Do you frequently find yourself exhausted?
Is it difficult for you to focus on the task at hand?
Do you have frequent mood swings or ongoing depression?
If so, you may have an adrenal condition that affects your adrenal hormones.
Adrenal conditions, including adrenal fatigue, can have a significant impact on your quality of life. Fortunately, there are natural solutions for hormonal imbalance that can help you manage these conditions.
Dr. Kimberly Dawdy, a naturopathic doctor in Ottawa, offers naturopathic solutions aimed at improving your adrenal symptoms so that you can return to focusing on the things that matter in your life.
If you’ve been diagnosed with an adrenal disorder, or you think you may have one, book your appointment with Dawdy Naturopathic today.
What Are Your Adrenal Glands?
You have two adrenal glands which are located on top of each of your kidneys and are part of your endocrine system.
This is the system that produces hormones for your body, and includes your thyroid, pancreas, sex organs, pituitary gland, hypothalamus, and more. Each of these produces its own hormones, which affect many different aspects of your body.
RELATED: Diabetes and Pancreas Disorders
RELATED: Thyroid Disorders
RELATED: Hormone Imbalance In Women
Your adrenal glands create DHEA, which is a hormone your body uses to build a number of other hormones, including estrogen and testosterone. They’re also responsible for creating cortisol, adrenaline, aldosterone, and noradrenaline.
So, if your adrenal glands are not working as expected, it can have a broad impact on your body by creating hormone imbalances.
Some symptoms of adrenal gland disorders include:
- Chronic fatigue
- Sweating
- Dizziness
- Nausea or vomiting
- Low blood sugar
- Low blood pressure
- Irregular periods
- Muscle or joint pain
- Dark patches on your skin
- Weight fluctuation
These symptoms tend to appear subtle at first, and will often develop over time both in severity and frequency.
If you notice these symptoms, it may be a sign of an adrenal disorder. Dr. Kimberly Dawdy, ND, can help.
Book your appointment with Dawdy Naturopathic today.
Naturopathic Treatment for Adrenal Fatigue
Adrenal Fatigue is an adrenal gland disorder that can occur when chronic stress overstimulates your adrenal glands.
This leads to inconsistent levels of cortisol, the stress hormone, in your bloodstream.
Plus, you’re DHEA hormone, which is responsible for creating many other hormones in your body is often lacking if you have adrenal fatigue.
This often results in ambiguous symptoms that can be hard to diagnose because they are similar to other adrenal disorders.
With adrenal fatigue, you typically wake up tired and unable to function without significant amounts of caffeine.
You’ll then get a burst of energy that will usually crash around the early afternoon.
Finally, you experience another burst of energy around 6pm that crashes again around 9pm, and then your energy peaks again at 11pm.
This can make it difficult to accomplish all of your goals throughout the day during these energy crashes.
Other symptoms that may indicate adrenal fatigue include:
- Brain fog
- Hair loss
- Muscle or bone loss
- Chronic fatigue
- Autoimmune conditions
- Sleep disturbances or sleep apnea
RELATED: Sleep Disorders
The good news is that naturopathic medicine can help to reduce the symptoms you experience.
By addressing both the physical and mental dimensions of stress, Dr. Kimberly Dawdy, ND, can help you manage your adrenal fatigue.
Book your appointment with Dawdy Naturopathic today.
Addison’s Disease Naturopathic Treatments
Addison’s disease is an autoimmune disorder that develops when your adrenal glands don’t produce enough cortisol or aldosterone because their cortex has been damaged.
Cortisol regulates your body’s reactions to stress and aldosterone regulates your body’s sodium and potassium.
This is called primary adrenal insufficiency, and it’s caused by an autoimmune reaction where your immune system attacks your adrenal glands.
RELATED: Immune System and Digestive Support
It can also be caused by secondary adrenal insufficiency, which happens when the pituitary gland located in your brain can’t produce the hormone ACTH which tells your adrenal gland when to release hormones.
No ACTH means that your adrenal gland won’t make any hormones because it’s not being told to.
Symptoms that you might have Addison’s disease include:
- Vomiting
- Salt cravings
- Weight loss or decreased appetite
- Low blood pressure
- Nausea
- Chronic fatigue
- Fainting spells
- Darkening in skin colour
These symptoms can culminate without treatment into an Addisonian crisis, which is a life threatening emergency characterized by extreme agitation, delirium, high fever, visual and auditory hallucinations, and loss of consciousness.
If you or someone you know is experiencing an Addisonian crisis, they need emergency care – call 911 right away.
However, it doesn’t have to get to that point.
Naturopathic medicine can help to address your Addison’s disease through treatments to support your adrenal glands, reduce inflammation in your body, and balance your hormones to help you feel better.
Book your appointment with Dawdy Naturopathic today.
Natural Remedies for Cushing’s Disease
Cushing’s disease is a disorder that occurs when your adrenal glands make too much cortisol.
Common symptoms of Cushing’s disease include:
- Fatty deposits found in your midsection, face, and between shoulders and upper back
- Purple stretch marks on your breasts, arms, abdomen, and thighs
- Weight gain
- Slow healing skin injuries
- Easily bruising skin
- Chronic fatigue
- Acne
- Muscle weakness
There are a number of reasons that your body might be producing too much cortisol, which causes Cushing’s disease.
It could be high stress levels in your life because of an injury, surgery, or the final trimester of pregnancy.
Extreme athletic training, malnutrition, alcoholism, and depression or high levels of emotional stress can also cause it.
RELATED: Support for Expectant and New Parents
RELATED: Lifestyle Counselling
Treatment for Cushing’s disease is usually focused on stress reduction and lowering the levels of cortisol in your body.
Dr. Kimberly Dawdy, ND, offers a number of natural Cushing’s disease treatments that can help.
Book your appointment with Dawdy Naturopathic today.
Naturopathic Treatment for Other Adrenal Conditions
There are other adrenal conditions that a naturopathic doctor can help with.
Pheochromocytoma is a condition where benign tumours develop in the medulla of your adrenal glands.
Adrenal cancer is a condition when cancerous tumours develop in your adrenal glands.
In the case of cancer, the only known effective treatment is from a medical perspective – discuss this with your oncologist to find out more.
However, naturopathic medicine can offer adjunctive cancer support designed to help you manage some of the symptoms of cancer, the side effects chemotherapy, and to help you recover from cancer related surgery.
Congenital adrenal hyperplasia is an inherited hormonal disorder that makes it very difficult to produce adrenal hormones and often affects the development of sex organs.
If you’re dealing with these, or any other adrenal related conditions, Dr. Kimberly Dawdy, ND, can help.
Book Your Appointment with Dr. Kimberly Dawdy, ND, Today
Adrenal conditions can make it harder to achieve the goals you’re working towards.
They can interfere with many aspects of your daily life, including in your career, relationships, pastimes, and more.
This can create a significant amount of stress in your life.
And because adrenal conditions are often related to chronic stress in the first place, this can create a vicious cycle of symptoms making the cause worse, which makes the symptoms worse, and so on.
But it doesn’t have to be that way.
Naturopathic solutions can support you and your adrenal glands with the goal of reducing your symptoms and improving your quality of life.
Dr. Kimberly Dawdy, naturopathic doctor in Ottawa, is here to help.