Adrenal Gland Fatigue 

I want to talk a little bit about Adrenal Gland Fatigue.  Before I was diagnosed I had no idea what this was.  Our adrenal glands are small organs above our kidneys that help deal with stress by producing cortisol.  If someone is under a lot of stress or goes through a traumatic experience their adrenal glands can't keep up with the hormones needed to combat the stress/stressors.  

Everyone’s symptoms are a little different & what might have caused their AGF.  For me personally, I think it was a few different things:

1. Dealing with Anorexia from age 13 to age 19 probably didn't help. Due to such a low body fat percentage & weight I lost my period for 4 years (amenorrhea).  I restricted my caloric intake to about 400 calories a day & would run 13-15 miles every day.  

2. Body building, there are many competitors who have been competing longer than I have that have never been diagnosed with AGF, but I did.  The yo-yo dieting & volume of training on such low calories was a big factor.  I went from being Anorexic to bikini competitions within 1 year so there was no rest time for my body or my hormones.

3. Stress, I'm a stress head! I had separation anxiety from age 5 to age 7, I started having panic attacks in middle school, I’ve dealt with depression for quite a few years & I just opened a new business with my family, so you could say I have some experience with stress/anxiety.

4. My quality of sleep has never been good.  As a kid I had nightmares almost every night & even when I didn’t have bad dreams that night I was afraid to go to sleep in case I did.  As a high school kid who worked, went to school, was a part of student council, FBLA, played soccer & danced, I had a lot on my plate.  When I got out of dance at 8/8:30 I ate dinner, showered & then started my homework.  I was awake until 2-3am sometimes & then up at 5:30 to get to school.  When I was bodybuilding & in prep I was so hungry I couldn’t fall asleep. 

5. I used to drink 2 XL coffees everyday because I was exhausted (Probably because I didn’t sleep well). I definitely over did it on the coffee which can be another cause of AGF. 

My side effects of AGF were:

1.   Bloating.  It was horrible!  I looked like I was 9 months pregnant all the time!

2.   Severe stomach pains, 95% of the time.

3.   Not to be gross but constipation.

4.   Allergic reactions from foods ate my whole life.  Apples, bananas, jelly, peanut butter, peanuts, almonds, wheat/whole wheat, cheese, ice cream, yogurt, eggplants, zucchini, summer squash etc.

5.   Horrible sleep patterns.

Everyone’s symptoms are different, but I just wanted to give you a basic idea of what they could be.  I hope this blog post helps bring some awareness about AGF & how common it is becoming. Stay strong xo