Why Chronic Stress Disrupts Energy Levels
We live in a high stress world. A world that places a burden on busyness and going hard until you can’t anymore. This chronic level of stress has placed such a high strain on our bodies and there is no doubt these high levels of stress have contributed to the influx of chronic illness in our society. Most of us know that stress isn’t “good,” but if we really knew the effects stress has on our bodies, we might stop and think about how we can be kinder to ourselves. So how does stress affect our bodies? I could go into many different reasons, but we will cover one extremely important reason why we should manage our stress and that is: stress causes an increase in the hormone cortisol which disrupts our endocrine system balance.
The endocrine system is all about hormones and hormones are all about communication. Hormones are extremely important because they help regulate things like our energy and metabolism, contractions of smooth and cardiac muscle fibers, our biological clock, control growth and development and govern the operation of our reproductive system. The endocrine glands, as well as a host of other organs and tissues, play a crucial role in producing hormones and communicating with the body its needs. Our hormones all work together in order to create hormonal balance in our body which means it is critical for us to foster the health of the organs at play. The major players of our endocrine system are the pitutiary, the adrenals, the thyroid and our sex organs.
The endocrine organs communicate with the hypothalamus, a small region of the brain, which goes on to communicate with the pituitary gland, then passes the signal to the endocrine gland to either increase or decrease the production of a particular hormone to create balance in the body. The thyroid is a key player in the bodies metabolism and produces hormones T3 and T4 to do this work. These hormones regulate many extremely important processes in the body like BMR, cellular metabolism, growth and development, stimulates the synthesis of protein and even enhancing cholesterol excretion which reduces blood cholesterol levels. Another extremely important player of hormone balance are the adrenal glands. The adrenal glands regulate our blood sugar and inflammation as well as control our bodies “fight or flight” mechanism. They regulate mineral balance and aid in the production of sex hormones.
As we can tell, the endocrine system is a really delicate system with many interconnected relationships and must be treated with care. It is always critical to treat hormonal imbalances starting with a properly prepared nutrient dense diet and then addressing digestion status, mineral status, fatty acid status, hydration and most importantly blood sugar regulation. Hormonal imbalances will not be corrected until blood sugar and adrenal issues are properly addressed.
Our adrenals fire when our bodies are responding to a stressful situation. This could be stress from being chased by a wild animal, getting fired at work, drinking too much caffeine and alcohol, over exercising and eating the standard american diet high in refined and processed foods. Our society has taught us that stress is normal, and often praised because it means we are running ourselves ragid in order to accomplish all that we can in the workplace and not emphasizing community and relationship, so we are suffering in all areas. When we are chronically stressed, our adrenals are chronically pumping out cortisol. Chronically elevated cortisol can disrupt our endocrine system in many ways but here are three I have chosen to discuss:
The liver is responsible for deactivating hormones that are no longer needed because these hormones need to be removed by the body. When cortisol is elevated, this decreases the effectiveness of the liver in being able to break down excess cortisol in order to be removed by the body.
When cortisol is elevated the pancreas also takes a nasty hit. Elevated cortisol creates an environment in which insulin receptors on cells won’t respond the way they should to insulin. This will in turn put a strain on the pancreas to secrete more insulin which in turn will lead to insulin resistance.
In times of chronic stress, the body prioritizes the action of the adrenal glands over metabolic rate and other endocrine function. The adrenal glands therefore take the nutrients that were to be used by other systems to allow them to continue to function. This places a burden on the endocrine system and its production of hormones.
As we can see, chronic stress, from any form, leading to chronically elevated cortisol levels puts an extreme burden on our bodies. Our body prioritizes survival, so when we put our bodies under extreme stress certain organs have to take a back seat and many have to work so hard to keep us healthy that they “burn” out. We must take special care to find ways to lower our stress levels, by adopting meditation to handle our stress or changing our diets to nutrient dense whole food sources, we must help our bodies heal so we can find optimal health.