Adrenals Adrainals

So... I've been reading about adrenal fatigue. Why? I have that sort of free time. And I'm wondering why I don't have enough energy to make a maple syrup & bread sandwich, but if I did, I'd make and eat fourteen of them in one sitting.

A few weeks ago all sorts of shit started hitting a big frickin fan. I'll bore you with those details another day, but it was a giant stress shot in the ass.

It was a rough few days, but then things mellowed out somewhat. Now I'm dealing with its aftermath. It's like having a mild case of mono, which if you've ever had mono, even "mild mono" makes you want to sleep for a year.

Even when I get to bed on time or early, I wake up tired. After feeling OK for about an hour, I'm ready to collapse back into bed. When I get in bed at night, I lie awake trying to shut off my brain and it takes forever to get to sleep.

I spend all day dragging my ass wherever I have to drag it, and if I don't have to drag it anywhere, I park it in a chair or on the couch. I feel OK again for about an hour in the evening, then I can't wait to crawl into bed.

Even though the PMS has long since come and gone, I'm craving sweets & carbs like an addict. Way worse than usual. No amount of coffee makes any difference - no jolt whatsoever. And out of nowhere, I'm having trouble with hay fever. I haven't had allergy trouble in years.

The writing project I was excited about a couple of weeks ago is a distant memory. I tried to work on it yesterday and put in maybe half an hour before I had to lie down. I've had headaches - no migraines - but I'd been headache-free for many months. I haven't run in three weeks. Not even to the fridge.

So I Googled "constant fatigue craving sweets" and found a few articles on adrenal fatigue. It makes a lot of sense. After years and years of stress, it seems plausible that at some point the adrenals say Enough! and go on strike.

Then I thought about past stresstivals and how I felt physically in the weeks or months afterward. I remembered at least a few occasions where after dealing with enormously stressful events, there was a time afterward of feeling physically drained and generally unwell. The recovery period seemed to be proportionate to the stressful period - the longer/more stressful the event, the longer it took to recover.

The worst thing I read about adrenal fatigue... you have to avoid sugar and caffeine. How cruel. I'll get back on the Greens Today and keep napping til this passes. I suppose I could see a doctor, but they're full of shit. I bet they'd try to tell me Paxil's been approved for treating doughnut cravings.

More about adrenal fatigue:

• Adrenal Fatigue/Adrenal Exhaustion
• Liz Lipski, PhD on Adrenal Fatigue - Google video (part 1)
• Liz Lipski, PhD on Adrenal Fatigue - Google video (part 2)
• Adrenal Fatigue vs. Low Thyroid symptoms matrix
  
• Project Aware Adrenal Fatigue
• Adrenal Health in Women
  
• Adrenalfatigue.org

Hippie Healthy

I don't want to alarm anyone, but I may be turning into a hippie.

It all started with the olive leaf. I'm still taking it, in small doses, working up to the recommended daily amount, but it feels like something's changed. It could also be age, the possible onset of perimenopause or overexposure to lawn mower fumes.

I found hemp protein at the Organic Market and thought I'd give it a try. Soy is purportedly bad for the thyroid so I'd rather avoid it. I read that some soy isolate powders are processed using hexane - an Erin Brockovich chemical! Gross!

Hemp seems to be an amazing super food. It has all essential amino acids, essential fatty acids, fiber, and it has the right type of branch-chain amino acids, the right ratios, blah, blah, blah... all good stuff - super good.

So far I've used it in fruit smoothies and as a "pesto" sauce on pasta and I love it. As I sit here writing this, I could be cramming blondies down my gullet but I don't want any. I just made them yesterday and they might as well be dirt clods.

I am trying to limit sugar overall and it's true that the less you eat it the less you crave it, but I'm not off it altogether.

The PowerBars, Kashi bars, etc. are all loaded with sugar, as are my beloved almond butter-honey sandwiches and the blondies I just made (I used xylitol instead of sugar, but they have butterscotch in them). But I'm no longer craving cookies & doughnuts like my life depended on them, which sometimes it does. Seriously.

I should add, I've not been drinking for some time - it's too expensive here and I haven't felt like it. Avoiding booze cuts out a ton of sugar & toxins right there, so that's always helpful.

It's like my body is weaning itself off anything unclean or unhealthy. Not going full-on vegetarian, but I'm eating less meat and I feel good. I think I'm feeling better than I have in a while.

Better energy, clearer thinking, and a reduced desire to pick fights with customer service reps. It's still too soon to know what might be going on, but I'm enjoying it whatever it is.

Olive Leaf Loaf

A friend of mine recently started taking olive leaf supplements and raved about feeling great (and looking great), so I decided to give it a try. I love olives, so why not try the leaves & see what happens?

Its purported benefits: fights colds & flu bugs as well as yeast and viral infections, powerful antibacterial (just the bad), keeps blood sugar stable, supports healthy thyroid function, reduces LDL cholesterol, lowers blood pressure, increases blood flow (by relaxing arteries), powerful antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, immune-booster and provides enhanced energy levels.

I even found chatter about its possible benefits in treating some cancers, but now I can't find that page. It sounds like a true wonder drug, eh? And if it's just olive leaves, it probably can't hurt me... too much.

And so begins the experiment...

I found a supplement at the store (Nature's Way) that supposedly has 470mg of olive leaf (olea europaea). I took one pill a day for a couple days, then two pills twice a day. I forget sometimes that I have the tolerance of a 6-week-old kitten.

The label says take three capsules daily at mealtimes. The internet says take it on an empty stomach. The internet also says it can irritate the stomach and to take it with food. I tried it on an empty stomach and with food - no difference so far.

I started taking it about a week & a half ago. The first couple of days were weird. Felt awake and alert and had pretty good energy, but I yawned a lot. All. Day. Long. I think I actually got tired from yawning.

Early this week I started feeling poorly. Almost like I had the flu. Went back to the interwebs to read about side effects. Some people may experience what's called the Herxheimer reaction or "die-off effect." From Wikipedia:

The Herxheimer reaction (also known as Jarisch-Herxheimer or Herx) occurs when large quantities of toxins are released into the body as bacteria (typically Spirochetal bacteria) die, due to antibiotic treatment or rapid detoxification.

Typically the death of these bacteria and the associated release of endotoxins occurs faster than the body can remove the toxins via the natural detoxification process performed by the kidneys and liver. It is manifested by fever, chills, headache, myalgia (muscle pain), and exacerbation of skin lesions.

Huh. I must be full of toxins - who isn't? But according to the interwebs, this means the olive leaf is working... it's getting into my cells, attacking the garbage living in there and killing it off faster than my liver and kidneys can shove it out the door.

It's recommended to drink a truckload of water to help flush the system and reduce the dosage until the fluish symptoms subside, then start up again at a low dose and gradually increase over time.

For regular supplementation use, it's recommended to take just 1000mg daily, though I suspect my sissy little system may not need that much.

The past few days have been less than great - headache, fatigue, nausea and what seemed like slight chills. The nausea affected my appetite, though overall my typical cravings for cookies and doughnuts is pretty much gone, and I'm in full-blown PMS mode. I should be shoveling crates of sweet, fattening carbs down my gullet, but I'm just not into it. Shocking.

It's also entirely possible that I was, in fact, fighting the flu. No way to know. But today I feel pretty good. I hope it *was* the O leaf killing off 42 years of crap and cleaning out my system. That would be nice. Internal spring cleaning.

I stopped taking it for now and will wait a couple days before starting up again. If it really does what it's supposed to do, I should be effing invincible in just a few short weeks.

Links to better pages I found:

• Olive Leaf - Wikipedia
• Olive Leaf - Drugs.com
• Olive Leaf Extract - CureZone
• Olive Leaf - herbwisdom.com
• Olive Leaf for Hypertension - WebMD
• Herxheimer reaction - Wikipedia

Zana-Doo-Doo

My chiropractor recommended the Zand Quick Cleanse - a liver/system cleanse & detox that only takes a week and doesn't require fasting.

So I started my Zand adventure this morning, downing a handful of "fiber" pills and later, a liver cleansing tablet full of all sorts of barky plant herby goodness. If nothing else, the pills and four gallons of water sure staves off hunger.

But I was apprehensive about going to the movies in the early afternoon, not sure what could happen while out & about. Would it be like that scene in Pope of Greenwich Village when they give the cop the horse laxative? I had to hope I wouldn't be caught running around the street clutching my pants.

So far, all is stable... but it's only Day 1. In the next few days I'm supposed to increase the number of fiber pills. Thank goodness we have a long weekend. At least when fasting, you don't have to worry about suddenly blowing a gasket and making sure you're always near a toilet.