Posted by bleauberry on April 1, 2009, at 17:10:42
In reply to hydrocortisone, posted by paul9 on March 31, 2009, at 23:49:50
Hypoadrenalism is almost universal with amalgam illness patients and I believe it is rampant in today's fast paced lousy diet stressed world, and I believe it is highly underrecognized in the psychiatry world. I have hypoadrenalism, have studied it deeply, have taken all sorts of treatments, have hung out at forums specializing on the topic, and would be happy to share with you.
The general assumption is that depression is related to high cortisol, and that antidepressants bring those high levels back to normal. What I believe they miss is that yes, while high cortisol is in the early stages of disease, it then enters a later stage where the glands are exhausted. Symptoms of high cortisol and low cortisol are very much the same...depression and anxiety being common in both.
A female singer in my band has been on all the ssris and xanax, with not much help on her anxiety or panic attacks. One day it dawned on me, looking at how skinny she was (common in hypoadrenalism) that maybe she had low cortisol. Without even testing for it, her doctor gave her the ok to try adrenal cortex extract. This weekend for the first time ever in her life she had no anxiety or panic before a show, she said she felt free and had fun. The ground-up adrenal glands of a cow did what powerful meds couldn't. It is just low cortisol, not the neurotransmitters themselves, at fault. Cortisol orchestrates the neurotransmitters.
I had strange reactions to the common things. Herbs are basically useless. If someone wants to give you herbs, don't even bother with that road. The best first step is adrenal cortex extract. I actually felt worse on it, more depressed, more tired. For some of us, the best and only thing is cortisol itself...hydrocortisone. The typical dose to restore normal phsyiological levels is 1.25mg-20mg. Any higher than 20mg risks shutting down the adrenal glands further. You just want to replace with the bare minimum dose possible what is missing, and no more.
Benefits I felt from just 2.5mg hydrocortisone, after starting at 1.25mg for a week, were: good sleep, total elimination of the morning panic weirdness that I woke up to, and calm/peace/serenity during the day even under stress. It did not help my fatigue, but it did massively increase my endurance...instead of stopping exhausted after 15 minutes of slowly chopping firewood, I could go for 3 hours. After two weeks I had the most pronounced depression-free day I ever imagined. Nothing short of a miracle. It did what no medicine ever came close to doing.
I had to stop because of the fear it would weaken my immune system. I have Lyme disease. I think that fear is totally ridiculous and am seeking hydrocortisone again. High doses risky, yes, low doses, no. My opinion.
If you go to an Endocronologist or GP you will get a worthless test. They will test your blood cortisol one time, or give a drug to see if your glands work. Basically, are your adrenal glands alive or dead? But...no indication of whether they are functioning strong or weak.
The best test is a saliva cortisol test in which you spit into 4 different test tubes throughout a 24 hour period so as to plot your cortisol curve on a graph and see what it does throughout the daily/nightly pattern. This test is very common among alternative MDs, integrative MDs, and naturopaths. GPS probably not. They are stuck in the old school. The test is called the Adrenal Stress Index.
So do I think hydrocortisone is worth taking a look at with or without drugs? Definitely a resounding yes in my opinion. But it is very important to get the test first so you know where you are starting from. You do not want to be taking hydrocortisone if your cortisol levels are following the normal curve. You only want it if your levels are below that curve.
When you read about adrenal fatigue and you see how the symptoms fit, it is almost like a lightbulb going off in your head. You know yourself better than anyone. Call the appropriate clinician in your area to get the saliva test. Getting hydrocortisone itself isn't that easy usually because most doctors are not well educated on it. I had to go through all the herbs and extracts first...playing the game sort of...in order to get my doctor to the point where he said ok let's try it. Glad he did. It was awesome.
If your doc will consider prescribing it, but is uncomfortable, that's ok. Get the test. That way he and you will not be shooting blindly. Also, be sure to remind him these are very low doses, only physiological replacement doses, not enough to cause the risks of HC at higher doses used to treat other diseases.
> is anyone now being treated or has anyone in the past been treated for depression with hydrocortisone either by itself or along with anti-depressants?
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> i've been treated for depression of years because of physical symptoms that could not be diagnosed. anti-depressants have either not been effective or have had only limited effects.
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> recently i discovered that all my symptoms can be explained by low adrenal function but the tests i had years ago were deemed to be "normal."
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> my pdoc doesn't feel "comfortable" prescribing hydrocortisone. i'm wondering if it is being used by others and if it is effective.
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poster:bleauberry
thread:887989
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20090330/msgs/888087.html