Colorado Springs Functional Medicine

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You Don’t Have Adrenal Fatigue | Stop Making Your Identity a Catch Phrase

For those that aren’t familiar with the adrenal glands, they have huge function in your health expression.  Every second of your day, your nervous system has to organize and coordinate your life experiences:  What you eat, how you think, how you move, wind changes, social influences, spiritual experiences, and congruency in purpose and practices.

With every single item, within microseconds, your nervous system has to decide if these particular influences will cause you harm or cause you happiness.  More often than not, your nervous system will be cautious and engage functions that shift you into immediate survival and protection. The first set of organs that your nervous system talks to are your adrenals.

Functional medicine Colorado SpringsThere are two major hormone groups (but many more) that the adrenals release to help you adapt when life throws curve balls at you.  One group is the catecholamines (adrenaline, epinephrine, norepinephrine, etc) that primarily work on functions of heart rate, blood pressure, muscle contraction, and triggering your brain for reaction over reason.  The other class is cortisol that primarily works to get your body to release stored energy (sugar) to give you instant fuel to escape a potential danger.

The longer someone is in the this state of protection, the more the body creates a default setting into that expression.  And the longer than is expressed, the more apt you favor catabolism (tissue destruction).  This sounds bad but no reaction or symptom is stupid.  These expressions are creating pathways for you to buy time to escape what is potentially life threatening. The more this reaction is repeated, the harder it is to keep up with the demands.  It’s like if you sprinted instead of walked to do everything.  You’re going to get tired.

Tired ≠ Fatigue

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Those Lab Values Suck

I had a woman contact me the other day.  She is 7-8 months pregnant and on her third pregnancy.  The first two have been fantastic and the kids have rockstar health.  This third pregnancy, she has been feeling more fatigued than the other two.  She was just attributing it to being a stay-at-home mom with two other toddlers and the physical and emotional load from chasing them all day.

At her last pre-natal appointment, the baby had a minor heart arrhythmia.  After having two pregnancies with no worries at all, this raised her concern a bit.  Truthfully she was freaked out.  At her previous appointment, some routine lab work was done.  With the increased fatigue and now a fetal heart arrhythmia with the baby, I said, “get me those labs.”  She said, “Why, my provider said everything looked fine.”  I said, “Those lab values suck.”

Those Lab Values Suck

Your labs suckWhen you look at the image, you will see all the different analytes measured.  On the right side, you will see the reference ranges.  I can’t stress enough that these values lump 95% of the population into the ‘normal and healthy’ category.  With 70-80% of healthcare claims are for chronic illness, there’s no feasible possibility or probability that 95% of the population is ‘normal and healthy.’

In the middle of the image, you will see the ‘out of range’ values.  For this woman, there were 3 values ‘out of range.’  Glucose, albumin, and immature granulocytes.  Her provider said that low albumin is often seen in pregnancy and is not a big concern.  I beg to differ.  Yes, low albumin is often seen in pregnancy but shouldn’t be swept under the rug.  Albumin is the main constituent protein in the blood.  It serves to transport hormones, vitamins, minerals,fatty acids, enzymes, amino acids, and drugs.

Yes, it may be low in pregnancy but that doesn’t mean it’s a good thing.  For that one value, think of the implications for mom and baby.  If there isn’t enough carriers for all the building blocks for the baby to develop as well as to provide mom the essentials for survival, is it a wonder mom is overly fatigued and baby has an arrhythmia?  I digress.

If we are going to use labs as a tool to assess prevention, then we have to analyze it in a range that is preventative. Click To Tweet

On the image, you will also see some hand writing.  That’s my assessment for your viewing pleasure.  When I do a lab analysis, I import the values into a spreadsheet for easy tracking and meticulously write a report on all the intricacies of everything.  To make my point here, I wrote on the actual labs.  You will see I have flagged 15 values.

The point isn’t to freak mom out anymore than she is but to uncover hidden dysfunctions that get labeled as ‘normal,’ that would explain why she is fatigued as well as the baby having an arrhythmia.

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Weight Loss like Vuarnet France

The topic that I have fielded the most questions and conversations about over the past few weeks has been regarding weight loss.  Maybe because I’m skinny (I like to call it lean).  Maybe because I used to be the fat kid (or ‘husky’ as I was told when I was younger).  I heard the word husky so much I thought it was a brand of clothing.  When we would go school shopping, we would always look for the ‘husky’ jeans.  When school would start up and everyone was checking out each other’s school digs, I would brag that I wore ‘huskies.’  In my mind it was as popular as Bugle Boy, Vuarnet France, and Jams.

Just like the brands of the 80s are out of business, so is the 80’s ideal weight equation of calories in + calories out = ability to wear acid washed tight-rolled jeans.

Calorie expenditure minus calorie intake is good in theory for weight loss but in today’s world of massive toxicities, inflammatory lifestyles, and emotional roller coasters, it just doesn’t work anymore.  Maybe it never did.  The past 40 years, the nation has gone low fat, no fat, light calorie, and no calorie and for the first time in history of the US, the number of obese people outnumber the overweight.

Let’s get past the dumbed down, calorie counting, weight loss formula and take a look at some areas of your weight loss journey that aren’t addressed.

You Are Exercising Too Much

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