Pain, Pain, Go Away!

While much of the country is probably suffering through too much cortisol, I think I am finally making enough. I quit taking it a few days ago when my face started getting puffy, I gained a couple of pounds that wouldn't budge, and I noticed my heart beating a few times: those are clear signs of overdoing hydrocortisone. I'm feeling back to normal now and my face doesn't look like the Pillsbury dough boy.  What finally brought this about? It could be that about a month ago, I really started cleaning up my diet. I haven't been perfect, but I stopped going out for lunch at work and getting anything from the deli except meat, cheese and roast chickens. I stopped buying chocolate chips under the pretense of making low-carb cookies. I also bumped up my kelp tablets to four per day and added L. casei shirota bacteria to my yogurt. After some five years, when I went through an incredible amount of stress with parents, relatives who were worse than useless in helping with thei...

Maybe it was getting rid of a biofilm. Maybe it was the iodine in the kelp pills. Maybe it's the adrenal medicine. Or maybe (probably) I got rid of SIBO last year. Whatever it was (probably all of those), I've gotten my strength back. Over the weekend, I made headway on the garage, mowed the lawn--without stopping!--canned some pasta sauce, baked cookies, did the grocery shopping and got the laundry done.  Three-herb marinara. I took six pounds of roma tomatoes from my garden and blanched, cooled, peeled and chopped them. They went into three-herb marinara, made with basil and oregano I picked in the dark and Italian parsley I went to two stores to buy, along with a dab of brown sugar, balsamic vinegar, salt and pepper.  While it simmered, I took a shower and then baked a big batch of low-carb cookies. I filled the jars with the sauce and a tablespoon of lemon juice, put them in the water bath, then put the second batch of cookies in the oven. I got to bed at midnight. This wa...

Cul-de-sac Commandos Mark and Patty McCloskey of St. Louis.  This has not been a good time to deal with adrenal problems: riots, shootings, and coronavirus concerns in some states. At least I'm in Indianapolis where coronavirus is tanking and protests have been peaceful since rioters were tear-gassed and pepper sprayed. The poor McCloskeys are in St. Louis, which is a violent city even on a good day. One would think they'd have had a plan for a riot--at least, I hope their plan wasn't going outside and shouting at a mob. We should all have a plan these days . Since getting well, I've had to figure out a new dose for my adrenal medicine. Since too much or too little iron, adrenal medicine and thyroid medicine can produce similar symptoms, it's been hard. I'm going to start low and go slow, just like with thyroid dosage. I felt well enough today to get some exercise. It's been so long--years!--since having a regular workout that my muscles are weak. ...

I've got it back, I'm feelin' better every day. Tell all those pencil pushers, better get outta my way. I'm doing well enough that I've worked out the past couple of days and started going for walks at lunch again--once when it was 14F (-10C). I'm cooling off at night now. It's good to put on my winter pajamas and pull up the covers. Adrenal cortex and hydrocortisone FTW! Here's what I've learned from my reading and experience: Minerals=>Adrenals=>Thyroid In other words: Sort out your minerals first: iron, magnesium, potassium and iodine. Salt your food to taste. If you think you have adrenal problems--being tired or wired at the wrong time of day, heart palpitations, frequent colds, sex hormone problems--take a 24-hour cortisol test. Sort out your adrenals--I use Seeking Health adrenal cortex; others use stuff with adrenaline in it, or "adaptogen herbs." The former gave me palpitations; I haven't tried the latter. I...

Changing my adrenal medication has done me some good. I'm now taking one that's just adrenal cortex. That's what the last one was supposed to be, but I'm sure it had adrenaline in it. I've been a lot less jittery and the heart pounding has all but stopped. It was so distracting when I was trying to sleep! I can't quit wholesale--I start catching cold every time I try. Even in the few days after I quit the one and waited for the other to arrive, I got cold and tired. So Saturday I had groceries delivered because I didn't feel like leaving the house. I filled up my online cart with about 20 items, then tried to change my address from work to home. I couldn't. The site said my home and work were in different regions. So I emptied the cart, changed the address, and started again. I got a pop-up message saying I'd changed my address--did I want to change it? I clicked yes, I wanted to change it. When I was ready to check out, there was my work address...

Taking more adrenal and natural desiccated thyroid was a bad idea. I had an instinct Friday morning that I didn't want to take NDT, but I ignored it. All day and part of Saturday, I was jittery and my heart was pounding. I finally decided to follow my instincts, informed by reading and experience. I didn't take any NDT Saturday and didn't take any NDT or adrenal hormones today. I'm feeling better. I also quit doubling up on iron, since I've started feeling hot at night. There are times when it's better to have a specific plan, but this might not be one of them.

Saturday, I quit taking NDT (natural desiccated thyroid) for a while, figuring my problems (pounding heart, feeling hot, lack of energy) were from taking too much. The problems went away, so I was right. Yesterday, I felt great: normal heartbeat, energetic, cheerful...then I went outside after work and felt too cold. My heart started pounding again. I woke up later that night and felt puffiness behind my eyes. This morning I was up a pound and my face was so puffy it looked like Elvis circa 1976. My stomach was rumbling after lunch and sending acid the wrong way. Not wanting to repeat the misery I went through from taking too much NDT, I waited until this afternoon, thought about making absolutely sure my iron and adrenals were straightened out this time, and finally said, screw it, if I don't like taking NDT, I'll stop. So I took 150 mg--and felt better.  My face doesn't look like I need to lay off the peanut butter, bacon and banana sandwiches. What I'm doing now...

Figuring out my endo problems has been hard. Palpitations can be caused by too much or too little potassium, magnesium, iron, adrenaline and T3 (thyroid hormone). Having experimented with the first three, I think I still have too much T3 in my system. That, and I felt a lot better a week ago after taking a break from taking it, then cutting my dose in half. Back when my adrenals were low, eating more carbohydrate made me feel better. It doesn't now. Another sign that the problem is too much T3. Lab tests last week showed almost everything was normal: iron, magnesium, potassium, hemoglobin, and various kidney functions. My fasting glucose was high, though (106); I'm hoping it's because I was in some distress. I'm also hoping that getting my iron straightened out will help downstream functions of adrenals and thyroid. I went about things backwards: first (says Nora Gedgaudas), it's iron, which affects adrenals, which affects thyroid. There's more to it than...

DIYing my adrenal fatigue and low thyroid has been a challenge. At least I'm over the brain fog and can read and think more clearly. After my ears got dry and itchy again--which seems to be a symptom of low thyroid for me--I upped my thyroid dose again. I also lowered my adrenal cortex dose since I was gaining weight, even with the increased NDT (natural desiccated thyroid medicine) and decreased carb intake. The cortisol (an adrenal hormone) will make you gain weight if you take too much. I hope this is the last time I need to up my NDT, since my current dose costs $80 per month. I can't even pay for it with my HSA (health savings account, a pre-tax deal in the US). At least the adrenal cortex is cheap, and hydrocortisone is $5 a tube. The adrenal cortex, which I take in the morning at at noon, started turning me into a morning person. I was up at six doing dishes, vacuuming the house, and packing a lunch. I was tired around 10 PM. Since backing off a little, I'm ba...

I've been taking various adrenal hormones for the past few weeks with mixed results. Overall, it's been positive: they seem to have helped me get over a three-month-long case of bronchitis and I have more energy. Using a dab of hydrocortisone at bedtime has prevented me from grinding my teeth at night. On the downside, the adrenal glandular (containing adrenaline) gives me palpitations if I take too much of it. I've been getting too hot and cold (mostly too hot). Too much hydrocortisone made me puffy and gave me a slight case of acne. Taking adrenal cortex after midday gives me acid reflux and keeps me up at night. (I'm writing this at 4:30 AM.) Your adrenal hormones help with healing, controlling blood sugar, controlling inflammation, and dealing with stress. They make some of your sex hormones. Why is adrenal fatigue apparently becoming more common? Your adrenal hormones are made of cholesterol--including LDL, the "bad" cholesterol. Salt is also importa...

I know I've been saying this for three months...but I think I am finally over my bronchitis. Three cheers for adrenal supplements! I kept using 35mg per day of hydrocortisone cream, until one day last week when I became puffy and gained a couple of pounds. That's a sign you're overdoing the hydrocortisone. I backed off, then started taking adrenal cortex extract that finally arrived. I waited until Saturday to take it because I wanted to be home in case I didn't feel well on it. Saturday morning I woke up with a persistent headache, but today, I felt 42 again . I installed a new car stereo, planted some ferns, cleaned up the yard, fixed the fences--and I'm a little sore because it's been awhile since I worked so hard. Much credit to the book Stop the Thyroid Madness, Updated Revised Edition, for its chapters on treating your adrenals.

I think I finally understand why I've had bronchitis off and on for months, why I had scary heart palpitations for years up until a few days ago, and why I couldn't fast or do well on keto/Atkins induction. The reason is adrenal fatigue. Some call it a made-up illness (there's no insurance code for it), but here are the results of my lab test for adrenal hormones: Green is optimal; my cortisol levels are mostly suboptimal. DHEA is in the tank. My adrenals are clearly at the low end. As Dr. William Jefferies put it, "Patients with mild adrenal deficiency describe wanting to do things but feeling too exhausted to undertake them..." The latter is exactly how I've felt for quite a while.  Cortisol, one of the adrenal hormones, helps you deal with inflammation and stress; it also helps regulate blood sugar, metabolism and immune responses. When my dog Molly died in 2017 and I started breaking out in hives at night, it was probably a lack of cortisol. Wh...