Night Cortisol Is Still High In Spite Of Interventions?

Amazigh

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Aug 30, 2012
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I think my stress hormones have been elevated since ~ 2013 when I experienced an injury. I gained almost 40 lbs which I haven't been able to get rid of (mostly right around my middle). I had been taking a lot of T3 and it seemed to not work. I noticed I couldn't tolerate stressful events very well, or even very exciting events. My sleep suffered on and off. My blood pressure began to creep up to about 130/80 intermittently. I developed erosions in my stomach lining, which the gastro dr. said was due to stress. I have a hiatal hernia and organ prolapse issues, all Cortisol-related. I have also been having stressful events on and off.

Some of this improved after I was advised to swap out some of the T3 I had been taking with T4, and it's been noticeable. My digestive issues have improved a lot (also with the help of famotidine). Making sure I got enough protein (which I was not eating enough of). I started taking 125mg of Clonidine for my elevated blood pressure in December, which was a very stressful month for me. I also supplement with gelatin, and a few other things.

I had been taking about 120mg of Progest-e/day, but had to stop because it caused bleeding for several days between my periods. So instead, I take 300 mg pregnenolone + <10 mg of DHEA.

My waking temps are close to 97.8 most of the time, unless I don't get sleep, but my heart rate doesn't seem to come up past 68. Overall I feel way better now than I have in the last 4 years, but some of these issues don't seem to budge and they've impacted everything from my work to my social life, to my sex life.

Here is the saliva cortisol test results from last week:

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Any insights/suggestions etc would be appreciated....
 

sweetpeat

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Nov 28, 2014
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Have you tried experimenting with the timing of when you take things? I tend to have a cortisol pattern similar to yours. I find that taking DHEA during the day will crash my energy because it's tanking my cortisol even further since it's a cortisol antagonist. But I know from testing that I'm low in DHEA. So I take it in the evening when my cortisol tends to be high. Pregnenolone will sometimes do the same thing; it depends on the dose. For me, I generally find a bigger dose of preg is better taken at night. So you could try early evening or bedtime dosing of one or both. Or maybe split dosing would help, if you usually take them all at once.
 

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