In this week's blog, I want to take a closer look at the relationship cortisol has with some other major players in the hormone world. Specifically, I'm going to delve into how stress, and it's end product cortisol, can create abnormal function of the thyroid gland, accelerating deterioration and aging.
The thyroid is a gland in the front of your neck that has two lobes, each of which is set slightly below and on the side of your larynx (voice box). The major hormone it secretes is thyroxine, or T4. It does this in response to a cascade of hormones that starts in the hypothalamus (the master controller), a part of the brain that is constantly sampling the blood for levels of everything from glucose and hormone levels to temperature and pressure. When the hypothalamus senses low levels of thyroid hormones, it secretes Thyroid Releasing Factor (TRF), which travels a short distance to the pituitary gland. The pituitary, located as deep inside the skull as you can get, then secretes Thyroid Stimulating Hormone (TSH). Once TSH is released, it flows through the blood to the thyroid gland, and stimulates the release of T4.
In order for the thyroid to make T4, it needs certain raw materials, specifically iodine, selenium, vitamin E, tyrosine (a part of protein) and just the right amount of cortisol. Providing it has all of these in the right amounts, it sends T4 out into the body. Once there, T4 , really a pro-hormone, is converted to its active form, triiodothyronine (T3). This step also needs certain factors present, namely selenium, vitamin E, and just the right amount of cortisol.
Every cell in your body has receptors on its surface for T3, which, once activated, have a profound effect on your physiology. In a nutshell, when T3 stimulates those receptors, it speeds up your metabolic rate, or increases how much energy your body will burn at rest. By doing this, it tells all of your cells how quickly to do their work. With enough T3, your body has the ability to do its work at a normal pace and things work well.
With too much T3 (hyperthyroidism), the body is supercharged, and we end up seeing symptoms like anxiety, fast heart rate, high blood pressure, rapid breathing, elevated temperature, difficulty sleeping, bulging eyes, thin sweaty skin, tremors, fatigue, weight loss, increased appetite, weakness, loss of menstrual cycle, and frequent bowel movements.
Lack of T3 causes the opposite effects, and is termed hypothyroidism. With this condition, we see symptoms like hoarse voice, puffiness around the eyes, cold intolerance, dry hair that falls out easily, coarse dry skin, weight gain, fatigue, lethargy, forgetfulness, slow heart rate, constipation, nerve disturbances like carpal tunnel syndrome, heavy menstrual flow, and anemia. When you look at the symptoms of hypothyroidism as a whole, with a few exceptions, it looks very much like what we see in an aging person. In fact, there are some who theorize that aging is a process of slowly developing hypothyroidism, and if we kept the thyroid function normal, we would see a slowing of this process. While this is yet to be fully proven, it does show some interesting possibilities, especially since thyroid function can be influences quickly and relatively easily with proper diet and lifestyle changes added to targeted nutrition.
Frank hypothyroidism is rarely caused by stress and cortisol, but there is a condition termed Euthyroid Sick Syndrome (ESS), that can be. In this condition, we see patients having many of the symptoms of hypothyroidism, but when we look at their lab results, they look normal. One of the issues with this condition is that in medicine, rarely do we look past the TSH test. I believe this is paramount to profession wide malpractice, but it is all that is usually looked at. In fact, this isn't even looking at thyroid function at all, but instead is peering at the pituitary's function. TSH is often normal in patients, yet when I look closer at their complete thyroid panel, there are significant abnormalities.
In the patient whose body is functioning normally and has just the right amount of cortisol, the body will secrete the right amount of T4 and activate it to T3. In those with high or low cortisol levels or those lacking adequate vitamin E or selenium, we see a different picture. While some T4 will still be made, the body has a different pathway to make T3, and we end up with a different product. Instead of activating T4 to T3, we get what is called reverse T3 (rT3). It looks exactly like regular T3, but it is a mirror image. It's no different than looking at your right hand compared to your left. They normally have identical numbers of fingers and a thumb, but the thumb is on the opposite side. If you put your left hand into a left handed glove, it works fine. If instead, you put the right hand into that left handed glove, things don't work so well. This is the case with rT3.
When the body has been exposed to high stress levels for extended periods, the body starts making less T4, and what T4 is made is then converted mostly to rT3, which changes how the body functions. Without T3, the cells start going into a hypothyroid state, and we get sluggish metabolism. With elevated rT3, we get these results exaggerated, since not only is the receptor blocked so T3 can't get there, but rT3 also shuts the receptor off, and can get stuck, just like a right hand in a left handed glove. In this case, the body will recognize it has plenty of thyroid hormone, since there is plenty, but it's too much rT3, and things are shutting down, yet the TSH will be normal or even low. According to medicine, the patient is fine, yet the reality is that they are far from fine. Their body is functioning as someone who is hypothyroid, yet it is unrecognized.
I see patients who exhibit ESS on a regular basis, and it is a fairly straightforward condition to treat. By doing a full thyroid lab workup, it is not that difficult to differentiate. Once found, I can counsel the patient on avoiding things that will aggravate the condition, and we can target nutritional therapy to not only help the body make more T3 instead of rT3, but also help the adrenals function better and secrete the proper amount of cortisol. Even frank hypothyroidism can be treated nutritionally, reducing the need for synthetic medications, all of which have some unwanted effects.
As we continue this discussion on stress in future blogs, you'll see how stress affects all of the systems in our bodies, and we cannot be healthy if we are not addressing how our body reacts to stress. Stress has a huge impact on thyroid function, and your body will deteriorate quickly and steadily if you ignore it. For a long healthy life, stress must be addressed, its impact on the thyroid should be assessed, and appropriate therapies added to help regain its optimal function.
Look for future blogs that will give more information and insights into improving your health with natural health care. You can also visit my website, like me on Facebook, follow me on Twitter, or listen to my radio show.
Tuesday, March 6, 2012
Tuesday, February 28, 2012
Stress Is a Killer #4
This week we'll continue our discussion on stress and its impact on us. So far, everything I've talked about has pertained to medicine's "normal", a 20 year old male. While I won't agree that today's average 20 year old male is either healthy or "normal", we use this group in medicine as our standard test subject for one simple reason: we can get 20 year old males to do just about anything for beer money. We find it more difficult to get 20 year old women to do the same, and once they are out of college and into the work force, we have a harder time getting male subjects as well. For this week's discussion, it's important to remember that men and women are different (and that's OK), kids are NOT little adults, and we change as we age.
Women and Stress
In general, women secrete a higher level of cortisol (remember that's our hormonal end product of exposure to stressors). This higher secretion means that all of the cortisol effects will be higher in women than men. However, there are some differences in how cortisol affects women. When a man's brain is exposed to cortisol, we found they had a decreased memory function overall, but specifically a decrease in spatial memory. We find neither of these happen in women. When I lecture to peace officers, they are not surprised by this. In stressful situations, women will have a better recollection of the details of what happened, and not fill in as much as men do. That means that in a given stressful situation, women are generally the more reliable eye witnesses.
The cortisol production fluctuates in women according to their menstrual cycle. This makes sense when you look at the biochemical pathways, and how intricate hormones interact. Starting on day one of the menstrual cycle (follicular phase), women will have a blunted response for the next 14 days. This means they will produce less cortisol during this time in response to stressors. For the last 14 days of the cycle (luteal phase), there is a significant increase in production. In this time period, stress will have a more detrimental effect on their health. When we add in oral contraceptives, we see a response much like that of the follicular phase. If you look at total levels given the same stressor, you see cortisol secretion as follows (high to low): luteal > men > follicular > oral contraceptives. Does this mean oral contraceptives are a good thing in relation to the stress response? No. The negative effects created by oral contraceptives far outweigh any changes we may see in relation to stress. Look for a future blog that explains how oral contraceptives are causing many health problems for women today.
While women have a higher level of cortisol secretion compared to men, they also have a blunted response to its feedback. Their brains are less sensitive to its effects, so when the levels increase, they have a slower "off" switch than do men. This means it will stay in their system longer, creating more potential negative effects in the long run. When we add the fact that cortisol inhibits the secretion of estrogens and progesterone to the equation, we see that stress can have a significant effect on fertility and the ability to get and stay pregnant. This makes perfect sense if you consider the developmental aspect: are you concerned with reproducing when the saber tooth tiger is breathing down your neck? Probably not.
In addition to differences in memory and feedback, cortisol also changes how the brain of a woman focuses. When exposed to stressors, the limbic section of a woman's brain shows significant increase in function. This section of our brain is where all of our "feelings" are housed and expressed. There is also a significant increase in ruminative thinking or rewinding. When stressed, women start rewinding and reviewing past events, what I call "ruminatin' and cogitatin'". They use their past memories, going over and over them, trying to make sense of what's happening now. Stress also increases anxiety more in women than men.
When we compare overt actions in response to stress, we find another significant difference. While men express the classic "fight or flight" mechanism, women will express a "tend and befriend" response instead. When you think again of development, this makes sense. With most hunter/gatherer societies, men could be gone from camp for most of the day, and often for extended periods on week long hunts. That left the camp with minimal protection from neighboring tribes who weren't always friendly. If an unwelcome visitor came calling, a "fight or flight" response could often lead to unwanted trouble. If instead, a "tend and befriend" attitude, where the unwelcome visitor was welcomed in, tended to, and conversed with was adopted, it could often give the hunters time to get back to camp and expel the visitor. Different survival mechanisms develop based on different situations.
Stress and Kids
In Mom's Stress Isn't Trivial, I discussed prenatal stress exposure and the profound changes it can have on our kids. In addition to that, we see long term effects when our kids are stressed. Early life stress can elevate CRH levels for life, creating all the negative effects associated, including increased risk of affect disorders, like depression, anxiety, schizophrenia, and bipolar. Before puberty, we see kids reacting the same, regardless of sex, but once adolescence starts, we see a divergence based on sex, where boys start acting like men, and girls like women.
Stress and Aging
It's very interesting to look at the stress response as we age. When we look at women, we really don't see much change except a gradual decline in response. However, when we look at men, we see their responses, including hormone levels, biochemical responses, and reactions, look much more like adult women, with the overall response being less. Whether this is part of the deterioration caused by aging or causes some of this deterioration, we really don't know. I hypothesize that if we could improve our response to stressors early in life and reduce their overall effects, we might see less deterioration, but I haven't seen anyone out there yet studying that.
It is important to remember that stress affects us differently based on our age and sex. Expecting a male response from a female, or a female reaction from a male, will only lead to more stress to ourselves. Part of coping with stress well and minimizing its effects on us includes knowing how to best interact with those around us. Treating your kids and your spouse the same isn't effective. Knowing those who influence your life, and how they react compared to yourself can have a profound impact on your happiness.
Look for future blogs that will give more information and insights into improving your health with natural health care. You can also visit my website, like me on Facebook, follow me on Twitter, or listen to my radio show.
Women and Stress
In general, women secrete a higher level of cortisol (remember that's our hormonal end product of exposure to stressors). This higher secretion means that all of the cortisol effects will be higher in women than men. However, there are some differences in how cortisol affects women. When a man's brain is exposed to cortisol, we found they had a decreased memory function overall, but specifically a decrease in spatial memory. We find neither of these happen in women. When I lecture to peace officers, they are not surprised by this. In stressful situations, women will have a better recollection of the details of what happened, and not fill in as much as men do. That means that in a given stressful situation, women are generally the more reliable eye witnesses.
The cortisol production fluctuates in women according to their menstrual cycle. This makes sense when you look at the biochemical pathways, and how intricate hormones interact. Starting on day one of the menstrual cycle (follicular phase), women will have a blunted response for the next 14 days. This means they will produce less cortisol during this time in response to stressors. For the last 14 days of the cycle (luteal phase), there is a significant increase in production. In this time period, stress will have a more detrimental effect on their health. When we add in oral contraceptives, we see a response much like that of the follicular phase. If you look at total levels given the same stressor, you see cortisol secretion as follows (high to low): luteal > men > follicular > oral contraceptives. Does this mean oral contraceptives are a good thing in relation to the stress response? No. The negative effects created by oral contraceptives far outweigh any changes we may see in relation to stress. Look for a future blog that explains how oral contraceptives are causing many health problems for women today.
While women have a higher level of cortisol secretion compared to men, they also have a blunted response to its feedback. Their brains are less sensitive to its effects, so when the levels increase, they have a slower "off" switch than do men. This means it will stay in their system longer, creating more potential negative effects in the long run. When we add the fact that cortisol inhibits the secretion of estrogens and progesterone to the equation, we see that stress can have a significant effect on fertility and the ability to get and stay pregnant. This makes perfect sense if you consider the developmental aspect: are you concerned with reproducing when the saber tooth tiger is breathing down your neck? Probably not.
In addition to differences in memory and feedback, cortisol also changes how the brain of a woman focuses. When exposed to stressors, the limbic section of a woman's brain shows significant increase in function. This section of our brain is where all of our "feelings" are housed and expressed. There is also a significant increase in ruminative thinking or rewinding. When stressed, women start rewinding and reviewing past events, what I call "ruminatin' and cogitatin'". They use their past memories, going over and over them, trying to make sense of what's happening now. Stress also increases anxiety more in women than men.
When we compare overt actions in response to stress, we find another significant difference. While men express the classic "fight or flight" mechanism, women will express a "tend and befriend" response instead. When you think again of development, this makes sense. With most hunter/gatherer societies, men could be gone from camp for most of the day, and often for extended periods on week long hunts. That left the camp with minimal protection from neighboring tribes who weren't always friendly. If an unwelcome visitor came calling, a "fight or flight" response could often lead to unwanted trouble. If instead, a "tend and befriend" attitude, where the unwelcome visitor was welcomed in, tended to, and conversed with was adopted, it could often give the hunters time to get back to camp and expel the visitor. Different survival mechanisms develop based on different situations.
Stress and Kids
In Mom's Stress Isn't Trivial, I discussed prenatal stress exposure and the profound changes it can have on our kids. In addition to that, we see long term effects when our kids are stressed. Early life stress can elevate CRH levels for life, creating all the negative effects associated, including increased risk of affect disorders, like depression, anxiety, schizophrenia, and bipolar. Before puberty, we see kids reacting the same, regardless of sex, but once adolescence starts, we see a divergence based on sex, where boys start acting like men, and girls like women.
Stress and Aging
It's very interesting to look at the stress response as we age. When we look at women, we really don't see much change except a gradual decline in response. However, when we look at men, we see their responses, including hormone levels, biochemical responses, and reactions, look much more like adult women, with the overall response being less. Whether this is part of the deterioration caused by aging or causes some of this deterioration, we really don't know. I hypothesize that if we could improve our response to stressors early in life and reduce their overall effects, we might see less deterioration, but I haven't seen anyone out there yet studying that.
It is important to remember that stress affects us differently based on our age and sex. Expecting a male response from a female, or a female reaction from a male, will only lead to more stress to ourselves. Part of coping with stress well and minimizing its effects on us includes knowing how to best interact with those around us. Treating your kids and your spouse the same isn't effective. Knowing those who influence your life, and how they react compared to yourself can have a profound impact on your happiness.
Look for future blogs that will give more information and insights into improving your health with natural health care. You can also visit my website, like me on Facebook, follow me on Twitter, or listen to my radio show.
Tuesday, February 21, 2012
Stress Is a Killer #3
Over the past few weeks' blogs, I've talked about how stress can affect the function of our bodies, and this week we'll continue along that same line as we explore further how the brain is impacted by stress. Remembering that cortisol is the end product of our body encountering stressors, let's look at how cortisol affects the brain and nervous system.
Brain Chemistry 101:
The nerves that make up your nervous system communicate through biochemicals called neurotransmitters. To date, we've identified over 100 of these, and they have a wide range of impacts on our function. Cortisol has an impact on many of these, and therefore directly impacts how our brains function. Since most of us want a healthy and optimally functioning brain, controlling stress in our lives and helping our bodies minimize the reaction to stressors can have a profound impact on our brain and mental-emotional health.
One of the biggest impacts cortisol has on our nervous system is to increase the amount of norepinephrine (NE). NE is not only a potent neurotransmitter that stimulates our nervous system into a fight or flight mode, but it is also a hormone that does the same thing on a system wide basis. It does things like increase heart rate and blood pressure, open the bronchioles so we can get more air in the lungs, increases blood flow and reflex speed of the muscles, and shunts more blood to the brain. While more blood to the brain is a good thing, it does this at the expense of the digestive system, thereby making it more difficult to process your food. Long term exposure also poses problems for the heart and blood vessels due to the increased heart rate and blood pressure.
With increased exposure to stressors, the brain releases more corticotropic releasing factor (CRH). In addition to the hormonal aspects we discussed in previous blogs, it also has a local impact on the brain, impairing sleep, enhancing vigilance, and decreasing melatonin. Sleep and vigilance are problems for many, and melatonin is a powerful anti-oxidant our body produces that also helps with sleep. Overall, excessive CRH production creates problems with a restful night's sleep.
Another neurotransmitter that is increased with cortisol is glutamate, which is excitatory to the brain, and can be neurotoxic at high levels. N-methyl-D-aspartic acid (NMDA), which is also increased with cortisol, enhances the effects of glutamate, making it more toxic. It is important for reconsolidation of memories, or what I call "ruminatin' and cogitatin'". When NMDA is high, we tend to spend more time thinking of past events, which can not only make it difficult to concentrate on the moment, but also can significantly increase our stress level. In addition, NMDA itself is neurotoxic when elevated.
While cortisol increases NE, CRH, glutamate, and NMDA (all not good in the long term), it also decreases certain other neurotransmitters, including Brain Derived Neuronal Factor (BDNF), gamma amino butyric acid (GABA), serotonin, dopamine, neuropeptide Y, and galanin. BDNF is something you really want a good amount in your brain, since it is one of the important factors that helps nerve cells heal. GABA is an inhibitory neurotransmitter that helps us focus. Serotonin has a huge impact on mood and keeping us happy while dopamine is necessary for movement and motor function. Neuropeptide Y and galanin protect our brains from the effects of CRH and minimize anxiety. All of these neurotransmitters that are decreased with excessive cortisol we want in good amounts for healthy brains.
Another chemical that is suppressed by cortisol is oxytocin. While most noted as a hormone that stimulates labor and milk production after pregnancy, for many years we were clueless as to why it appeared in males. We now know it plays an important role in our social interactions. Oxytocin is released when we are among those whose company we enjoy, and is very important for decreasing anxiety. It also reduces our blood pressure and increases our pain thresholds. It's has been likened to a "love hormone" as well, since it is what seems to be released during the courtship phase of a relationship and after sex.
Beyond neurotrasmitters, cortisol creates functional changes in the brain. It creates significant problems specifically with memory. Part of the issue deals with transitioning short term memories into long term storage, while it also negatively affects our spatial memory function. This is our ability to remember details about stressful situations, and is one reason why the police may find several witnesses that all saw the exact same thing, yet none of them recall the same scene. By having spatial memory suppressed, it makes the brain "fill in the gaps" with what it thinks should have been happening, or with other memories that may be less traumatic.
As a whole, it can be simply stated that either long term or single high event exposure to stress can significantly increase the risk of affect disorders, most notably mood disorders like anxiety and depression, but also things like schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, paranoia, and delusions. In plain English, your brain does not like stress, and it will become damaged if you don't effectively deal with the stressors in your life.
In future blogs, we'll continue to look at how stress affects us, and how we can minimize it's impact.
Look for future blogs that will give more information and insights into improving your health with natural health care. You can also visit my website, like me on Facebook, follow me on Twitter, or listen to my radio show.
Brain Chemistry 101:
The nerves that make up your nervous system communicate through biochemicals called neurotransmitters. To date, we've identified over 100 of these, and they have a wide range of impacts on our function. Cortisol has an impact on many of these, and therefore directly impacts how our brains function. Since most of us want a healthy and optimally functioning brain, controlling stress in our lives and helping our bodies minimize the reaction to stressors can have a profound impact on our brain and mental-emotional health.
One of the biggest impacts cortisol has on our nervous system is to increase the amount of norepinephrine (NE). NE is not only a potent neurotransmitter that stimulates our nervous system into a fight or flight mode, but it is also a hormone that does the same thing on a system wide basis. It does things like increase heart rate and blood pressure, open the bronchioles so we can get more air in the lungs, increases blood flow and reflex speed of the muscles, and shunts more blood to the brain. While more blood to the brain is a good thing, it does this at the expense of the digestive system, thereby making it more difficult to process your food. Long term exposure also poses problems for the heart and blood vessels due to the increased heart rate and blood pressure.
With increased exposure to stressors, the brain releases more corticotropic releasing factor (CRH). In addition to the hormonal aspects we discussed in previous blogs, it also has a local impact on the brain, impairing sleep, enhancing vigilance, and decreasing melatonin. Sleep and vigilance are problems for many, and melatonin is a powerful anti-oxidant our body produces that also helps with sleep. Overall, excessive CRH production creates problems with a restful night's sleep.
Another neurotransmitter that is increased with cortisol is glutamate, which is excitatory to the brain, and can be neurotoxic at high levels. N-methyl-D-aspartic acid (NMDA), which is also increased with cortisol, enhances the effects of glutamate, making it more toxic. It is important for reconsolidation of memories, or what I call "ruminatin' and cogitatin'". When NMDA is high, we tend to spend more time thinking of past events, which can not only make it difficult to concentrate on the moment, but also can significantly increase our stress level. In addition, NMDA itself is neurotoxic when elevated.
While cortisol increases NE, CRH, glutamate, and NMDA (all not good in the long term), it also decreases certain other neurotransmitters, including Brain Derived Neuronal Factor (BDNF), gamma amino butyric acid (GABA), serotonin, dopamine, neuropeptide Y, and galanin. BDNF is something you really want a good amount in your brain, since it is one of the important factors that helps nerve cells heal. GABA is an inhibitory neurotransmitter that helps us focus. Serotonin has a huge impact on mood and keeping us happy while dopamine is necessary for movement and motor function. Neuropeptide Y and galanin protect our brains from the effects of CRH and minimize anxiety. All of these neurotransmitters that are decreased with excessive cortisol we want in good amounts for healthy brains.
Another chemical that is suppressed by cortisol is oxytocin. While most noted as a hormone that stimulates labor and milk production after pregnancy, for many years we were clueless as to why it appeared in males. We now know it plays an important role in our social interactions. Oxytocin is released when we are among those whose company we enjoy, and is very important for decreasing anxiety. It also reduces our blood pressure and increases our pain thresholds. It's has been likened to a "love hormone" as well, since it is what seems to be released during the courtship phase of a relationship and after sex.
Beyond neurotrasmitters, cortisol creates functional changes in the brain. It creates significant problems specifically with memory. Part of the issue deals with transitioning short term memories into long term storage, while it also negatively affects our spatial memory function. This is our ability to remember details about stressful situations, and is one reason why the police may find several witnesses that all saw the exact same thing, yet none of them recall the same scene. By having spatial memory suppressed, it makes the brain "fill in the gaps" with what it thinks should have been happening, or with other memories that may be less traumatic.
As a whole, it can be simply stated that either long term or single high event exposure to stress can significantly increase the risk of affect disorders, most notably mood disorders like anxiety and depression, but also things like schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, paranoia, and delusions. In plain English, your brain does not like stress, and it will become damaged if you don't effectively deal with the stressors in your life.
In future blogs, we'll continue to look at how stress affects us, and how we can minimize it's impact.
Look for future blogs that will give more information and insights into improving your health with natural health care. You can also visit my website, like me on Facebook, follow me on Twitter, or listen to my radio show.
Tuesday, February 14, 2012
Stress Is a Killer #2
In this week's blog, we'll continue to look at how stress affects the body. In How Full Is Your Barrel, I discussed the basics of what stress is. In Stress Is a Killer #1, I started explaining the hormonal pathways involved with stress and how they can impact your body. This week, we'll continue to explore hormonal impacts of stress, and look at how stress affects you differently with repeated or prolonged exposure.
Cortisol is the main hormonal end product of stress in the body. It is a steroid hormone, meaning it is made from cholesterol. It moves freely into our cells, and impacts the expression of our DNA by stimulating a receptor on the nuclear envelope. While most hormones have a fairly steady level in the body, cortisol has a diurnal variance, where it is high in the morning, decreases throughout the day except for an after lunch spike, and increases again as we sleep to be high in the morning. Changes in the diurnal rhythm can create significant problems. Too high in the evening, and our brain can't shut down when we're ready to sleep. Too low in the morning, and we can't get out of bed in the morning. No afternoon spike, and we're ready for an afternoon nap. It's not just about the amount of cortisol we have, but also about how much we have when.
In addition to cortisol, there are other hormones that are released in response to stressors. One of these hormones is dehydroepiandrosterone (DHEA). Where cortisol tears into our muscle stores to give us needed energy and is locally destructive, DHEA is protective to a variety of tissues. It generally counteracts the effects of cortisol, most importantly in our brain. DHEA is a regenerative hormone, and is considered by some to be almost a "fountain of youth", since we see decreasing levels of DHEA as we age. Some "anti-aging" doctors regularly prescribe DHEA to their patients because of this. Unfortunately, since this regenerative hormone is also a precurser to many other hormones including estrogens, progesterone, and testosterone, this can be dangerous. Adding a hormone like DHEA without proper testing is like playing Plinko. You add the hormone in at the top, but you never know exactly where it's going downstream. You may end up with excess estrogens in a man or testosterone in a woman, neither of which is desired.
There is a reason DHEA and cortisol are released together. As cortisol has the chance to save our lives, DHEA is there to shorten its duration and protect us if possible. One of the problems we see today, is that long term exposure to stressors will stimulate the body to make cortisol at the expense of DHEA, and we end up with unchecked cortisol and no regeneration afterward. This is another reason some doctors will recommend DHEA supplementally. Again, I caution against this without proper testing to make sure one is really deficient and doesn't end up negatively affecting their other hormones.
Our normal stress response, as defined by Hans Selye, the father of stress research, has three phases to it. Initially, we have an alarm reaction (AR). We then move to a stage of resistance (SR), and finally a stage of exhaustion (SE).
The graphical representation illustrates that as our bodies encounter stressors, we initially have a decreased resistance to them. Think of the first real cold day in November. You know, when it gets down into the low 20's, and we're all complaining about how cold it is, since it was in the 70's just a few weeks ago. Your resistance to cold on that first cold day is less than normal, since you haven't had recent exposure to that stressor. Compare your reaction in November to your reaction in the dead of winter; mid-January when it's been below zero for two consecutive weeks, and we finally have a nice sunny day and climb to a balmy 15. We're rejoicing at how warm it is on that day, yet it's actually colder than it was in November. You're now in the stage of resistance, and you can tolerate more of that stressor than before. If, however, you were to live in a climate where it never ever got warm, and were always cold, eventually, your body's resistance to cold would be exhausted, and you'd enter stage 3. At this point, even 40 seems cold. I see this commonly in my elderly patients. They really don't like cold any more than they like heat. They want a constant 75 degrees all year long. Their resistance to both cold and heat has been exhausted.
How each of us travels through these three phases depends on our individuality and the type of stressor. The stage of resistance can last for decades for some, yet only for a few hours in others. We are each unique, and we have no ability to predict response time..
As we move into stage 2 and 3 though, our response to the stressor changes. Instead of getting as much corticotropic releasing hormone (CRH) from the brain, we get more arginine vasopressin (AVP) instead. Where CRH increases fear related behaviors and reduces reward expectation, AVP increases water retention instead. That means we have the same stressor, but our blood pressure ends up rising instead of our behavior and expectations changing. Repeated or long term exposure of the brain to cortisol also creates significant changes. We see damaging of certain brain structures, shrinking of the brain as a whole, and a sensitization of the brain to cortisol (so it does more damage) and of the adrenals to ACTH (so we get more cortisol released). While we aren't totally sure this is permanent damage to the brain, we are seeing that it is at least somewhat irreversible. Since the structures that seem most affected by cortisol are those that are related to memory, any negative changes are a problem.
Dealing with stress in a positive way is vital to our long term health. We'll continue to discuss how stress affects us and what we can do to help offset the negative effects in the coming weeks.
Look for future blogs that will give more information and insights into improving your health with natural health care. You can also visit my website, like me on Facebook, follow me on Twitter, or listen to my radio show.
Cortisol is the main hormonal end product of stress in the body. It is a steroid hormone, meaning it is made from cholesterol. It moves freely into our cells, and impacts the expression of our DNA by stimulating a receptor on the nuclear envelope. While most hormones have a fairly steady level in the body, cortisol has a diurnal variance, where it is high in the morning, decreases throughout the day except for an after lunch spike, and increases again as we sleep to be high in the morning. Changes in the diurnal rhythm can create significant problems. Too high in the evening, and our brain can't shut down when we're ready to sleep. Too low in the morning, and we can't get out of bed in the morning. No afternoon spike, and we're ready for an afternoon nap. It's not just about the amount of cortisol we have, but also about how much we have when.
In addition to cortisol, there are other hormones that are released in response to stressors. One of these hormones is dehydroepiandrosterone (DHEA). Where cortisol tears into our muscle stores to give us needed energy and is locally destructive, DHEA is protective to a variety of tissues. It generally counteracts the effects of cortisol, most importantly in our brain. DHEA is a regenerative hormone, and is considered by some to be almost a "fountain of youth", since we see decreasing levels of DHEA as we age. Some "anti-aging" doctors regularly prescribe DHEA to their patients because of this. Unfortunately, since this regenerative hormone is also a precurser to many other hormones including estrogens, progesterone, and testosterone, this can be dangerous. Adding a hormone like DHEA without proper testing is like playing Plinko. You add the hormone in at the top, but you never know exactly where it's going downstream. You may end up with excess estrogens in a man or testosterone in a woman, neither of which is desired.
There is a reason DHEA and cortisol are released together. As cortisol has the chance to save our lives, DHEA is there to shorten its duration and protect us if possible. One of the problems we see today, is that long term exposure to stressors will stimulate the body to make cortisol at the expense of DHEA, and we end up with unchecked cortisol and no regeneration afterward. This is another reason some doctors will recommend DHEA supplementally. Again, I caution against this without proper testing to make sure one is really deficient and doesn't end up negatively affecting their other hormones.
Our normal stress response, as defined by Hans Selye, the father of stress research, has three phases to it. Initially, we have an alarm reaction (AR). We then move to a stage of resistance (SR), and finally a stage of exhaustion (SE).
The graphical representation illustrates that as our bodies encounter stressors, we initially have a decreased resistance to them. Think of the first real cold day in November. You know, when it gets down into the low 20's, and we're all complaining about how cold it is, since it was in the 70's just a few weeks ago. Your resistance to cold on that first cold day is less than normal, since you haven't had recent exposure to that stressor. Compare your reaction in November to your reaction in the dead of winter; mid-January when it's been below zero for two consecutive weeks, and we finally have a nice sunny day and climb to a balmy 15. We're rejoicing at how warm it is on that day, yet it's actually colder than it was in November. You're now in the stage of resistance, and you can tolerate more of that stressor than before. If, however, you were to live in a climate where it never ever got warm, and were always cold, eventually, your body's resistance to cold would be exhausted, and you'd enter stage 3. At this point, even 40 seems cold. I see this commonly in my elderly patients. They really don't like cold any more than they like heat. They want a constant 75 degrees all year long. Their resistance to both cold and heat has been exhausted.
How each of us travels through these three phases depends on our individuality and the type of stressor. The stage of resistance can last for decades for some, yet only for a few hours in others. We are each unique, and we have no ability to predict response time..
As we move into stage 2 and 3 though, our response to the stressor changes. Instead of getting as much corticotropic releasing hormone (CRH) from the brain, we get more arginine vasopressin (AVP) instead. Where CRH increases fear related behaviors and reduces reward expectation, AVP increases water retention instead. That means we have the same stressor, but our blood pressure ends up rising instead of our behavior and expectations changing. Repeated or long term exposure of the brain to cortisol also creates significant changes. We see damaging of certain brain structures, shrinking of the brain as a whole, and a sensitization of the brain to cortisol (so it does more damage) and of the adrenals to ACTH (so we get more cortisol released). While we aren't totally sure this is permanent damage to the brain, we are seeing that it is at least somewhat irreversible. Since the structures that seem most affected by cortisol are those that are related to memory, any negative changes are a problem.
Dealing with stress in a positive way is vital to our long term health. We'll continue to discuss how stress affects us and what we can do to help offset the negative effects in the coming weeks.
Look for future blogs that will give more information and insights into improving your health with natural health care. You can also visit my website, like me on Facebook, follow me on Twitter, or listen to my radio show.
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