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Adrenal Glands and Mood
Adrenal hormones are often ignored in the conventional medical model until their levels reach extreme pathological elevations or deficiencies. However, the adrenals produce cortisol, DHEA, epinephrine (adrenaline), and norepinephrine, which are all critical to mood health, and when they are outside of an optimal range, mood is one of the first things affected. Imbalance in the adrenal glands typically results in depression, anxiety, insomnia, and fatigue, depending on whether the adrenal hormones are high or low. The adrenals also have a strong relationship with neurotransmitter production, thyroid hormone production, sex hormone production, and inflammation. So adrenal health is a pivotal aspect of treating depression and other mood issues.
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What's Causing Your Depression?
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Your Result:
Situations and Lifestyle may be contributing to your depression
When I say lifestyle, what I mean is the basic requirements of life—food, exercise, sleep, stress, and substance use. In short, it means the way you live—too much excitement or stress, too little sleep, forcing your body to deal with constant alcohol, tobacco, drugs, or poor diet. These contributors are the foundation of the chemistry of your body and mind, and will influence how your brain chemistry operates; and they may contribute to episodes of depression along the way if they are out of balance.
Most of us thrive when we keep our pace of life in the slow to medium range. Unfortunately the modern lifestyle doesn’t make this easy for us, because we are often saturated with responsibilities, work, tasks, information, commutes, and expectations to keep up with the pace of others. Depression can develop when dealing with difficult life situations, especially when the situation is long term.
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Medications may be contributing to your depression
A number of common medications can contribute to depression. Some of the most common are medications for anxiety and insomnia, some antibiotics, pain medications, acid reflux medications, birth control and hormone replacement, corticosteroids, some blood pressure medications, cholesterol medications, anticonvulsants, Parkinson's drugs, acne medications, and paradoxically, some antidepressants.
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Blood Sugar Imbalance may be contributing to your depression
Blood sugar balance can wreak havoc on your mood. Blood sugar crashes, low blood sugar, and high blood sugar all have unique expressions within mood and depression. Additionally, protein balance in your diet may affect how your body processes blood sugar. Whether it's a dietary imbalance, poor eating habits, low protein, too much sugar, hypoglycemia, or diabetes--depression can manifest when the blood sugar reaching the brain and fueling the body is out of balance.
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Environment may be contributing to your depression
Environment includes your personal environment and home, workspace, social environment, and the climate you live in. Depression can be triggered by chemicals and molds in the home or workplace, stress and toxicity in your social environment, or low Vitamin D due to lack of sunshine in some regions, or specifically during some seasons when you have less exposure to the sun. Additionally, heavy metals can build up in your body and brain and can cause depression if you have have had exposures through your home or work building, well water, proximity to mining operations or industrial sites, dental fillings, or simply through eating a lot of fish which may be contaminated by heavy metals.
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Your Result:
Gut issues may be contributing to your depression
Depression can develop when gut health is out of balance. Gut inflammation, intestinal permeability (a.k.a. "leaky gut"), and the microbiome have an enormous role in mood. Some important neurotransmitters are formed in the gut, and the formation of these neurotransmitters depends on having healthy gut flora. Abnormal gut flora (bacteria colonies, yeast, etc) can release compounds that cause depression and other mood symptoms when they circulate to the brain and nervous system. Plus, gut health affects mood through what is now known as the "Gut-Brain Axis".
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Thyroid Imbalance may be contributing to your depression
Some of the classic symptoms of low thyroid, or hypothyroidism, are depression, fatigue, constipation, hair loss, weight gain, dry skin, and joint pain. However, the conventional model of medicine does not begin to treat the thyroid until severe symptoms of hypothyroidism have set in, or until the lab number reaches a certain level. Unfortunately, symptoms arise early in that process, especially mood symptoms and energy levels, and will remain until the thyroid is addressed. Subclinical hypothyroid symptoms can be addressed to help with mood and energy levels well before most general practitioners would address the thyroid as the cause. Thyroid imbalance also has a strong relationship with adrenal hormone imbalance, and a large number of thyroid cases have an autoimmune cause which may also contribute to depression via inflammation.
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Your Result:
Sex Hormones may be contributing to your depression
Depression is a symptom of estrogen imbalance, progesterone imbalance, and testosterone imbalance; so sex hormone imbalances can affect mood conditions in any gender, at any time of life. For women, PMS or PMDD is often associated with depression and anxiety, as well as having mood changes around menopause. Men can have low production of testosterone at any time of life, but particularly during what is known as 'andropause', when testosterone naturally declines with age. Other hormone imbalances may affect mood in non-binary people due to unique hormonal expression, or in transgendered individuals due to specific medications or dosing. Balancing sex hormones is helpful for mood, overall quality of life, and vitality. Additionally, sex hormone imbalances may arise as a result of stress, adrenal imbalances, or thyroid imbalances.
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Your Result:
Neurotransmitter Imbalance may be contributing to your depression
Neurotransmitters are the main chemical messengers of mood, and they include "uppers", which lift your mood and stimulate excitement and activity, and "downers" which calm and relax. Neurotransmitter imbalances are pivotal treatment areas for mood disorders, and they can be tested and treated individually. Imbalances in neurotransmitters can result from many areas, included genetics, gut health issues, and hormone imbalances in the adrenals, thyroid, and sex hormones.
Depression can be a result of several different neurotransmitter imbalances, including serotonin, dopamine, and norepinephrine. The two main branches of depression are serotonin dependent, which presents as a weepy, sad, melancholic 'blues' type of depression; and dopamine/norepinephrine dependent depression, which presents as a tired, lethargic, brain-fogged, and unmotivated type of depression.
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Your Result:
Infectious Diseases may be contributing to your depression
Infectious diseases such as chronic Lyme disease, reactivation of Epstein Barr Virus (the virus responsible for mononucleosis), and long-term COVID-19 symptoms can cause chronic depression through inflammation, nutrient scavenging, and direct effects on the brain and nervous system. In addition to causing significant fatigue, some viruses go dormant in the nervous system permanently, only to be reactivated in times of high stress. Each of these chronic infectious diseases also has a strong relationship with inflammation, which is another cause of depression. The ability to fight off an infectious disease that may affect mood is dependent on your immune system health, which may be compromised as a result of stress, autoimmunity, or exposure to molds or heavy metals.
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Your Result:
Genetics may be contributing to your depression
Your DNA is the fundamental software for how your body creates proteins, enzymes, and chemicals such as neurotransmitters, as well as how all of these things are broken down. Some people experience depression because their genes code differently than other people, and they are unable to form the neurotransmitters needed; they form abnormal molecules which cause problems with mood; their genes require higher level of certain nutrients to carry out processes; or the genes may simply impair a person's ability to break down certain chemicals efficiently. However, even though the DNA you are born with is permanent, there are ways to support your genes to improve their effect on your mood.
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Diet may be contributing to your depression
Some of the ways that diet can contribute to depression are through food allergies or intolerances, deficiencies of mood nutrients, mood irritants (nitrates, glutamates, dyes, preservatives, and synthetic ingredients), and affecting the health of the gut and microbiome. All of these affect the Gut-Brain Axis, neurotransmitter production, or can simply be irritating your nervous system.
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Your Result:
Nutrient Deficiencies may be contributing to your depression
Nutrient deficiencies arise when the diet is not balanced to include critical nutrients, or when there is malabsorption or gut inflammation blocking you from absorbing all of what you eat. Depression arises from specific deficiencies of amino acids, which are the building blocks of neurotransmitters; from not getting enough B-Vitamins (or from too much); and also from genetic individuality in which people use different amounts of certain nutrients, so the standard recommendations actually leave some people depleted.
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Your Result:
Inflammation may be contributing to your depression
A lot of people believe that constant aches and pains are a normal part of getting older. But it's not--the body is designed to heal from past injuries. If you have chronic pain in your joints or muscles, regular headaches, or other indicators of inflammation, such as rashes or allergies, then chronic inflammation may be at the root of your depression as well. Depression can develop when inflammatory compounds affect the brain tissue; inflammation of the brain through the "Gut-Brain Axis"; and build up of toxic compounds in the body that have an inflammatory effect. Chronic inflammation is caused by inflammatory diet, genetics, physical activity levels, obesity, and lack of the natural compounds that help block inflammation such as flavonoids, antioxidants, and Omega-3 fatty acids.
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Your Result:
Adrenals may be contributing to your depression
Adrenal hormones are often ignored in the conventional medical model until their levels reach extreme pathological elevations or deficiencies. However, the adrenals produce cortisol, DHEA, epinephrine (adrenaline), and norepinephrine, which are all critical to mood health, and when they are outside of an optimal range, mood is one of the first things affected. Imbalance in the adrenal glands typically results in depression, anxiety, insomnia, and fatigue, depending on whether the adrenal hormones are high or low. The adrenals also have a strong relationship with neurotransmitter production, thyroid hormone production, sex hormone production, and inflammation. So adrenal health is a pivotal aspect of treating depression and other mood issues.
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Some neurotransmitters require an appropriate amount of cortisol in order to form correctly, which compounds the effects of adrenal imbalance on mood.
Cortisol, which is the main stress hormone in the body, is made from the same building blocks as Progesterone (a female sex hormone). So when stress is high, or adrenal hormones are out of balance, the body preferentially chooses to produce cortisol instead of progesterone, which leads to additional sex hormone imbalances. This process is called the “progesterone shunt” or “progesterone steal”.
When cortisol is high, the thyroid begins to produce ‘reverse T3’ instead of the active form of the hormone, so adrenal issues can also be at the root of some thyroid issues, both of which affect mood.
Cortisol is one of the main steroid hormones that the body produces, so when it is low, the body is unable to stop inflammatory reactions, and then pain, inflammation, and autoimmunity may increase.
Resources for Adrenals and Mood
For more information on how adrenals and cortisol affect mood and what you can do about it, explore various treatment options tailored to individual imbalances.
- Grab the free 7-day Adrenal Mini-Course and get a breakdown of how adrenals affect your mood, what might be causing adrenal stress, and what you can actually do about it. You’ll learn which labs can help identify imbalances, plus discover other biological factors that could be playing a role.
- Get your personalized Road Map: Check out the Holistic Mood Assessment if you’re ready to see the whole picture of how to treat the root causes of depression and anxiety biologically. Because understanding your brain? That’s the first step to feeling like yourself again.
- View the Supplement Protocols: Check out the High Cortisol and Low Cortisol supplement protocols on Fullscript (you’ll need to sign up for an account to view the protocols and receive an ongoing 10% discount on your purchases). Here you will find individual protocols related to each adrenal imbalance.
Understanding how hormones affect mood is at the core of mental health. Your mood isn’t a mystery, it’s chemistry.
