Adrenal fatigue is debilitating for many people around the world. If you are constantly tired for no reason, feeling run down and stressed, regularly crave salty or sweet snacks, have a decreased sex drive, have regular body aches or struggle to bounce back from stress or illness, you too could be suffering from adrenal fatigue. Conventional medicine does not recognise adrenal fatigue as a distinct syndrome and does not offer anything more than Band-Aid solutions for its symptoms.
However, expert functional medicine practitioners like Luke Clarke are able to diagnose adrenal fatigue and have helped many other people just like you achieve great results by properly and holistically treating it.
What causes adrenal fatigue?
The deficiency that causes adrenal fatigue is an imbalance of hormones in the body. This is usually due to your adrenal glands being over-stimulated, either through a very intense single stress or by repeated stresses. Adrenal glands deal with all kinds of stress – physical, emotional or psychological – by producing hormones that regulate everything from energy production and storage to immune function, heart rate and muscle tone. An inadequate response from your adrenal glands to these stresses is likely to cause some degree of adrenal fatigue.
Can vitamins and supplements fix adrenal fatigue?
Some in the medical profession believe that adrenal fatigue is simply caused by iron deficiency, or a deficiency of Vitamin B12 in the blood. Others tell patients to just “get more sleep”. However, it is rarely as simple a fix as that.
Adrenal fatigue is referred to as a “syndrome”, most often associated with prolonged stress after acute or chronic infections, including respiratory infections like influenza, bronchitis or pneumonia.
A whole range of factors can reduce adrenal function and adrenal fatigue may surface after an accumulation of multiple triggers over a period of time. Given the wide range of potential causes for adrenal fatigue, there are also a wide range of potential treatments. Specific diets are just one such treatment that have been shown to help patients overcome their issues and rediscover improved energy levels.
Is adrenal fatigue common?
There are no recent statistics available on adrenal fatigue. However, in 1969 Dr. John Tinterra, a medical doctor who specialized in low adrenal function, estimated that approximately 16% of the public could be classified as severe. Dr Tinterra believed that if all indications of low cortisol were included, the percentage of people suffering adrenal fatigue would be more like 66%.
How can I find out if I have adrenal fatigue?
Just because you have some of the symptoms of adrenal fatigue, it doesn’t mean you necessarily have adrenal fatigue. The only real way to tell if you have adrenal fatigue is to consult a functional medicine practitioner like Luke Clarke for a proper diagnosis. One of Australia’s leading naturopaths, Luke Clarke can diagnose adrenal fatigue at his Melbourne clinic and offers practical, tailored solutions to address the syndrome. If you want to be back bouncing out of bed and powering through your day with added energy, contact Luke Clarke for a free 10-minute consultation today.