Our bodies find it difficult to deal with the stresses of modern life. The amount that we have to try and pack into any given day is often overwhelming and we find ourselves sleeping less and working longer hours as we try and balance our jobs with our family responsibilities and our dwindling social life. One of the first things to go is our exercise regime and we make this situation worse by turning to convenience foods, in the mistaken belief that we do not have time to prepare a good diet. Lack of exercise and poor nutrition will lead to additional stresses and strains on the body and it’s hardly surprising that things start to go wrong. This is when adrenal fatigue can become evident, a little known and poorly diagnosed condition that is linked to the adrenal glands, miniature organs near the kidneys, which are nevertheless very important. After some years of unhealthy lifestyle habits and crazy schedules, the telltale signs of failure start to creep in.
We have to remember that our body was basically “designed” over the centuries to function according to basic primitive needs. We needed to eat, we needed to sleep and we needed to fight, if necessary. Today is a much different story, especially when you consider that we eat very nutritionally deficient foods, bring so many toxins into our bodies and don’t repair ourselves correctly by sleeping as we should. We should be resting even more and demanding nutritional excellence, if we are to survive, this way.
Before we know it, chronic fatigue begins. Our blood sugar starts to get out of balance and our adrenal glands are unable to help them combat stress. The stress hormones overrun our nervous system, thyroid and brain function are impaired and our immunity is vulnerable. We are unable to regenerate our adrenal glands due to lack of sleep; with such a poor diet, food sensitivities result in hormonal imbalance and an inability to stop inflammation and fend off attacks.
Most people will not notice these symptoms, certainly not enough to look into them further. They may feel run down, but attribute this to the hectic lifestyle and think it is just a consequence of the way that life is, these days. They do not recognize their low levels of energy as a problem and think that if they eat a quick, convenient, “junk” meal or dive into the gym for 30 minutes that this will be okay, not realizing that they are just putting even more strain on their adrenal glands.
One of the most important building blocks for hormone composition in the body is pregnolone. When we are rundown and overstressed, the body uses pregnolone to make cortisol to handle stress. As the body becomes more stressed, additional cortisol is stolen from testosterone or DHEA, aggravating an already serious situation.
What’s the answer? Just think about leading a slower life, having plenty of sleep, going to bed and waking up with the sun, eating very nutritionally and working out often. Is this too much to ask, or too difficult?
Tags: Health, Chronic Fatigue, adrenal fatigue
