Health and Fitness
Fat Loss Remains a Dream Unless We Manage Cortisol.
How elevated cortisol relates to insulin resistance and prevents fat loss and how we can address elevated cortisol issues.
Chronic and Emotional Stress
All my knowledge about the cortisol hormone was theoretical until it became a significant health risk for me years ago.
Then, it became so severe that it adversely affected my physical and mental health and prevented me from losing unnecessary fat, especially in the abdominal area.
In addition, toxic emotions created unbearable emotional stress, which was the more significant part of the iceberg.
Elevated cortisol in my bloodstream raised serious alarm bells in my mid-life. My primary healthcare professional raised her concerns and referred me to an endocrinologist who diligently focused on my hormonal profile.
Elevated cortisol was the root cause of my hormonal imbalance. For example, the higher the cortisol was, the lower my testosterone got.
With heightened cortisol and lowered testosterone, many disease and discomfort symptoms started bothering me, affecting my performance and killing the joy of life.
The primary symptoms of high cortisol manifested as anxiety, sleep disorder, food cravings, mood swings, aching muscles, lack of libido, fat accumulation in the belly (potbelly), muscle loss, and overall dissatisfaction with my life. In short, the quality of my life dramatically reduced, and living with elevated cortisol was not fun at all.
Identifying the root causes of elevated cortisol was the first successful step. I was grateful for the primary cause analysis conducted by my endocrinologist. This analysis helped her diagnose my underlying issues and secondary causes.
The root cause of my elevated cortisol was chronic (emotional, mental, and physical) stress. This hormone was trying to save my life, which was terrific. However, I had no clue why my stress and anxiety were so high.
I thought I was doing everything right from my perception. However, obviously, something was wrong. In fact, in hindsight, many things were terrible.
Cortisol typically goes up in the morning. It is a natural process. This valuable hormone helps us to wake up and get ready for the day.
However, my morning cortisol levels were almost triple the normal range in the mornings. The endocrinologist thought constantly elevated cortisol was unacceptable.
As I mentioned in this story titled Hormonal Intelligence: Sharpen It to Achieve Optimal Health, cortisol affects other hormones.
What Caused Elevated Cortisol
I asked the specialist what I was doing wrong. After a detailed review of my lifestyle based on a couple of consultation sessions and reviewing my medical history provided by my family doctor, she came up with a few theories.
Disappointingly, one of the first root causes was my beloved coffee which I was addicted to and consumed in excessive amounts. I thought coffee was a healthy drink with lots of antioxidants. However, I had no clue it would severely affect my stress level and hormonal balance.
When I got up, the first thing I did in the morning drank a few cups of strong coffee. Then, with the energy caffeine gave, after 20 minutes, I went out to run several miles.
Running workouts used to give me temporary pleasure. However, the accumulating stress created by caffeine and excessive exercise was a recipe for declining health and fitness. The body had to develop more cortisol to deal with growing stress.
Besides, I worked full-time in a demanding job and studied part-time to complete a post-graduate degree. Furthermore, having a young child waking up multiple times and requiring attention was another contributor to the accumulation of stress. I thought these were just normal living conditions and did not expect they were ruining my health.
According to the endocrinologist, my acute stress turned to chronic stress. My body was under constant mental, emotional, and physical pressure. In addition, my diet was wrong, my workouts were stress-creating, and my living conditions worsened.
However, every cloud comes with some silver lining. When my elevated cortisol was about to kill me, I discovered some valuable solutions with the help of this specialist and several other healthcare professionals. Fortunately, my elevated cortisol did not result in Cushing Syndrome.
In this story, I share five beneficial lifestyle changes that helped me reduce elevated cortisol, normalized other hormones, and took my health and fitness to the next level.
1 — Learning to Deal with Toxic Emotions
Emotional stress, toxic emotions, excessive anxiety and fear, and amygdala hijacks are potent pressure elements to raise cortisol. So the essential way to deal with anxiety for me was to tame my overactive amygdala.
The amygdala is a hard-coded system in our limbic part of the brain with common life threats such as sudden noise, extreme physical conditions, or suffering. The amygdala observes and senses risky situations and perceptual danger, affecting our survival adversely.
In my situation, there was no real-life danger, but my body saw stress as a threat. So I used my logical brain to tame the sensitive amygdala. Mindfulness was one of the techniques I used. I learned to act mindfully and to live in the moment.
Observing every moment is a critical aspect of mindfulness. I ate, drank, worked, and exercised mindfully. Being aware of things around me and keeping things in the proper perspective helped me overcome my anxiety and significantly reduced my stress.
I shared my experience of dealing with anxiety in an article: Dealing With Anxiety in Difficult Times: How to understand anxiety symptoms, root causes, distinguish anxiety from fear, take practical & effective measures.
2 — Switching from Running to Joyful Walking
I stopped running. It was causing me a lot of pain in my joints.
Exercise is vital for our health. But, as a fitness enthusiast, I did not want a sedentary lifestyle. So, I ensured to walk 10,000 steps with joy daily.
As advised by my health consultants, I replaced running with gentle walks. Strolling outside and enjoying the environment with mindfulness made a significant impact on my stress level. Even after 90 minutes of walking, I was feeling energetic and alert.
Completing 10,000 steps per day became my success formula for beating stress. Having a smartwatch counting my efforts was a motivational tool for me. In addition, having an indoor trampoline helped me complete my 10,000-step goal, especially on cold and rainy days.
I shared my experience with and the benefits of using a trampoline in an article: Joyful Workouts to Get Fitter, Stronger, Healthier: How I transformed my fitness with flexible exercises at home, without going to a gym.
During my travels, I continued my workouts with jubilant exercises, as mentioned in this story: How I Stay Fit While Traveling: 100 Pushups In 10 Minutes Kept Me Lean And Joyful In Foreign Countries.
3. Giving up Coffee and Replacing It with Sustainable Alternatives
I used to love coffee. The smell of coffee in the morning mesmerized and energized me. However, due to adaptation, I had to consume more coffee to get the same effect.
Some good things may also be wrong sometimes, depending on our circumstances. Don’t get me wrong; I am not against coffee. It may do wonders for some. However, it was not suitable for me as it raised my stress level, especially on an empty stomach in the morning, coupled with excessive cardio.
The best solution to replace coffee was a cold shower in the morning. Cold showers gave me a better hormonal balance. Cold showers slightly elevated my cortisol within the first five to ten minutes but then normalized it.
I shared my experience and the benefits of a cold shower in this article. Instant Mental Boost for Leaders: Cold showers are simple hacks that can make a tremendous impact on our performance.
I also used a few supplements that gave me more energy than coffee and kept my cortisol at normal levels. Impact of Supplements on Fitness and Health: What I learned from trying four unique molecules.
I still use NAC (N-Acetyl- Cysteine) to manage my oxidative stress, as mentioned in this article: What If There’s Hope to Improve Immunity: Why NAC is a Critical Molecule for Health: An independent review of N-Acetyl Cysteine with support of recent scientific and medical studies.
4. Improving Sleep Quality and Increasing Duration
Improving my sleep quality helped me reduce stress and increased my performance, and made me feel fantastic. In addition, getting at least an eight-hour of quality sleep was the panacea to resolving my health problems.
I suffered a lot from sleep deprivation which mocked up my hormones, primarily cortisol. I didn’t know about it and blamed other things, such as genetics and other life circumstances. However, the root cause of my chronic stress was a lack of quality sleep.
Learning about my sleep issues and accepting them was an excellent start in resolving them. I shared my experience of improving quality sleep with some practical tips extracted from my book: Chapter 5 — Powerful Life-Changing Hacks That Truly Transformed My Life: Chapter 5: Smart Sleep Habits.
5. Eliminating Digestive Discomfort
I used to have debilitating digestive discomfort causing auto-immune responses and chronic inflammation. As usual, stress was the main culprit for digestive discomfort.
My diet was not aligned with my nutritional requirements. So, my bad diet caused more stress. It created a catch-22 situation.
I used to eat excessive carbohydrates, which turned to sugar and increased my insulin. After a while, my body became insulin-resistant and experienced metabolic syndrome symptoms, including mild fatty liver.
I documented my experiences in solving these complicated problems in this story: 12 Entangled Health Conditions I Owned & Fixed By Myself: How I transformed my problematic health and fitness situations by methodical trials & errors.
Besides, unknowingly I was taking excessive fiber to improve my digestive system, but my poor body was suffering intensely. My digestive system was in agony with additional fiber.
I experienced the pain of bloating every day when I cut fiber entirely, my terrible bloating went away. How naive was I for not listening to my body! Why did I Entirely Cut Fibre from My Diet? A zero fiber lifestyle was a necessity for my digestive health, allergies, and autoimmune conditions.
When I solved my digestive issues and healed my leaky gut, my cortisol elevated cortisol levels significantly reduced and normalized. How I Naturally & Easily Fixed My Leaky Gut: After severely suffering from digestive discomfort, allergies, inflammation, and autoimmune disorders for over a decade.
Final Words
Identifying symptoms and root causes of elevated cortisol in the bloodstream was an excellent start. Accepting the conditions was the next important step.
We are all unique and have different stress responses to various conditions. My mistake was not listening to my body but following generic advice without questioning the truth.
For me running, coffee, demanding work, and having a young child were the triggers. Nevertheless, not honoring these triggers and overloading my body and mind caused chronic stress, evident from constantly elevated cortisol levels.
Replacing running with a gentle walk and replacing coffee with better alternatives such as cold showers and effective supplements addressed my physical stress issues.
Dealing with anxiety effectively addressed my emotional and mental stress.
Solving my digestive issues improved my overall well-being and significantly reduced stress, inflammation, and auto-immune conditions. Gaining emotional maturity sustained my hormonal balance, particularly normalized cortisol, insulin, leptin, and testosterone.
When I solved my hormonal issues, particularly normalizing cortisol, my belly fat effortlessly melted; increased testosterone and autophagy-generating metabolism made me gain defined physic. As a by-product, excessive loose skin disappeared.
Thank you for reading my experience and perspectives on elevated cortisol.
12 Entangled Health Conditions I Owned & Fixed By Myself
12 Bullet-Proof Life Hacks That Helped Me Thrive
Disclaimer: Please note that this post does not include health or professional advice. I documented my reviews, observations, experience, and perspectives only to provide information and create awareness.
Besides aiming to increase the hormonal intelligence of my readers and writing about neurotransmitters such as dopamine, serotonin, oxytocin, GABA, acetylcholine, and norepinephrine, one of my goals as a writer is to raise awareness about the causes and risk factors of prevalent diseases that can lead to suffering and death for a large portion of the population.
I aim to educate, create awareness, and empower my readers to take control of their health and well-being.
To raise awareness about health issues, I have written several articles that present my holistic health findings from research, personal observations, and unique experiences. Below are links to these articles for easy access.
Metabolic Syndrome, Type II Diabetes, Fatty Liver Disease, Heart Disease, Strokes, Obesity, Liver Cancer, Autoimmune Disorders, Homocysteine, Lungs Health, Pancreas Health, Kidneys Health, NCDs, Infectious Diseases, Brain Health, Dementia, Depression, Brain Atrophy, Neonatal Disorders, Skin Health, Dental Health, Bone Health, Leaky Gut, Leaky Brain, Brain Fog, Chronic Inflammation, Insulin Resistance, Elevated Cortisol, Leptin Resistance, Anabolic Resistance, Cholesterol, High Triglycerides, Metabolic Disorders, Gastrointestinal Disorders, and Major Diseases.
I also wrote about valuable nutrients. Here are the links for easy access:
Lutein/Zeaxanthin, Boron, Urolithin, taurine, citrulline malate, biotin, lithium orotate, alpha-lipoic acid, n-acetyl-cysteine, acetyl-l-carnitine, CoQ10, PQQ, NADH, TMG, creatine, choline, digestive enzymes, magnesium, zinc, hydrolyzed collagen, nootropics, pure nicotine, activated charcoal, Vitamin B12, Vitamin B1, Vitamin D, Vitamin K2, Omega-3 Fatty Acids, N-Acetyl L-Tyrosine, and other nutrients to improve metabolism and mental health.
Disclaimer: Please note that my posts do not include professional or health advice. I document my reviews, observations, experiences, and perspectives only to provide information and create awareness.
As part of my creative non-fiction writing goals, I’d like to share a few stories that might warm our hearts with a bit of humor into weighty topics.
Sample Humorous Stories
Finally, After Burning Her House, Georgia Found Enlightenment
Hilarious Tips to Prevent Brain Atrophy and Keep the Gray Matter Giggling
8 Psychological Points I Had to Unlearn and Relearn the Opposite
Based on my writing experience and observations, I documented findings and strategies that might help you amplify your voice, engage your audience, and achieve your desired outcomes in your writing journey.
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