have to do and maybe you

> will get lucky and your adrenal situation will be low at the time they

> make the blood draw.

>

> A person cannot become hyperthyroid on low doses of thyroid

> medication. The adult healthy thyroid gland makes 180mcg to 220 mcg of

> thyroid hormone a day. When you take 50mcg of thyroid hormone in a

> pill, the pituitary is aware of the outside addition of hormone. It

> monitors the blood at all times. So, it knows you have added outside

> thyroid and it will adjust TSH down to slow down your thyroid gland by

> the amount taken. So, in other words, it will slow the thyroid gland

> down by 50mcg and tell it to produce another 130 to 170 more mcg or

> less to get total daily production of thyroid hormone to the 180 to

> 222 that is needed. So, taking thyroid is not like a vitamin. It does

> not add on top of your own thyroid gland production, but is factored

> in by the brain and the brain makes adjustments to thyroid output to

> protect against overdose. So, it is not possible to have thyroid

> overdose at any dose less than daily production due to regulation of

> the brain and it's ability to slow thyroid gland production by the

> amount of hormone taken in pills.

>

> So, any time a person has a bad reaction to thyroid, it means two

> things: They have weak adrenal function and they need thyroid hormone

> and are definitely hypothyroid.

>

> The reason for a bad reaction has to do with how circulating thyroid

> levels control the size and function of the adrenal glands. Thyroid

> hormone stimulates the adrenal gland. If thyroid is too low, then the

> whole system slows down and this slows the liver. Slowing the liver

> slows the breakdown and removal of adrenal hormones keeping the

> lowered levels in the system longer. A hypothyroid slowed system uses

> less adrenal hormones as well.

>

> The minute you start to take thyroid and raise your metabolic rate up,

> you are putting a huge stress on the adrenals. First, you are speeding

> up the metabolic rate and this makes the body need more adrenal

> hormones. Second, you are increasing the natural breakdown and removal

> of adrenal hormones from the liver. Third, you are increasing

> circulating thyroid levels in the blood and this increases stimulation

> of the adrenal glands. The end result is that within a short period

> the adrenal glands become exhausted.

>

> They then go into a cyclic type of behavior. The adrenal glands store

> hormones in the gland for stress and rainy days so to speak. When you

> start thyroid with weak adrenal function, the adrenals are forced to

> use up all their stores. When this happens, then they stop production

> of hormones until they can rebuild them. This causes blood levels of

> cortisol to go too low. The brain immediately sees this problem and

> starts pumping out tons of ACTH to tell the adrenals to get to work.

> But the adrenals can't do anything until they can build up some

> hormone. So, ACTH builds up in the blood higher and higher.

>

> Eventually, the adrenals are able to restore some hormones to the

> gland, but then they see that there is LOTS of ACTH in the blood and

> thinking like it is an emergency, they dump all the hormone they just

> managed to make. This them will drive up cortisol too high sometimes.

> Once again they become depleted and must stop production temporarily.

>

> So it goes like this all day, with big ups and downs. So, what results

> you get on your test depends on when your blood was drawn with respect

> to this wide up and down function. So, you have about a 50% chance of

> coming back with normal results. This wide up and down swing of

> function of stressed adrenals causes lots of problems, like headache,

> hypoglycemia (feeling hungry when you shouldn't) insomnia, the shakes,

> symptoms of too much thyroid (thyroid will build up in the blood and

> not be able to work in the absence of cortisol), emotional

> instability, irrational anger, crying jags, nausea, vomiting, and on

> and on. It isn't pretty, but it is adrenal caused.

>

> The point I was making was that her only options are to reduce stress

> hugely or do temporary adrenal support. She can do temporary adrenal

> support without the doctor. IsoCort has 2-1/2 mg of cortisone per

> tablet. Licorice root tea (1 teaspoon) is roughly equivlent to 4 mg of

> cortisone.

>

> Tish