3 HIDDEN FACTS ABOUT HEALING YOUR FATIGUE! [FFYH Episode 3]

I don’t know anyone nowadays who doesn’t answer affirmatively to dealing with some kind of stress. The question really is for how long? For some people it’s been low to moderate stress for quite a long time and for others it’s been high stress in repetitive episodes. No matter what kind of stress you have experienced, at some point your adrenal glands will suffer……

 

Click below to listen to the podcast!

3 HIDDEN FACTS ABOUT HEALING YOUR FATIGUE!

You can listen to the article here.

 

I don’t know anyone nowadays who doesn’t answer affirmatively to dealing with some kind of stress.  The question really is for how long?  For some people it’s been low to moderate stress for quite a long time and for others it’s been high stress in repetitive episodes.  No matter what kind of stress you have experienced, at some point your adrenal glands will suffer.

The underlying stress induced biochemical changes that are occurring in your body that  not only lead to fatigue that you may or may not recognize are the same chemical changes that can be at the core of your resistance to losing fat (especially your belly fat)  even though you eat well, your erratic energy patterns that might make you get a second productivity wind at night or food cravings that just seem like they’ve got you by the tail!

All of these issues can be coming from some stage of adrenal dysfunction which has to be found and fixed before you can really attend to resolving the other related health conditions!

What’s in between Addison’s Disease and Cushing’s Syndrome?

Both Addison’s and Cushing’s are medical diagnoses of adrenal pathology, Addison’s being not enough adrenal output and Cushing’s being too much output.  Your doctor can diagnose these for you but what about the large grey zone of suboptimal adrenal function that lies between these diagnoses that can be present for long periods of time without ever being found?  I call it the grey zone of suboptimal function because traditional medical practitioners don’t know to look for it, there isn’t a formal diagnostic name or medical code for it and yet these less than optimal adrenal levels can contribute to serious shifts in your chemistry that can account for growing abdominal fat, out of control inflammation, insomnia, depression……..the list goes on!

How do I know if I am in the grey zone of dysfunction?

The primary adrenal hormone that is assessed is cortisol and that can be done with a fasting morning blood draw, a 24 hour urine collection or multiple salivary samples. Although the 24 hour urine test tells you about your total cortisol output for the day which is much more information than just an early morning blood cortisol will give you, it still doesn’t give the circadian rhythm of cortisol output which is so important to see when it comes to assessing the brain’s communication with the adrenals or the adrenal’s normal high to low shift of daily cortisol output.  The salivary sampling test gives you all of this information which allows you to know the stage of adrenal fatigue that you are in within the grey zone of dysfunction.  Normalizing the different stages of dysfunction requires different regimens.

A Breakfast of organic fruit and yogurt is always better than salty sausage and eggs, right?

Not if you are in Stage 3 of  adrenal decompensation!  A few of the hallmarks of stage 3 adrenal dysfunction are low morning cortisol felt as fatigue no matter how many hours of sleep you’ve had,  difficult to control blood sugar, cravings for salt, sugar and/or spices, irritability, low mood, low blood pressure and a host of other symptoms. Low adrenal hormone output defines this stage and that often results in low sodium levels in the blood.  You might actually crave salt and will feel much better with a bit of salt in the morning.  A protein breakfast is critical in this stage to get blood sugars to rise slowly and to begin stabilizing you for the day, you won’t snack so much through out the day because of constantly dipping brain energy.

These are just a few facts among many about identifying and healing adrenal gland dysfunction.  Among the primary pillars that make up optimal health, balanced hormones are among them and the adrenal hormones are as crucial to creating vibrant health as are the androgens and estrogens that we usually think of first  when it comes to hormone balance.

I am passionate about helping people sleuth out the reason for their persistent health issues and finally fix them which is why I am including a section on this topic of adrenal health within my upcoming class:  Manage Your Energy, Master Your Health!™ on May 7th, Corte Madera, CA. 

KNEE BONEʼS CONNECTED TO THE……..HIP BONE, HIP BONEʼS CONNECTED TO THE…………..INTESTINE? [FFYH Episode 2]

Yes, you read that right! In the human body, it’s all connected, whether by bones, muscles or other soft tissues or fluids. All bodily structures can influence each other through tension and force patterns that are created, for example, through the system of joints that the song refers to…..

 

Click below to listen to the podcast!

KNEE BONEʼS CONNECTED TO THE……..HIP BONE, HIP BONEʼS CONNECTED TO THE…………..INTESTINE?

You can listen to the article here.

 

Yes, you read that right! In the human body, it’s all connected, whether by bones, muscles or other soft tissues or fluids. All bodily structures can influence each other through tension and force patterns that are created, for example, through the system of joints that the song refers to. There are also connections between the less obvious ‘soft articulations’ as we say in orthopedic manual therapy. Examples of soft ‘joints’ would be the upper portion of the stomach or liver as it lies just under the breathing diaphragm or the kidneys that glide behind the membrane that lies toward the back of your abdomen. There are also numerous mixed connections in the body between a soft surface and a hard surface such as your brain inside the skull, or your lungs against the ribs or your intestines resting inside your pelvic bones. So it isn’t just the influence of one bone to another through the joints as you know them but actually mechanical communication occurs between all structures in the body no matter of their density.

Knee pain is probably only 2nd to spinal pain among the most common pain complaints that I see in my office. After 30 years of clinical practice you can imagine the amount of knee pain that I have witnessed and you might think the most difficult cases have been the ones that have involved the most trauma such as compound spiral thigh fractures or triple ligament ruptures. But in fact, the more difficult knee pain to solve is when there hasn’t been any mechanical trauma at all! This is actually critical information in the knee pain owner’s history and immediately alerts me to look for other structures and systems that are not functioning optimally and could be contributing to their knee pain.

Certainly, if the hip or lower back were not in good alignment, it’s a no brainer that stress and strain at the knee could result. What is less obvious and rarely considered by your doctor and particularly by your orthopedic specialist is the fact that your colon or large intestine may be the source of your unrelenting knee pain. How can that be? Well, if you can accept that all structures in the body that sit next to each other can create influential tension patterns among themselves, then you can realize that an unhappy intestine can create an abnormal tension or improper movement pattern with your hip bone which, in turn, produces strained motion at the knee.

If you are someone who suffers from unexplained and unresolved knee pain, your MRI scan has negative findings and you haven’t suffered any trauma, perhaps someone needs to be assessing the functional health of your intestine and asking you questions about your food choices, your elimination pattern, the quality of your bowel movements and your hydration. It’s an amazing and wonderful experience to alleviate someone’s chronic constipation, irritable bowel or frequent loose stools and find that their long standing knee pain vanishes as well.

I’ve given you a fairly simple example of a soft structure having a mechanical influence on neighboring bone structures, but in reality, it can get much more complex than that where structures at even greater distance are the source of pain, unhealthy biochemistry can be creating an abnormal environment throughout the system and invisible nerve impulses from elevated stress levels may be communicating a core message of danger. So, if you’re still trying to imagine how systems and structures far removed from the knee could actually be creating pain in the knee, it might help to remember how you felt on a turbulent flight with screaming babies or bickering teens seated a few rows away from you! What, you didn’t have a good flight? They were 5 rows away!