Posted by blueberry1 on December 16, 2006, at 10:17:41
I have no idea if my cortisol levels have anything to do with my depression. But a few months ago my cortisol levels were tested 4 times throughout the day. They were way below normal all day, and rose to just barely the low end of normal in early evening. Strange, but if I am ever to feel half decent at all - what I call my evening bounce - it is in the evening. So is something else going on that sometimes randomly gives an improved evening mood and simultaneously raises cortisol, or is the cortisol itself controlling it all? Quite confusing.
My naturopath/psychitiatrist nurse practioner at the time said it was fatigued adrenal glands and she gave me stuff to boost adrenal glands. We tried several things but they all dramatically worsened depression and created incredible anxiety.
In case anyone is wondering, my evening bounce has nothing to do with food or diet or daily exertion or stress of anything. Believe me, I've tried all kinds of things. When I was on prozac the evening bounce was more pronounced, but was still random, unreliable, and unpredictable. Right now I am on 300mg st johns wort, 200mg lithium orotate, high EPA fish oil, and 1.25mg zyprexa. For some strange reason after all these years on drugs, I seem super sensitive to them and absolutely cannot take recommended doses without getting a lot more depressed. My current cocktail has put a weak floor under me...it's been a few weeks since I've had any crying spells...but if I were to take a depression scoring test my numbers would probably be in the high-moderate to severe depression range.
The evening bounce happens rarely now. I wonder if it was some kind of daily bipolar swing that the lithium and fish oil has eliminated.
I would like to do a test of something rather benign to raise cortisol levels and see what happens. Any ideas?
poster:blueberry1
thread:714189
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20061212/msgs/714189.html