Adrenal Fatigue 101

Burnout isn’t always dramatic. Sometimes it’s quiet and constant: you wake up tired, lean on caffeine, push through your day, and tell yourself you’ll recover “later.” We’re breaking down what that pattern can look like through the lens of adrenal fatigue, and we make it simple with an analogy you’ll remember: your energy works like money. You’ve got cash on hand, savings in the bank, and credit. When you’re living on credit, your body still shows up, but the payback can feel brutal.

We talk through the biggest adrenal stressors we see in real life: chronic emotional stress and anxiety loops, sleep deprivation and a disrupted cortisol rhythm, blood sugar spikes and crashes, caffeine on an empty stomach, and the hidden hit of information overload from screens and nonstop stimulation. We also cover overtraining and why “more exercise” can backfire when recovery is missing, plus how inflammation, chronic illness, environmental toxins, and chronic pain keep the nervous system stuck in fight or flight.

You’ll leave with practical, doable takeaways for adrenal support and balanced energy: prioritize sleep, use naps or a daily laydown to reset, anchor meals around protein, add whole-food complex carbs for steadier fuel, and stop digging the hole deeper with habits that keep you stressed. If someone you love is running on fumes, share this and help them rebuild their reserves. Subscribe, follow, and leave a review so more people can find Dx2podcast!

Transcript

Welcome And Wheel Of Life

Debra 0:04

Welcome to the D Times 2 podcast, hosted by Sisters Denise and Deborah. We are all about finding balance in the various parts of life. Using the Wheel of Life as our guide, we explore how to keep each spoke rolling smoothly. We discuss health and wellness, education and spirituality, as well as mental and emotional growth. Join us for real conversations, practical tips, and a few laughs as we share stories, insights, and strategies to help you create a life that feels balanced, purposeful, and designed by you. Good morning, Deborah. Good morning, Denise. Good to see you today. You too. How have you been? I'm I've been well. Windy, but well. You look a little windblown. Oh, that's it. No, you don't. You look beautiful. I'm supposed to be sexy. It has been really something else lately. Yep. Record windstorms. Do you have anything to share with us today?

Vision Gains From Tiny Habits

Debra 1:00

I do. I am absolutely buzzin'. Do you want to know why? I sure do. Okay, I'm gonna give you a little backstory. For the last little while, I've been trying having trouble with my vision. For one, my glasses are old enough that there's some scratches on them, some of the finish is worn off, and when I put my glasses on, I feel like I'm putting fog over my eyes. Well, that's not good. That's not great. We're supposed to make it clearer, right? So distance vision is better, but foggy. So everything's a fog all the time. And then when I wear my contacts, the last couple times I've put my contacts in, for one, I'm really proud of myself. I never said my eyes are doing badly. I said every time I would say, my contacts aren't working right. Because it felt like my contacts weren't working right. Okay. Anyway, last week I actually went to the eye doctor because I really want to get some new glasses. Well, yours are foggy, so that's a good idea. Right, right. It was like I gotta just do something about this, and so I needed an eye exam anyway. And my vision has improved in both eyes. No way. That's why my contacts weren't working right. That's nuts. I was so excited. Like I was literally buzzing when I came out of there, and they just kept saying this is very unusual. And I kept saying, No, but I've been working on it. I've been working on it. So think about our SMART goals that we talked about a few weeks ago in that episode. Like I literally apply the principles that we talk about. Yeah. So there are different eye exercises, eye exercises I've been doing, and then there are like just eye resting things that I've been doing. I think I showed you one where you cover your eyes, you black everything out, and it literally helps your eyes just relax. So I've been basically easing the strain on my eyes and also strengthening the muscles that focus the eyeball. Those tiny little muscles. Yep. It's not something I can teach a class on, but I've been actively working on it a little bit for a while, and vision in both eyes has improved. At my age of 55, when most people's vision is declining. That's amazing. I know. You should be buzzing. I am buzzing. I can't wait until my new glasses come in. Today I'm wearing my new contacts, and it's like, I can see everything. I can see. It's awesome. Yeah. Ooh, way to go. That's my story for this week. And a true example of payoff from some of the goals that I have been working towards. Good job. Yeah. You got 1% better. Yes. I actually got two clicks better. Well, whatever that means. On both eyes, two clicks. Yeah. So congratulations. If you're an ophthalmologist, you know what that means. Or if you've had any eye exam, click click, is this better? Click click, is this better? That's awesome. Yeah. So way to go. Thanks. I'm excited. You should be. Yeah. What color glasses did you get? I'm gonna tell you I got two pairs. One for specifically working at the computer because I have trifocals. She's special. I am very fancy. And so when I've been working at the computer, my head is cocked up so I can see out of the bottom part of my glasses, and it is very, very, very hard on my neck. That's not very ergonomically smart. It's terrible. And I usually stop working on the computer when my neck is in agony. And I need to stop doing that. And so I got one pair. The frames are like almost royal blue, acrylic, just for the computer. And then my other ones are kind of a red burgundy. I tend to go burgundy purple with my glasses somewhere in there. And they are graduated on the bottom. So I'm hoping they look good because they didn't have the actual ones in the store. They had some that were green that I didn't want. Like they transitioned to green to yellow. Yeah, not good for me, but the red option was beautiful. Cool. So those will be my real glasses, my for everything glasses. Good. Yeah, sound like fun, fun colors, fun things. Yeah. It really is nice when you can see clearly. I've I just every day I've been like, I can't see. And it's like it didn't matter if it was my contacts or my glasses for various reasons. And now I can see. That's so nice. Yeah. Good job.

unknown 5:56

Yeah.

Debra 5:57

Thanks. You want to talk about our topic today?

New Glasses And Computer Ergonomics

Debra 6:00

Yes. Are you ready to move? Let's go in. Okay.

Adrenals Explained With Money Analogy

Debra 6:04

So I have had on my mind a lot lately some conversations I've had with many an in-person client. Okay. About the adrenals. What are adrenals? So adrenals are two of the, well, there's a pair of adrenal glands. They sit right on top of the kidneys, and they have a lot to do with energy reserve. So my analogy that I give all the time, because I think for most people it makes sense, is you think about your adrenals and what they provide as money. Okay. We know money. We do. Okay. So think about having savings in the bank, cash on hand, and then credit. A lot of people are in adrenal fatigue, and they are they've burned up all of their cash on hand. They've burned through all of their savings in the bank, and they're spending all of their energy on credit. They're borrowing. They don't have it to use and it must be paid back. And they need to get flush with cash and rebuild that savings in the bank. Makes sense. That's a good analogy. It tracks. I tracked that. Yeah.

Sponsor Break Protein Ice Cream

Debra 7:26

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Why Women Push Through Exhaustion

Debra 8:24

So I'm going to say this is a conversation I have repeatedly, especially with women, because women tend to just suck it up and push through and keep going with all the demands of everything all the time, whether or not they have it to give. So mostly women, but it affects men. Yes, it can affect everybody, but it tends to be a little more common in women. Yeah. Have you ever felt like you're spending energy, borrowed energy? Yeah, I have. I have felt like that at points in my life. At points in your life. Did you do anything deliberately to pull out of it? Or did you just do what you had to do until that season ended and you could kind of recuperate?

Naps And Getting Horizontal Daily

Debra 9:19

Well, I would say that I've done things throughout my life. Well, specifically one thing throughout my life that I think helps set reset adrenals, and that's take a nap. That does help reset adrenals. So that's been a really big thing pretty much my entire adult life. To have a nap. Or I'll lay down if I can't fall asleep or don't have time. I at least lay down and try to calm everything down. Calm the system. That is something consistently I've done.

SPEAKER_00 9:48

Do you do it every day? Pretty much. Good for you.

Debra 9:52

I would love to do it every day, but I do not get to do it every day. Just sometimes because of how my schedule lands. But if I don't get to have a laydown, I I say I at least need to get horizontal in the day. That's the laydown. Get horizontal and change the gravitational stress on the body. If I don't get to have a nap, I always will go to bed early. So I either get it midday or I get it at the end of the day. That's good. Yeah. Just because sometimes I can't I can't make it work in the you know, mid middle of the day. But there have been times where I look at my schedule and I see how things are gonna land and I lay down at 9.30 in the morning because that's the time I have. It makes a difference. I think no matter what time you do it, it does help.

Chronic Emotional Stress And Anxiety Loops

Debra 10:44

Yeah. So let's talk about some of the things that tax the adrenals more than just go, go, go, do, do, do, B, B, B. Okay. Okay. So I put together a list of 10 things. You know, me and my 10. I love a top 10 list. So number one is chronic emotional stress. It's literally the number one driver for adrenal strain, adrenal stress, or adrenal fatigue. And it goes in that order. They get strained and then they stress and then they just crash out and burn. Okay. So whether it's long-term psychological stress or if it's short-term emotional stress, it really helps, it keeps cortisol elevated, and that taxes the adrenal glands. Okay, so it can look like work pressure, it can look like financial concerns, it can be trouble in relationships, whether it's family or friends. It can also be have to do with just caregiving responsibilities. If you're a mom with kids at home, or you're like us, where we have aging parents that are the sandwich generation. That takes some care. Yeah. Or it can be big major life things. A death in the family, or a serious illness in, you know, of someone that's close to you, job loss, or what about stressing about things that you don't have control of or something that might happen? Would that f feel would that fall under that stress?

SPEAKER_00 12:26

Yes, absolutely falls under that.

Debra 12:27

I think a lot of people worry about things that they can't control. And they've made up in their mind things that are gonna happen that haven't even happened yet. That is a literally the definition of anxiety where you're thinking about what might but hasn't. So you're thinking of all of the worst case scenarios. And generally not any of the best case scenarios. Yeah, the mind always the mind tends to go to the negative. Yeah. I I think people when I sometimes it's being afraid of what's going to happen, and sometimes it's making up your mind that something has already happened that hasn't happened yet. Does that make sense? Yeah. So it's important to not do that. To get to rewire your brain so you're not making up a decision, making up a reality that hasn't happened. It's a false reality. You're assuming your brain doesn't know the difference. So try to rework your wiring to be okay with what's going on now and prepare. Right. Prepare for good and prepare for the negative. Right. You gotta prepare for both sides because you don't know. Right. So prepare for all eventualities, not just what could possibly go wrong. Right. Yeah. Okay. I understand why that one's number one. Yeah, it's literally number one. It's a big one. Yeah. Okay, number two, oh,

Sleep Loss And Cortisol Rhythms

Debra 13:56

sleep deprivation. I we we say this every time. We literally talk about sleep in every episode. Because it matters that much. Okay, so sleep deprivation deprivation. Poor sleep disrupts the cortisol rhythm your body relies on. So I heard I hear a con recurring theme of cortisol. Yeah. Cortisol is a stress hormone, right? And the adrenals release hormones. Yes. Okay. So it's part of that endocrine system that's all all tied together. Okay. So some sleep deprivation, some things that contribute to it. Going to bed late. Yep. That's kind of obvious, right? Don't go to bed late. Inconsistent sleep. Yep. Screen exposure at night. Shift work. That was a harder one to do something about. Yeah. You have to just manage it. So, like my husband technically is on shift work. He works at night. And every weekend he tries to have a normal day. And it's so frustrating because he gets four hours, maybe five hours of sleep on Saturday morning as his night of sleep. And then when it's bedtime that night for me, he tries to come to bed with me, but his body is on the opposite schedule. So one, it's inconsistent, but also it's inconsistent because of shift work. And he usually will come to bed with me at nine or nine thirty, and he's up by three because his body is wired at is programmed to be awake at that time. That's not good long term. I know that sometimes you it's like there really isn't that much you can do about it. Right. You just have to manage it the best you can. Yeah. So even one to two hours of sleep debt every night can stress your adrenal responses. So yeah. Sleep is important. It stresses the adrenals, and then it also contributes to how your body handles carbohydrates. So ultimately, it also affects your blood sugar levels. Crazy. It's like a whole domino effect that happens. Let's talk about the immune system. One of the best defenders we know comes from optimal health systems, and it's called defense. So it supplies your body with researched back ingredients, toothstone to support your immune system and fight off illness. It also boosts the immune system, providing a potent dose of antibodies for a quick recovery and reduces the risk of viral infection. One of the things I love is that it increases the white blood cell count in your body almost immediately while filling your gut with healthy bacteria. This is one of those things I recommend to my clients to always have on hand. You can take it continuously through, quote, cold and flu season or when you're under a lot of stress, or just pop it in here and there if you feel like you're starting to come down with something. Take it for a day or two, maybe three, and then put it on pause. But it ultimately restores health

Sponsor Break Immune Support

Debra 17:16

to areas of your body that are affected by potentially unhealthy eating habits, like during the holidays, and also from overstressing. And it does it by using whole real food ingredients. You can go to optimalhealth systems.com and use the code D times2, that's DX2, to get a great discount off your order. So I want to pause real quick and just mention a couple of tools that can help with both of those things that we just talked about, that are supplements that I recommend to people all the time. I personally use. Please talk about sleep gummies. We can talk about sleep gummies. And really truly, for better sleep, go back to our sleep episode because we talk about all of it in detail there. But one of the things that really helps, especially with just the stress response, is the stress and anxiety relief pack. Oh, from optimal health. From optimal health. It's amazing because it's kind of all encompassing to help you deal with it, whether it's emotional stress or if it's a physical stress, but it also helps rebuild your internal responses so that things can handle the stress demands better. So whether it's emotional stress or physical stress or mental stress, it all has pretty much the same effect on your body. Yep. So that anxiety that stress anxiety pack, which is really awesome.

Supplements For Stress And Sleep

Debra 18:47

I actually bought that for my husband and he has taken it for three days, so I don't know how it's helping him. But I looked at the ingredients and they're all really, really good support ingredients, real ingredients. So I'm excited to see how it's it's terrific. I I have some of my clients who will who take it every day and will not stop because it helps them so much. I take it sometimes, but I only take it sometimes. If I know a time a day or a week is gonna be extremely demanding, I will take it for that week and then I'll just pause it. Okay? So it can be used here and there as needed, or it can be used on a continuous basis if you just are unable to change some of those stressors, stressors, and the other ones that we'll talk about, because some of them can be changed and some of them have to be managed. And that stress anxiety pack is one of the ways that you can help manage it. So also for better stress um are the sleep gummies from Optimal Health. They really help you get to sleep. So if you've got that busy mind or just trouble settling down, they help you get to sleep. And then calm. There is some calm in the stress and anxiety pack. Okay. But if you're taking that pack in the morning to deal with your day, it's also a good idea to take a little bit of calm at night to help you get the good quality of sleep. Nice. So the stress anxiety pack doesn't matter when you take it. You can take it in the morning to deal with your day, or you can take it at night if you just kind of have chronic ongoing stress and you want to make sure your recovery is top-notch and your body settles down and fully recovers and repairs during the night. The people who take it in the morning are people who are are a little more prone to anxiety, overwhelm, and just some of the overwrought emotions where it helps them just be more steady and deal and deal with it as it's actually coming.

SPEAKER_00 20:58

Okay, good to know.

Debra 21:00

Thank you. So sleep, but I would be remiss if I didn't add one more thing, which is magnesium. Again, there's like one magnesium in the stress anxiety pack, but a full like nighttime dose for repair and recovery is three of the magnesium glycinate. Some optimal health. The essential magnesium. Yeah. Yeah. So all of those are from optimal health. And it's like if you take the stress anxiety pack in the morning and it has one magnesium in it, at night you could just take two to finish getting that full dose for the day.

SPEAKER_00 21:33

Nice.

Debra 21:33

But you could also take three. Three's not gonna hurt you. That's not gonna help. Yeah, you could take four and it wouldn't hurt you. Yeah. Okay, what's number three? Number three on our list of the adrenal stressors is blood sugar instability. And I connected that a little bit to the poor night of sleep because one night of bad sleep makes you more insulin resistant for the next four days. And that's Affects blood sugar. So frequent spikes and crashes in your blood sugar again force the body to release cortisol as well as adrenaline to stabilize the glucose. Okay. So there's a whole chemistry experiment going on in the body that we don't know, like we're not focused on. It's just doing what it has to do to survive, okay, in the conditions that we give it. So some of those triggers that can cause blood sugar instability are skipping meals, eating a lot of high sugar, added sugar, or refined

Blood Sugar Swings And Protein Anchors

Debra 22:40

carbohydrates in your diet. So the packaged, processed, boxed foods. It can be excess caffeine, especially if it's excess caffeine without food. So caffeine on an empty stomach hits your body and your adrenaline, which comes from your adrenals, harder than if it's after you've had food. Okay? And then low protein intake, because protein is the great stabilizer, right? We talked about that at length in our protein episode. We did. So if you need more details about the protein, go to the protein episode. But you really want to think about anchoring every meal around protein and then adding the other things to it. Yeah. One, I'm gonna just mention one of the other things that helps to replenish and nourish the adrenals that don't spike blood sugar is if you deliberately add some whole food complex carbohydrates, especially with breakfast and with supper. What do I mean when I say complex carbohydrates? Yeah, what are you talking about? Not whole wheat bread. So it's things like potato. So starchy foods, potato, whether it's a russet, a red, a Yukon gold, a sweet potato, any sort of a potato. Still in its whole food form, not a potato chip. Okay. Okay. It could be oats, but it needs to be old-fashioned, slow-cooked oats or still-cut oats, nothing instant. Those have had the the instant has had the comp complex remote. Yes, and the simple. Yes, we're after the complex. It could be rice. Long grain rice. Any any kind of whole grain rice. So it's gonna be the slow cook rice, the one that takes 20 minutes, or if it's brown rice, 40 minutes. None of the quick cook. It could be quinoa, it could be beans or lentils. It could be any kind of, I call them the hard squashes. So this not zucchini or yellow squash that are the soft squash, soft skin squashes, or after the ones that have a hard shell, like pumpkin or butternut or acorn or spaghetti squash. Okay. Those types of things. Those are the complex carbs. So if you think about adding in cooked volume, so if the rice is cooked, measure out a half to three-fourths of a cup to put it with your protein at that meal. That's not gonna spike your blood sugar, but it's gonna give your body those whole food complex carbs that it needs to replenish and nourish the adrenals. So all those foods you just said, I would not eat for breakfast. Except for maybe potatoes. So you said at breakfast and at dinner, so complex carbohydrates. You wouldn't eat oatmeal at breakfast? Maybe oatmeal. But what about like berries? Are not complex. No. They can go next to it, but you need one of those more dense sources of carbohydrate, and berries read pretty neutral in the body. What about chia seeds? No. Okay. Okay, because those are fiber that's not absorbed, and they're fat. And we're after some absorbable carbohydrate. Okay. That gives you actual energy, not just fiber. Gotcha. Okay? So good questions. But it needs to be that type of a food. So think of the starchy foods. If you cut it, it leaves some white on your knife or on your cutting board. Okay. Okay. But you can like I add it with breakfast all the time. If I'm making a protein shake, I will put a tablespoon of uncooked oats into it because if that was cooked, it would come up to about a half of a cup and I'll just blend it in. Or I will make Southwest veggie skillet scramble and I'll put some black beans in there. Or I will do you can do sweet potato like you do regular potatoes with breakfast. Or I'll do like a saute of um different veggies that include butternut squash and have it next to my eggs. So it's savory going with savory eggs. Nice. But you can do potatoes every day for breakfast, or you could do the oats or quinoa. I now that I think about it, I actually did change my breakfast last week and I started doing a yogurt, kefir, keep seed, protein powder, oatmeal breakfast. So make it and let it sit for a little while and then let it get all nice and thick and then eat it. Yeah. So your oatmeal that you're putting in there is your starchy carb. Yeah. And a lot of times in the morning that's how I do it because it's just easier for me to do it that way. No cooking in room. No cooking. Just blend it all together and drink it down. Yeah. Okay. But nighttime for supper, it's easy to incorporate any of those. Yeah. One of the most toxic things that people do is color their hair. And my hand is up. I am guilty of this. I love to play with my hair color. I have for years. And now I love to cover my grays. The best non-toxic hair color that I have found is polar hair care. It is easy, it applies like a shampoo. You only have to leave it on for 10 minutes. It lasts for about six weeks. And it doesn't have any of the harsh chemicals and all the nasty stuff in it. Plus, it's infused with Reishi, macadamia, jojoba oil. So it leaves my hair feeling better and not dried out and abused. Use the code Deborah 6334. That's my name, D-E-B-R-A 6334. So if you go to polarhaircare.com slash Deborah 6334, you'll get an awesome discount off your order. On to number four. Number four is overtraining or

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Debra 29:14

excess exercise. Is there such a thing for real? There is such a thing. Yeah. Yes. Exercise is beneficial. It does a lot of good things for our body. But chronic high-intensity training without recovery can elevate your stress hormones. Yep. Which is cortisol. Yep. And adrenaline. And insulin, right? And insulin. And all those things. So common examples of overtraining or excess uh exercise are daily intense HIIT workouts. Yep. Where you're pushing yourself, pushing yourself, that's what HIT is. Endurance training without rest days. Training during illness or poor sleep. That's a bad idea. It's a bad idea. If you have to choose exercise or sleep a little longer because you're sleep deprived, sleep. Sleep. Yep. Every

Overtraining And The Recovery Tradeoff

Debra 30:08

time. So I will I agree with all of those. Like intense HIT training. People think the more I do, the better it is. Yep, it really is not. The heavier I lift and the longer I lift, the better it is. But it's not. Your body only has so much to give. Yep. So I see a lot of people who are doing that and they are using credit energy to do it. So they're digging their energy deficit deeper and deeper and deeper. And they either have to choose to slow down and prioritize rest and recovery, or they absolutely will crash and burn, and then they're not going to be able to do any of it. So this I think applies to your normal everyday person. There are athletes that train for endurance things like the hundred mile runs or a triathlon. Typically, they don't do it just on a whim, and they have a training program. They're not running, pushing hard every single day. They vary it. And they have a nutritional program to go with their training program. Yeah, so they can keep their body fueled. So even those kind of people don't just go, go, go. No, with their intense exercise. I can't tell you though, the number of people I have talked to one-on-one who they're so anxious and trying so hard to lose weight. So they get up and go to the gym every day at five o'clock, and then they go to work, and then you know, they'll take a walk after work and like they're just going and doing. And I'm like, you need to skip the gym and sleep. And they will not because to them it doesn't make sense that the sleep is gonna help them lose weight more than going to the gym. Well, you can get up and exercise at 5 a.m. if you're going to bed at eight. You can, but they're not. Yeah. That's that's the other side of that coin. You can get up at five o'clock and go to the gym. Go for it. But go to bed at eight o'clock. Yeah. So there's no there's zero extra benefit to working that hard and pushing that hard because you are depleting yourself more if you're not also getting the recovery time. Yep. Yep. For sure. Okay, good there. So the next one we're gonna talk about, number five, is inflammation and chronic illness. So ongoing inflammation signals the body to stay in a stressed response. I went through a period of this and I like it was really the best exercise for me to do at that time was just a slow, gentle walk. And that's part of the reason I still take walks most days just to move, but not in any way stress my body. But things that can contribute to that are imbalances in your gut. Okay, a lot of people have that. It can be autoimmune conditions where your body is literally attacking itself and you're always in an inflamed state. It can be chronic infections. And then it can also be environmental toxins. So sometimes people are just in a toxic environment or

Inflammation Illness And Toxic Exposure

Debra 33:23

they have a job that's in a toxic environment, and that's going to lead to some inflammatory stress response in your body that taxes your adrenals. Self-exflammatory? Yes. I'm thinking in my head about stories I've accounts that I've heard. Like Tony Robbins and his mercury poisoning and Dr. Mark Hyman and his poisoning, and that kind of led them to detoxification and taking care and where and they literally crash and burn and have like nothing else matters until that's the only thing that matters. And that's the only thing you can focus on is recovery. So if you'll choose to do it, and I know sometimes it's easier said than done, because everybody needs us all the time. We have to do the things or we want to do all the things, but you have to pick the top priorities. And sometimes that's you. Yep. You have to fill your bucket before you can share it. Sometimes it must be you. Yep. Okay, number six, caffeine overuse. This doesn't happen at all. She said facetiously. So facetiously. Caffeine literally stimulates your adrenaline to release, which is made in your adrenal glands. Yep. And it taxes them constantly. So excessive intake of caffeine includes multiple coffees per day. Energy drinks. Caffeine on an empty stomach. Those can mimic a stress response and raise cortisol levels. So you're putting stress into your body. Yep. And if you're taking caffeine and not doing anything and like sitting at a desk, your body doesn't know what to do. It doesn't know what to do with that energy just generated inside. Yeah. So if you're going, I think you can use caffeine to help you. You can use it wisely. You you need to make sure you time

Caffeine Overuse And Better Energy Options

Debra 35:22

it well. And if you're gonna go sit at a desk, maybe you don't need a cup of coffee. Maybe you don't need a 300 milligram caffeine drink. You just have a little bit of something. If you need something, a little bit of something. Because you're not racing, you're not chasing a tiger or running from a tiger. You're sitting at a desk. I think that's that's probably one of the things that hurts people. I think it is, especially because I'm gonna say over the last five to ten years, energy drinks have become so prevalent, and people don't even look. Like some of them are a hundred milligrams, some of them are 400 milligrams. From can to can or bottle to bottle, there can be a huge difference, but there's also other ways to get good sources of energy. Okay, one of them we've talked about we have we we do our little self-promo ads for it is the drink update. So it's an energy drink, but the I'm gonna say stimulant in it, the energizer in it, isn't caffeine. It comes from Astaxanthin. So it doesn't hit all of those adrenaline, like it just doesn't force it like caffeine does. So there are other ways to get it, but it's also partnered together with nootropics and adaptogens, which help your body use the energy appropriately. So that update energy energy drink is a great option. And we have for the things that we've talked about, we have discount codes. There's discount codes for update in our bio, there's discount codes for optimal health in our bio. It's a D times2, right? That's the discount code. It's also on our website, D times2Podcast.com. But one of the things also from Optimal Health that that helps with that ready-need energy that people get can get from energy drinks, but you can get it in a smarter way, also comes from optimal health systems, and it's called be awake. And that ties in with our next one, which is has to do with poor nutrition. And one of the things that leads to that is being low in B vitamins. So the B awake is really full of B vitamins.

SPEAKER_00 37:42

Yep, it is.

Debra 37:44

So yeah, it is. That's why it's called B awake because it has tons of B vitamins in it. Yeah. Nutrient deficiencies do impair your adrenal response. So I B vitamins kind of power pretty much everything in your body. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 38:04

So the B awake is great.

Debra 38:06

Magnesium, we already talked about with uh for helping with sleep. But vitamin C, if you're low in vitamin C, it affects how your adrenals work as well. It makes them not as productive. Your adrenals store vitamin C in them. So make sure you're getting enough of that. Yeah, and we get a lot of vitamin C from fruits and veggies of all the kinds. But if you don't eat a lot of those, then the whole C from Optimal Health Systems is a beautiful option. I have some of it every day, and I also eat my fruits and veggies. But then those foods I already talked about that help to replenish the adrenals, those complex carbohydrates, help with these nutrient deficiencies as well. Perfect. Perfect combinations, right? Yeah. The last one on there, like if you're depth, if you're deficient in protein, yeah, also affects the kidneys and how they're functioning. Excuse me, not the kidneys. The adrenals that sit on top of the kidneys. Oh goodness, Denise. Protein deficiencies also affect the adrenals and how they function. So make sure you're getting enough protein. Protein, protein, protein. Anchor every meal around protein. Sleep, sleep, sleep. Yeah, we're talking about those. We beg of you. A lot. Yes. Never beat a dead horse. That saying has been around for a long time for a reason. People that are drinking energy drinks all day long just to stay functional, that's what they're doing. They are beating themselves up like they were a dead horse. We got to stop doing that. The only energy drink that I recommend to my clients is update. It's clean energy without caffeine. So you don't have jitters and chaos and like the problems that caffeine causes in the body. And it also helps to give you focus and a clear mind. It's really the one I use and the one I recommend. To get a discount off of your order, go to drinkupdate.com and use the code DX2. That's D times two. That's us. So drinkupdate.com and then the code for your discount is DX2. Number eight is environmental stressors. We already talked about this a little bit, but the body treats toxins as stress signals. So it could be anything like air pollution. We had a lot of that in our area over the weekend because of the wind and the dust and the dirt that was in the air. Our air was literally hazardous to breathe. Yeah, it was so bad. It was, yes. So sometimes there's you're in a city or an area where there's constant pollution, or it can be just periodic like ours, where it was a day or two and then totally cleared out. It can be heavy metals, whether in hair color or your water or your soil. It can be pesticides, which are widely used, and it can also be household chemicals. What you actually use to clean your home and maintain your home or scent your home matter a lot. It does. Yep.

Environmental Stressors And Chronic Pain

Debra 41:18

Okay, number nine is chronic pain. Chronic pain keeps the nervous system in fight or flight, so you're constantly on edge, basically. Yep. And it continuously activates your adrenal hormone. Your body thinks it's always being chased by a tiger. Yeah. Yep. Well, it's also it also causes like chronic pain causes inflammation, which we already addressed. So and and we already also said at the outset that emotional stress, your body sees physical stress, which chronic pain is a physical stress. It sees it the same way. It doesn't differentiate. The mechanics behind the scenes in your body are the same. And then the last one is number 10, which is become more and more and more an issue, is information overload and constant stimulation. So all of the screens and all of the access that we have to everything all the time, more than has ever been available in human history, can be a good thing. That can also be a stressor. So it can be notifications from your phone, it can be comparison on social media, it could be the news and the news cycles, or it could also be not having to do with those. It could just be chronically multitasking all the time, every day. That goes back to where I started with saying women tend to have like all the things that we're juggling all the time. I'm not to shortchange what men deal with, but women the caretaker nurturer in us covers more. Yeah. Whether we're responsible for it or

Information Overload And Constant Stimulation

Debra 42:59

not, we're thinking of it and aware of it. We have a thousand tabs open all the time. All the time. So those create low grade but constant stress signals to the brain. So again, like trying to mitigate any of those, manage any of them, maybe do a social media fast from time to time. Like do what you can do in your life for each of those areas we talked about. And then if you can support nutritionally with some of the things we've talked about, we talked about the be awake for energy and replenishing some of that poor nutrition. We've talked about wholesale, we've talked about magnesium, we've talked about sleep gummies, we've talked about the big one, the stress and anxiety relief pack. And then I'm gonna mention with the one that wraps all of this up. It also comes from Optimal Health. We talk about those ones all the time because they are the best we've found. And I use them in practice and they work. It's called adrenal. Oh, specifically designed to support the adrenal glands and replenish the adrenal glands. But I hate to see people just take the adrenal and not address the other things. Because those lifestyle factors, those nutritional factors will constantly dig the hole and the adrenal will fill it in, but you're never getting ahead and rebuilding that savings in the bank. So adrenal can be worth its weight in gold. Yeah. Good tools. Good tools. Good tools to have. Reputable tools, not just kinky. Yeah. Fly by night. Like this is it works really, really well. But I've had this conversation so many times recently that like

Adrenal Support Without Ignoring Lifestyle

Debra 44:51

I really wanted to address it with the group at large and put some of those resources out. Some of them are lifestyle, some of them are behavioral, some of them are environmental, and some of them are nutritional. But we need to remember that adrenal stress rarely comes from one big event, right? It's not usually one and done. It usually develops from a lot of small stressors stacked together over time. And sometimes they stack together enough that you finally reach the straw, you had the straw that broke the camel's back. We never want to get to that point. We want to deal with them as they're coming and let them not compound over time. Yeah, I that's great wisdom, Deborah. Amen. I really don't have anything to add to that because that was very well put. Okay. So let's just wrap it up there then. And like hopefully you found this information in this episode useful. I know you know other people who could benefit from it. Please share it with them. Just hit the share button on your podcast episode. Just share it. Yep. Share the love. Make sure you're following us so that you get notified when we have new episodes come out. They drop every Monday. Every Monday. Yep. And you can find us on all the socials Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Pinterest, YouTube, YouTube. We're there. We're there. We also have a website that you can go to, d times2podcast.com. That's dx2podcast.com. And that's where you can find all of the resources and freebies and discount codes we talk about. You can find on there. Yeah, they're always there. So you don't have to remember everything, but you do need to remember if you want to order any of the products, the names of the products we've talked about. Yeah. Those will be in the show notes. But you can look through there. But the discount

Share Follow And Where To Find Codes

Debra 46:45

codes are always on our website. Yeah. So until next time, keep your wheel rolling smoothly. Bye. Thanks for listening to the D Times 2 podcast with Denise and Deborah. We hope you enjoyed today's episode. Be sure to subscribe and share it with someone who's ready to roll toward a more balanced life. Your support means the world to us. And just a quick note we're sharing our own experiences and ideas, not professional advice. Always do your own research and talk to a qualified expert before making big decisions. Until next time, keep your wheel rolling strong.