Been feeling worn down, exhausted, not well, or even unsexy lately?
There is ONE common culprit behind all of this — chronic stress. But there IS a solution — read on!
Here’s how it works: When you are stressed, your adrenal glands create a hormone called cortisol. Cortisol has an enormous effect on every system in your body.
Feeling Tired? If your cortisol is off, the chemistry of your brain is altered. This causes both short-term and chronic fatigue, and also insomnia. Your adrenal glands become exhausted from constant demands to produce cortisol. They then begin to produce too little cortisol, which leads to chronic fatigue, and even depression.
Gaining Weight? The excess cortisol caused by stress causes your blood sugar levels to fluctuate. Since the brain’s primary fuel is sugar (glucose), any imbalance in blood sugar makes you crave sweets and carbohydrates such as bread, pasta, potatoes, and pastries.
Sound familiar? This is the source of “stress eating.”
Plus when your adrenal glands are busy pumping out cortisol in response to stress, they can’t produce aldosterone – a hormone that regulates your minerals. So you’ll be low on magnesium and crave chocolate, chips, or other salty processed foods. Not good.
Got a Low Sex Drive? Unbalanced cortisol levels lead to lower sexual energy, desire, and performance. Because your adrenal glands are busy making cortisol, they produce fewer sex hormones.
Stress prepares your body to fight or run, not make love. And since unbalanced cortisol levels can also cause insomnia, depression, and fatigue – the likelihood of feeling perky and sexy is pretty slim.
Stress Kills Brain Cells. If that is not enough, there’s also evidence that stress kills brain cells. So your mental edge drops off, you have less access to your higher brain centers, and even your memory suffers. (Ever try to find your car keys when you’re stressed?)
Fast, Low-Cost Solutions. The sources of stress in your life are unlikely to simply go away. The REAL answer is to develop a new way of handling stress, while you simultaneously focus on higher states of conscious. Check this out!
And cortisol produced by adrenal glands also rises in response to stress, which tells the brain to refuel.