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Working at a computer and adrenal fatigue

Messages
45
Hey.
I've been suffering from fatigue for about a year and it's been getting a lot worse since about a month. I had surgery 15 days ago and I experienced extreme stress a few weeks preoperative, which caused my fatigue to increase to about 4/10. A few days after the surgery I woke up with a fatigue of 7/10 and I've been devastated ever since. I go for walks for 1h a day, cook food, do grocery shopping, and that's about it. I'm currently on sick leave due to having the surgery.

For fun I like to work on an app I'm developing for myself, but I'm unsure whether or not I currently should. Is sitting in a chair and using the brain an acceptable activity?

I haven't been given the diagnosis from a doctor, although I have pretty much all of the symptoms for adrenal fatigue and I've recently done the flashlight test and my iris couldn't stay contracted for more than a few seconds before it started to fluctuate.

Thanks in advance.

e: I've installed f.lux on my computer to reduce the stimulation from blue light.
 
Last edited:

ukxmrv

Senior Member
Messages
4,413
Location
London
Sorry to hear how badly the surgery has hit you.

I'd take a pinch of salt with the idea of adrenal fatigue. It's not a recognised medical condition and it's of maybe doubtful use in treating or understanding your fatigue.

My experience of surgery is that it is the anesthetic, exertion and any other drugs given that causes an increase in my symptoms. There are documents to give to your Anesthetist on things to avoid for people with CFS. You haven't said if you have a diagnosis of CFS as you only mention fatigue so I have no idea if these would also be useful to you.

In my own case I would cut down on activity until my symptoms stabilise and for me a walk of an hour would be out of the question anyway.

Some people with CFS find that brain exertion tires them out as much as walking or showering or other physical types.

Have you checked to see if you have POTS? I find sitting in a chair and working impossible. I use a laptop on the sofa and keep my feet up. Before I knew about anesthetics and CFS I had surgery and found my POTS was much worse after. Spent my time lying down or at least with my legs supported.

An acceptable activity is one that doesn't aggravate your symptoms. It may be that if you cut down on the physical stuff you may have more strength left over for the app work.

Hope this helps in some way.
 

Bansaw

Senior Member
Messages
521
I work in I.T. on a computer every day, and I notice an increase in overall health when I'm on vacation, and even at the weekends. I think its just being in the outdoors that is somewhat healing. The sun, the natural vitamin D. You dont have to go on a one-hour walk, just go outside and sit.
If you are programming an app, take a ten minute break every hour and get up, stretch etc.
In my tea break here , I go on a 15 min walk.
Also, dont surf the internet too much reading the news! Its all bad news and this gives us a negativity overload which takes energy to deal with for some people.
 

Carl

Senior Member
Messages
362
Location
United Kingdom
Be aware that f.lux adjusts the screen brightness and warms the display ie reduces blue light later in the evening and does not provide 24/7 blue light reduction. Many monitors now have blue light modes which reduce blue light which might be worth using if your monitor supports it. Alternatively you could reduce the blue colour level a bit to reduce blue light, either in the monitor settings or in your operating system colour control panel.

That might reduce the stimulation from blue light.

Avoiding white screens might also help. There are browser extensions for firefox and similar browsers such as StyleRRR, Stylish is an extension which received some criticism due to privacy issues and their user styles site is awkward to use, not allowing right clicks so you cannot open the styles in new tabs and installing styles in StyleRRR means highlighting the userstyle code and copying it with ctrl C and then copying into a new style in the StyleRRR extension toolbar button. I stopped using Stylish when it got so difficult attempting to stop people doing what they wanted. There are other extensions such as FreeStyler, which I disliked and Stylus which is new and I have not tried. It is meant to be a fork of stylish without being anti privacy.

Many websites such as google, amazon, ebay etc have custom style sheets made for them and just need to be installed into one of the extensions shown above.

BTW I used to use Proxomitron with JDList which can add the time/date to the titlebar so that I know when a page was loaded which is helpful with checking for page updates on some sites. It can change none SSL webpage backgrounds from white to a different colour, I used a light grey. It does not work well now that many sites use SSL unless a security certificate is installed but that creates other problems so I now use browser extensions to eliminate the atrocious widespread use of white backgrounds on so many sites. White screens and paper are no where near the same IMO!

Styles Tuner is another FF extension which allows the colours and texts on webpages to be altered each time you visit them. This can remove white backgrounds which I find very difficult on the eyes. Some sites now use SSL connections which can affect some methods of altering the white background but this extension does work on all tested sites.

BTW I am another who does not believe that adrenal fatigue is a legitimate condition and it is certainly not a medical condition. It's more neuroendocrine related. Tu Si Zi (Chinese dodder seed) can be helpful and it helps the hypothalamus and also helps the Kidney and Liver Qi, helping elevated liver enzymes and improving pituitary function which can be affected in CFS. Gou Qi Zi (Wolf berry) is often used with this herb but note that Gou Qi Zi can be immune stimulant as well as anti ageing.
 
Last edited:
Messages
45
Sorry to hear how badly the surgery has hit you.

I'd take a pinch of salt with the idea of adrenal fatigue. It's not a recognised medical condition and it's of maybe doubtful use in treating or understanding your fatigue.

My experience of surgery is that it is the anesthetic, exertion and any other drugs given that causes an increase in my symptoms. There are documents to give to your Anesthetist on things to avoid for people with CFS. You haven't said if you have a diagnosis of CFS as you only mention fatigue so I have no idea if these would also be useful to you.

In my own case I would cut down on activity until my symptoms stabilise and for me a walk of an hour would be out of the question anyway.

Some people with CFS find that brain exertion tires them out as much as walking or showering or other physical types.

Have you checked to see if you have POTS? I find sitting in a chair and working impossible. I use a laptop on the sofa and keep my feet up. Before I knew about anesthetics and CFS I had surgery and found my POTS was much worse after. Spent my time lying down or at least with my legs supported.

An acceptable activity is one that doesn't aggravate your symptoms. It may be that if you cut down on the physical stuff you may have more strength left over for the app work.

Hope this helps in some way.

Oh, I just started treatment for it but I'm only going do the lifestyle (meditation) and diet change (Dr Wilson's diet), and I assume that should be helpful for me overall even if there's no such thing as adrenal fatigue.

I'm still under investigation, but it's only at a general doctor and not a specialist so I'm hoping for a referral. From what I've read, the increased symptoms from the anesthetics can last for up to a year, pretty insane.

What do you mean by stabilize? Not getting worse or getting back to the state pre-surgery?

Did your POTS improve after the surgery, and if so how long did it take? I live in Sweden and I don't think most of the doctors are aware of this disease, I can barely find any information in Swedish. Maybe I should ask my doctor to test for it. When measuring my pulse I get 72 when lying down and 88 when standing up (waited 30 secs after standing). Don't seem to qualify as POTS but I keep misunderstanding a lot of things these days so...

I was afraid that the only way to know whether the activity is acceptable is by trial and error. If I do get more fatigued by programming I assume I should take a break.

Thanks for the lengthy reply.

I work in I.T. on a computer every day, and I notice an increase in overall health when I'm on vacation, and even at the weekends. I think its just being in the outdoors that is somewhat healing. The sun, the natural vitamin D. You dont have to go on a one-hour walk, just go outside and sit.
If you are programming an app, take a ten minute break every hour and get up, stretch etc.
In my tea break here , I go on a 15 min walk.
Also, dont surf the internet too much reading the news! Its all bad news and this gives us a negativity overload which takes energy to deal with for some people.

That's some sound advice regarding the programming, thanks. I hate reading the news so I don't have to worry about that :). I think I'll start going for short walks and just sit in the forest each day, thanks for the suggestion; should help calm me down a bit.
 
Messages
45
Be aware that f.lux adjusts the screen brightness and warms the display ie reduces blue light later in the evening and does not provide 24/7 blue light reduction. Many monitors now have blue light modes which reduce blue light which might be worth using if your monitor supports it. Alternatively you could reduce the blue colour level a bit to reduce blue light, either in the monitor settings or in your operating system colour control panel.

That might reduce the stimulation from blue light.

Avoiding white screens might also help. There are browser extensions for firefox and similar browsers such as StyleRRR, Stylish is an extension which received some criticism due to privacy issues and their user styles site is awkward to use, not allowing right clicks so you cannot open the styles in new tabs and installing styles in StyleRRR means highlighting the userstyle code and copying it with ctrl C and then copying into a new style in the StyleRRR extension toolbar button. I stopped using Stylish when it got so difficult attempting to stop people doing what they wanted. There are other extensions such as FreeStyler, which I disliked and Stylus which is new and I have not tried. It is meant to be a fork of stylish without being anti privacy.

Many websites such as google, amazon, ebay etc have custom style sheets made for them and just need to be installed into one of the extensions shown above.

BTW I used to use Proxomitron with JDList which can add the time/date to the titlebar so that I know when a page was loaded which is helpful with checking for page updates on some sites. It can change none SSL webpage backgrounds from white to a different colour, I used a light grey. It does not work well now that many sites use SSL unless a security certificate is installed but that creates other problems so I now use browser extensions to eliminate the atrocious widespread use of white backgrounds on so many sites. White screens and paper are no where near the same IMO!

Styles Tuner is another FF extension which allows the colours and texts on webpages to be altered each time you visit them. This can remove white backgrounds which I find very difficult on the eyes. Some sites now use SSL connections which can affect some methods of altering the white background but this extension does work on all tested sites.

BTW I am another who does not believe that adrenal fatigue is a legitimate condition and it is certainly not a medical condition. It's more neuroendocrine related. Tu Si Zi (Chinese dodder seed) can be helpful and it helps the hypothalamus and also helps the Kidney and Liver Qi, helping elevated liver enzymes and improving pituitary function which can be affected in CFS. Gou Qi Zi (Wolf berry) is often used with this herb but note that Gou Qi Zi can be immune stimulant as well as anti ageing.
It's possible to set up f.lux to always disable blue light. I have no idea if it'll work but I'll try anything at this point. I have one of those extensions, but haven't really configured it much. I'll check it out, thanks.

Interesting that you don't believe in adrenal fatigue as a condition either, I have to say I was very sceptical at first too but then I read so much about it on the net that I started to believe in it, especially once I did the flashlight test, but now I'm starting to question it again. I was never much for anything regarding homology (could be the wrong term), it just felt like they wanted to make easy money. Thanks.
 

caledonia

Senior Member
Back before I had ME/CFS I had my wisdom teeth out under general anesthesia. I had a great deal of fatigue for about a month, then luckily it cleared up.

Adrenal fatigue is real. But it's more like a symptom than a cause in and of itself.

There are a couple different types of adrenal fatigue. 1) the adrenals themselves are fatigued/depleted - caused by excess stress, caffeine, etc. (surgery could fit in there). 2) there is a signaling issue in the pituitary and/or hypothalamus caused by lack of glutathione, the body's major antioxidant and detoxifier (again, surgery could be the cause - due to the toxic hit from the anesthesia).

Another factor could be heavy metal toxicity from mercury, lead, arsenic, etc. My adrenals went from almost flatlined (near zero) to about 50% of normal sometime after I got my last mercury amalgam filling out. It could be that an underlying toxicity from metals made you more susceptible to being affected by the surgery.

There are many treatments for adrenal fatigue. The most common one is to take adrenal cortex extract.

I've tried all the mainstream treatments and they all make me over stimulated. I believe I have type 2 adrenal fatigue (the signaling problem). Although I did have good luck with Dr. Wilson's Adrenal Rebuilder during a time of great stress. I was only able to take about 1/8 to 1/4 of one pill before it got too overstimulating.

The other treatment I do is to replace electrolytes which are lost when the adrenals aren't functioning normally. If you're craving salt or salty foods like potato chips, have twitchy muscles, heart palpitations, or insomnia, that's a clue.

I do a glass of water with magnesium, potassium, and sea salt four times a day to compensate.

You could also try some coconut water and see if that helps.

My other suggestion would be to cut way back on walking for now, so your body has resources for healing.

I've also had issues with blue light from the computer shifting my sleep cycle. Apps like f.lux don't help. I simply get off the computer by 8pm and that seems to work for me.
 

Mary

Moderator Resource
Messages
17,335
Location
Southern California
I had adrenal fatigue, and still experience it under periods of great stress. Several years ago I felt weak as a kitten (no way could I have walked an hour a day!), the doctor gave me Prozac which of course did nothing, and I hated the way it made me feel so I stopped it after 2 days. Then I saw my chiropractor who does muscle testing and he quickly found that my adrenals were depleted. He gave me an adrenal glandular product by Standard Process (Drenatrophin PMG), I had to take about 3 times the recommended dose because I was so weak, but within a few days my energy started to come back. I had been under severe stress actually for many years related to childhood trauma.

My adrenals seem to be my Achilles heel and under periods of severe stress (which I try to avoid as much as possible but it's not always possible) I get weak again and have to take an adrenal glandular, which has always helped me. I didn't do well with an adrenal cortex extract, though many people do.

Also, pantothenic acid is crucial for adrenal health, and I take extra, in addition to a B complex.

I agree with others here, walking an hour a day is a lot and may be too much for you right now.
 

TenuousGrip

Senior Member
Messages
297
An aunt of mine was Dx'd with adrenal exhaustion/fatigue ... either by a chiropractor or a naturopath.

My wife was recently talking with me about it. I mentioned that "I'm not even sure that it's a thing."

My wife -- far more wise than diplomatic -- reminded me that "Yeah. Well, most people don't believe ME/CFS is a thing either."

Okay, Honey. Fair point ;-)
 

sb4

Senior Member
Messages
1,654
Location
United Kingdom
I second the blue light idea, I always take all the blue out of my screen. Also screen flicker can cause problems, something to do with your brain working harder to tune out the flicker.

Another thing is non-native EMFs. If you are next to a wifi router or very close to your computer it can produce many differen't symptoms, including fatigue.

There is more to being outdoors than just vitamin D. A lot more!
 
Messages
45
Back before I had ME/CFS I had my wisdom teeth out under general anesthesia. I had a great deal of fatigue for about a month, then luckily it cleared up.

Adrenal fatigue is real. But it's more like a symptom than a cause in and of itself.

There are a couple different types of adrenal fatigue. 1) the adrenals themselves are fatigued/depleted - caused by excess stress, caffeine, etc. (surgery could fit in there). 2) there is a signaling issue in the pituitary and/or hypothalamus caused by lack of glutathione, the body's major antioxidant and detoxifier (again, surgery could be the cause - due to the toxic hit from the anesthesia).

Another factor could be heavy metal toxicity from mercury, lead, arsenic, etc. My adrenals went from almost flatlined (near zero) to about 50% of normal sometime after I got my last mercury amalgam filling out. It could be that an underlying toxicity from metals made you more susceptible to being affected by the surgery.

There are many treatments for adrenal fatigue. The most common one is to take adrenal cortex extract.

I've tried all the mainstream treatments and they all make me over stimulated. I believe I have type 2 adrenal fatigue (the signaling problem). Although I did have good luck with Dr. Wilson's Adrenal Rebuilder during a time of great stress. I was only able to take about 1/8 to 1/4 of one pill before it got too overstimulating.

The other treatment I do is to replace electrolytes which are lost when the adrenals aren't functioning normally. If you're craving salt or salty foods like potato chips, have twitchy muscles, heart palpitations, or insomnia, that's a clue.

I do a glass of water with magnesium, potassium, and sea salt four times a day to compensate.

You could also try some coconut water and see if that helps.

My other suggestion would be to cut way back on walking for now, so your body has resources for healing.

I've also had issues with blue light from the computer shifting my sleep cycle. Apps like f.lux don't help. I simply get off the computer by 8pm and that seems to work for me.

The odd thing in my case is that the increased fatigue didn't kick in until after several days, which makes me think it could be stress related instead of reacting to the anesthetics - I was so stressed I got numb in my arms and face. If it indeed is due to stress, I assume it's irreversible, is that correct?

If adrenal fatigue is real and a symptom I experience, I hope a possible referral to an endocrinologist will help me alleviate it. I do eat a lot of sea salt and drink a lot more water now to see if that helps.

I'll stay indoors for the next couple of days since everyone seems to suggest it. Getting off the computer at 8pm would be almost impossible for me, I'm so bored now when I'm lying in bed all day.

How much have your fatigue improved since you started treating the adrenal fatigue?

I had adrenal fatigue, and still experience it under periods of great stress. Several years ago I felt weak as a kitten (no way could I have walked an hour a day!), the doctor gave me Prozac which of course did nothing, and I hated the way it made me feel so I stopped it after 2 days. Then I saw my chiropractor who does muscle testing and he quickly found that my adrenals were depleted. He gave me an adrenal glandular product by Standard Process (Drenatrophin PMG), I had to take about 3 times the recommended dose because I was so weak, but within a few days my energy started to come back. I had been under severe stress actually for many years related to childhood trauma.

My adrenals seem to be my Achilles heel and under periods of severe stress (which I try to avoid as much as possible but it's not always possible) I get weak again and have to take an adrenal glandular, which has always helped me. I didn't do well with an adrenal cortex extract, though many people do.

Also, pantothenic acid is crucial for adrenal health, and I take extra, in addition to a B complex.

I agree with others here, walking an hour a day is a lot and may be too much for you right now.

Interesting that the adrenal glandular product helped you so quickly. I might give it a try. Do you think a cheap one like this would work: https://se.iherb.com/pr/natural-sources-raw-adrenal-60-capsules/5867
I'm very poor so if that would suffice that'd be great.

An aunt of mine was Dx'd with adrenal exhaustion/fatigue ... either by a chiropractor or a naturopath.

My wife was recently talking with me about it. I mentioned that "I'm not even sure that it's a thing."

My wife -- far more wise than diplomatic -- reminded me that "Yeah. Well, most people don't believe ME/CFS is a thing either."

Okay, Honey. Fair point ;-)

I've been thinking the same way, that it might be a real disease or at least symptom, but we won't know for sure until it is accepted by doctors.
 

Mary

Moderator Resource
Messages
17,335
Location
Southern California
Interesting that the adrenal glandular product helped you so quickly. I might give it a try. Do you think a cheap one like this would work: https://se.iherb.com/pr/natural-sources-raw-adrenal-60-capsules/5867
I'm very poor so if that would suffice that'd be great.

I think it's worth a try. You might have to play with the dose. Initially I had to take 9 Drenatrophin tablets a day, for I think around 2 weeks, it was 3 x the recommended dose, because I was so weak. And then I had to keep taking it for quite awhile, but the was able to gradually cut back on the dose. Because I got it through my chiropractor, it cost about 1/3 of what is charged on-line.

I'm not saying you should take 3 x the recommended dose of this product. I'd recommend starting low - your bottle says 2 a day following a meal, see how you do, and then maybe increase it. Again, I can't tell you what to do, but this is what I would do.

I saw your other post about Lexapro - I can't tolerate SSRIs, they made me feel horrible. There are other things that can help with stress - Relora, niacin, l-theanine, to name a few.
 
Messages
45
I think it's worth a try. You might have to play with the dose. Initially I had to take 9 Drenatrophin tablets a day, for I think around 2 weeks, it was 3 x the recommended dose, because I was so weak. And then I had to keep taking it for quite awhile, but the was able to gradually cut back on the dose. Because I got it through my chiropractor, it cost about 1/3 of what is charged on-line.

I'm not saying you should take 3 x the recommended dose of this product. I'd recommend starting low - your bottle says 2 a day following a meal, see how you do, and then maybe increase it. Again, I can't tell you what to do, but this is what I would do.

I saw your other post about Lexapro - I can't tolerate SSRIs, they made me feel horrible. There are other things that can help with stress - Relora, niacin, l-theanine, to name a few.
For the small price of less than $15 for a bottle including shipping, I'm thinking about giving it a go. If so, I'll start with 2 a day for a few days and then increase it gradually.

I don't doubt there's good natural destressers out there but I've read that quite a lot of people have been helped by Lexapro so I'll start there.
 

Mary

Moderator Resource
Messages
17,335
Location
Southern California

Mary

Moderator Resource
Messages
17,335
Location
Southern California
For the small price of less than $15 for a bottle including shipping, I'm thinking about giving it a go. If so, I'll start with 2 a day for a few days and then increase it gradually.

I don't doubt there's good natural destressers out there but I've read that quite a lot of people have been helped by Lexapro so I'll start there.

One more thing, and then I'll lay off the Lexapro. Several years ago a friend told me that it was a bitch getting older (she was late 50's I think), because of the diarrhea. And I just looked at her, I had several older sisters and diarrhea was never part of the equation, unless they were sick. Well, she was on Lexapro, so I looked it up and sure enough, diarrhea was one of the "side" (actual) effects.

I suggested she try 5-htp instead. 5-htp helps the brain produce serotonin, unlike Lexapro which actually changes the way your brain works, like all SSRIs. She switched to 5-htp (told her doctor about it) and told me she felt much better on it and had more energy than on the Lexapro and was very glad she switched (and no more diarrhea either! :sluggish:).
 

caledonia

Senior Member
How much have your fatigue improved since you started treating the adrenal fatigue?

So far I haven't seen much in terms of energy other than my labs look better. I do feel more comfortable in terms of getting better sleep (which does help some with energy, concentration and memory), and also just a better feeling of well being, less of that weird dizzy lightheaded feeling and so on.

I think I have a lot more things going on with metals blocking the citric acid cycle where energy is produced, and the mitochondria. (I'm mostly housebound, about 25% of normal.)

I'm doing the Cutler frequent dose chelation protocol to hopefully get out the rest of my metals, but it's going to take some time.
 
Messages
45
@nostalgic - here's one more thing you might try, and it's free! :)
http://forums.phoenixrising.me/inde...-to-calm-balance-ans-stimulate-thyroid.52258/

Done daily for 2 weeks, it's supposed to rebalance the autonomic nervous system. It was very calming for me and I started sleeping better after 10 days or so I think. Though eventually it seemed to boost my thyroid, then I had to cut back on my thyroid med, but actually I've just started redoing it.

I just tried it but the compartment syndrome in my calves made it hard to do it correctly, as well as the back pain from my myalgia. I had to put an extra pillow below my back and only put the feet on the chair and let the legs split a lot. Dunno if that matters but I'll try to do this for a while. Can't be worse than failing to meditate anyway. I just can't wind down, my mind keeps racing and it's so far impossible to not think about something. Maybe it'll become easier with time. Any ideas?
 
Messages
45
So far I haven't seen much in terms of energy other than my labs look better. I do feel more comfortable in terms of getting better sleep (which does help some with energy, concentration and memory), and also just a better feeling of well being, less of that weird dizzy lightheaded feeling and so on.

I think I have a lot more things going on with metals blocking the citric acid cycle where energy is produced, and the mitochondria. (I'm mostly housebound, about 25% of normal.)

I'm doing the Cutler frequent dose chelation protocol to hopefully get out the rest of my metals, but it's going to take some time.
What I'd do for a full night's sleep. So annoying to wake up 3-6 times every night. Good luck with the metal cleansing.
 

Mary

Moderator Resource
Messages
17,335
Location
Southern California
I just tried it but the compartment syndrome in my calves made it hard to do it correctly, as well as the back pain from my myalgia. I had to put an extra pillow below my back and only put the feet on the chair and let the legs split a lot. Dunno if that matters but I'll try to do this for a while. Can't be worse than failing to meditate anyway. I just can't wind down, my mind keeps racing and it's so far impossible to not think about something. Maybe it'll become easier with time. Any ideas?

I think doing it however you are able would be better than not doing it at all. I think a major part of why it works is getting your legs higher than the rest of your body.

Meditation is great, so give that a go too. When I first started meditating many years ago, it took 2 weeks of doing it daily before I was able to calm my mind even for a few seconds. It won't happen overnight. I think it's like any form of exercise - you're not going to see results for several weeks but you still have to do it every day. I've heard people say, I can't do it, my mind is too active - well, that's the whole point. You have to keep doing it and very slowly your mind will start to calm down. I think it was about 6 weeks after doing it daily that I really noticed it becoming easier to do,

And I'd suggest trying this breathing exercise by Andrew Weil - it's the second one listed here (4-7-8), it's easy to do, I do it while I'm doing that pose on the floor. I also did it this morning before I meditated (covering all the bases here!) https://www.drweil.com/health-wellness/body-mind-spirit/stress-anxiety/breathing-three-exercises/

And the supplements I mentioned above can help with sleep as well as just calming you down: niacin stimulates GABA receptors, niacinamide can help too, though niacin works better for me. But if you get niacin, get the plain kind that makes you flush (don't get the extended or time-release type which has been linked to liver damage). l-theanine helps the brain produce GABA. Relora helps reduce cortisol. Inositol can help too.
 
Messages
45
I think doing it however you are able would be better than not doing it at all. I think a major part of why it works is getting your legs higher than the rest of your body.

Meditation is great, so give that a go too. When I first started meditating many years ago, it took 2 weeks of doing it daily before I was able to calm my mind even for a few seconds. It won't happen overnight. I think it's like any form of exercise - you're not going to see results for several weeks but you still have to do it every day. I've heard people say, I can't do it, my mind is too active - well, that's the whole point. You have to keep doing it and very slowly your mind will start to calm down. I think it was about 6 weeks after doing it daily that I really noticed it becoming easier to do,

And I'd suggest trying this breathing exercise by Andrew Weil - it's the second one listed here (4-7-8), it's easy to do, I do it while I'm doing that pose on the floor. I also did it this morning before I meditated (covering all the bases here!) https://www.drweil.com/health-wellness/body-mind-spirit/stress-anxiety/breathing-three-exercises/

And the supplements I mentioned above can help with sleep as well as just calming you down: niacin stimulates GABA receptors, niacinamide can help too, though niacin works better for me. But if you get niacin, get the plain kind that makes you flush (don't get the extended or time-release type which has been linked to liver damage). l-theanine helps the brain produce GABA. Relora helps reduce cortisol. Inositol can help too.
Cheers. I will keep trying to meditate but it's very frustrating to fail all the time. Many years ago I did do it from time to time but I kinda gave up on it, and it was so easy back then, probably another factor for my frustration.

I dunno why it should help to have the legs above the rest of the body but if it works it doesn't really matter.

Hopefully the Lexapro will help me get some better sleep, if not I'll have to look for alternatives.