cortisol, pounding heart/palps, overheating

[alice111]

anyone have any experience, or knowledge on the relationship between these things - cortisol, pounding heart and heart palps, and overheating?
most of what I have come across seems to indicate these as symptoms of low cortisol, but can they be caused by high cortisol as well?

 

[Ema]

I can't write a long message now but you might consider taking some sea salt in water for the pounding heart and palps. Low sodium is a common cause and goes along with adrenal dysfunction.

If your bp is high, that is a good indicator of too much cortisol and vice versa.

 

[CFS_for_19_years]

See if you have the symptoms of Cushing's syndrome (Cushing's syndrome is when you have spikes of high cortisol):

http://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/cushing-syndrome/basics/symptoms/con-20032115

The best doctor to diagnose this is an endocrinologist.

 

[drob31]

Here's how I have come to understand it:

Low cortisol is like high cortisol because high cortisol can make cells resistant to all hormones, including cortisol itself. This means with high cortisol, you get some resistance at the cellular level, which would theoretically make it feel allot like low cortisol. High cortisol can also cause cellular resistance to other hormones such as testosterone, progesterone, and estrogen. Cortisol is needed for thyroid hormone to be accessed by the cell. Too little and it makes you hypothyroid. Too much and it again, makes you hypothyroid. Hypothyroid is probably what causes most of the symptoms, but the cells would theoretically also be deficient in all hormones. This is why high cortisol can feel allot like low cortisol.

That is my current understanding. It has taken allot of time to understand it.

The question is, why is cortisol high or low?


It's important to get cortisol testing done. You can do the 4x/day saliva test, blood serum total and free cortisol, and also 24 hour urine collection for total, metabolized, and free (google DUTCH hormone testing for this one).

 

[minkeygirl]

I have low cortisol all the time, ok BP and constant heart palpitations. I take Propranolol.

 

[alice111]

@drob31 the problem is from my understanding you can't test once you are one cortef?

 

[drob31]

@drob31 the problem is from my understanding you can't test once you are one cortef?

You're not supposed to be on it when you do the test, so you could try tapering off and doing the test if you're doc is okay with that.