It’s been three years since the pandemic, and I can tell you right now – collectively, the world over – our poor little adrenal glands have taken a hit.

Can anyone say they haven’t been affected by stress in some way over the past few years, at some point? I’m sure you have experienced heightened stress in the past few years, and maybe even a bucket-load of chronic stress.

And for some people, this insane amount of stress is breaking down the body, showing up as fatigue, low immunity, anxiety, heartburn, PMS, infertility, skin issues, achiness, plus so much more.

Adrenal Glands

Your adrenal glands sit on top of your kidneys, and they secrete your stress hormones cortisol and DHEA. When your body and/or your mind is under stress or inflamed for a long period of time, your stress hormones can go out of whack, and eventually start to deplete. When this happens, your brain is no longer communicating to your adrenal glands effectively, which can leave you in a chronic (and not very nice feeling!) state of fight or flight. Over time this can lead to body burnout symptoms such as anxiety and depression, fatigue, low immunity, female hormone issues, gut issues, chronic pain, and insomnia.

The four major causes of adrenal fatigue are emotional stress, dietary stress, pain, and hidden inflammation (i.e. inflammation coming from somewhere in the body, such as the gut or the detox pathways).

In my practice, Chris & Filly Functional Medicine, we take a holistic approach to treating your stress hormones, using functional medicine lab testing, mindset coaching, nutrition & lifestyle modifications & nutraceutical supplementation, where needed.

In this blog post today I want to focus on how food can stress out the adrenals, and how you can use nutrition to heal your stress hormones back to a state of calm…Yesss, please!

Two Main Food Fundamentals for Healing the Adrenals

There are two main fundamentals when it comes to healing your adrenal glands with food:

1. Stabilise blood sugar levels which will help to stabilise cortisol.
2. Reduce inflammatory foods to take the stress off the adrenals, and increase anti-inflammatory whole foods.

Stabilising Blood Sugar Levels

Stress changes the way we eat. Most people under stress tend to eat foods that convert to sugar quickly in the bloodstream, including sweets and starches. This quick fuel can keep us going in emergencies, but too frequently becomes our fuel of choice for non-emergency times as well.

While we are under stress, predictable physiological changes occur in which the mechanisms, which control blood sugar levels are taxed. If blood sugar levels go too high or too low, cortisol (your stress hormone) will rise. This can cause and exacerbate adrenal fatigue if blood sugar imbalances are happening chronically. Our food plan for adrenal fatigue is designed to counteract this trend and improve your body’s functioning while under stress by maintaining blood sugar levels.

The goal is to keep your blood sugar balanced throughout the day so that you avoid the highs and lows that can add to your stress levels. If you eat properly you can maintain your blood sugar and maintain even energy and mood throughout the day.

A few key points for stabilising blood sugar levels:

1. Avoid sugar and other refined high-carbohydrate foods.
2. Limit higher-glycemic fruits (i.e. bananas, dried fruit, grapes, pineapple) and starchy vegetables (i.e. potato, corn). You don’t have to completely avoid these foods, but just limit the amount you’re having per serving. Some people will need to also experiment to see how grains affect blood sugar levels, in terms of the amount and when in the day they eat them.
3. Each meal should contain a balanced amount of fats, protein, and carbs. If in adrenal fatigue, it is recommended to not go too low carb (i.e. keep to around 100g carb a day – this may differ for each individual).
4. Eat regularly, at least breakfast, lunch, and dinner. If you’re particularly low in vitality and struggling with blood sugar crashes, you will want to eat snacks as well. Aim to eat every 2 – 4 hours.
5. Avoid/limit caffeine and alcohol as they both affect blood sugar levels and cortisol levels.

Reducing Inflammatory Foods & Increase Wholefoods

Inflammatory foods are always going to put stress on the adrenal glands. Any food that inflames the gut, will cause a cortisol response. When healing the adrenals, you will want to avoid common inflammatory foods. These include:

1. Processed and refined foods, such as trans-fats, additives, preservatives, refined sugars. These are foreign to the body and will cause inflammation. Think about them as eating plastic! Yuck!
2. Artificial sweeteners (i.e. Equal, Aspartame). These chemicals disrupt brain chemistry and blood sugar, and many have reported side effects, including neurological symptoms.
3. Alcohol (hello you, popping up again!). Alcohol puts a big burden on the liver, which can lead to poor detoxification and toxin overload.
4. Caffeine (oh, hello to you again too!). Caffeine is a stimulant for cortisol production and can add an extra load onto already stressed-out adrenals.
5. Wheat and gluten-containing products. Many people have a sensitivity or intolerance to gluten, and it can cause inflammation in the gut, which can then stress the adrenals. For at least 3-months, gluten is recommended to avoid. You can always challenge it later to see if it affects you individually.
6. Avoid soy. Like wheat, many soy products are GMO and adulterated with roundup. Many people also have a sensitivity to soy. Soy should be eliminated for a time to see if it affects you negatively.
7. Dairy. If you’re not sure if dairy inflames you, we recommend having at least 2-weeks off all dairy products, then reintroduce the products one at a time to assess if dairy causes reactions.

So what should you eat? Lots and lots of vegetables, meat, and eggs (unless you are vegan/vegetarian), gluten-free grains, legumes, nuts and seeds, fruits. If you can purchase organic, that is always best. You will also want to get plenty of water into your body. If you check out our other blog posts, you will find lots of Adrenal-Friendly recipes to help you on your journey to healing your adrenals.

And if you’re a client in our Ending Body Burnout Method, you can have access to over 350+ adrenal recipes & meal plans.

P.s. If you’re struggling with healthy eating, especially if it’s showing up as emotional eating, I’m running a Root Cause of Emotional Eating Webclass on Mon 22 May 7pm for Natural Medicine Week. It’s free! And you can sign up here.