Welcome to the world of adrenal fatigue
Posted in life on 18. May, 2010
If you’ve read my last few posts (the ones that are not workouts), then you’ll notice a theme: I’ve got a lot going on. If I think back to the beginning of the year, I had an amazing string of 6 weeks of MEBB work, not much stress, good times in life, and general happiness. My diet was dialed in. Everything was good.
And then I went to Vegas. And San Diego. And Colorado. And Canada. Then there was SXSW somewhere in there.
And the list goes on…
My Type 1 personality leads me to believe that I can handle all of it. I can burn the candle at both ends. Work, train, party, race. Hell, I won my age group in a duathlon with 1 week of prep time. I’m invincible, right?
Wrong.
(aside: HUGE thanks to those who checked in with me after reading my last post. Now that I have an explanation for what’s going on, I feel MUCH better now… I’ve got some personal life repair work to do, but that’ll come in time)
In thinking about the last week or so, culminating in the last post I wrote, I spent some time thinking about what I’ve been up to, and why I would have such high highs and low lows. And then, listening to Robb Wolf, something hit me… adrenal fatigue (funny thing when you run into this listening to the Paleolithic Solution podcast
Robb ran into this situation, best described from his blog post:
For those of you unfamiliar with this condition, your adrenals begin to give out [due] to too many life demands. Sleep, stress, training can all take their toll. I think I’ve had a mild to moderate dose of this condition for a LONG time. I have always burned things pretty hard … This combo of shitty food and bad sleep really takes me down at the knee caps.
…
What my adrenal fatigue boiled down to was this: Crushing fatigue most of the day, only perking up a bit in the evening. This is a reversed cortisol profile in which I have higher levels in the evening than morning. this is about a stage or two away from the full systemic melt-down that leaves on in bed, immune compromised and generally feeling like death. Cortisol competes with testosterone for the substrate pregnenalone. High cortisol means insulin resistance, low strength and slow recovery. Excessive metabolic conditiong makes things worse. What’s excessive? You never make progress, you feel like absolute death doing anything over a few minutes duration. I’ve also had 4-5 sinus infections in the past about 8 months. No bueno.
This. Sounds. Familiar.
I’ve had similar issues with energy levels. I didn’t want to get up in the morning. I couldn’t get to bed when I needed to. My mind was constantly racing at night, and I got really bad sleep. My diet went to shit — for every good meal, I would have 2 bad ones. I was drinking way too much, way too often. And I was still trying to train hard and race. Do a google search for adrenal fatigue and alcohol, and you’ll find countless results that contain the words “emotional outbursts.” Awesome. Do another one for adrenal fatigue and emotions, and you’ll find more results that link the two. Bingo.
No wonder my CrossFit WODs have been crap, my races have been a bit slower, I’ve been constantly sore and irritable. No wonder people have asked me if I’m ok several times a week for the last several weeks. No wonder I’ve felt like I was walking on a wire for the last month or so. And no wonder the situation culminated with two emotional outbursts that I can’t explain, because the kind of thing I reacted to is not something I normally care about.
I’m overdoing it, big time, and it’s all got to stop. Yesterday.
I started my plan to recover on Sunday. Here it is:
- CrossFit WODs will be short. I’m going to lift and do some CrossFit Endurance track/pool/bike work. All of it will be short.
- I need to get back into my routines that I know work for me.
- I need to cook meals more often than not, and they need to be solid. Which also means I’m going to be food logging for a month.
- I’m going to stop drinking until Memorial Day weekend, where I’m going camping with lots of old friends. And then I’m going to stop drinking again until after my Half Marathon on June 6. After that, we’ll evaluate it along with everything else.
How will I know I’m good? When I can:
- Sleep well.
- Even out my energy levels throughout the day.
- Feel happy, constantly.
- Train well, with purpose, and with great results.
If your world is going haywire, and you’re one of the Gen X Weekend Warrior Rockstars, take a step back and read what Robb Wolf and Melissa Urban have to say on this topic. Maybe your candle is burnt out. I know mine was.
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