The alarm goes off and you hit the snooze button several times that you’ve become a snooze button connoisseur. You drag your ass to get your cup of give-me-life which at first sip tastes like heaven. The morning is a scramble and you know that by mid-day you may get yourself another coffee. Your ability to handle stress isn’t great and it’s either a challenge to get to bed or you’ll wake up between 2-4am. And let’s not talk about your cravings for carbs.
If this all sounds familiar, then woman, you just might have adrenal fatigue and I’ve created a free Adrenal 411 guide that you can download right now. But how do you know for sure?
It’s the reason why I’ve decided to breakdown the symptoms of adrenal fatigue.
Now if you’re a part of the “Adrenal Police” I fully understand that the adrenals don’t technically “fatigue” or give out, but it’s a lot easier to talk to the average person about this subject versus calling this hypothalamic pituitary adrenal axis dysfunction!
Okay so what are the symptoms of this anyway? Here are several and you may have one or a combination of them:
- Reliance on stimulants such as caffeine
- Seemingly insatiable cravings for sugar and salt.
- Struggling to get to bed and feeling wired but tired or waking up between 2-4am.
- Struggling to wake up in the morning
- Digestive troubles
- Low libido
- Weight gain (especially around the mid-section)
- Depression and/or anxitey
- Hair loss
- Thyroid issues
In addition to all these symptoms, when cortisol (the hormone released in response to stress) is out of whack for some time, it’ll consume progesterone which can increase bleeding, make PMS symptoms so much worse, delay ovulation and even increase the risk of getting fibroids.
If you’re struggling hormonally, you must work on the adrenals.
And before you think it’s all about food and supplements it isn’t. You must incorporate healthy boundaries and drop the codependency (which is classified as sacrificing yourself to enable and appease other people). People pleasing is a distraction from feeling and it’s a way that many people validate their own sense of self-worth.