Adrenal Fatigue Syndrome through 3,000-year old glasses – Part I

Jun 4, 2016 | Acupuncture, Adrenal Fatigue, Fatigue, Stress Reduction, Traditional Chinese Medicine, Weight Loss, Wellness

Summer is upon us. Time to get out. Time to dive headfirst into summertime activities. Time to get a tan and then show it off. Time to show off the new body we worked so hard to get, thanks to those New Year’s resolutions. Time to do all those things that make us feel great. But what if we don’t? Feel great, that is. What if we don’t feel like getting out? What if we don’t feel like getting a tan, much less showing it off? What if, despite eating kale and pomegranates and all the other superfoods du jour, we still have the same body that we would never consider show-off-worthy? What if we don’t feel like diving headfirst into anything? Take a deep breath; you’re not alone.

From a Traditional Chinese Medicine perspective, your “issues” may be due to an imbalance with your adrenal glands or your kidneys – something called Adrenal Fatigue Syndrome (AFS) – but we’re getting ahead of ourselves……

In Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) everything is about balance. One of the best, and most succinct, explanations of this concept, in my opinion, comes from Dr. Michael Lam, MD, MPH and Dorothy Lam, RDN, MS, MPH:

Two concepts that are unique and fundamental to TCM are Qi (internal vital energy) and yin and yang (the harmony of all the opposite elements and forces that make up existence). The Chinese concept of Qi (pronounced chee) is that there is an invincible life force that spontaneously flows freely throughout the body through the Five Elements – Wood, Fire, Earth, Metal and Water – each representing a distinct quality of the Qi energy that is vital to the continual good health and flow of nature. TCM asserts that Qi is weakened or blocked when a person is ill. Specifically, the illness is a result of the blockage, rather than the blockage being the result of the illness. The theory of yin and yang states that the two opposites inherently in every object or phenomena in the universe, counterbalance each other; and that one enjoys good health when yin and yang are in balance but when they are out of sync, one becomes sick (“Acupuncture, TCM, and Adrenal Fatigue Syndrome” https://www.drlam.com/blog/acupuncture-tcm-and-adrenal-fatigue-syndrome/4603/ , 2014).

With that said, back to the kidneys, adrenal glands, and how they play into AFS. In TCM, when you are in good health, the kidneys’ relaxed yin state is in balance with the adrenals’ yang state.

Kidney yin is connected to the parasympathetic nervous system and the adrenal glands’ production of the hormone cortisol. Cortisol is produced in periods of high stress, to lessen the effects of the stress. Overproduction of cortisol, however, can result in increased glucose levels, insulin resistance, weight gain (particularly around the mid-section), anxiety, irritability, insomnia, and all-around poor moods. Over time, this causes our bodies to break down, The amino acids in the body which are used to build and repair everything in our bodies from muscle cells to neurotransmitters, end up being used for fuel instead.

Kidney yang provides the heat necessary for proper digestion and many other metabolic functions necessary for good health, most notably the production and regulation of epinephrine and norepinephrine – also known as adrenaline and noradrenaline. These are commonly known as our “fight or flight” hormones because they are released in times of extreme stress and regulate the body’s ability to combat imminent physical danger.

A very simplistic, yet illustrative, analogy would be that yin is calming in nature – thus its connection to the parasympathetic nervous system. Yang, on the other hand is stimulatory – connected to the sympathetic (reactive) nervous system, and driven by epinephrine (adrenaline), norepinephrine (noradrenalin), and hormones such as estrogen and testosterone.

Adrenal stressors

Adrenal stressors

When we are stressed, cortisol production shoots up, peaks, and then falls dramatically as the adrenal glands become exhausted, throwing the balance of yin and yang into a state of yang deficiency. Adrenal Fatigue Syndrome is a result of the kidney’s yang deficiency state and can manifest itself through depression, chronic fatigue, decreased sexual function and low thyroid function. It is not happenstance that these conditions parallel Western Medicine’s diagnoses of depression, hypothyroidism, sexual dysfunction, and kidney inflammation.

 

So what causes all of this in the first place? In a word – stress. What kind of stress? Unfortunately, just about all of them. Financial pressures, emotional stress, marital stress, and employment stress, to name a few. Then, there are those stressors that are more controllable: lack of relaxation, lack of sleep, overexertion, smoking, caffeine intake, poor eating habits in general and specifically eating too much sugar and/or white flour, lack of a work/life balance, and negative attitudes or beliefs.

So what can we do to find out if our adrenal glands might be contributing to how poorly we feel? And how do we then fix our tuckered-out adrenal glands – aside from laying off the gummy bears? This will be the topic of our upcoming sequel – “Adrenal Fatigue Syndrome – Part II”.

In the meantime, to learn more about TCM and Functional Medicine, visit our web page at www.NaturesBalanceAcupunture.com . Call Nature’s Balance Acupuncture and Wellness Center at (815) 788-8383 to learn more, or to schedule your individual wellness assessment.

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